San Diego has a mighty herd...

Well.

The funny thing when something like yesterday happens is that in the grand scope of eternity - it really doesn't matter.

When I worked for Discovery - there was a show that was in its first season. One of the directors there was looking to change things up a bit and came up with an idea -they sold it - and he was the producer on the show. He is a great director - a bit volitile - but he went over to the other side and produced this one.

For some reason - God knows why - I ended up directing all or part of 11 out of the 13 original episodes. It was incredibly tough - and doing the reinactments - sometimes we would get upwards of 30 scenes a day. It was ridiculous stuff - like start a scene wide - zoom in to a two shot - have the actors keep going - run the camera to the side and get overs - pop to close ups - run back to the wide - have them exit and move on.

Silly.

Well - Season one was seen as a dud. Strange - because it got renewed for two more seasons after that - so it must not have been so bad. But I was seen as one reason why the show sucked. So I was brought into the office and addressed like this:

Greg. I'm just really upset. This show sucks. And a big part of it is your fault. I have seen some really bad directing here. Its all we can do to make the show work. I can't believe you would do things like this. BLAH BLAH BLAH... essense being that I suck.

So I said:

Wow. Well I'm sorry you feel that way. We had a really bad schedule and I was doing all I could to get everything in the can - but I understand. If I did that bad - I guess I shouldn't shoot here anymore...

He said:

No no... I didn't mean that...

And things went back to normal.

Basically I guess there needs to be bloodletting every now and then to let people know their place. Everyone from SF is jumping to my defense - but how pitiful it is that they have to. I guess this is what happens when you get slandered. Pretty hard to defend against it - especially when you're on the other side of the world.

So now - its just back to normal. I continue to work on the shoot - and they continue to undercut me.

Just like before... :)

Its all good. The show will look great and then that will be that.

We have an early morning script meeting today - and I've been writing copy frantically for the last three days - so hopefully we will go out this afternoon and take a break. My old producing partner here Hogan is taking us to a chunk of the Great Wall so my wife can see something other than my grand humiliation... :)

Yesterday got so bad - I made Bill watch Borat. I thought his head might explode.

Played basketball last night for the first time this year since January. Actually had a really good night. Felt a bit better afterwards.

Not near as good as I'd feel if I was part of a mighty herd.