To spruce up the offices, Nate and Toby in the
art department have hired Marc, a local graffiti
artist, to create a bunch of very cool Pitch Perfect
themed banners that hang around the offices: in the
choreography area, the recording studio, and the
Aca-taqueria.
My understanding is that after
we wrap, the banners (spray painted onto canvas so
they can be moved) will be auctioned off or given to
fans. Each one unique, making it a very cool piece
of movie history & artwork. Worth every brain cell I
lost during the first 24 hours as they were still
drying a foot from my head.
After rehearsal today several of us headed down to New Orleans to attend the yellow dress premiere of Liz Banks' latest movie "Walk of Shame". I say "yellow dress" because in lieu of the traditional red carpet, there were two rows of women wearing little yellow dresses"... which you have to see the movie to understand.
For me, the single hardest thing about making
Pitch Perfect 2 is being away from my fantastic kids Cap and Mimi. Words can't
express how much I miss them, and yet having spent
20 years spreading and promoting contemporary a
cappella, there's just no way I can turn it down a
sequel to the movie about the competition I started,
and my very supportive family agrees. So, I'm living
in a suite in the Hyatt in Baton Rouge, calling home
every night at 9pm (7 for them), and when I can,
flying home for the weekend.
Today, April
25th, is my son Cap's 14th birthday, so I'm taking
him out of school, and we're spending the day
together exploring the Bay Area. We head in a
direction, and see where the wind takes us. We call
it Adventure Day, and we've been doing it since Cap
was a toddler.
If I weren't home with my family, I'd be hosting
the ICCA finals in NY. Indeed, if you weren't aware,
the International Championship of College A Cappella
at the heart of PP is real, celebrating 20 years
today.
The name no longer trips off the
tongue the way it did when I started it with Adam
Farb in '94, as it was the NCCA, a punny nod to
basketball's NCAA "march madness" tournament. We can
no longer call it "the N-double C-A" and instead I
usually hear it referred to as "Ick-uh". Oh well!
Air travel may seem glamorous to some, but having
flown over 1 million miles I can assure you it is
not. Basically, an airplane is a flying bus, and
busses aren't always on time. In fact, my flight to
Houston is delayed, so I won't arrive in time for my
connection to Baton Rouge, so I'll be put up (in the
cheapest hotel United can find) for the night, and
catch a 6am flight (which means waking at 4:30) to
get into the office by 8:30am. I don't blame the
airline or anyone ~ life happens ~ and I'm certainly
not complaining, as I'm very thankful the technology
exists allowing me to pop home for the weekend. I'm
simply making the point that it's nothing to
romanticize.
However, I can report that
romance is indeed still alive, as after last night's
Pacific Boychoir concert, in which Cap had 3 solos,
he turned on his cell phone and had 65 texts from
girls in the audience. Now, I realize some people
still think singing is for nerds. In fact, Pitch
Perfect calls a cappella "organized nerd singing,"
which is hilarious. I fully support making fun of
everyone in a comedy movie. However, out here in
reality, singing is of course far more than a punch
line.
I read a fascinating essay by Neil
Gaiman recently that posited that "nerds" are simply
people who are especially focused on a particular
pursuit, and whereas this can be quite off-putting,
especially to fellow teens who have no such deep
interest, "nerds", with their deep knowledge of a
subject, paired with countless hours perfecting a
skill set, become some of the planet's most
successful people. Silicon Valley was built by
nerds, and we find very successful nerds throughout
the fields of science, medicine, math, history,
literature"... and music.
To make sense of all of the various sound files
(both the learning recordings we've created ~ with
one part in the right channel, and the others in the
left ~ and the final recordings), we need a clear,
short naming system for each of the Bellas, so Magee
has assigned them each a 2 letter designation, which
I dubbed "The Periodic Table of the Bellas."
Most of the monikers aren't elements, but a couple
are, such as Aubrey who gets the auspicious "Au"
(gold) and Beca who is saddled with the far more
pedestrian "Be" (beryllium).
Apparently the building we used as our production
offices for PP1 have been locked and untouched since
we wrapped, so a couple runners headed over to see
if anything was worth salvaging over there, and they
came across Aubrey's white board exactly the way it
appeared in the movie! Who knew dry erase technology
was so reliably permanent?
Take a close look
at it if you get a chance, as it's pretty hilarious.
The level of behind the scenes detail in PP1 is
particularly impressive. Best example: the "wheel"
in the Riff-Off. Pause the screen and check out the
categories. My favorite: "songs ruined by Glee."
One of my favorite scenes in the movie is the
introduction to the "worlds", in which we get to
hear versions of Journey's "Anyway You Want It" from
Latin America, South Asia, South-East Asia and
Africa. For moviegoers unfamiliar with a cappella,
it's a great way for them to understand how a
cappella can reflect styles of music around the
globe, and how an arrangement can take a song in
many different directions.
I do like the
double meaning of the song's title, as we're in
effect saying that you can find and enjoy a cappella
music in any style of music you wish, which is why
I've been referring to this scene as the "mall food
court."
I wish there were an contemporary all-women's a
cappella ensemble in Latin America, and perhaps once
the movie is seen in the region there will be, but
right now there isn't. The closest is the group
Edgar Rios from Nota assembled for The Sing Off
Season 4, which was initially supposed to be all
women, but in the end he couldn't find a single
female bass or vocal percussionist, so Calle Sol
became a mixed ensemble (4 women, 2 men).
So, what do Ed and I do when faced with the
impossible task of creating an all-women's group for
the mall food court? We get creative! Liz wants an
all women's group of amazing dancers, so we pull in
the two best dancers (who are also great a cappella
singers) from Calle Sol (so they can be on screen as
well as behind the mic), have AJ cast the rest of
the group with great dancers, and use a variety of
voices to fill in the rest of the background parts.
And when I say variety, I sometimes mean Ed and
myself.
Fact is, on this track, I'm singing
the lowest trombone part (no one can tell if a vocal
trumpet in this range is coming from a male or
female singer), and bass. Yes, bass. Lest you think
this is easy, I spent a while in front of the
microphone trying different tones while Ed coached
me to be less heavy, more resonant in my upper
range, etc.
And Ed is similarly all over
these tracks, as we're both African vocal
percussionists (I'm the conga drums while Ed is both
the shaker/gourd and the everything else drum track"...
he's remarkably versatile), both Treblemakers, both
members of Das Sound Machine (my 25 tours of Germany
with my a cappella band The House Jacks has resulted
my ability to speak English with a thick German
accent that until now was not a marketable skill),
and so on.
We would have loved to hire all
of our a cappella friends from around the world, but
it just wasn't financially feasible, as it starts
getting very expensive when you consider plane
flights, hotel rooms, etc.
So I can one day
tell my grandchildren, for a brief, shining moment,
before they were born, I was a red hot Latin dancer.
Often when I'm working with teenage singers
they'll ask me "Is Fat Amy that funny in real
life?!?" to which of course I have to respond "Um"...
Fat Amy isn't a person. Her name is Rebel", which
usually elicits a smile from a nearby adult.
Fact is, Rebel IS funny in person, but she's also at
times quite soft spoken and very diligent. We
emailed out arrangements and learning files before
the actors arrived, and Rebel came prepared, all but
memorized by the second day of rehearsals. Very
impressive.
Her craft is rather meticulous,
which is often the case with comedians who appear
scattered and improvisatory. Robin Williams comes to
mind. All of us are able to toss out a witty quip
from time to time, but even the funniest people on
the planet aren't always brilliant, and have a
limited ability to improvise at a perpetually high
level. Everything else is the result of hard work.
And Rebel works very hard.
I'm reminded of
our first session together in the recording booth
working on PP1. We were recording her part on "Turn
The Beat Around" and as much energy as she was
putting into the part, it just wasn't funny. We kept
trying different things, and finally I asked her if
she'd try the part in her Australian accent, which
wasn't a consideration, as the role of Fat Amy
wasn't written for a foreigner, and even foreigners
usually sing pop music with an American accent.
As soon as she launched into the song with a
full on "Ozzie" twang it was like the clouds parted
and she was unleashed. Each take got funnier and
funnier. So the two of us headed to Jason's office
and asked if she could be unabashedly Australian,
accent and all. "Sure" he said, not giving it a
second thought, and that was that. I now have
trouble imagining Rebel any other way, as her role
became less about her becoming a character for the
movie, and more about the movie shining a spotlight
on her carefully crafted (yet apparently care-free),
zany sense of humor.