"Tom, from the elevator, turns to Rachel, tears streaming..."

I'm back. It was a long layoff, I know. Basically, I got sick. And I was really busy at the same time. But lots of posts in the coming days, I promise...

...Starting with my shoot for Eleventh Hour, which took place the day after my last post. Warning, I'm still low on time, so this will be very stream-of-consciousness, just to get it out, and not the usual, refined writing you're used to. ;)

The title of this post refers to the lines in the script that were haunting me leading into the shoot. They wanted someone who'd be able to give a strong emotional performance on cue, and I'd been able to do that in the audition. But how would I fare on the set, with take after take after take, and about 50 people watching me?

"Painfully shy Tom, from the elevator, turns to Rachel, tears streaming...."

This is after painfully shy Tom has killed Hailey, his supermodel neighbor, and is now perched on her balcony overlooking Eighth Avenue.

Of course, by the time we did the episode, I was no longer Hailey's neighbor; I was now her doorman. And we no longer had an awkward scene in an elevator; it was now a creepy scene where I followed her upstairs to "give her mail to her" and then forced my way into her apartment.

The script changes came at the eleventh hour (ha ha, get it?), literally the night before, and they changed my day somewhat, that's for sure. Starting with trying on an ill-fitting doorman's outfit at 8am. And then psyching myself up to be "creepy guy" all day, instead of "painfully shy geek" which I was before. I threw on a little Brooklyn accent (much more polished than the one I did for LIE TO ME) and proceeded to set.

Where I encountered something I've never dealt with before: two directors. The episode director whispering in one ear, and the executive producer in the other one. And not always agreeing. The exec producer was a Scottish expat and had a THICK accent, and it was hard to take him seriously sometimes as he gutturally said, LAYTS NOOT MEK IT ALL HAWLYWID, YAH? LAYTS MEK IT REAL!

I did okay for the main scene, except I had to close the door behind me when I forced my way in to the apt., and the E.P. kept giving me alternate lines to end the scene with. (Original line: "Aren't you going to invite me in?" Alternates: "Maybe you should invite me in." "Shhhh, shhhhh, don't be afraid Ms. Vaughn." CREEPY!) And I'd say on about HALF of the takes, I forgot to close the door because I was trying to remember which line I was doing this time, and the director had to remind me a couple of times, and that sucked. I'd remember to shut it twice and then forget the third time, and about the 4th or 5th time this happened, I shouted "GodDAMNit!" after the take ended, and startled half the people on the set.

But it was a good creepy scene, and I was psyched that we got a nice shape out of it.

"Painfully shy Tom, from the elevator, turns to Rachel, tears streaming...."

So then I had a couple hours to kill. For one, we had lunch, and for another, they were shooting a quick intervening scene before my big breakdown. During the latter, I met Rufus Sewell, who was lovely, and was to be in my next scene. We talked a while about what it's like acting in Stoppard plays (Mr. Sewell originated the role of Septimus in Arcadia, and I had also recently seen him in Rock 'n' Roll on Broadway), which was a total trip.

I had spent some time trying to get mentally in shape for bawling. I had a full-on deep tissue massage the day before just so my body would be loose, with all the tense spots released—I wanted to be fully available to myself, as it were. I also made a playlist on my iPhone called "weepies", which had 7 or 8 tracks on it of songs that really move me emotionally. These included (in no particular order), the Finale from West Side Story, Albinoni's Adagio in G minor (which you may know from Gallipoli), Barber's Adagio for Strings (which you may recognize from Platoon), Górecki's Lento e Largo, andSunday and Finishing the Hat, both from Sunday in the Park With George. Last, but certainly not least, Judy Collin's masterpiece, Suzanne, which wound up being my key for the day.

But first, let me talk about the fun part. In this scene, I was to be seen on the balcony ("tears streaming"), and after a couple of lines, over I go. Suicide. Having just been shot the previous week, I was really looking forward to another yummy death scene.

I'd originally assumed this would be shot outside with an airbag or something. Ha! Not in the world of tee vee. When I found out we'd be shooting it in the studio, I wondered how they'd fake it and still assumed I'd be 3-4 stories in the air. Nope. My 16th-floor balcony was on the ground floor of the studio. The camera, which I guess would have had to have been on a crane otherwise, was on the floor a few feet away.

To give you an idea, here's the balcony I'll be appearing on, complete with its view of 45th ST and the Majestic Theater. (Try to imagine a few taxis honking below):


Now take another look at that same shot with a slightly wider view:

Pretty funny, huh? Pretty magical at the same time. I like how if you look closely at all the apartments across the street there's no one actually visible in any of the windows. Just sofas, plants, weird shapes. No people though.

"Painfully shy Tom, from the elevator, turns to Rachel, tears streaming...."

So all afternoon I'm pacing around, feeling mopey and listening to my iPhone. All of the songs above have led me to cry at one point or another. I respond very viscerally/kinesthetically to music, and I knew it was going to be my ally today. I pictured Mel Gibson arriving one second too late to stop the charge. I pictured Maria shouting at both gangs, "How many bullets left, and still have one for me?" I think of that quote and it gives me chills, even as I type this. I also shamelessly used what life has dealt me in recent years. You all know the various tragedies we've had to stare down and I went there. Thought about all Jody and I have been through, and what my worst fears had been on some of those days. I worked myself into quite a miserable state. And I tried to envision having just unexpectedly snapped and killed someone I knew (as in, the "event" of the scene), although, truth be told, that didn't trigger a whole lot.

We did a rehearsal of the shot for lighting, and when it was done, I turned on Suzanne. This song is a gorgeous and melancholy 70s ballad written by Leonard Cohen. And it has a powerful effect on me.

Sometime in his last year or so, my dad had figured out iTunes and was downloading songs from his past that he'd always really loved. He picked me up at Amtrak for a particular visit, and proudly popped a CD in the car's player, telling me it was the first CD he'd ever "burned". Suzanne came on and he told me how it was a song from back when they WROTE SONGS, not just crap, and how it TOLD A STORY, and how there was COMPLEXITY, and it MADE YOU THINK. And then we listened to the song all the way back to my parents' house, not a word spoken between us. I remember seeing the dashboard of the car and the smell of Barry's shampoo, and listening to this song. It's a cutting and profound and timeless memory for me.

And here I was on set, playing it over and over again, and thinking about all of our last moments, and his last moments with my mom, and of course I just let loose. Except I needed to try to harness all that. So I'd get to the brink, and then stop. And get up and turn off the music and go get a cough drop (I was already coughing that day), and chat with my stand-in. And when the feeling was going away, I'd restart the song from the beginning. And summon up the memories again. And so on.

When it came to shoot the scene, I had to have fake blood all over my hands, which meant no hanging onto the iPhone and then stowing it in my pocket until the last minute. I had to surrender it completely. But by then I was walking this fine line between cool actor on set and complete basketcase breakdown. So I hoisted onto the balcony with my bloody hands in front of me, and as they called the regular sequence of the shot—"picture's up......rolling!......speed!.....xxx scene 26 take two!"—I was summoning those opening chords in my head and picking one new memory of the last three years to focus on (mostly Barry, but stuff about Jody's dad as well, and my mom, and even some stuff that Jody and I dealt with).

And the tears came powerfully, and I sobbed, and we'd shoot the scene, and at "CUT!" I would just cut it off and hitch it back and STOP. Which was not too hard, because the scene ended with me pitching over the side of the balcony, falling a distance of about a foot and a half, and landing with a quiet "thud" on these two gymnasts' mats they'd stacked up. And that sideways "thud" was a weird enough sensation that it jogged these other thoughts right out of my head. And it was a bit of a relief to stop crying each time, but I was going so hard to the well that there was a lot more that wanted to come out, so it hurt a little bit to keep it in as well. But stopping each time was the way to go, because we did 9 takes from one angle and 3 from the other, and I was able to start it up again at the top and sob through every damn one.

I felt guilty the whole time. I asked myself if I was betraying someone—it certainly felt like I was cheapening my father's death or the like. But at the same time, I thought, "this is my job, I have to get there, anything is fair game." I'm sure Barry would have told me USE IT! USE YOUR LIFE! So I made my peace with it.

And then I was wrapped, and the director came over to personally thank me for giving him what I did for the scene. It's going to wind up being all of three seconds on camera, but I hope they pull in close for those three seconds. A lot of work went into them. Plus, I really hate watching TV and seeing someone making fake crying noises and they're not really crying. It's not an easy thing to do, and that's fine, but if you're not in that state, either GET in that state, or else play the scene the way you're actually feeling.

Okay, off my high horse now.

I was keyed up for the rest of the night, probably because I never let it all out. After being in that manic state for over an hour, letting out and then pulling it back, my body really wanted that final release. I could have sat in my trailer and blubbered, but it felt bizarre to try to trigger it at that point, and I was so tired, besides. So I called Jody as I was leaving the lot, and THAT triggered some of it, just telling her about the day, and I cried over the phone to her for a bit. And then she wisely took me out for a burger and a serious martini. The latter of which finally brought me down.

Okay, this is an absolute TOME, thanks for reading this far, I hope it's not too self-indulgent, but it actually helped me to write it all down. And as I said, more posts in the coming days, promise. :)