Billy Garcia’s Movie Set Experience

December 16, 2008 by Lynn

Bily Garcia, best known from his time on Survivor: Cook Islands, is a friend of mine and sent me this exclusive account of his time filming the reality horror film, Reality Horror Night. He’s a terrific guy and his article is a fun read. You can find out more about Billy on his MySpace site & about Reality Horror Night on the official site. [Photo: Reality Exploits, DO NOT re-use without permission]

I just had the pleasure of acting in the movie Reality Horror Night. By the middle of the shoot I also had the pleasure of becoming the fight choreographer/stunt coordinator. By end of the shoot, the movie had been slated to become a trilogy and I had been commissioned to cast parts 2 and 3. Wow! I am going places! Where do I begin?

[Photo: Reality Horror Night - DO NOT re-use without permission]

On the first day of shooting, the whole cast got together for the first time, much like a real reality show. Jason Prager from Beauty and the Geek is a friend of mine from the New York Reality TV School where we are both mentors. So we met up at New York’s Penn Station to grab a train ride to the shoot location at Glen Cove Mansion in Long Island.

We just happened to run into Robert Smith from I Wanna Work For Diddy while we waited for our train. So during the long train ride into Long Island, the three of us got to break the ice before meeting the others.

Once we arrived to the set, Paul Grassi of The Mole and Erik Chopin of The Biggest Looser were the first to get social with the three of us. But, it didn’t take long for Danielle Dipietro of MTV True-Life, Destiney Moore of Rock of Love, Matthew Underwood of Zoey 101, and Frenchy of Rock of Love to join in. We quickly bonded as a cast.

Gary Garver of the Howard Stern Show, Gina Lynn of Howard TV On Demand’s Wack Pack At The Christy’s Farm, and Joseph Gannascoli of Celebrity Fit Club and The Sopranos were also there but kept to themselves mostly.

Elizabeth Gasinski of Momma’s Boys had a lot to do the first day of shooting so I left her to focus until the end of the shooting day. Then we talked and she was very nice and excited. Her show hasn’t aired yet [it premieres on NBC tonight] so this whole Reality Celebrity thing hasn’t hit her yet. Boy, is she in for a shock! ha ha ha.

I didn’t see Cathy from I Survived a Japanese Gameshow until the last day of shooting. She was really busy that day but was a trooper all the way. Now she can also say “I survived a horror movie shoot.” Ok, that was corny but the joke fits.

[Photo: Reality Horror Night - DO NOT re-use without permission]

So I figured I’d get to know the Director of Photography really well since it’s up to him to make my ugly mug look good on screen. Vitaly Bokser is the DP for Reality Horror Night and having peeked over his shoulder several times during shooting I can honestly say that Vitaly Bokser is a damn good Director of Photography. Several of the cast who joined me at sneaking a peek all agree that Vitaly is phenomenal. He knows how to capture the mood of the scene. Plus making actors that come from TV look cinematic with a limited time to shoot each scene takes talent. Vitaly proved he has an abundance of talent.

Director Doug Elford Argent was so easy to work with that I felt comfortable in what was a very new environment to me. A movie set is very different from Survivor’s “the whole island is your playground” approach and Doug understood that and made the transition easy for me. He was very understanding of the entire cast and found ways to make every scene work.

Before I met Doug I believed the stereotype that directors are tyrannical and boy was Doug the opposite. In fact, Doug Elford Argent and Vitaly Bosker were such a super team that every memory I have of the movie shoot is a positive one. I left feeling like my performance was the best it could be with the limited acting experience I had. That’s thanks to Doug and Vitaly.

[Photo: Reality Horror Night - DO NOT re-use without permission]

Danielle Dipietro also lent a big helping hand with my acting. She is an experienced actress and I very much appreciated her lending me her experience. I had a major tongue twister moment she helped me get through. It’s bad enough I have dyslexia, but in my head, I would translate lines into Spanish to know what I’m saying then back into English to say the line. So a couple of times my brain was slow to process and I got tongue tied. ha ha ha.

Danielle stepped up and gave me the help I needed. I appreciated the help so much so that I wanted to give back to her and the rest of the cast and crew. I got my chance when I became the Fight Choreographer/Stunt Coordinator. I got to choreograph three fight scenes and the actors in those fight scenes were so hardcore they made my choreography look good. I didn’t want everyone to look like they were born knowing Kung Fu so I went for a “street fight” approach which means it’s a bit rougher on their bodies. But all of the actors stepped up. I think fans will be pleased.

The Special Effects Artist was Stephanie Wise. She’s a big FX Wizard! Her work looked so real. I was very impressed as were the cast members who got to see her work. She was the magic behind the gore. It was cool to see how the Effects get made and see how it works together. Those behind the scenes featurettes every horror movie DVD has really don’t do this craft justice.

Stephanie also doubled as a stunt person so she’s ultra hardcore. If she wasn’t splattering blood in an FX scene then she was getting slammed around during my choreography sessions. ha ha ha.

The Film shoot overall was a ton of fun and I was sad to see it come to an end. Line Producer David Fletcher was a busy body that was on top of everything, the producers were great, the whole crew was fun. And the Mansion was, well, a Mansion! Wow! Since the shoot went so well, the producers are already gearing up for parts 2 and 3 so the fun’s not completely over for me yet. I get to cast the next two sequels. Lynn Spellman, eat your heart out….ha ha ha.

And none of this would have even been possible without the Executive Producer, Sean Pomper and his company Fame Demands Fortune. He’s the mastermind, the one who cast us and the man who made me the fight choreographer. We owe it all to him! Thanks, Sean, for everything!