Are there jobs you have regretted taking and if so why? Is listening to your gut an important part of accepting a job or not?
It is important to listen to your instincts about a project – there are certain people I would never work with based on past experiences, or on-set stories from people I know and trust. That being said, sometimes a job can sound like a disaster, but be completely fulfilling, so deciding to pass on a project isn’t always an easy, or correct decision.
That being said…I got called to do a job out of state, with a problematic director I’d worked with several times on commercials/music videos. He’d been difficult, but manageable on those short projects, but I’d heard stories of him on features that gave me pause. One this job, I’d be replacing an A-list operator that had either quit in frustration, or been fired a couple of weeks in, depending on who was telling the story. It was a massive feature, and as I didn’t have anything on the books, I decided to take it, with my plane leaving the next day.
I had a heart-to-heart conversation with the other operator who I very much respected on the van ride to work. He told me the project was a mess, and that the go-to aesthetic was, “When in doubt, shake the shit out of it…”. I arrived on set, and was involved in three huge setups before we actually rolled a foot of film. A massive shot would be set up, and the director would walk away. Someone would see him using his hands to line up a shot 100 yards away, and we’d scrap our shots, and walk down to meet him to see what he wanted to do…this repeated itself over and over.
There was yelling and chaos, and it was clearly a job I didn’t want to be a part of for a day, much less months, yet my first day on set was a Friday, and I couldn’t quit on my first day…so I decided to give it the weekend and see if things improved over the downtime. Of course, when Monday arrived, nothing had improved - the indecision, the screaming…it was not a happy set to be on, and I wouldn’t be part of it. However, we were filming a long way from a major production city, and it wasn’t easy to bring someone new in – in order not to put the DP in a bad spot, I decided I needed to hang on until Friday before quitting. That would give them the weekend to find someone qualified and get them to the location.
I talked to the DP at lunch on Friday and let him know that I needed to walk away at the end of the day. He told me that he was jealous, and that he couldn’t stand being there either. You never know how a decision like that might affect your career, but in my case, it wasn’t healthy to remain on a caustic and hostile set, and it was better to walk away as soon as I could, even though I didn’t have a job to go to.
When you first start out it’s hard to know what is right and what is wrong. All you want to do is work and you quite often simply take anything that comes along. But as you grow as an operator, you will start looking back at the good jobs and the bacd jobs and, if you are honest, you will likely start recognizing why you shouldn’t have taken the bad ones. Sometimes its not cut and dry but if you get top the point where you can pick and choose, listen to your gut. Sometimes things are better than they seem. Sadly “oh but it’s a really good script” can often be the wrong thing to hear. More often than not now, I follow my spider sense and say no when it’s tingling. Sometimes its the right call and sometimes not but there is usually something else, and often better that comes along.
Years ago I was called for a huge music video with an extremely well known rock star. I was told that paperwork would be sent that I had to read and sign. Ia assumed that is was the standard NDA but in fact it was about five pages of how you could and could not interact with this person. One of the things literally stated that you were not allowed to look him in the eye. I turned the job down because even though it was a big gig and a lot of money, I just felt that being in that kind of environment, one based on fear, didn’t seem like a healthy way to work. I’ve never regretted that decision and the stories I have heard since then confirmed that this is someone I didn’t want to be around.
Listening to your gut is the advice I received from my mentor, so I’ll agree. Yet, if you listen to money over your gut, any job builds your experience whether a good choice or not.
