THURSDAY
I was due to do the afternoon shift, but it didn’t quiet work out like that. I was meant to cover for Izzy TC(the other volenteer driver -keep up!) for an hour while she caught Michael ‘Harry Potter’ Goldenberg, but it all went a bit tits up. A Speaker (mentioning no names) got lost in town, so while Richard the Chaffeur searched for her, both me and Izzy ended up out driving for most of the hour!
Most of my jobs tended to be groups, and tended to be people being taken back, so I didn’t get to research who they were, or to have much of a chat. At various points I had Ed Rubin, Rachel Holdyrod, Sam Lavender, The UK Film Council, and TV’s Dr Raj Persuad in the back of my van.
Jake West was one of the few solo jobs, and he was really passionate and enthusiastic. There was a bit of a kerfuffle about getting him a ticket (which wasn’t his fault - and which Kenny kept trying to give me money for, even though I‘d been given the cash in advance!) Jake said loads of people come up to him and say they want to be filmmakers, but they can’t get the funding - as long as you can find someone with a decent DV camera then anyone can be a filmmaker - his advice was do it yourself and learn by doing it, the Robert Rodriguez route.
The evening was dead - I had two jobs in 3 hours, so I just sat and nattered to Richard and the Jedi. Drove Brian Ward, and he was interesting - he’s a former Pop video director, so had a lot of stories about divas (Art Garfunkel was the worst he worked with apparently!)
Went to the Travelodge again in the evening and left 5 minutes before they kicked us out - an early night at last!
FRIDAY
I did the afternoon again, after a well needed lay in (though I did show up before midday unlike a few lightweights I could mention!)
Again it was mostly groups so I didn’t get to have much of a chat with many of them - I was a bit networked out by this point anyway! I had Allison Owen, Katherine Butler, Sarah Gavron, Abi Morgan, Jurgen Wolff, Peter Carlton amongst others.
Also Menhaj Huda - who’s got a series in development with Kudos. The Slovos liked my choice of in car music (The Clash) - they said the music in Catch a Fire cost a fortune. They also thought there‘d been some sort of accident cos the traffic wasn’t moving - had to explain this is normal for this country! I also took Euroscript’s Charles Harris back, which was good as I’d been on one of his excellent courses, so it was great to catch up with him.
I took Anthony Horowitz Rachel Holydroyd and Nick Cunningham back to the station then took Elizabeth Morgan Hemlock (who’s hobbies include avoiding Stuart Perry, and who can blame her?) and a Plasma TV into town, then I was done.
I handed the keys over with a great sigh of relief - I’d got through the whole week without crashing or killing anyone! I did ask if I could keep the van, but Lizzie said no -she did buy us drinks all night, so I’ll forgive her! After a week of (virtually) no drinking, I was on the beer. Then the wine. Then the beer again. And then the wine again. Then the whiskey.
It was fantastic to really get to spend some time with t’other runners and a great time was had by all, lots of laughing and hugging and crying and tears goodbye. We were kicked out the Travelodge at midnight. And then everyone went to beddie-byes and were tucked up safe and sound and drifted off to the land of nod…
Well, that’s my story and I’m sticking to it...
FINAL THOUGHTS
I couldn’t afford to attend, so I though volunteering would be the next best thing. Turns out it was far, far better. What amazed me that the 22 of us that volunteered where the only ones who seriously volunteered (apparently there were a few who wanted to, say, do one day and get in free for the rest of it - worth asking I suppose!) I would have thought that more of the people who couldn’t afford it would have volunteered.
But their loss! As I said in the first post (many, many words ago!) it was a fantastic experience with a really great bunch of people.
Now I’ve just gotta find something else to blog about…
:)
4 comments:
sigh. i enjoyed reading all about this festival.
how did you find out about volunteering? did they advertise?
I contacted them when the festival was annonced in a rare fit of initiative, but they had a little volenteers needed ad on the website nearer the time.
Hi Martin,
I really enjoyed reading your blog - I could get a real sense of what you were up to in between me running up to you waving a piece of paper like a lunatic! I'll buy you a beer on Sat.
Cheers Ricky, be good to see you again - and if yr mad enough to do it again, give the potdoll a job! (I'll explain her secret ID on Sat, but she's a star of tommorrow!)
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