As the last couple weeks of summer came
to a close, TCU began to take over my life. I went to orientation,
attended Frog Camp, Frogs First, Howdy Week, and the like.
Eventually, I wouldn't even have to think when introducing myself
because it became second nature.
“Hi. I'm Paul Elliott. I'm a freshman
Pre-Business major from Austin, Texas.”
I must have played dozens upon dozens
of icebreakers after I left home college. Regardless of what kind of
activity we were ever asked to perform in order to get to know one
another, we always had to introduce ourselves. I guess it's an
unspoken rule that when doing an icebreaker, one must provide
everyone with an interesting fact about themselves. Sometimes you'd
be asked for a favorite color or favorite food, but without fail, a
“fun fact” was always required of you. Fortunately for me, I have
had a go-to fun fact since middle school.
My mother is a self-employed accountant
and works out of our house. One typical day when my dad was at work
and I was at school, two people arrived on our front porch and
knocked on the door. They were Mr. and Mrs. Crowley, two location
managers working on an upcoming film production in Austin, Texas.
They confronted my mom and asked her what she thought about the idea
of shooting part of the movie in our house. Initially she was very
skeptical, and told them to wait while she called my dad. She
telephoned him at work asking for his advice.
“If they seem legitimate, invite them
in and talk it over.”
She did just that. It turns out that as
a child, John Crowley went to the same elementary school that I did,
not more than three blocks from house. He know the neighborhood
really well as a result, and thought the location, and more
specifically my house, would be a perfect place to film the movie.
After one more meeting with the Crowleys, this time with my dad
present, my parents agreed to the whole process.
I'm fairly certain that at that point
time sped forward a couple weeks, and before I knew it the film
adaptation of the book How to Eat Fried Worms was being filmed
at my house. The many weeks they spent filming the movie were some of
the best of my life. Amazing experience after amazing experience just
kept coming.
I got to meet celebrities like Tom
Cavanagh, who played J.D.'s brother on the television show Scrubs,
and Hallie Eisenberg, that one girl from the Pepsi commercial and
also the sister of Jesse Eisenberg (star of The Social Network and
Zombieland). I also had the opportunity to be in the movie as well.
It was really cool to be an extra in the movie, and it was easy money
too. At one point I also got to be a hand model in one the scenes,
which can be a surprisingly lucrative career for a middle schooler.
During the shooting, the camera crews discovered that the main
hallway of our house was too narrow for a full camera rig to be able
to comfortably film in. Because of this, the film company ended up
building a replica of my house in a studio in north Austin. I
remember going to visit the set and absolutely loosing it. It was as
if the world's largest printer had spat out an exact copy of my
house, with all the little details from my room specifically
included.
I can probably talk about the whole
experience for days, but what I really valued was how it changed the
way I connected with my family. How often does something crazy and
unexpected like a movie being filmed in your house happen? While the
movie was being filmed in our house, we were temporarily moved to a
rented house. I was oddly happy about our “new home” being two
stories tall, and I made sure to thank the film company for the
upgrade. The whole filming process brought everyone closer together.
Every new day was an exciting adventure and we all got to be involved
in a once in a lifetime opportunity. My favorite memories came from
swapping stories with my parents about which important movie person
they had met that day and talking about what cool opportunities life
had in store for the following day. I was completely and utterly
happy.
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