This year’s upcoming Muir Movie, “Caught in the Act,” is a comedy about a student playwright, Alex, whose script is chosen to be performed at the undergraduate play festival. But this victory comes with a personal twist — he writes a play hoping to win the love of his life when she stars in the leading role.
The film, written by fourth-year theater and visual arts double-major Oakley Anderson-Moore, who co-directed, is about “people our age” and “the subculture of theater,” she said — a world with which much of the cast of Muir Movie is intimately acquainted.
Fourth-year theater major Allison Dana stars as Francesca, nicknamed “Chucka,” the warm and captivating girl for whom Alex is head over heels. The plot may sound quite romantic, but there’s one problem — Alex is a compulsive liar. Will his lies pave the way for a love-story success or bring about his downfall when Francesca finds out about his wily ways?
Fourth-year visual arts major Nick Louie, the other co-director, is bent on not giving anything away. Going over film footage in the dimly lit editing room of the Media Center last Saturday night, he modestly declined to advertise the movie. Louie said that he learned to think critically through his classes at UCSD, but learned the technical aspects of filmmaking through his work with Muir Movie. Students involved, according to Louie, turned to Muir Movie looking for a creative outlet that 10-minute clips made for classes couldn’t provide.
It turned out to be painstaking labor. The directors woke every cast member at 7 a.m. every Saturday and Sunday, and didn’t get home until late at night. Casting for the movie began in fall 2005, and filming continued until early spring — then the arduous editing process began. The final product should be only 50 minutes long, so a huge amount of film had to be edited out.
Anderson-Moore said that this year’s cast, totaling 15 to 20 members, was the result of a more extensive casting effort than any of the previous three years. Everyone is encouraged to audition, but when mere encouragement falls flat, Anderson-Moore said, “You just [have] to bribe them to come.”
Since John Muir College provides most of the funding, the name of the organization is Muir Movie, but about half the members aren’t actually from the college.
Alex is played by fourth-year theater major Steven Lone, a familiar face among undergraduate actors, having been in several plays, including “Measure for Measure,” “As You Like It” and “Closer” (as well as other cabarets in the San Diego community). Before coming to UCSD, Lone was in other semiprofessional acting roles in San Francisco where he made a “small living off acting.”
Anderson-Moore said that although Lone was “originally too good-looking to play the role we had in mind, he essentially blew us away at audition.”
Despite the technical difficulties of filming, such as angling lighting, choosing a location, battling daylight and, especially, scheduling with all the actors, both directors hope that the making has been fun for all involved.
“There might be gratuitous nudity shots,” Lone said. “Let’s just say there’s a lot of extra footage they could blackmail me for.”
“Caught In The Act” will screen for free on May 10 at Price Center Theater at 8 p.m.
[Editor’s note: Oakley Anderson-Moore is a senior staff writer for the Guardian.]