Exploiting Hollywood 1980

   Chapter 331 Sequence Rehearsal

   "Let's relax and do some physical relaxation. Today I'm going to teach you an ancient oriental relaxation technique, Tai Chi."

   After breakfast every morning, this group of teenage actors has a relaxing morning class. When actors are rehearsing or performing, if they cannot relax their bodies, their emotions will not easily erupt.

   But generally everyone uses stretching exercises or yoga to relax the body. Some old actors also drink a couple of sips of wine to relax. It is rare to practice oriental mysterious relaxation techniques like Coppola.

  Coppola is a famous American director. The poor teenage actors had no idea what the oriental mystical relaxation technique had to do with the roles they were going to rehearse, but since Coppola said it, everyone had to do it.

  The TV in the rehearsal room was playing a Tai Chi teaching video. A thin Chinese actor began to teach Tai Chi in English.

   "Forget your movements, it doesn't matter, remember the state of your body. Raise your hands, inhale, exhale..."

   Chinese actors in ancient costumes began to introduce how to practice Tai Chi on TV.

   "A few people on both sides are missing." Tom Cruise leaned over and whispered to Ronald.

   "Let's practice and wait for them to take the bait." Ronald nodded and exchanged colors with Tom and Rob.

"Ronald, you're doing very well, are you good at Tai Chi? Come and teach everyone." Coppola saw Ronald's Tai Chi movements were better than others, so he simply let him come to the front to lead the exercises. .

  The screen of the TV is too small, so the actors can't see it clearly. It feels much better to have a real person.

   "Tai Chi is very easy, everyone can see my hand shape." Ronald didn't know why his movements were quite standard.

   "Relax your body, everyone follow me to imagine", Ronald raised his hands flat on his chest, "I have a big watermelon, big and round." He made a Tai Chi gesture and held the ball in front of his chest.

   "Hey hey..." Two groups of young actors ran in and were stunned by Coppola, so they had to follow everyone to practice.

   Ronald saw the two leaders at a glance.

   One is Emilio Estevez (Emilio Estevez), who plays the role of "Two-Bites" in the Oil Head Gang, and is the eldest son of the famous movie star Martin Sheen.

  The other is Leif Garrett, who plays the role of Gongzi Gang Bob.

  Ronald knew what to do and ignored them. He separated his posture of holding the ball, and a wild horse came to divide his mane. "Cut the big watermelon into two pieces, one for you and one for him."

   "Hahaha..." Diane Lane covered her stomach with laughter, out of breath.

   She saw the palm of Emilio Estevez's outstretched hand to cut the watermelon, turning black.

  Emilio was glanced at by her, his face turned red, and his hands clenched into fists. She was going to prank Diane again, but she was painted with black paint on Diane's doorknob.

   "Hahaha..." Some people saw Emilio's black hand, and some were in front, thinking that Diane was amused by Ronald's saying that he cut the watermelon, and laughed into a ball.

   "Okay, Ronald, come down, you guys continue." Coppola also smiled and called Ronald aside.

   "You know I made them play pranks, right?"

   "I guessed it, but Cherry is a sassy girl and Diane needs to fight back."

   Sure enough, it was Coppola's idea to let two groups of actors compete to play pranks on Diane.

Ronald went on to say, "It's humorous to put honey on the toilet seat, imaginative and bad taste to write Bitchi on the mirror, and red paint on the bed is a terrorist. You should announce before A wave of people wins."

   "Fuck, Emilio, this little Axxhole." Coppola also scolded, he knew who was leading. The eldest son of Martin lacks a sense of humor and is less relaxed than his younger brother Charlie.

   It can be seen from the attitude of the two of them towards their stage names on the set of "Apocalypse Now". Emilio is old-fashioned and insists on keeping the Estevez family's true Latino surname. And Charlie is more flexible, inheriting his father's stage name Xin makes his debut a little cheaper and has no burden.

   A small disturbance passed quickly. Diane did not tell his father Bert the prank. The attention of teenage actors was easy to shift to new things, and they were quickly involved in Coppola's video rehearsal most of their energy.

   During the two-week rehearsal time, the actors rehearsed almost all the scenes from start to finish. Ronald also filmed all the rehearsal sections with a Sony BetaCam.

   Unlike the actual filming, the rehearsal process is carried out from the beginning to the end of each scene according to the sequence of the script. Apart from no lighting, no makeup.

   Every night, Ronald and Coppola watched the rehearsal video with the trainee director. Analyze what the actors did well and what did not, and continue to improve the next day.

   As time went on, Ronald felt that the actors were getting better and better. Because the rehearsal is carried out according to the script, the development of the story and the characters is very sufficient, and the actors' understanding of the characters is getting better and better.

  Ronald now fully understands why Coppola had to assemble all the actors for rehearsal in advance. This method can make them more natural during the official performance and convince the audience.

   "As expected of a great director", the trainee female director also praised it.

"you are right."

   Ronald didn’t fully understand the words of the trainee director from a technical point of view. This practice of rehearsing for a long time in advance was not a director of Coppola’s level, so it was difficult to calm down. Many actors have schedules and will not waste two weeks of rehearsal.

   Of course, most of the actors are newcomers who are under 20, and there is no capital to play big names, which is also an important reason. Except for Patrick Switz, who played Big Brother Horse, the others didn't even have a manager or a stand-in who took care of their lives on the set.

   Very monotonous during rehearsal. Coppola tried to let the actors relax, have something to do, not get bored by being too focused, and always try to keep them in a state of happy and engaged creation.

   Ronald has been on the sidelines, he admires Coppola's ability to measure the actor's mentality and emotions.

   Every time the actor is too tense, he will show everyone a movie, or play some games, take a small vacation, and let the actors relax.

   After two weeks of rehearsals, the actors were a little tired, and Coppola booked a new movie "Rocky III" at the Tulsa Cinema at the right time.

The opponent that Stallone knocked down on the screen this time was the black star "Mr. T" with a very special image. -Team, an absolute beast.

  Rocky's opponent in the first two films, Apollo, took over the coach after the death of Rocky's coach and trained Rocky.

   In the last scene of Rocky beating Mr. T, all the boys stood up and shouted, throwing away the fatigue of two weeks of rehearsal for a while, and began to look forward to playing himself like Stallone during the official shooting.

   Ronald learned a lot of tricks to mobilize the actors' emotions and help the shooting. He felt that Coppola was very concerned about mobilizing the actors' state. No wonder the actors in his films always perform very well.

   "Let's have a table tennis game, everyone relax, and the official shooting will start tomorrow."

   After watching the movie, Coppola saw that it was still early, so he lifted the ping-pong table in the hotel to the open yard and let the boys start playing.

"Ralph, come and play." C. Thomas Hall, who played the protagonist "Horse", was only sixteen years old. He obeyed Coppola and played his best friend "Johnny". Elf Mazio often hangs out, looking for the feeling of a close friend. This time he also came to play with LaMazio.

  Ralph Mazio and C. Thomas Hall are good friends in the movie, but they don't get along very well. Mazio thought about memorizing his lines all day long and trying to figure out his acting skills. Howl thinks about playing and being lazy all day.

   "No, I still have to read the script."

   "Oh ComeOn, don't be so boring. Today is the last day off."

   "Okay", Mazio thought about it right, put down the script and started playing ping pong with Howe.

  The boys had never played table tennis, but no one was willing to admit defeat, and soon they started a ring match, and if they lost, they would automatically step down.

  Diane and Michelle Melink, who played her best friend, were also watching the boys' competition, which made the competition of the actors even more heated.

After going back and forth, the Oil Head Gang gradually gained the upper hand. Emilio Estevez later learned that the black paint was Ronald's idea, and he always hated Ronald for making him embarrassed. Finally, when he got the racket , challenged Ronald.

   "Hey, Ronald. Would you dare to come and play with us? Those gangsters are no match."

   "Let's play." Ronald didn't want to disturb Coppola's arrangement. This was a tactic he deliberately designed to provoke competition between the two groups of actors.

   "Don't you dare? Or do you think that our technology is not on the same level?"

   "Your skills are indeed not on the same level as mine." Ronald thought to himself, but he just smiled and turned to leave.

   "Loser!" Emilio saw Ronald dare not, and called Ronald a loser from behind.

"Hey Ronald, let them see how good you are." Diane couldn't take it anymore, came over and took Tom Cruise's racket and handed it to Ronald, "You can't really not. Shall we fight? Do you want me to fight for you?"

  Ronald looked at Diane, and Tom and Rob, who were booing next to him, took the racket.

"Hey, can't you even hold a racket?" Emilio saw Ronald holding the racket with his thumb and forefinger straight, "I'll let you serve first." He threw the table tennis ball over, and set it up. He said to Ronald in a self-confessed handsome pose.

   "Watch out, I'll send you a forehand" Ronald raised his hand to serve, and Emilio caught it.

  Emilio Estevez didn't understand what was going on, picked up the ping pong ball and hit the racket hard, sending it back.

   Ronald kept his body still, reached out with his backhand for a push, and the ping pong ball bounced back quickly and hastily. Emilio didn't get it again.

  Just like that, Ronald pushed the ball on the left and smashed on the right. He didn’t move his feet much. Standing in front of the table, he used a strange grip position to hit Emilio until he could only pick up the ball.

  "Shxt", Emilio was beaten and threw his racket on the table and stopped playing.

   "You guys play, I still have something to do." Ronald also put the racket on the table, clapped his hands and left.

  Leaving Tom Cruise, Rob Law and others to look at each other, what the **** is this special style of play?

   Soon it was time for the official shooting. Ronald came to the scene early to see what secrets Coppola had.

   When he watched "Fast-paced Richmond High School", he always felt that the actor's performance before and after was out of tune.

  Because of the lighting, the scenes where the two actors are edited together in dialogue may actually have been filmed at different times, or even weeks apart.

   For example, in today's dialogue scene between Ma Zai and his second brother Soda Soda, he spent more than three hours carefully lighting up C. Thomas Hall, focusing on the scene of Ma Zai talking to his second brother at home.

  Then re-light on Rob Laub tomorrow, focusing on the dialogue shot of the opposite soda pop.

  How to keep the dialogue scenes of the two actors and their emotions in perfect harmony after they are edited together?

  What Ronald wants to know most is the details of these directing performances. A big director like Coppola must have his own tricks, right?

   "Cut!" Coppola called off the shoot and exchanged ideas with the DP.

   "It's coming, let's see how the big director directs the actors' performance and emotional scale." Ronald is full of expectations, this kind of opportunity doesn't come often. He didn't even dare to blink.

   "Very good, this one is good, print." Coppola nodded with satisfaction, "Let's take another shot."

   "Cut!"

   After taking a few more shots, Coppola still felt that the first two were better, and asked the field recorder to write down the number of shots to be printed by the final laboratory.

"next."

   Ronald stood up in shock, how did it pass? No re-directed part of the skill?

  Could it be that Coppola is so sure that tomorrow's Rob Law's soda pop, the intensity and emotion of the performance, are all in perfect harmony with C. Thomas Hall's horse boy today?

   (end of this chapter)