We left a trail of mishap on the way to Warsaw today.
Just as the front door closed behind us, just as it clicked shut, we realised that neither me or Nora had a house key. . Shit!
We got a friend to go pick the key up from Camden and go double lock the door. Saved. I also spent a frantic 30 minutes searching for my passport. This is a usual occurrence. The adrenaline rush that accompanies this ritual is unparalleled.
Travis are going to Warsaw today to shoot a video for Love Will Come Through. The shoot will last 2 days with 2 days travelling.
A couple of days earlier we all met at our record company in Chiswick, for a meeting with one of the directors, the producer, the executive producer, the DOP (director of photography) and the wardrobe girl, to go over details of the shoot.
The other director was already on location, sorting stuff out. Both directors are from Iceland. We saw a video they’d made for Sigur Ros which looked beautiful, and Dougie had spoken to them at one of the LA shows a couple of weeks ago and they were very cool by all accounts. (Cool not in the iD sense of cool, but cool in the proper sense of cool; together, bright, focused, friendly, with a strong sense of what they wanted, and not pretentious).
Their original treatment involved a bunch of school kids and the grim reaper, who has a fling with the kids’ teacher. It was a great treatment but we decided that we’d like to be in this video, and so they re-treated and came up with an equally bizarre idea which involved a cowboy, an Indian, alluring twins, concrete landscapes, the number 6…or 9, football, dancing, a floating birthday cake and a lot of running about.
At the production meeting we looked at the location, Warsaw, in a part of the city called Pragua. Roman Polanski had shot The Pianist there, I think, so the place had a good cinematic pedigree. Pictures on the director’s ibook were passed around. It looked good.
We also talked about what they wanted us to wear. I was to be the stoic cowboy, on his lonely journey to nowhere, (and from nowhere) so cowboy hats were discussed. Cowboy boots were swapped for Norwegian reindeer boots with curly toes. I’d got a pair of these when Nora and I went on a husky dog sledding holiday in January. There was excitement for these boots.
Dougie would be a happy football playing Indian, looking for adventure, so a head-dress + Scotland ’78 strip were talked about. Dougie raised the ‘Village People’ point and everyone concurred. The Scotland ’78 strip was out of bounds too because of how cold it was gonna be in Poland. In the end we agreed on a single feather and a black jacket, Andy and Neil would be dressed less eccentrically. Naturally.
The flight was good. Dougie and I sat together on the plane and chatted most of the way. We fly so much these days it’s crazy. Like getting the bus. Flying gets harder the more you do it. I flew for the first time when I was 21. I never thought I would ever get to go on a plane. It just goes to show you.
The girl, who was meeting us at the airport, missed us coming out of arrivals. This gave us time for a fag and some fresh Polish air. She found us in the end and we rode on giant goats to the hotel.
On the way, a piece of paper was handed back to us with a list of 3 restaurants we could eat at, a brief description beside each. These are the descriptions on the sheet:
BELVEDERE- set in a lovely glass space with lots of greenery and drippy condensation.
FUKIER- …Three candle lit dining rooms and a fantastic heated courtyard. Sophisticated and (mostly) great food.
RESTAURACJA POLSKA- The perfect authentic spot to take visitors to Warsaw. The waitingstaff simper condescendingly, as you impress your guests by ordering in broken Polish.
The drippy condensation of Belvedere was tempting, as was the (mostly) great food at Fukier but we all agreed that what we wanted most was to be simpered at condescendingly and so chose Restauracja Polska. The food was great, actually. The waiters were swift. The wine was fine. We were disappointed though with the lack of simpering.
Earlier, before eating, we had to attend production meeting in the producer’s hotel room. Costumes were to be tried on and timetables for the days ahead finalised. In our room I opened my suitcase and quickly realised that I had forgotten “the Norwegian snow boots”. I’d put them in a plastic bag at home but hadn’t gone the full distance by putting them in my case.
This is me, down to a tee. I am quite bad at remembering stuff. I lose a lot of things when I travel. Lately though, my track record had improved. This was an untimely slide down the ladder. I called our manager and luckily, a film crew were coming out from the UK the next day to film us for a TV show. We arranged for the shoes to be biked over to these guys and they would bring them for us. He called back while we were in the meeting. The shoes would be on set for 10.30am.
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