The Hughie Diaries... Part 1

This terrifying terpsichorian team: Hughie and Shannon, at the Wrap Party.

HOW THIS JOURNEY CAME ABOUT On a songwriting trip to Nashville, Tennessee in late 1995, I became good mates with a Mr. John Persinger. While celebrating John's birthday at his parents' place in Chattanooga, I met and became good friends with his sister Marshall. This friendship nearly led to my arrest and deportation for jumping a national park fence while the rangers were on strike, but a lenient sentence was passed. Our immediate release saw the continuation of our friendship. On my return to Australia I was asked by Marshall if I would like to witness the making of a movie. The movie would be filmed in Texas and had jazz music in it. I bought me a ticket and kept a diary.

--------------------------------------------------- MAY 5, 1996 I arrive in LA from Sydney, Australia, with one night's stopover there to attend the premier of the film "The Great White Hype." Then I fly to Nashville to spend a week introducing my Nashville friends to the art of consuming Autralian Bundaberg rum. One week later, I arrive back in LA. FRIDAY, MAY 10, 1996 It is 8:20 pm and I am lying on the couch in the back room of the house I am staying in while in LA. In the lounge room of this beautiful wooden-floored 1930's house are the actors who have been cast for the movie "Still Breathing." Tonight is the first time that the Director, Jim Robinson, shall hear his script read by actors. Anticipation is in the air as seats are taken and the cast and crew introduce each other and engage in polite conversation. Celeste Holm is not available for the reading of her role -- eccentric jazz-tuba-playing grandmother Ida -- so it is read by another actress of a similar age. Most of the other leading actors are here, though: Brendan Fraser, Joanna Going, Paolo Seganti, Angus MacFadyen, Ann Magnuson and Jeff Schweickert. Also here are Sxecutive Producers Joyce and Bud Schweickert, from Seattle. I recognise faces from different movies. Ann Magnuson is very friendly and tells me how she worked with Australian director Phillip Noyce on a recent movie with Harrison Ford called "Clear and Present Danger." Just arrived with his dad is a young boy who shall play the part of the boy who gives advice to Brendan Fraser's character, Fletcher. The boy and Brendan seem to develop an immediate rapport. A very confidant young lad who has his father by his side. sort of reminds me of a father taking his son down to the under-12's cricket match at the Gavonlock Oval early on a Saturday morning. Just a bit better paid in the movie, I guess. [Note: The scenes with the boy's character were omitted from the final cut of the film. ...Not to say that the boy isn't a fine batsman. --Webmaster.] "Absolutely not, you don't know me," reads Joanna Going (as Roz) in reply to an offer by Paolo Seganti (as Tomas) to buy her a painting worth lots of dollars. I get the impression that in reading through their parts of the script, the actors don't put the vibe into their reading that they will into their performance once rehearsals and filming take place. All new to me. I just had a slight scare. While the reading continued downstairs, I crept upstairs for a quick shower. As I tip-toed back down the wooden staircase, trying not to tread on the cracks that would make lots of noise, I remembered that the Director had left the taping of the rehearsal in my hands. I only hoped that the tape hadn't run its course, on side A, without me turning it over. Creeping down across the wooden floorboards, I was suddenly a teenager again, spending the night at my girlfriend's house, sneaking down the hall to her room, trying not to wake her mum and dad. There is a definite art to it. Stick to the walls. Stay close to the walls. The tape was turned over without any dramas. A strange plant smell comes in through the back window, which opens to the huge back yard. Marshall, "Still Breathing's" producer, has told me of how this house was once owned by an explorer -- or something like that -- for National Geographic Magazine. Apparently, he would bring back exotic animals from his expeditions and have them live in this expansive jungle-like yard. There is a Chinese bridge over what once must have been a stream that ran through it. The pages turn in the lounge room and chuckles are heard at humorous lines. Angus MacFadyen, who played Robert the Bruce in "Braveheart", comes out to the back room and asks quietly what I'm doing. I tell him I'm just writing in my diary, and we step out the back door for a little yarn. He lights up a cigarette and tells me that he is from Scotland, and recently spent time in Australia, ra ra ra ra ra... A real nice bloke. The reading goes on... and some more chuckles. I look forward to the red wine, Scotch and food that have been set out on the table. The reading is now over. Jim Robinson says a few words, and then conversation. "So, you have a boyfriend in LA." "Yes," she replies. "And you live in New York." As planned, I have a few Scotches, and one of my good friends from the production office, Shannon, and I make our way upstairs. I promised her that I would play her a few of my tunes on the old guitar. The songs and the Scotch are just taking hold when Marshall arrives and asks if I'd come downstairs and play a couple of my songs for the Schweickerts and Jim. ...No dramas. LA to a young Australian lad. A sharper edge to the people... a duller edge to the day. DRIVING IN LA I'm handed the keys to a hire car, as I am often called upon to deliver or pick up office supplies, checques, scripts or other stuff. On a couple of occasions I have fallen into an Australian train of thought and pulled into the left-hand side of the road, into oncoming traffic. No real dramas, as I am still alive. One night I take two and a half hours to deliver a script to a house that's twenty minutes up the road. "No worries. Yeh, I know where that is."

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			`This terrifying terpsichorian team: Hughie and Shannon, at the Wrap Party.`

	HOW THIS JOURNEY CAME ABOUT On a songwriting trip to Nashville, Tennessee in late 1995, I became good mates with a Mr. John Persinger. While celebrating John's birthday at his parents' place in Chattanooga, I met and became good friends with his sister Marshall. This friendship nearly led to my arrest and deportation for jumping a national park fence while the rangers were on strike, but a lenient sentence was passed. Our immediate release saw the continuation of our friendship. On my return to Australia I was asked by Marshall if I would like to witness the making of a movie. The movie would be filmed in Texas and had jazz music in it. I bought me a ticket and kept a diary.
	--------------------------------------------------- MAY 5, 1996 I arrive in LA from Sydney, Australia, with one night's stopover there to attend the premier of the film "The Great White Hype." Then I fly to Nashville to spend a week introducing my Nashville friends to the art of consuming Autralian Bundaberg rum. One week later, I arrive back in LA. FRIDAY, MAY 10, 1996 It is 8:20 pm and I am lying on the couch in the back room of the house I am staying in while in LA. In the lounge room of this beautiful wooden-floored 1930's house are the actors who have been cast for the movie "Still Breathing." Tonight is the first time that the Director, Jim Robinson, shall hear his script read by actors. Anticipation is in the air as seats are taken and the cast and crew introduce each other and engage in polite conversation. Celeste Holm is not available for the reading of her role -- eccentric jazz-tuba-playing grandmother Ida -- so it is read by another actress of a similar age. Most of the other leading actors are here, though: Brendan Fraser, Joanna Going, Paolo Seganti, Angus MacFadyen, Ann Magnuson and Jeff Schweickert. Also here are Sxecutive Producers Joyce and Bud Schweickert, from Seattle. I recognise faces from different movies. Ann Magnuson is very friendly and tells me how she worked with Australian director Phillip Noyce on a recent movie with Harrison Ford called "Clear and Present Danger." Just arrived with his dad is a young boy who shall play the part of the boy who gives advice to Brendan Fraser's character, Fletcher. The boy and Brendan seem to develop an immediate rapport. A very confidant young lad who has his father by his side. sort of reminds me of a father taking his son down to the under-12's cricket match at the Gavonlock Oval early on a Saturday morning. Just a bit better paid in the movie, I guess. [Note: The scenes with the boy's character were omitted from the final cut of the film. ...Not to say that the boy isn't a fine batsman. --Webmaster.] "Absolutely not, you don't know me," reads Joanna Going (as Roz) in reply to an offer by Paolo Seganti (as Tomas) to buy her a painting worth lots of dollars. I get the impression that in reading through their parts of the script, the actors don't put the vibe into their reading that they will into their performance once rehearsals and filming take place. All new to me. I just had a slight scare. While the reading continued downstairs, I crept upstairs for a quick shower. As I tip-toed back down the wooden staircase, trying not to tread on the cracks that would make lots of noise, I remembered that the Director had left the taping of the rehearsal in my hands. I only hoped that the tape hadn't run its course, on side A, without me turning it over. Creeping down across the wooden floorboards, I was suddenly a teenager again, spending the night at my girlfriend's house, sneaking down the hall to her room, trying not to wake her mum and dad. There is a definite art to it. Stick to the walls. Stay close to the walls. The tape was turned over without any dramas. A strange plant smell comes in through the back window, which opens to the huge back yard. Marshall, "Still Breathing's" producer, has told me of how this house was once owned by an explorer -- or something like that -- for National Geographic Magazine. Apparently, he would bring back exotic animals from his expeditions and have them live in this expansive jungle-like yard. There is a Chinese bridge over what once must have been a stream that ran through it. The pages turn in the lounge room and chuckles are heard at humorous lines. Angus MacFadyen, who played Robert the Bruce in "Braveheart", comes out to the back room and asks quietly what I'm doing. I tell him I'm just writing in my diary, and we step out the back door for a little yarn. He lights up a cigarette and tells me that he is from Scotland, and recently spent time in Australia, ra ra ra ra ra... A real nice bloke. The reading goes on... and some more chuckles. I look forward to the red wine, Scotch and food that have been set out on the table. The reading is now over. Jim Robinson says a few words, and then conversation. "So, you have a boyfriend in LA." "Yes," she replies. "And you live in New York." As planned, I have a few Scotches, and one of my good friends from the production office, Shannon, and I make our way upstairs. I promised her that I would play her a few of my tunes on the old guitar. The songs and the Scotch are just taking hold when Marshall arrives and asks if I'd come downstairs and play a couple of my songs for the Schweickerts and Jim. ...No dramas. LA to a young Australian lad. A sharper edge to the people... a duller edge to the day. DRIVING IN LA I'm handed the keys to a hire car, as I am often called upon to deliver or pick up office supplies, checques, scripts or other stuff. On a couple of occasions I have fallen into an Australian train of thought and pulled into the left-hand side of the road, into oncoming traffic. No real dramas, as I am still alive. One night I take two and a half hours to deliver a script to a house that's twenty minutes up the road. "No worries. Yeh, I know where that is."