HOME FROM NARNIA

Hello and boy is it good to be back home in the US of A. My adventure on PRINCE CASPIAN was a wild one. It was great fun, so much to do and see and experience, but it also kicked my butt big time. I have to say it was by far the most difficult show I ahve ever done and I think my crew would atest to this as well.

aside from the 9 month shoot all over the Czech Republic, Poland, New Zealand, it was just a tough show. I had a big crew with different personalities and as you might figure, that can breed some issues from time to time, but over all everyone walked away as good friends that all shared in a hell of an experience.

I think the things I will miss in Prague are some of the people I had met. The city is beautiful everywhere you look. I loved my crew and spending on an average of about 100 hours a week with them was a blast. They made me run the gambit of emotions on this one. On LION the hurtles with the crew where mostly work related, but this time there were alot of personal issues that some times over shadowed things. I understand of course, but i guess it is the nature of the beast, alot of people from 10 different countries shoved into this situation and things get all mixed up and crazy. It is a great social experiment I must say. Almost SURVIVOR-like to some degree. At times I was sure we were on a reality show and the winner was the sole survivor on the crew. In the end I feel we all won though.

Well my body clock is all messed up. I got home at 5pm last night, had dinner and was out by 7pm. That then means that I got to wake up at 1am, YEAH, so this is giving me a huge chance to catch up on all my emailing, my space and face book accounts to answer everyone that was so great in writing me while I was away. If I have not written you back as of yet, I will, I promise, so thanks for hanging in there and waiting.

I plan to take 2 weeks off and then head back to KNB and start working on the next Narnia film, VOYAGE OF THE DAWN TREADER. It will begin filming in Malta in late January and then we travel to Prague and then Iceland. Should be fun and there is a lot of new creatures for us to come up with!

Hope everyone is doing great and I will write again soon. Glad to be home!!!

Howard

2:43 AM - 14 Comments - 16 Kudos - Add Comment

ROBOTS ATTACK - HOLIDAY IN CZ

ROBOTS ATTACK!!!! HOLIDAY IN THE CZECH REPUBLIC

Hello again from Prague and the Czech Republic. Things here are still going well on the film, but I am curious how we will continue to keep our sanity for the next 4 months here. It is such a strange place and though Prague is starting to understand the tourist trade, other places in CZ have not as you will soon read.

This past weekend was the last time we will have a 3 day holiday weekend as we head into 6 day weeks for the most part of it. 2 more weeks on nights and then we head to Poland for a week then lovely Usti for a while and then back to Prague then to Slovenia and then back to Usti and finally end in Prague. Jeez my 3% is swimming as I think about all the bouncing back and forth we will be doing, UGH!

Any way, back on track, I went out of Prague this weekend to a small spa town called Karlovy Vary. It is where the shot the latest James Bond film CASINO ROYALE and I stayed at the same hotel, which was cool. I drank a bunch of vodka martinis, shaken not stirred for Mr. Bond, hehehehehe. Anyhow, once I arrived by train I took a cab to the hotel where I was met w/ this very snotty receptionist at the front desk. I gave my name and she told me in a very cold manner there was not a reservation for me. I presented my printed copy of the confirmation from the night before, yes I waited to the last min to make my plans, and again she told me I did not have a room. The worst of it was how unhelpful she was and that she did the cardinal sin, not taking responsibility for the screw up and sold her employer down the line stating it was not her fault and that the hotel screwed up and over booked, it was not her fault at all, not that I ever said it was? This is the worst thing you can do when working for someone, blame the company that signs your check. Dumb ass! So I end up giving her the benefit of the doubt and ask her to suss it out and I will be back in 20 mins. She throw her arms up as if she had no interest in assisting or rectifying this situation. Heck I had already paid for the room and now she tells me I do not have one.

Giving her an extra 10 mins, I return and see what is up. She is annoyed to see me and states that she has a room for me and that is it. No sorry for the inconvince or anything. I am just met w/ a cold shoulder and I take my key, cuss under my breath that I hope she is found dead in the morning and head to my room.

Through the course of the day I wander the town, which is very nice, lined w/ outside restaurants, cafes, shopping, the whole shebang. I then think, "Hey I am in a spa town, how about some spa treatments!" I head back to the hotel and there is Eva Braun again and she looks like a puckered cat's ass. I am polite and ask about some treatments and she states in that lovely annoyed tone, "I do not know, go to the spa down stairs please". At least she said please this time. I am pissed and feel like one more moment near her will cause me to commit murder, so I head to the 1st floor and find that no one there speaks English and hey, I do not speak Czech, perfect! I try and explain what I want and it appears they are all booked up for the weekend. They are being nice, but I sense a certain "I hate Americans" in their tone. To come to think of it, most everyone there had this tone and that our money was just not as good as the guy from Düsseldorf. It is pretty crazy and really pissing me off! After all this was May 6th, the 62nd anniversary of being freed from the Nazis by the Americans and they are treating us like this. Boy they have short memories!

The final straw comes when I decide to give it all up and just go and get something to eat at one of the cafes. I place my order and wait…and wait…and wait… and then it comes and it is really not what I wanted, but I am not going to go through this crap again. I ask my waitress for the bill, you need to do this the moment your food hits the table or it will take hours to come to you by the way. I eat as 2 older couples from Texas show up and take a seat at the next table. I think I am having trouble as this gang is going to have crap bullets when they see what is in store for them. Well I was right, they place their order in their Texas twang, which is even harder for the servers to understand and the orders get all mixed up as they do not get anything they wanted. One of the women order sausages and wanted mustard, which was not on any of the tables to be found, so the Texan woman asks her again and again while breaking down the word so she might understand it better. "MUUUUUS TARD, YELLOW YOU KNOW?, MUST TARDDDDDDD". It was useless and she had to eat her sausage w/out her precious condiment. At my table I was still waiting for my bill, this was after asking 3 more times and thinking they understood me. I finally grabbed my backpack, wished the Texans good luck and headed off to the register. I stood there thinking, F this, I should just split and let them figure out how crappy their service is here, but I would feel guilty later and have to go back to pay, so I asked for my check for the 5th time and the woman asked me what I had, she writes it down and I paid. As I hand my money over the woman at the register was talking away w/ a fellow employee and never looked at me once. She took my money, made change and threw it back at me w/out ever looking at me. I looked in my hand and think "Do these buggers deserve any tip? HELL NO!!!!" I pocketed the money and stormed out, unfortunately they did not care or learn what a bunch of monkeys they all are and that once again they have done a terrible job representing their country in the understanding of what service is, how to treat the people in their establishments and guests in their country.

I know this all sounds petty and stupid, but we are faced w/ this every day here. To come from a wonderful accommodating and friendly country like New Zealand to this place, which is beautiful and can be fun, but the lack of consideration, manners and just general lack of respect, responsibility for their actions and about 100 other things start to gnaw at one's self and you go slowly mad, as I feel I am going. Now do not get me wrong, there are many of the CZ people here that are wonderful, like my CZ wife (really my assistant) Eliska, who is strong like bull and good with plow, and all the CZ makeup team I have. They are so sweet and funny, but they have all been around foreign crews and understand how to deal with kindness and consideration. They are great!

Well I wish I had another long weekend ahead, maybe I can squeeze out a 2 day get away and head out of the CZ Republic and go else where. Maybe Germany, Italy, who knows, but somewhere else where they do not speak Czech.

Hope all is well and talk to you soon,
Howard

6:32 AM - 8 Comments - 10 Kudos - Add Comment

Yak Se Mash!

Dear Friends and family,
So please excuse me for not staying in touch as well as I did on the first Narnia film. It has been a crazy world-wind filled ride bouncing from country to country, land to land, world to world, it has been nuts, but so much fun!!!!! You know me, I see the best in everything and try and make it as pleasant as possible as sometimes that is all you can do.

So the New Zealand shoot went great. It was very sad to see it end as I love it there, I consider it my second home and to leave was hard. I got to see so many old friends from the last film and met so many new wonderful people as well this time around. I hope I will be back very soon as I really felt connected to NZ more then ever.

I am now in Prague ready to start the next leg of this film, Such a different place then NZ is of course. The city is beautiful, good food and beer, too good actually, but there seems to be a lack of passion and initiative in the people here that I am use to elsewhere. The Czech people are great once you get to know them and they know you, but the warm up process takes a while and until that all clicks, it is pretty chilly. So strange as I love to laugh, and joke and hug everyone, and they do not know how to deal with that. Most of my jokes and sarcasm are met w/ blank stares and cricket noises. I mean maybe it is because I do not speak that much Czech, but to me laughter is universal, but here, not so much.

On that same note, I feel that this is a country that has unfortunately been under the occupation of some many other countries and tyrants through the centuries and now the new tyranny has begun since Communism ended in 1991, it is tourism and it seems to have taken over this beautiful place like a plague. I wanted to go out and find something that was uniquely Prague for my kiddies, but all that is out there are t-shirts that have "Prague Drinking Team" on them, or manufacture puppets in every other stall in the town square, art exhibits of great artists that turn out to be just prints of their work hung on walls to lure the visitors in and worst of all, tons and tons of tourists crowd everywhere with there cameras aimed at the astrological clock tower every hour on the hour to watch it ring out the time and a little animated show up-top the tower activates. Restaurants are crowded, people are in your way and there is just so much of everything. I would have loved to see this city before the swarm of tourist began invading it. It is dissappointing, but the more time passes, the more everything changes, and some times not for the best.

So enough of that rant. Now let's learn some Czech words that have proven to us to be extremely useful:
Dobre Rano - good morning
Dobry Den - good day
Dobry Vecer - good evening
Dekuji (pronounced de kwee ye) - thank you
Dobry - good
ano - yes
ne - no
Jak se mas? ( pronounced yak se mash) - how are you? (Borat says this alot by the way)
Muz - man
Ena - woman
Prosim - please
Jednou tohle? - how much for the little girl I want to buy her?

Now you too can come to Prague and blend in like me!!!!!

Well, I need to get back to work now, busy week ahead as we begin our Narnian invasion. The first wave of KNB'ers arrives this Sunday, so we are getting ready for them as they will need to jump right into the world of Narnia and be ready to work like dogs, never sleep and eat alot of CZ food and beer.

I will write again soon, miss you all and Nashledanou ( good bye).

Love Howard

1:24 AM - 8 Comments - 14 Kudos - Add Comment

I know I suck, but i promise a new update is on it's way!

Hey everyone,
I am so sorry I have not adding anything for so long, I suck!!!! I promise to do it by this weekend and it will have new spills, thrills, excitement and a few behind the scene PRINCE CASPIAN tid bits.

Thanks for being interested and talk to you all soon!

Howard

10:07 AM - 3 Comments - 5 Kudos - Add Comment

Ready and Action!

Hey Gang,
Well cameras are rolling as of now on the next CHRONICLES OF NARNIA - PRINCE CASPIAN as we enter our 2nd week of filming in New Zealand. It is going really well as Andrew, our director, is so great and so sure of what he needs and wants to make this film even better then the first. i am really excited about this film as it will be, i hope, yet another film my children will watch and fall in love with, as that is really what it is about for me these days. The fame, the forture, whatever, just let my kids think their Dad is pretty cool and I will be happy forever!

Last weekend we headed down to Wellington to visit with friends Richard Taylor and Gino Acevedo as their partners/wives had babies just a few short months ago and I wanted to see them and spend some quality time with all my friends that I never get enough time with. It was wonderful and their babies are so beautiful and fun. i miss having babies...well maybe not that much. I like holding them and then handing them back to their folks, ah the perfect baby experience.

Well, this weekend we head down to the south island and begin filming there for 2 weeks or so. We will finally have 4 of our characters playing there, which is very exciting as Tami, Sarah and myself have been prepping and testing, but there is nothing like being on set with a makeup you are proud of, and I am very proud of these. I sure wish I could show photos of them as they are so very cool, organic, real and alive. I hope when you do get to see them you will feel the same way. The team at KNB have done a great job prepping the makeups and hair work, it is top notch!

Well, I promise to write another blog sooner and as soon as I can figure out how to attach photos to these blogs, i will do so of other things outside of whatr we are filming as New Zealand is a beautiful place to be and share with all.

Talk to you soon mates,
Howard

1:05 AM - 9 Comments - 12 Kudos - Add Comment

I forgot how great NZ is!

Hey Gang,
Well I am here now in New Zealand with my trusted team, for now, Oscar winner Tami Lane and Sarah Rubano. It is great to be back here as I love NZ so much. At one time I really wanted to move here and just work w/ Richard Taylor of WETA, but my love for LA, greg Nicotero and KNB provailed and the rest is history.

Now about the show, this past week we prepped the makeup trailer, we have the same one we used on the first Narnia film, so it is nice to be in the place where Mr. Tumnus was born. We prepped the two makeups we have playing first up here, 2 dwarves, one played by the great Peter Dinklage and the other Warwick Davis. Both excellent actors that will bring a whole new look and feel to the Dwarves of Narnia as I felt the dwarves we had in the first film, with the exception of Ginabrik played by Kiran Shan, were less then stellar as we were tied into the performer's own limitations, their body shapes and sizes and lack of understand the english languge as they were all from Thailand and India, so you could imagine. It was a hell of an experience, but I am very glad we have 2 amazing actors that will create 2 fantastic characters for this film and are up for the task at hand.

We start filming this Tuesday and we will be here in NZ until mid March, then it is off to Prague for the long haul. That is where the major creature work happens and we bring in the crew of 40 artists from around the world, another thing that makes me excited as I love working with people that see things differently. My way is not the only way, far from it. I value each person that can bring something new and inventive to the table, it is always so fulfilling. We will have makeup artists from the US, Canada, Ireland, Spain, Austraila, New Zealand, Prague, and who knows where else, but it is sure to be cool.

Well that is it for now. I will write again next week and fill you in on the haps on set. Hope all is wll and talk to you soon. Cheers mates!
Howard

9:58 PM - 5 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

Makeup Trade Show

Hey Gang,
I just got back from a world wind trip to London for the International Makeup Trade Show presented by Makeup Artist Magazine. It was absolutly fantastic!!!!!!

I arrived Friday afternoon, met up w/ friends for dinner and drinks, of course, then hit the hay to be ready for the next day at the show.

Saturday came along and the venue was awesome. It looked like an old train station, much better then the place they have the LA show in. Everyone was there, so many makeup artists from all over the world. The US, London, Spain, Ireland, Iceland, Sweden, CZ, you name it. I got to meet so many new friends and saw so many old ones. One of my best friends from Canada, Charles Porlier was there promoting his school VFS, which is the best makeup school right now in my opinion, saw Jeff Dawn, a great artist and dear friend for years who i have not seen in forever, Stephan DePuis, another genius of the makeup world and then met so many of my idols through the years like Cliff Wallace, Danial Parker and Nick Dudman, who I think are amazing. I also got to see the 2 best Spainish makeup artists in the world David Marti and Montse Ribe from DDT, most recently nominated for this year's oscar for PAN'S LABYRINTH. I loved their work in this film and hope they win all the awards they have been nominated for, which are the Goyas, the BAFTA and the Oscar. best of luck guys!!!!

On Sunday I spoke for an hour, could have used 5 hours, but you know how it goes, and it was just great. i wish my KNB partner Greg Nicotero could have been there, but he was unable to attend. Next time I hope.

Anyway, this was an amazing event and one I am so glad I did not miss. I hope I am asked back next year as I would do it in a heart beat. if you are a makeup artist, you should really try to attend this, it is well worth it for every reason.

..Well, back to New Zealand in less then 10 hours. i will write again form there. All the best and talk to you soon,
Howard

10:14 AM - 7 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

NZ here we come

Hey everyone,
So as I head out and can't but think how amazing the first film experience was and how this one should be even more fun and excitment! I have alot of the same crew back, Jeff Himmel, Beth Hathaway, Sarah Rubano, Dawn Dininger, Mark Ballou, Clare Mulroy, Robbie Derry,and of course the great Tami Lane. I have added a few new KNBer's to the mix like Mark Boley, Rob Freitas, Mike Fields and Kevin Wasner and I have a lot of the amazing Aussie crew back as well and I hope to bring on some of the artists from the Spainish makeup effects company DDT, who handle the work in PAN'S LAB, which is great by the way. I have a slew of CZ artists and my old friend Brian Wade, who lives in Prague now, along for the adventure.

well Tami and Sarah are in New Zealand right now setting up the trailer and getting ready for our first tests next week. Tons to do and so little time to do it in, but that is normal these days.

I am traveling to London for the weekend for the Makeup Trade show as I am a key note speaker, fancy huh? I am very excited and honor to have been asked to blah blah about what I love and do.

That's it for now. Hope everyone is well and more to come!

Howard

6:18 PM - 5 Comments - 6 Kudos - Add Comment

Through the wardrobe again and into Narnia

well everyone, i am ready to head out, go through the wardrobe again and enter the world of Narnia for the second time and i can not wait as it is going to be yet another amazing experience.

I leave within the week to New Zealand where we will film for a while and then off to Prague for a long while. Alot to do and I will keep writing to update everyone.

Wish me luck and talk to you all soon,

Howard

10:58 PM - 3 Comments - 5 Kudos - Add Comment