Torchwood: Week Nine Production

Production: Week Nine:

Monday
Torchwood hits the beach! It was one of those rare occasions when the production was in an open place, with members of the public appearing in the background if they so wished (as long as they agreed to the conditions laid out on the notices!).

Eve Myles and Mekhi Phifer were on location today, with filming taking place by the DogTown skate park on Venice Beach. Tweets from Dichen Lachman suggested she was enjoying the beach, too!
16:00 AF After thinking it was going to rain all weekend,
the sun today feels SO good. :)
11:03 AF Hard at work! http://t.co/yTJcP8P
11:08 AF http://t.co/LVMiLg7
11:18 MP shooting on venice beach right now...
was supposed to rain but we been blessed with sunshine.
11:45 AF The sun is warm and lovely, but wind is a bit chilly. :)
14:53 AF GAH! Sandstorm! O_O
14:55 AF Pre-sandstorm! http://t.co/fgdTHQB
17:52 AS Cold, sun and wind burnt. Still its so beautiful. Yay for the beach.
18:37 AF I miraculously managed to get thru it without any kamikaze grains
going for my contact lenses! :D
18:47 AF I think this is my favorite photo I took of Venice Beach while down
at the #Torchwood shoot today. ALIEN SEAGULLS! :-) http://t.co/sxZMt3r

Paul Sauser was also on hand to see some of the action at the skate park, including Eve Myles apparently being filmed as Gwen on her mobile. Additional photos of her were published by Caught on Set.
 

Tuesday - Wednesday

Chazz Sutton, via Plixi
After such a public location on Monday, the production disappeared into relative obscurity once more. However, it was possible to infer that one of the units was present at the Inglewood Forum based on snatches of conversation on Twitter:
07 20:48 CS Working a show for Starz called Torchwood
tomorrow in Inglewood. I just Google searched
it... seems very intriguing
*scratches fake goatee*
08 18:01 CS I just shook Lonestar's hand #Winning
08 20:13 CS The end to a long ass day which I so needed.
It's good to be paid.
So grateful to be called back for tomorrow.
08 23:11 CS Yeah 14 hours on set was no joke.
So exhausting but was awesome to be part of
somethin so hush hush.
Also met great new peeps. Recall baby!
09 13:07 CS Adventures in extras holding. So exciting.

Allyson Floyd chatted a little bit about the life of a stand-in:
08 14:53 AF I spent more time wrangling with UPS today than I spent on set! :P Oy.
08 23:07 AF I'm literally not there at all, lol! Stand-ins are only used to set up
camera angles and lighting!
08 23:19 AF I've done kind of a ridiculous amount of extra work though...
if you knew where to look, you'd see the back of my head everywhere!
08 23:20 AF And a few places where I'm pretty recognizable, but it would be
too tedious to look up all the episode #'s and movies.
11 01:15 AF I generally stand in for one of the main cast, so that usually puts me
there several days a week.

Meanwhile, the BBC Production Office were prepping for two kinds of activity later in the week ...
08 14:45 BBC We have a birthday coming up soon, 3 days to be exact.
Mission #3 get JB the perfect gift. Are surprises still classy?
Oh the possibilities!
09 18:38 BBC Wonderfully productive day! RTD is typing away and we're prepping two units.
Phones are ringing! Carpal tunnel arising! Action galore.

Thursday

Matthew Arnold, via YFrog
Two locations were listed for activity Thursday, the James Oviatt Building (home to the Cicada Restaurant), and the Yard, a kick-boxing club - however, reports indicated other locations were visited throughout the day, with at least two units operating! Matthew Arnold reported that filming was taking place on a street at his uncle's, and this unit included Alexa Havins.

Meanwhile, another unit had to contend with a minor disaster on set:
09 17:18 AF Then it's back to work on the set of
#Torchwood: MD tomorrow!
10 09:56 AS Another early morning. Yawn!
But I have my honey with me today. :)
10 12:22 AS A water main just broken now there's a river
running thru set. Too bad the waters nasty or
I would run thru it like the 10 yr old I am. LOL
11 13:00 BBC A water main broke at our 2nd Unit location,
a cool looking salvage yard. Awesome location
11 13:04 BBC The water leak had nothing to do with us!!
It was just a crazy random event.
11 14:27 AF I missed out on that! I had a later calltime. ^_^ 

BBC, via Twitpic
Another location in use turned out to be the Los Angeles City Hall again, with John Barrowman and Ernie Hudson present; John was later to receive two big cakes for his birthday on Friday (celebrated UK time!)
10 17:43 ST A bit quiet here shooting a 6 page scene.
Amazing actor with John today.
Both are intense. Really great writing too.
Beautiful location too.
10 19:01 ST Entire crew just sang @Team_Barrowman happy birthday
and presented him a cake with candles.
Lots of joy and laughter. Now we r on the move.
10 19:16 ST A glimpse of vintage LA I love this city :-)
10 20:00 ST I can't say where til tomorrow when we r gone :-)
12 08:00 ST LA City Hall

10 23:02 BBC Mission #3 SUCCESS! A surprise TWO cakes
and we gave John the day off tomorrow.
Happy Birthday!
10 23:54 JB Hello from LA
10 23:55 JB Thanks for all the birthday wishes..
6 more minutes till the actual bday
10 23:57 JB Going to bed then of to Palm Springs tomorrow
for celebrations with Mom and dad and family.
10 23:59 JB been very busy filming and feel bad
I have not tweeted. hope to rectify that.
11 00:00 JB Dont ask Torchwood questions as I cant answer...
DUH!!!
But get to Comic con if you can..

Friday

Daryl Crittenden, via YFrog
As mentioned above, Friday was a day off for John Barrowman as it was his birthday, but work continued for the rest of the cast and crew as usual.

10:32 ST Concept meeting for episode 7.
Creativity is not only coming up with a brilliant story
it's bringing it to life on a budget. Oye!!
14:28 DC Heading to set on #Torchwood today....
time to make the doughnuts!
17:08 ST Hint pink flamingo
18:50 DC This is a light post. Only a lightpost. #Torchwood
18:51 DC Ps had a blueberry doughnut yum. #Torchwood

Filming also continued around the Yard, as observed by Dina Kampmeyer:
11 19:01 Okay, trying not freak out, but torchwood is filming 20 feet away from me.
If my bf can get me on set, i may just freak.
12 14:45 I was having a drink at Villains & they were filming next door.
They were packing up, but I was there!
12 14:47 The set was all dark & dank. Looks like maybe a basement or tunnels
where creepy aliens would hide.

Finally, we're pleased to include a special report on life as an extra, courtesy of Maria Zambrana:
Read Maria's Report:
I worked on the second unit of "Torchwood: Miracle Day" last night, (Ep5, I believe?), as one of about 150 people for the night shoot. We didn't have to sign a confidentiality agreement like I did in Episode 1 (two months ago), but common sense dictates that it'd be wise not to go into extreme detail, no?

We were shooting on "French Street" on the Warner Bros. lot (that's a street name not the location setting!), and our holding was this empty building on the corner. The room filled up pretty quickly so, despite it being a bit chilly, others took their folding chairs and lined up along the sidewalks. I found that the "store" next to this one was empty, so I simply went in there and had the place to myself. A props cart was set up right outside the door where we picked up a few items.

There were some background people there that performed two or three different roles and got there around 3pm or so, and another lump of people brought in just for the one scene (7:45pm., 8pm., etc.). We were ostensibly broken up into groups (Group A, Group B, etc.) but that's just a basic early-stage organizational thing; by the time filming takes place, you're just swept up en masse into the action. The only thing that matters is your call time... as in, the 3pm. call time allowed the earlier people to be dismissed earlier. Also, they got lunch - we didn't get any food on set, save for some people who scavenged their leftovers before catering threw them away (this food-raid done at the encouragement of one of the A.D.s, incidentally, who was rather put off by the fact that catering was not available to everyone).

(This is why I always make sure to eat before I go to a set, and to bring my own water. You can't rely on a production to take care of you. I was on the set of final episode of "24" and the entire building ran out of toilet paper. Guess who the only extra was that brought their own roll that day?)

Eve Myles was the only main cast member on our part of the lot; there were two units, ours and another over at Warner Ranch, but I've no idea what they were shooting or who with. At one point, upon finding out that one of our number was a big "Doctor Who" and "Torchwood" fan, she took a few minutes to pose with and take photos with the guy, which put him on Cloud 9! So sweet of her to do that.

All in all, though, the shoot went well. We all did one rehearsal walking around the block, past our holding area, and back to our starting positions. Then we made three or four more circles, wearing and carrying our props (aw, c'mon, why should I spoil what they were?). And we were done! Check-in to sign-out was about six hours, and a good four of those hours was wasted at wardrobe and holding.

Source - Dr who news page