Long time readers of this blog will know that I’ve been looking back at my diaries from ten years ago, during the filming of Robot Overlords. From now on the diary entries you’ll see are the ones featured in the back of the film’s novelisation (and if you want a signed and dedicated copy of the paperback, then please step this way and click here).
In this thrilling episode I get to fly out to the location! They only had enough budget to have me on set for eight days, so I had to pick and choose them carefully. I’d written a scene where the gang decode a message left on some ancient standing stones and I really wanted to see how it was done. And thus it was that I headed for Tollymore Forest Park in Northern Ireland (which was used extensively in Game of Thrones)…
Tuesday 18th June
Belfast and back again
Left work early, hopped on the Gatwick Express and was in Belfast City Airport by nine o’clock.
No sign of my taxi driver (again), but I was greeted by hordes of teenage girls, weeping with mascara running down their faces… turns out I’d just missed JLS passing through Arrivals.
When it eventually arrived, I shared the taxi with Martin Chamney from (our VFX company) Nvizible. It pulled up outside a magnificent hotel facing the sea in Newcastle (the Slieve Donald Hotel, look it up… it’s amazing). It must have had 200 rooms, a golf course, spa and luxurious marble lobby. ‘This,’ I thought, ‘is more like it.’ Of course, it was the wrong bloody hotel!
We were directed to our correct hotel in the main street, passing the condescending sneer of the concierge as we slunk out.
The Main Street Donnard hotel was much more welcoming. A friendly man and woman waved us in, not needing us to sign anything, and their son (?) showed us to our rooms. They were comfy if basic. Martin and I popped out for a drink and when we returned the woman was watching a horror movie on a laptop in a corner of the lobby… When we came down at 6:45am she was in the same spot with a duvet wrapped round her.
We arrived at the location in Tollymore Park bright and early. I got chatting to the security guy who had a London accent and it turns out grew up not far from me in Hornsey.
I jumped in a minibus with the VFX guys and we made the bumpy journey up twisting, narrow roads. The location was terrific. Sweeping views of hills and mountains and a lake and, in a clearing, were our standing stones. Made of polystyrene coated in concrete, they look so real that some of the crew thought that we’d desecrated an ancient monument (the story requires that they’re covered in graffiti).
SBK was up first. He had to converse with two robots who weren’t there, but he really delivered and put everything into it, take after take. We had a Panavision crane on rails, which swooped above him for the robots’ POV, and the shots were very cool.
Between set-ups it was great to catch-up with the crew, and I got chatting to SBK’s stand-in Brian. A very affable chap, not only a veteran of Game of Thrones, but also an architect. This is something I came across again and again today: many of the NI crew and extras know one another from shows like GoT and work so well and efficiently together, they save us time and money, essential for an indie movie like ours. Brian told me of SBK’s first scene of the shoot, which involved a rain machine. He told Jon in no uncertain terms, ‘I don’t get wet!’ Somehow Jon got him on board.
I was interviewed by a couple of guys from Radio 4, and Total Film. I hope I didn’t say anything slanderous…
After lunch, Gillian and the kids arrived and the energy levels went back up a notch. They’ve clearly bonded brilliantly during the shoot. Good to catch up with James Tarpey, who took the time to have a chat. Milo’s dad Ray was also on good form. Milo is having the time of his life.
Unfortunately, I had to leave earlier than I hoped as I was sharing a cab with Piers and producer Steve Milne (whose flight was departing earlier than mine). But Steve is a Spitfire fan and I took the opportunity to drip-feed bits of Black Spitfire to him and I think I might have his interest.
I also got talking Robot sequels with Piers. He’d like a pitch by the end of the month and a script by May.
Uneventful flight home, though I did see Air Force One land at Belfast International (it’s the end of the G8 summit).
I discovered later that we had been taken to that first posh hotel because that’s where the actors were staying and the taxi driver assumed all the crew were staying there. I presume the producers heard that I didn’t play golf and that’s why they put me in the cheaper hotel… (insert your own shrug emoji here).
The day was my first opportunity to see the actors in full flow and they were definitely having fun with it. There’s something very odd about watching Oscar winner Sir Ben Kingsley have a conversation with an invisible robot, speaking dialogue that you came up with in your lunch break at work.
And no, Steve Milne wasn’t interested in The Black Spitfire project, but talk of a Robots sequel was exciting. Sadly, that’s all it was in the end. Talk. But we’ll get to that later. In the meantime here are some pics…
Mark Stay Writes 