Original song by Kenny McNett and Zach Pond. Download the MP3 here!
When I drive home late at night, I pass a lone security guard in front of shipping depot. That guard sits on a chair, in a shallow alcove, in front of a closed door. But in front of that worker is a double-wide sidewalk, a row of street parking, and a lightly used side road–a perfect performance venue. So, after countless late night pangs of empathy as I saw the brown-clad security guard sitting blankly in a chair, the idea for Late Night Worker was born: a full song and dance number with live band and dancers, performing for graveyard shift workers. I loved the image in my head of a troupe of performers giving it their all for a single worker, tucked into the corner of some building, with the worker clapping and smiling at the end of it, knowing the performance was just for him or her. A parking structure attendant, a shipping depot security guard, a drive-thru food vendor.
Every year, I make a short film for my church’s local film festival. This year, the festival was fast-approaching and I needed to kick something into gear. I wrote the lyrics and melody for Late Night Worker and set to task our resident musicians, Zach and Jonathan. I called up my choreographer from Danger Dancer and tossed up a casting call web page for dancers. I contacted personally most of the dancers to invite them, but I wanted the option for anyone to invite their friends, so I distributed the web page fairly openly. I also threw a bone over to GuerilLa to see if anyone wanted to join up (I heard from one member, but she couldn’t make it that night).
Zach (guitar), Jonathan (ukelele), Stephen (djembe), and I came together to write the music. In my atonal way, I sung the melody I’d written, then Zach lead the boys into making it a real song. It was a catchy little tune and we were all excited about the way it looked on paper with guitar chords and all. We printed it out and held it in the air, “It’s a real song now!” We had the choreographer over a little later to perfect the dance break in the middle and sent her home with a rough recording so she could plan the dance.
Performance night came. Our team of fun-loving and veteran dancers came from as far as two hours away. We set up a mini recording studio on my balcony and cleared my living room for dance practice. We’re on the fourth floor and it wasn’t long until our neighbor from below knocked on our door to request we stop thudding on her ceiling. We invited her in to see what we were up to. She smiled and said something like, “That’s nice of you to do for the workers. But, why don’t you just mark your jumps instead of actually making them so it’s not so loud for me?” I found out later that she was on the original Broadway cast of A Chorus Line. I love living in LA.
We recorded the master track of the music and vocals out on my deck, then we headed down to the street for our final run-throughs. A parking attendant showed up to ticket a car right next to our impromptu sidewalk rehearsal space, so we tried to do our number for him. He could have been more interested in a clump of dirt.
Not discouraged by Mr. Parking, we tried to head to our first stop, the shipping depot. Sadly, the guard was not in the normal position and we weren’t able to perform for him! Ironic that the entire impetus for the evening devoted to lonely workers was off talking to a friend. Defeat #2, but the plan was to visit multiple spots and cut the video together for the video. So off to the drive-thru. We finagled with hiding the cameras for a bit, then it was fun time. It went really well and the whole crew was totally pumped after our first performance.
As a director in my other shorts, I’ve had to face changes to schedule and deal with things as they come. But never have I faced the entire cast and crew wanting to get doughnuts in the middle of our shooting schedule. I’m sure I had a moment when my face was utter confusion, but I realized I had better ride the wave and let everyone get sugared up. We poured into the doughnut shop and I put on my patient face, smiling congenially, all the while the clock in my head ticking away. Then the idea popped out of the mass of doughnut eaters: “Hey, why don’t we do the song for the doughnut guy? He’s a late night worker….and how about that 24-hour restaurant at the other end of the parking lot?”
Serendipity! Pure, delicious, deep-fried and sugar-glazed serendipity.
Here are some photos from the rehearsal and master recording:
Shout-out to Gurustump for the production pics!
Your ideas rock. Such a fun little piece. Hope the festival went well. BTW, BareFoot is producing another dance for the camera evening…this one in collaboration with the museum of glass. Videos will be shown in their theater space on third thursday (aka free night) in October as a part of the Arts Crush Festival, a state wide arts event running all October…I’ll keep you posted on submission info. Hint, hint.
Dancing is harder than it looks. Hats off to all that dance and do dance routines.
It is so fun to watch the StreetComdey do their thing but even more fun for me is reading of your ‘behind-the-scenes’. In my next life maybe I will be a special effects/creative force for something like this. I love how plans go haywire but somehow come out better!
I’ve studied a number of spectacular info located at http://www.streetsmartcomedy.com/2010/late-night-worker. Worth social bookmark submitting with regard to revisiting. I’m wondering just how much work you placed to make this sort of great informative website. Carry on the good job!
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