Kassandra's images - 4

And there it is: new pictures from Kassandra's set.

You can also see more images here, here and here.

Actor Leandro Lefa and director Ulisses Costa in the set

Renata Stein and Blá-Blá, the doll

Improvising a curtain for a point of view shot

A ghostly image

Leandro Lefa geting into the character

Kassandra's Feelings - III - the shooting

Renata Stein's impressions during the filming of Kassandra. Her impressions about the rehearsels can be read here and here.

Day One:

It was a hard day, actually, I've got a little "soft" on the set. It seems that it took all day to get used to working with so many people in the room of Kassandra’a home. Nevertheless, I believe that I did reach the mood of the life of Kassandra quickly. But it made ​​me quiet throughout the day, which left me a little "down".

The focus helped me in the most difficult scene of the day, Scene 5, when I needed to cry, and even then it was complicated. I felt sensitive to every situation, I got involved, but the tears did not come so easy. I also know that much of this difficulty is because of the many cuts that have between one and take another. The few tears came after a look from director Ulisses. It helped me think I might be disappointing him.

The presence of my colleague Maico made ​​me feel better since he was one of the few people I knew and felt comfortable as Kassandra. I arrived on set already preparing myself for Kassandra, most of the people I knew right there and I had no opportunity to mingle with them. So it seemed that only Maico and Ulisses believed in my work, and it made ​​me more reclusive.

Talking with the director, we realize that this is one of the differences between theater and cinema. There are many people working on the set, each with a function and concentrated entirely on it, lots of breaks to change the camera and light and I, in this case, alone without other actors, trying to concentrate. In the theater we got months of preparation and testing, always with the same actors, creating a confidence relationship.

I came home exhausted and extremely sensitive.

Day Two:

Today it was lighter, in terms of concentration and sensitivity. I got more comfortable on the set and Maico came early, and Susana Witt and Leandro Lefa were there too. So I laughed and I relax more, but I did find it harder to concentrate in certain scenes later. I realized that no matter how hard it is to be Kassandra, you need a lot of concentration to be her. So I went back a little to a self seclusion.

What were heavy today were the attack scenes, escapes and other disaster. It means a lot of beating and as a result, many wounds. There were some complicated scenes with birds, after all, it seems that they all had a problem similar to that of Kassandra...

Day Three:

Behold the Great Man. Today he decided to appear. We recorded the scenes with him, ande the ones with blood.

What a strange and awkward day. I do not know, or better, we can not say why, but it was weird. I also thought the director was more impatient today (will he allow me to post this?).

Today I thought I didn’t give everything. I think it was exhaustion. Being Kassandra is not easy. And despite all the tiredness, at the end of the recordings I stayed there on set. Laziness? Farewell? Or is it just Ramona’s wonderful snacks and Maico’s massage that holded me there?

Kassandra now only in the coming months with more blood and color.

I am very grateful to all staff that is giving life to this Ulisses’ dream that now is also mine.

Music on the set

There was solid certainly even about Kassandra’s shooting even before Roger Monteiro presented the first draft of the script, and that is we would make the scenes with music.

The film has little dialogue and most of its sound will be recorded in post-production, which allowed the presence of music on the set. The idea was well received by the crew as a whole, especially by composer Chico Pereira (pic), who made a playlist to run not only as the scenes while shooting, but also in the intervals. Renata Stein also enjoyed the idea: she could choose her own music for the emotional scenes, helping her performance.

Below are two examples of the songs played during Kassandra’s filming. The first is a piece of Phillip Glass, one of the references collected by Chico, and the second is the theme from Requiem For A Dream, composed by Clint Mansell, chose by Renata to play in a few moments of the film:

Metamorphosis - Phillip Glass

Lux Aeterna - Clint Mansell

The movie inside the movie

A simple detail on Kassandra’s script ended up creating a whole new monster, with the biggest proportions possible. It was right there, in Roger Monteiro’s script, in the scene 7: the neighbor, played by Leandro Lefa, is in front of the TC watching a “porn movie of questionable taste”.

We could have simply hided the TV or used any erotic vídeo. But director Ulisses da Motta Costa decided to shoot some erotic scenes – but no hardcore, changing a bit the original concept, without sex.

“I took as reference the ‘Pornochanchada’, a popular Brazilian genre from late 70’s, early 80’s, that used to mix comedy, some action and plenty of nudity and, sometimes, even real sex”, explains Ulisses. “And anyways, we couldn’t make someone go through any embarrassment, but we could make it all funny. That’s why I invited a longtime friend, Elena Meneghetti, who, when we were in college, made a class work dressed as a dominatrix. She’s really humorous, perfect for what we needed.”

A frame from the original material

The scenes that will be used on Kassandra were shooted in a couple hours on Elena’s house. Maico Silveira made a small part as the man who is seduced by Elena. The crew and cast had such fun in the shooting that when the producer Ramona Barcellos called to know if everything was ok, all she heard was laughter.

The crew was improvised: besides Ulisses directing, the producer Roberto Coutinho made the cinematographt, the publicist Daniel Coutinho was the set producer, the composer Chico Pereira edited the video. The only one on her function was the costume designer Giulia De Cesero, who also made art direction.

In no time, what was to be a small scene turned into a “bigger project”: a fake trailer of a Pornochanchada set in Porto Alegre (usually, those genre was made in Rio de Janeiro or in São Paulo). Not just that: even artistic pseudonyms are being thought to make the 70s vibe even more alive. Not counting, obviously, more characters and scenes.

“I got why people used to make Pornochanchadas at that time: it’s so much fun, even thou the movies were awful”, says Roberto Coutinho. “It´s a challenge to make something purposely poorly made”, Ulisses states. “That’s why the improvised crew was essential for the bad visual results.” Chico Pereira, responsible for editing the little “treasure” got the difficulty. “I was editing right the scenes when I thought: no, I have to unlearn everything I know”, tells him.

New scenes will be made on the breaks of Kassandra’s shooting. Wait for it!

About the cast: Luis Franke

 

Somewhen, during the footage of Kassandra, the following dialogue happened between actor Luis Franke and director Ulisses da Motta Costa:

Ulisses: You do know I’m a nonsense director, don’t you?

Luis: No. You have some sense. Some.

A few minutes later:

Ulisses: Luisão, do you know why I’m a nonsense director?

Luis: Why?

Ulisses: Because only a nonsense person would call an actor two times winner of the Açorianos Award to play a character that… doesn’t speak.

Luis Franke is the mysterious Big Man: a man with huge proportions, whose only purpose is a mystery to the main character, once he usually appears as a threat. “Kassandra is a walk through the real and the imagination, the lucidity and madness, the fight and the encounter with our real ‘me’”, defines the actor.

 

During the rehearsals, Luis was worried discussing the meaning of each character and their actions along the narrative. He wanted to know the role of the Big Man related to Kassandra: “I think my character represents the sleeping courage in her, which will be awake whenever she needs”, said.

Wanted by cinema, publicity, television and, of course, theater, Luisão won one Açoriano Award (a theater award in Brazil) for his work on the play O Sobrado – as a supporting actor – and another, for best actor, in an adaptation of Heinrich von Kleist’s The Broken Jug. 

He praises the whole cast and crew: “I have the biggest pleasure on being in the cast of Kassandra. The high level crew, coordinated by the great Ulisses Costa, who directed the process beautifully, allowed all the actors to connect with their characters and reach the deepest point of their minds. Acting with the young Renata Stein and my friends Maico Silveira and Leandro Lefa was, more than anything, an honor”.

About the cast: Suzana Witt

Renata Stein is not the only girl in Kassandra's cast. She's followed by Suzana Witt, who plays two different roles in the movie.

It's not mere coincidence that both the actresses study together, at the Dramatic Art Department in the Rio Grande do Sul Federal University. Suzana already worked a couple of times with director Ulisses da Motta Costa as assistent director. One of these works was a web series in wich Suzana called Renata for an audition. Eventually the web series was not released, but it was in the audition that Renata met Ulisses and most of the Kassandra's crew. By the way, she was aproved in the audition for one of the main characters. 

From assistent director, Suzana was promoted to actress. "In our earlier works, I was used to work behind the cameras", she says. "In Kassandra was different, but not that much. In the end, cast and crew are one". A curiosity: she and the costume designers Isabela Boessio and Giulia De Cesero were high school colleagues. To choose a costume for a prostitute (one of Suzana's roles) was a great fun for them.

Thou it is a quick appearance, the prostitute's scene was complicated. Suzana didn't have the time to rehearse with her partner, Leandro Lefa. Also, the dialogue indicated in the screenplay was vague: "a discussion with obscene terms". Both the actors and Ulisses conceived the scene just before it was made. 

In the first take, Suzana turned to Lefa and spoke out loud:

- Honey, this is way more expensive!

The crew had to hold the laughing until the "cut".

Kassandra's Images - 2

More pictures from Kassandra's filming, starring Renata Stein's with her thousand faces. Check out for more pictures here.

 Marker and action.

Leandro Lefa in scene.

Ulisses da Motta Costa directing.

"Calm down, Kassandra. It's just the world outside".

Bye-bye! See you in the next post!