I arrived in time to take in the Palm Springs Film Festival’s first offering, the screening of Barbi and then after a conversation with the film’s director.
The film was screened at Palm Springs High School. Nice auditorium maybe seats 800. We weren’t sold out, but it was nearly so.
Here is a pro tip from an entertainer who has worked a lot of rooms. Producers at the festival hadn’t checked the sound system and of course it worked even though the rooms acoustics completely sabotaged the sound.
A rousing effort was made to work through the issue but it was not a minute before the audience began gently jeering to get the staff to fix the problem. It was impossible to hear.
Ultimately a gracious and willing Greta Gerwig stood at the front of the stage without any microphones and just spoke up in a loud clear voice, her interviewer pressed on with the microphone. He asked questions but nobody heard them.
A few things I picked up on. A lot of this was shot in London. Warner Brothers said yes to everything, so did Mattel, and Greta was floored by the lack of obstacles.
There were test screenings, she had to lose a Madam Curry joke in the opening of the movie. The actress who played the inventor of Barbi was 92 years old, her willingness to do the part and her zest for life impacted everyone on the picture.
The woman and daughter who travel back to Barbi land from LA, the man playing her husband at the end is really her husband.
Greta comes off as a really dedicated filmmaker and wants to have a great relationship with her audiences.
I have a portable speaker that is lightweight, small, doesn’t even need to plug in and would have easily fixed today’s sound fiasco.
When you are doing it life you had better have a Plan B. I think we heard maybe 60-75% of Greta’s comments. Imagine if we could have had a really clear conversation. Try again tomorrow
In this latter stage of life I have found myself more bold.
I feel the pain of this situation and if there can imagine
that I’d have done more than just jeering…like simply
removing the microphone from the interviewers hand!
Ha!
We would have had no problem speaking to the audience. I wanted to go up and just direct, Greta had a fine voice and she was a little reluctant to go louder, she should have. The man asking the questions speaks from back of his throat, he garbles words, no enunciation skills, he would have been a bigger hill to climb. Greta was 75% there. I gave it a thought for a moment and thought I’d only add chaos if I jumped to the rescue