Being A PA On A Movie Set

Last weekend, I had the privilege of working on a short film set. A friend of my mentor's friend needed PAs (Production Assistants) on set so I drove down to South Gate with one of my friends (who was doing Grip and Electric on the shoot) and spent 24 hours over the course of 2 days at a horse farm. Here's the story of one of those days.

10 a.m.: I woke up and had breakfast, got dressed in jeans, sneakers, and a work-out shirt and went to my friend's apartment. We left around 11 a.m. since we had to be on set at noon.

Noon: After driving for about 45 minutes, my friend and I arrived at the farm. There wasn't anyone there besides another Grip and two other people. The rest of the crew started filing in around 12:30-1 and we got to work setting up the first scene. The Grip guys lit everything and I was charged with assisting the Art Department.

The first task I was given was to fill a shelf behind a desk with old books and put fake dust on it to make it look old. After that, I had to clean a window so more light could get through and almost choked on dust in the process.

The horse farm that we were inhabiting for the weekend was full of dust and with riding lessons still going on, it was floating around in the air. I grabbed a carpentry dust mask and got to work moving things around. My contacts were so irritated, but I forced myself to cry to keep them moist.

2 p.m.: By then, we had finished the first scene of the day and began setting up the next one. We were supposed to have lunch, but we didn't know where the food was, so we were forced to wait. The thing about a set, especially if you're a PA or a Grip is there's a lot of waiting around.

You're only needed when someone needs you, so the time that's spent not running around for someone is spent sitting. Thankfully, we were at a farm with plenty of horses so my friend and I would wander off every so often to the stables to pet them. He was as hot and tired as I was, if not more.

It was about 92 degrees that day (if it wasn't 92, I'd be surprised) so we were guzzling water and keeping to the shade to keep cool. The barn provided some much-needed reprieve from the sun.

5 pm: Around dinnertime, the dinner still hadn't arrived. We decided to press on and began setting up a scene in a long wide alleyway. I parted from my Grip friend again and just cleaned up 'Crafty' (a huge table with food on it) to make room for the food that was inevitably going to arrive.

I chatted with the other PAs, the wardrobe lady, and the make-up lady for a bit and heard their life stories. It's fun to see where people come from on a set. One of my fellow PAs was the manager of a frozen yogurt store that Shia LaBeouf frequents, the other one was a student fresh out of college, and the other moved to LA after college and just stayed, bouncing from set to set. Somehow, some way, we all ended up here.

7 pm: After we realized that dinner was never going to come (the director's mother was supposed to make it for us), we ordered Domino's and destroyed all 20 pizzas in about 20 minutes. There's only so many Nature Valley bars and fruit snacks you can eat from Crafty until you want actual food.

The Grips, including my friend, actually got so fed up with waiting that they went to Chipotle. After dinner, we began to film the alleyway scene which lasted all the way until-

Midnight: I was sitting next to my friend in the 60-degree weather (which, in California, is cold) watching the scene unfold in front of us. We had nothing to do besides sit there and since my friend wasn't getting paid, the Key Grip told him he could leave at midnight. I drove with him so I asked the head of the Art Department if I could go home–I wasn't doing anything anyway. She told me to drive safe and that she would see me tomorrow.

So my friend and I got to drive home a little after midnight. I'd learn the next day that the rest of the cast and crew ended up going home around 2 a.m. Overall, being on set was a great experience, but I don't know if I'm in a hurry to get back any time soon.