Peter and I had our second, and final, day of filming yesterday. We spent about 6 hours at a “shkola-internat” in the Podil neighborhood of central Kyiv. An “internat” is an orphanage, and I wasn’t sure what the difference was about a “shkola-internat” or “school-orphanage”. More on that in a separate post.
As for filming, it was MUCH easier this time, partially because we had more realistic expectations for the day, and also because there was only one scene Peter and I were in. We arrived a little bit earlier than the requested 12 noon, and we wanted until almost 2:30 before anyone was ready to use us. We got our make-up, which was a lot more than last time. I would have taken a picture of myself in all that make-up except for the fact that I think she made my lips ridiculous huge and I thought they looked stupid. We’d been told in advance the general request for what to wear, but my selection didn’t much fit the liking of the wardrobe girl. She searched through a couple piles of mostly kids’ clothes and finally pulled out a little yellow t-shirt and asked me if I could wear size small. “It’s very po-ukrainiski,” I joked, secretly horrified that she might make me put on this ridiculously tight shirt. She acquiesced and told me to button up my cardigan all the way to the top so my shirt underneath would not be visible. Geez, I didn’t think my shirt was that horrible!
During these preparations, we had the opportunity to meet Elena (who’s last name I forgot to write down, dammit!), the Russian actress playing the lead female role in the film. We also met Ira, a local Kyiv actress who is playing the role of the orphanage director in the film. Our scene was with Ira, so while we were waiting to be called to the set, we rehearsed our scene with her in the crew room. To be honest, I hadn’t read yet the 2-page script I had been given a few days before shooting, and when I looked through it, I learned that my “husband” now has a name, Jack Brown, and he’s a tanned man in glasses, with a gold Rolex. I also read that Donna (i.e., me) is big, clumsy, with a lot of hair in a braid, with a purse with a peace dove symbol on it, and she looks like an aging hippie. I guess she did pretty well for herself – a fat, hairy, aging hippie who married a guy with a gold Rolex. Only in the movies, eh? (I think/hope this was all written before they actually asked me to be Donna in the film, and that they just didn’t bother to change the descriptions to be closer to reality.)
In our scene, Peter and I are led by the orphanage director into a room adjacent to a classroom where a bunch of girls are having a “social adaptation” lesson, which to me looked like my high school home economics class – learning to iron, sew, cook, etc. Through a large window, we watch the girls at work, and the orphanage director tells us about a couple of the girls, including Lada, the star of the film. I translate some descriptions of the girls to my husband, we look horrified when we hear Lada’s story, then we discuss who we want to adopt, and finally we happily announce that we want Lada. Those 45 seconds of the movie took over 2 hours to film, from various angles and numerous slight alterations in dialog and movement.
So, my film debut should be ready in the fall. Director Sasha Kirienko kindly agreed to a photo with us, and then rearranged the composition for a second photo, and again for a third photo, which I think was the best one. Don’t mess with the director, he knows what he’s doing!
And thus ends my brief but illustrious film career – or has it?
Anka in Kyiv 