2001-04-22 - 12:30 a.m.

Making movies, part one

Lesson one � filming even the most simple things properly takes a very very very long time indeed. At least a trillion rehearsal shots, and then probably several squillion takes. Making films is probably one of the most tedious yet at the same time very stressful things ever invented. Especially when you�re putting up the readies and every time the camera�s rolling they�re using up what feels like several thousand pounds of your hard earned per second.

Day one: The Office. A principal having to act his way (admirably) round 4 days self-induced sleep deprivation, car alarms going off at seemingly every time the camera starts rolling and only 3 major rewrites and complete reorganisations of the plot, such as it is.

But I DID get a line. Desperate times call for desperate measures. The history of cinema is a footnote to this moment in time. Enter screen right, approach reception desk: �Hi, I�m here for the meeting�� And only 2 takes. (First time they got a freak light reflection off my head). God, it�s exhausting being an actor�you know when you just have to GIVE so much of yourself�it�s almost�a religious experience.

Actually, I felt like Kramer in that Seinfeld episode where he gets a line in a Woody Allen film � something like �These pretzels are really making me thirsty�� Anyway, Benicio Del Torro, you�d better watch your back, man.