The importance of reading instructions

I have just spent two days filming three short instructional films for people on oil rigs –in both English and Norwegian versions, which reminds of those very early days of sound film when several language versions of a film would be made on the same set. I have, for instance, some Laurel & Hardy films which the boys perform in both English and Spanish. Well, the Laurel & Hardy analogy is good for the filming we did over the course of the two days. I was the clumsy one who doesn’t read the instructions, so I guess that makes me Laurel. My screen wife (who is not pictured) was the clever one. We shot one of the films on exotic location Oslo’s main park, and the other two in interiors, where one of my tasks was to assemble an Ikea chest of drawers. This being no easy feat for someone like me,  I used method acting to at least give the illusion that I looked like I knew what I was doing! Much of the actual assembly was however done by the camera man between takes. At the end of the day, the chest of drawers stood there, stubbornly, like the black column in 2001 - A Space Odyssey, and just as foreboding. Nobody wanted to disassemble it, or take it away, so it remains where it was built. However, one gentle push will probably send the whole thing crashing back to its default state of countless bits of wood,  screws and bolts.

Just how this is going to enlighten and enthuse those hardy souls on board oil-rigs in the North Sea is beyond me, but at least it pays next month’s rent.