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rinueLast night, I was on location until around 4 in the morning, gaffering a location shoot for a lesbian WWII romance. We were in a maze of narrow alleys near the center of London, and the walls had a few illustrations by Banksy that we had to cover (temporarily! we would never destroy a Banksy!) so that passerby wouldn't stop to admire them. One of them was of a man in a black coat and top hat. "Jack the Ripper," said my friend Jon, approvingly. Since I'd also seen a sign pointing toward Spitalfield, I sort of gradually put together that we were in or near Whitechapel, but I didn't have much time to think about it, as I was busy reflecting light at people.
At around 3 in the morning, I was standing alone at the end of one of the streets, waiting for some blackwrap so I could temporarily deface a municipal propery that was interfering with our lighting. I looked up and thought, "hullo, I've taken a photograph of that parking garage. How strange that I've been looking at it all night and just now put it together. A very attractive parking garage." Then I looked to my left and thought, "hullo, isn't that Crispin Street Women's Refuge, where some of the Ripper victims lived when they could afford it?" And then I put together that I was just around the corner from where Mary Kelly was killed, which I remembered as being at around 3 in the morning, which it then was, although the mutilated body wasn't found for several hours, and there were crime scene photos, and there I was, alone, and I got well and truly creeped out in one of those "the back of my head is floating off and I need to pace on my heels very slowly" experiences, and I felt sort of sad that I had no one to share it with, so I told the DP, and she got creeped out. (She also thought it was strange that I knew so much about the Ripper murders, whereas I am always surprised when people don't. It's like Egyptology, or dinosaurs - it's a natural phase one goes through.)
Following this, I climbed up a ladder and covered a number of warning lights around a work site. This was obviously not something I was really meant to be doing, although it wasn't really wrong per se, and it was just for a little while, and I put it back afterward. (The same could be said of the notably more dangerous giant hole in the ground we uncovered.) Cleverly, I was wearing a high-visibility yellow vest with reflective tape on it, theoretically for my safety, but actually so that when people walked past (which they did, often, as various bars closed), they would look up and see me doing things they wouldn't normally accept and think "it's okay; she's wearing a yellow vest." It's amazing how well this works. It is like wearing a lab coat, only with a different context.
At around 3 in the morning, I was standing alone at the end of one of the streets, waiting for some blackwrap so I could temporarily deface a municipal propery that was interfering with our lighting. I looked up and thought, "hullo, I've taken a photograph of that parking garage. How strange that I've been looking at it all night and just now put it together. A very attractive parking garage." Then I looked to my left and thought, "hullo, isn't that Crispin Street Women's Refuge, where some of the Ripper victims lived when they could afford it?" And then I put together that I was just around the corner from where Mary Kelly was killed, which I remembered as being at around 3 in the morning, which it then was, although the mutilated body wasn't found for several hours, and there were crime scene photos, and there I was, alone, and I got well and truly creeped out in one of those "the back of my head is floating off and I need to pace on my heels very slowly" experiences, and I felt sort of sad that I had no one to share it with, so I told the DP, and she got creeped out. (She also thought it was strange that I knew so much about the Ripper murders, whereas I am always surprised when people don't. It's like Egyptology, or dinosaurs - it's a natural phase one goes through.)
Following this, I climbed up a ladder and covered a number of warning lights around a work site. This was obviously not something I was really meant to be doing, although it wasn't really wrong per se, and it was just for a little while, and I put it back afterward. (The same could be said of the notably more dangerous giant hole in the ground we uncovered.) Cleverly, I was wearing a high-visibility yellow vest with reflective tape on it, theoretically for my safety, but actually so that when people walked past (which they did, often, as various bars closed), they would look up and see me doing things they wouldn't normally accept and think "it's okay; she's wearing a yellow vest." It's amazing how well this works. It is like wearing a lab coat, only with a different context.
