Hollywood North: Vampire story turns out to be suited for COVID-19 safety concerns – Vancouver Sun

Under the new safety and health protocols laid out by WorkSafeBC and separate studios, the on-set changes include: distancing, masks, sanitation stations, dedicated safety-protocol personnel, and no more hanging out and communal lunches.

We have an actor that has been on the show for five seasons who shot their last scene the other day and it was a very emotional moment, said Walker. A big round of applause from all of the crew, but then no one could go hug that person and congratulate him because we cant do that anymore. Its changed the culture a little bit.

Actual workdays have changed too. Shoots are a couple hours shorter so people dont get tired and then complacent with safety and there is no guarantee that an episode will be completed eight or nine days later.

You have to reprioritize how you do the work. It has had a big ripple effect on our post-production, you know having to leave gaps in episodes, waiting for material we will have to shoot later, said Walker. Its an interesting Rubiks Cube of a puzzle.

Shorter days, however, dont translate into extending the shooting schedule. Instead, Walker says its a kind of run-and-gun style now that sees them avoiding time-sucking setups that use dollies and big cranes.

Another difference is the amount of people on-set at any given time. Crews are about 20 per cent smaller, but the biggest drop in bodies is the number of background actors brought in. On Van Helsing, that group is down by 90 per cent.

Heading into shooting Season 5, which will air in late 2020 or early 2021, Walker said all 13 episodes of the season were written. Then the pandemic appeared and stabbed a stake through the heart of that plan.

Theres an old expression with writers, its called, Kill your babies. It just means the things you love the most sometimes you have to dispense with because logistics and environmental factors come into play that just make it not possible to do what you had in mind, said Walker. That is just the new reality of this: How do you story-tell in a compelling and interesting way in this new reality?

See the original post here:
Hollywood North: Vampire story turns out to be suited for COVID-19 safety concerns - Vancouver Sun

Reviewed and Recommended by Erik Baquero