Page 21 - AVN November 2023

If the scrubby hills around the remote location house look familiar, it’s because they’ve been standing in for Korea for decades, most recently in the M*A*S*H movie and TV show. Today, on the second day of a two-day shoot, Holly Randall is producing Hopeless here for her own company. It’s a vignette featuring Casey Calvert as a woman dealing with a recent breakup and Lumi Ray as the friend who helps her get over it.
Randall is relishing the independence of working for herself: “I’ve been in the industry a long time and I’ve worked for various companies for a long time. And even though I’m super appreciative of all the things that I’ve done, I’ve always kind of felt—a lot of people feel this—they’re kind of stifled by the corporate we-need- these-shots-we-need-this-we-need-that kind of bullshit. Jeff [director Jeffrey John Hart] has been my Director of Photography for quite a few years. We have worked really well together. We get these scripts, and we execute them, and we just talked about ‘What if we produce something? As low-budget as possible?’—We’re both funding this out of our own pockets.—’And just shoot something beautiful and see how that goes.’ I’m just producing this. He co-wrote it, he’s directing it, he’s shooting it. He’s basically doing everything—although I’m shooting the photos, nobody else is going to shoot the photos on my set. And I told him, ‘I’m just going to give you this opportunity to fulfill your vision because I think you can create something magical.’ He did the first day guerilla style, at Venice Beach and Santa Monica on the pier. Just run-and-gun, small crew, hand-held camera. Really beautiful stuff.
“This is a labor of love. We don’t expect to make money on this.”
Kyle McQueen co-wrote and edited the film, with Amber Guerra co-producing and managing art direction for Randall and Hart.
“We’re kind of fucking with the audience a little bit,” Hart tells me. “There are some scenes where it looks like they’re going to have sex, but they don’t.” This tease is illustrated by a night dialogue scene which will play right after yesterday’s beach sequence: Ray sets Calvert up with blankets on her living room couch, presenting Calvert with a sock monkey that resonates with her. There’s some remember-when chat and a comradely kiss—and then Ray heads off to bed, leaving Calvert to snuggle in, hugging the sock monkey.
A pause to re-light for morning, and Calvert is awakened from a dream by Ray calling from the kitchen “Do you want some juice?” and repeating it, louder and more intensely, until Calvert sits bolt upright on the couch. This leads to a montage in the kitchen as Ray makes breakfast and Calvert watches and helps. “Ideally very sensual, very pretty,” Hart says. “We’re going to make the room very bright. I’ve shot so many scenes with not-pretty lighting. This is the first time I’ve had full control to shoot what I want. Casey and Lumi are camera-aware, as long as I stay with them and not miss anything, they’ll run that show.” In the kitchen scene, Ray, who used to be a chef, shows impressive knife skills as she chops up a garlic clove to toss into the omelette cooking in the pan. The two are getting flirtatious now, touching and giggling.
ON THE SET | 11.23 | AVN.COM 21