Screen Gems Was a Gem

Waiting in line at Screen Gems Studio, the largest television and movie studio outside of California, for the 2:00 tour, we strike up a conversation with Keith, a 30-something native of Augusta, Georgia, who has been in Wilmington all week to see if he wants to move here.

He explains that he has lived his entire life in Augusta and feels the need to move away from family and friends. He asks us how we like Wilmington. We extol the virtues of life here.

Then it is off on the tour of Sound Stages 5 and 7 where One Tree Hill has been filmed for eight seasons. Since some of us aren’t the demographic (teenage girls, primarily), our guide gave us a capsule plot summary. Oh, my. Let’s see. Two half-brothers who don’t know the other exists and assorted other teens deal with the trials and tribulations of high school in the first four seasons. Fast forward four years. These characters return to their hometown as a fashion designer, rock musician, published author, and a NBA player, to name a few. How’s that for realism?

Walking through the sound stages and seeing all the tricks to make the rooms look as if they are in a real house was intriguing. My favorite trick was the plywood countertops painted to look like granite. One even had an ogee edge.

Since there is no electricity or plumbing on the set, an extension cord or garden hose has to be run to the kitchen if someone wants to make toast or wash a plate. One Friday someone forgot to unplug the extension that powers the refrigerator light. Picture pop cans exploding.

But on the other hand, there is a patio with a full-sized, heated swimming pool.

We spoke with almost all the tour guides and learned some interesting tidbits. All the original art work is by Wilmington artists. A lot of the furniture is from the Ikea store in Charlotte.

In the Screening Room we watched a trailer with scenes from many of the productions done here such as Firestarter, Muppets from Space, Nights in Rodanthe, and The Secret Lives of Bees.

The tour guide explained how some of the scenes were filmed.

One of the funniest stories dealt with a misplaced stunt man. During a hurricane a branch had to crash through a window. When reviewing the dailies, they discover that the stunt man in his yellow slicker can be seen through the window. Since the set had been struck, they had to rebuild it. The retake still had the guy visible. Yes, they had already struck the set. Third time was a charm.

She also talked about problems with continuity. Some of the time they opt not to re-shoot the scene because of the expense. In one such instance a character in One Tree Hill kept taking her heels off and putting on her sneakers between takes. Then she would forget to change back so sometimes she is dancing in heels and sometimes not.

So why is Wilmington such a hotbed of television and movie production? North Carolina House Bill 1973 and House Bill 713 were signed into law on July 22, 2010. The first provides a 25% tax incentive; the latter eliminates the 6.9% corporate income tax on the incentive taken by a production company. This allows the production company to realize a full 25% of qualifying expenses. These two new laws have brought more projects to Wilmington. According to one tour guide, they were losing projects to Atlanta because of the more favorable tax laws there. Now Wilmington has the upper hand.

Who knew that an hour tour could be so interesting?

Oh, and Keith? We caught up with him at the end of the tour. When I encouraged him to be adventuresome and make the move, he revealed that he had put a deposit down on an apartment today. I think the Friday nightlife downtown closed the deal.

What a Difference 697 Miles Make

Weather Forecast for Wilmington


Weather Forecast for Cleveland

Spring Has Sprung!

Today the first bloom of the season appeared.


First crocus of the season

The parsley wintered over.


Parsley

Ah, the joys of February in North Carolina.

It Was a Lovely Valentine's Day

My Sweetie came home with this lovely bouquet. And the roses are actually fragrant.

My Valentine's Day Bouquet

Then he prepared a delectable dinner with shrimp cocktail and sushi-grade ahi tuna in a delightful butter-herb sauce accompanied by steamed spinach with various colors of small tomatoes that were lightly sauteed and then allowed to steam just enough so they were tender but not split.

And what did I do for this amazing man. I left the heart that we exchange next to his hearing aids, sent him a card with the jazz he likes, sent him this photo, and did the dishes. Maybe I should do more.


Note that they are holding hands.

It Was An Enchanted Evening!

The Lincoln Center Theater production of South Pacific has been in town for almost two weeks. Is there any other musical that has so many well-loved songs? There are six in the first act alone.

But the one that brought the house down was David Pittsinger's "Some Enchanted Evening".

What an amazing voice. Unfortunately, there is not a recording yet. This clip hints at his depth and range. It also didn't hurt that he is easy on the eyes. No wonder Nellie Forbush could not "wash that man right outa my hair".

I Am So Lucky

Yesterday I received an early Valentine's Day present as did both my daughters. My amazing Sweetie gave us each the new iPod Touch.

Now this isn't blog-worthy in itself since we all own 2 or more Apple items already.

But now we three own a piece of technology that we can hold in the palm of one hand and video chat with each other. With Apple's new FaceTime app, we are just a click away from each other. Even Kimberly, a self-described Luddite, finds it amazing.

Wonder how soon FaceTime will allow all three of us to chat at the same time?

Kathy the Relationship Coach

Our local paper ran an interview with Kathy Dawson, the relationship coach that my Sweetie and I met with for 12 sessions this past fall.

Click here for the interview with Kathy

The last sentence to this question, "What are some ways we can inject romance into a typical day, say the first Monday in February?" refers to us.

It is a lovely way to end the day.

GroundWorks Dance Theater

An absolutely delightful evening spent with Jan and Rick.

First, there was dinner at Light Bistro: caramelized scallops with black pepper risotto and tomato jam for me; oven roasted chicken breast with warm potato-mushroom and spinach salad and truffle brown sauce for my Sweetie.

Then it was off to see GroundWorks Dance Theater. There were two world premieres on our dance card this evening.

“The Return”, choreographed by David Shimotakahara, is his take on Our Town. I was amazed at his innovative choreography. Just when I think that it is surely not possible for him to surprise me, he does.

The second premiere was David Parker’s “All I Do” set to “All I Do Is Dream of You” and yet, not. The music begins to set the mood and then shortly disappears. The dancers rise to the occasion with rhythmic slapping of themselves and each other. Their interactions and facial expressions made me laugh out loud.

Then came "Boom Boom", another piece by Shimotakahara, set to the blues. We saw this at Cain Park last year and loved it. It was even better this evening.

And what a treat to see David dance in two of the three pieces.

Watch John Lee Hooker perform Boom Boom and see if you can keep from dancing.

The Storm Wasn't a Beast Here

Yes, it snowed; then there was some ice; then it snowed again but it did not add up to a crippling storm.

Actually the weather provided me with a laugh. My California brother sent me the following email:

I think you should put this in your next blog. Your "favorite" brother does not understand why you and our younger sister live in such cold weather. You are both very, very intelligent with a lot more brains than I have, so why do you live there. Let me tell you about my day yesterday. I started out with a flannel shirt and a vest, but within 30 minutes of pruning our apple tree I had to remove the vest and should have gone in and put a t-shirt on because I was perspiring. By the time I got the trimmings loaded in my truck to take them to the green waste recycling, I was so hot that I had to drink 3 large glasses of water. I'll have to admit the nights are a little nippy, but I did not freeze my ears or have frozen feet from being outside yesterday.

Your weather is awful!

To my favorite brother, could it be that my sister and I are made of stronger stuff?

What a Storm

The Weather Channel loves this storm. One broadcaster dubbed it The Beast. At one time there were 29 states with weather alerts. These ranged from a tornado watch in the south to blizzards in the plains to heavy snow in the Great Lakes region to ice accumulations in many areas.

As of now we are in the wintry mix category. Our forecast calls for an inch of sleet by morning with another 1"-2" on Wednesday.

There have been some outages already in neighboring towns.

Hope we have power when we get up.