To Protect and Serve

Yesterday, I was on a set at a location house in the hills above Encino, California. To say it's an upscale neighborhood would be an understatement. The home where we were shooting was privately gated and built against a hillside. There were stairs everywhere in the house as it had four levels. The home was lavishly decorated with modern and abstract furniture, art sculptures, and other interesting decor. I'm guessing here, but I'd say the place is probably worth 4 or 5 million. The grounds, of course, are impeccably landscaped, including a pool that has some really cool fountains and water effects around it.

Everything was going real well until about sunset. That's when we heard a woman's blood-curdling screams coming from somewhere nearby. The screams, according to a number of people on the crew, were coming from the next home up the street. The woman was screaming things like "Help! Please someone help me! Oh God! Help!"

Our production manager immediately got on his cell phone and called 9-1-1.

In minutes, an LAPD patrol car showed up and the homeowner (of our location house) directed them to residence next door.

About five minutes later, the cops returned to the gate (at the front of the house where we were shooting) and asked to speak to the homeowner and our production manager. It seems the cops weren't interested in any further information regarding the screaming woman. Instead, they were now interested in us.

According to the cops, when they knocked on the door of the house where the screams came from, no one answered. The cops decided no one was home so now they wanted to know what was going on at the house we were at. Our PM told them we were shooting a flick and immediately offered up the (properly issued by the City of Los Angeles) shooting permit to the officers.

No problem, right?

Wrong.

In moments, four more squad cars showed up. Now, there were about ten cops milling about at the gate and a few of them entered the grounds and began asking a lot of questions: Questions that called into question the legitimacy of our production manager's 9-1-1 call.

Somehow, through some creative law enforcement logic, the cops wondered if our PM's call was an attempt to deceive: They wondered if it was possible that the screaming had been made by performers in our production! When the cops were asked why they thought we would call in a complaint directed at our own production, they shrugged and wondered if we were concerned that other neighbors might be calling in complaints and we were trying to cover for ourselves.

Ya can't make this stuff up.

When the cops were asked if they had received any other phone calls complaining about someone screaming loudly they said, "No. Not yet."

Not yet?

Anyway, I know all this seems to defy logic but that's what was happening as another two or three patrol cars showed up. By the way, when the cops were asked if they entered the house next door--to insure there wasn't an injured person inside--they said no, they didn't think there was enough "probable cause" for them to make an entry. They also didn't question any other neighbors to determine if anyone else had heard the screams. Instead, they decided they did have enough probable cause to start checking I.D.'s and grilling members of our cast and crew.

Then, a couple of LAPD vice officers showed up and took over the investigation. Now we had, what seemed like, half of LAPD's West Valley (San Fernando Valley) patrol shift guarding the perimeter of our production location while plain-clothes vice officers conducted a thorough investigation. Obviously, they somehow determined we were potentially dangerous people.

No one at the location was permitted to enter or leave the premises as vice, accompanied by a few uniformed officers, grilled cast and crew people... apparently looking for permit violations. One of the girls (on our crew) was given a particularly hard time by one of the uniforms because she didn't have a California I.D. Instead, she showed them her Oregon driver's license. That seemed to be suspicious enough for her to have to answer an awful lot of questions regarding what she was doing in California. Who needs Homeland Security when we have such determined and thorough peace officers guarding us from, uhhh.... citizens of Oregon!

Ultimately, the Protect and Serve boys discovered that two cars belonging to people attending our shoot--both cars belonging to magazine reporters covering the production, not crew members--constituted a violation of the "No Street Parking" rule listed in the shooting permit. After being held hostage for over two-hours, the production was shut down and we were all told to pack up and leave. No one was cited but the production was shut down anyway.

We never found out if anyone was hurt (or worse) at the house next door. Neither did the cops. At one point, I made a not-so-quiet comment about there obviously being no other crime taking place in the San Fernando Valley at the moment. (There were, by this time, about 15-20 cops on the scene.) Unsurprisingly, my attempt at humor didn't prompt any chuckles amongst the Boys in Blue.

Oh well. Just another day at the office.

The pretty girl at the top, from yesterday's shoot, is Nautica. MUA and hair by Lilian. Here's another of Nautica, clowning around with a goofy pose, while I was shooting her on an exterior, spiral staircase in the backyard of yesterday's production location.