Arturo: When we did B-17, the essentials were reduced down to the point that there were basically just two people working on the movie. Sarah who wrote the piece, starred in it, did the art direction, set and costume design, makeup, character voices, and music. I directed, did the cinematography, lighting, editing, special effects, sound design, some of the music, and finishing. Except for one day when we needed another actor to play a part, there were always only the two or us on the set.

This clip shows how we worked a scene seemingly shorthanded. I applied the “spit” (beaten egg whites) while handling the camera, as Sarah refined and concentrated on her performance.

Sarah: This production technique was very efficient! We solved problems as they came up. I think originally we tried to use real spit (we are method whenever possible), but it was too hard for me to fill a bowl up with enough spit for even one take. If I recall correctly, I asked Arturo to go ahead and spit on me (after all, he was doing method camerawork - more on that later... ), but he wasn't too comfortable with that idea ^_^ After a few more tries at mixing concoctions, I found a single egg in my fridge (yet another advantage of building your set in your apartment!)

It made perfect sense for Arturo to fling to 'spit' on me and operate the camera simultaneously. The action was supposed to be coming from the character that the camera was inhabiting. As an actor, I could feel as though I was being acted upon and react accordingly. A production assistant would have broken the circular field of energy and only would have slowed things down.