Big Helium Dog
A DIARY (PART ONE)

Thursday Night, approximately 11:30 PM: While chatting with Vincent on the net, he invites us to come down to the Big Helium Dog (BHD) set for a day of filming on Saturday. We cheerfully accept.

Friday Night, 10:35 PM: We receive the final times and places to meet up, and learn that Brian Lynch, the BHD director, will meet us at the production offices in Red Bank around 7:30. We've got a 3 hour drive to Red Bank, so we plan on leaving around 3:00 AM to give us some breathing room.

Saturday Morning, 2:30 AM: We wake up.

3:17 AM: After a quick update to the page to explain our absence, we hop into the car and depart for Red Bank.

3:30 AM: We think about stopping for a disposable camera, then decide we might not have the time. (Note: We will later discover this is quite a mistake. Notice the unfortunate lack of photos on this page.) By the way, if anyone on the crew could send us any stills or negatives for this page please let us know.

4:50 AM: We realize that we're doing 90 MPH.

4:51 AM: We decide that it might be a good idea to slow down.

4:55 AM: We enter the state of New Jersey. Aside: Isn't it funny that they let you INTO Jersey for free, but you have to pay to leave?

6:09 AM: We arrive in Red Bank and park the car directly in front of the famous "Jay And Silent Bob's Secret Stash". The town is pretty dead at this hour and nothing is open, except...

6:20 AM: The Broadway Diner. Ahhh, breakfast. This is allegedly the diner that Kevin and the View Askew Crew stop by at quite often, since it's within walking distances of the View Askew Offices, which we can see from here. We order some coffee and food.

6:35 AM: We eat and drink our coffee as the Princess Diana funeral plays on a small black and white TV (with surprisingly good sound). A waitress pulls up a chair to watch Elton John sing.

7:05 AM: We leave the diner and proceed to drive around the town to kill a few minutes. We spot a Dunkin Donuts and decide to stop and buy a dozen for the crew as a nice gesture.

7:15 AM: We park in front of the BHD production offices on Monmouth Street and walk up to the third floor. Upon entering, we notice 2 folks sleeping on chairs (Set designers who were up all night working) and a couple other folks milling about, cleaning up and such. We drop off the donuts and hang back.

• The Big Helium Dog production office has a large cast list of over 80 hanging on the wall, surrounded by head shots of the various actors and actresses involved in the flick. It's quite a cast! The front end of the room appears to have a set of a large discussion table, complete with microphones and chairs. We're not sure what this is for at this point.

7:30 AM: BHD crew & actors start showing up in the offices. Before we know it, there's about 20 people in the room with us and most of the donuts are gone. We try and figure out which one of the guys is Brian Lynch. When 8:00 (set departure time) draws closer...

8:00 AM: We take a stab and finally meet Brian. He offers us a ride over to Vincent's house (where ALL of today's filming will take place) and we head to the elevator in a flash.

8:10 AM: We're en route to Vincent's now! Brian expects us to have quite a few questions for him about the flick, so we start to ask about the disppearance of the BHD web site, the status of the flick, what it's about, etc, etc...Here's what we learned:

• Well, we first learned we didn't have enough questions. Brian expected quite a few more from us, I suppose, but we were happy with the info that we did get. We didn't have a tape recorder, so none of this information is quoted or verbatim, rather just a general idea of the answer that we got...
  
  
• At first, when we asked about the website and production of the film, Brian continued to say "Everything is fine", yet with a slight tone of sarcasm (Which we soon discover is Brian's general demeanor...He's quite the jokester). We never really found out why the website disappeared, but filiming is going ahead of schedule and will finish up THIS Thursday, September 11th.
  
  
• The plot, he tells us, is impossible to explain. BHD, he says, has a continuing theme but is also broken up into smaller skits, similar to a Monty Python or Kids in the Hall movie, which he said inspired him when he wrote the movie. We differ on the fact that "Kids in the Hall: Brain Candy" was a good movie (I hated it, Brian loved it), and Brian promised that there's something in BHD that will offend everyone.
  
  
• Miramax will have first look at BHD when it's finished. If they decline, Brian will shop the movie around to look for a distributor. He says it's coming out in 1998, but will still be the best movie of 1997. As we said, most of what Brian says is tongue-in-cheek, which we got used to quickly, but realized we should have taken advantage of the opportunity when he promised to answer 3 of our questions seriously, since we never got the chance again.
  
  
• All in all, Brian's a really funny guy, which will certainly reflect in the movie as well. He took the time to talk to us as the day continued when he had a chance, but as director was also obviously quite busy. We'll have some more info from Brian when we get the chance to talk again.

8:20 AM: We pull up in front of the famous Quick Stop (yes, RST video IS right next door) for Brian to pick up an Asbury Park Press. He searches for an article on the flick, but it's nowhere to be found. The article should be in there in the next few days, he says. Hopefully someone can send us a copy.

8:25 AM: We arrive at Vincent's house. Vincent's a really nice guy; he lets us take a look at some of his imported horror laserdiscs and we chat for a little while, as we wait for the rest of the crew to arrive. Vincent will be playing a character called "The Cigarette Fairy" in BHD. Yes, we know it sounds strange, but it makes sense when you see it.

(Times from now on will be approximated, due to the fact we didn't have a watch on set.)

Around 8:30 AM: As Vincent and Brian talk outside and start to set up the shot, we talk with an actor, Kris VanCleave, who will appear in the first scene being shot today. He's got a smaller part of a trucker, with just a few lines here and there. Kris tells us that he plays in a band and is hoping to have one of their original tunes appear in the movie somewhere.

Around 8:45 AM: The first shot, which takes place on the front stairs of Vincent's house and involves Kris delivering one line, is underway! We're VERY impressed, by the way, with the level of professionalism on a film of this size. Of course, we've never been to a movie shoot before, but seeing how it all worked was amazing, and everyone on the crew really had their act together.

Around 9:00 AM: After a few takes (as well as the often used "safety take"), the first shot is complete! Meanwhile, Vincent has disappeared to the makeup area (behind the house) for his transformation into The Cigarette Fairy. As we stand on the street, we see a truck slowly drive by and park, and out steps Kevin Smith and Kim Loughran!

CLICK HERE FOR PART TWO!

You'll hear about Kevin's scenes, the elusive Cigarette Fairy, bikini girls, and our big motion picture debut! See you then!