Monday September 9th and Ralph Stoffers, Carol Dewey, Dave and Kathleen Shirley, Louisa and I are at the club at 7.00am on a cold Monday morning – not the time we would normally bowl. But this is no normal bowling day – this is bowling in a movie!
That was the first day of shooting on the made for TV movie ‘Rocky Road’ –a story about a young executive who loses his high flying job in the city and returns to his small town home to help his father run an ailing ice cream business. So what’s the connection with lawn bowling?
The script calls for the male lead, played by Mark Salling from the show Glee, to be challenged to a game of lawn bowls ( I have no idea why). So we were supposed to be bowling in the background as the actors played out their scenes. But, to our surprise, we were required for walk on parts and to actually appear on camera as well as provide background bowling scenes. I have to say that we were awesome! If our scenes ever make it past the cutting room floor you will see what I mean. If we are left on the cutting room floor you’ll just have to take my word for it.
Lots of the bowling scenes were fake in that we could not bowl the length of the green. Because of cameras and other equipment we could only roll our bowls about 20 feet, so our bowling action looked more like it was short mat bowling rather than regular lawn bowling.
We had fun and it was interesting to see how things are done on a movie set but there was an awful lot of waiting around and I could not believe how many times we had to repeat a scene. The Assistant Director kept coming to us and saying “that was great lawn bowlers but we’re just going to have to do it again”. A pity the professional actors couldn’t get it right!
The location for the movie is supposed to be Vermont so anything that showed Cobourg or anything Canadian had to be moved. That’s why the US flag was flying and the Cobourg Lawn Bowling Club sign was turned back to front.
On Wednesday September 18th the crew was back at the club to film an internal scene where some of the actors were playing cards in the club house. We were not involved in that but I was there throughout to keep an eye on things.
The windfall for the club was the fees we were paid for the use of the club. In addition to the fees for the two days of filming we also picked up fees for use of the washrooms on three days when scenes were being shot in Church Street and in Victoria Park.
I managed to get some photos and there is a slide show below.
That was the first day of shooting on the made for TV movie ‘Rocky Road’ –a story about a young executive who loses his high flying job in the city and returns to his small town home to help his father run an ailing ice cream business. So what’s the connection with lawn bowling?
The script calls for the male lead, played by Mark Salling from the show Glee, to be challenged to a game of lawn bowls ( I have no idea why). So we were supposed to be bowling in the background as the actors played out their scenes. But, to our surprise, we were required for walk on parts and to actually appear on camera as well as provide background bowling scenes. I have to say that we were awesome! If our scenes ever make it past the cutting room floor you will see what I mean. If we are left on the cutting room floor you’ll just have to take my word for it.
Lots of the bowling scenes were fake in that we could not bowl the length of the green. Because of cameras and other equipment we could only roll our bowls about 20 feet, so our bowling action looked more like it was short mat bowling rather than regular lawn bowling.
We had fun and it was interesting to see how things are done on a movie set but there was an awful lot of waiting around and I could not believe how many times we had to repeat a scene. The Assistant Director kept coming to us and saying “that was great lawn bowlers but we’re just going to have to do it again”. A pity the professional actors couldn’t get it right!
The location for the movie is supposed to be Vermont so anything that showed Cobourg or anything Canadian had to be moved. That’s why the US flag was flying and the Cobourg Lawn Bowling Club sign was turned back to front.
On Wednesday September 18th the crew was back at the club to film an internal scene where some of the actors were playing cards in the club house. We were not involved in that but I was there throughout to keep an eye on things.
The windfall for the club was the fees we were paid for the use of the club. In addition to the fees for the two days of filming we also picked up fees for use of the washrooms on three days when scenes were being shot in Church Street and in Victoria Park.
I managed to get some photos and there is a slide show below.