Central Park, very early in the morning – just across the street from the Plaza.

My first day on the set was Friday and it was a l-o-n-g day. Our call was at 8:30 – later than originally planned. I can only surmise that shooting the day before went overtime and they had to adjust the start. The problem for me was that I went to bed early the night before and woke up at 3:30 am. And I couldn’t get back to sleep.

Even if I hadn’t woken up quite so early, I would have had to be up by 5 at the latest. Travel anywhere in the city takes time; determined by the subway, weather, and unforeseen delays. Traveling into Manhattan from Brooklyn takes even longer. It adds at least 20 minutes on to any trip. Since my area of Brooklyn is directly south of the Battery, the southern tip of Manhattan, you can see that I have a lot of ground to cover via the subway. Though when we shoot one day next week in lower Manhattan, I’ll catch a break.

I arrived early. One of the things we have to do three times a week is get a Covid test. So I went to the testing area and had that taken care of. Then I went out to the catering truck and got some coffee. Then I went to the floor on which we were shooting that day and waited, unsure who to talk to, who to introduce myself to. It was very busy there with various crew members setting up cameras, sound – everything that is needed to film. I tried to stay out of the way. Eventually, I recognized the director’s voice and introduced myself to him. And eventually, I was introduced to the First Assistant Director who provided me with a headset so I could listen to the actors as they were filming. I have to say that everyone is very nice and helpful.

In the meantime, both Jim and Ben arrived and we had a happy reunion, in Jim’s case, and a first face-to-face meeting, in Ben’s. Jim kept showing everyone a photo he had of the two of us from way back when I was teaching him, just to prove how long we’d known each other. We’ve known each other for 21 years.

I sat with the producers in an area called video village. There are monitors there where we can watch the scenes being filmed.

Several scenes were on the docket. It takes a long time to shoot a scene. It needs to be shot from all sorts of angles and perspectives. It’s fascinating to watch the process.

I can’t go into details, of course, but it was a long day. I was there about 12½ hours, going on very little sleep, and then I had to travel back to Brooklyn, which took 40 minutes.

I was so exhausted, I felt a little bit insane. After calling Don to tell him I was home safely, I wound down a bit, then slept straight through until 8:30 am.

Tomorrow’s shoot has a 7 am call and it’s quite a trek from here. I’ll be up at 4 am. This is all quite an adjustment and I worry about keeping up with it all. I just need to get in a rhythm and know I can catch up on sleep on the weekend. It’s very satisfying, though, to have met everyone and know what I have to do. All of the ‘firsts’ are out of the way.

Don is coming today – probably in the afternoon. I have to find a laundromat this morning, although Don has offered to do it for me tomorrow morning. We’ll see. It’s raining at the moment. I think Don will be here until Tuesday. Tomorrow is supposed to be sunny, so he can do something fun while I’m on the set. He had to delay his visit here because he had to pick up his car from the mechanics and it wasn’t ready until yesterday.

Some photos of the girls in the apartment:

Sophie in her mushroom dress.

Imogen in a Liberty print dress and new tights.

They were checking out the back garden.

Okay. I need more coffee. I’ll check in when I can, but if the days are like Friday was – and I think they will be – I might not get back to you for a while!

Stay safe.

Happy Sunday.