Nested in the heart of downtown New Brunswick, New Jersey, owned and operated by the forward thinking, Joshua Suggs, Delta’s Restaurant is an expansive, ultra modern, bi-level dining/entertainment paradise. As usual, we had an early call time for the crew and New Brunswick is not around the corner, so we greeted the morning’s night with a hearty yawn, unsteadily stepping into dawn’s sunrays that began to etch across NJ’s landscape. First to arrive was GC’s fearless leader, Jerry J. Cunningham, who was busy unpacking equipment from his jeep and waiting for the rest of the crew. By the feel of that morning, he knew that this was going to be a long shoot. When Gary Powell, GC’s Director Of Photography (DP) arrived; he and Jerry brought all the equipment inside and began to map out where and how the scene was going to be shot.
CB Flowers began to prepare all the paperwork, examining the script, then went on the usual breakfast run of donuts and bagels before the actors arrived. The Makeup Supervisor, Shakira Gill finally found her way to Delta’s and she needed some coffee to pull herself together. The lovely Kesha Lewis (GC’s own ray of sunshine!) arrived and CB directed them both to the restaurant’s coffee station where Mr. Suggs was graciously prepared several pots of hot java. Amanda Yachechak (Jenny Rivers) needed a place to park so CB pointed her in the direction of the lot. Our wonderful extras, Christopher Cunningham (GC’s fearless leader’s brother), Douglas Sines and Michelle Lorelli soon made their entrance, as did Vanessa Morales (Lisa Hendricks) and Derek Brantley (Dave/Mr. Holmes) as Shakira ran them through makeup. Jerry signaled CB that he was ready and for him to get everyone on set—time 11:30am. After three hours of intense shooting, stomachs were growling and Jerry shouted, “Lunch! CB, see what everybody wants…ask Joshua for what around, he knows”. Joshua handed CB a stack full of menus from hundreds of local eateries. Everything from fast food to African to Thai! “NO PIZZA! NO CHINESE,” everyone yelled! The cast and crew decided on Mexican and when the food arrived there was one less order to be accounted for—our fearless leader’s order! YIKES! CB put his order in but apparently it got lost in translation. He was cool about it and ate his trusty apples—what a guy! After lunch, it was back to work and the latter part of the day was the most grueling. It still is amazing that the cast & crew were still standing! By 10:30pm, the crew had most of the equipment broken down and they cleaned the place of “GC” debris while CB was taking care of the actors, extras and thanking Joshua for being so patient and generous with his time. It was truly a blessing for the GC team to secure Delta’s and Mr. Suggs was definitely the hero of the day!
Saturday October 3rd was a warm yet rainy morning that gave way to bursts of sunshine as the day progressed. The “Getting Caught” crew was in Elizabeth, New Jersey filming at the infamous, Club Dolce. This time, the courtesy goes to DJ Manny Donoso, a good friend of Jerry’s who regularly spins at the club contacted the owner for use of the venue. Incidentally, if you want to get your “party” on, Dolce is the place to “boogie on down”. It’s another ultra chic, NYC styled nighttime venue boasting a full service restaurant that offers American, Spanish & Italian cuisine. Jerry informed CB that the call time would be 11am for the crew and 12noon for the cast. That was a welcomed relief for cast & crew to catch some additional hours of sleep and not having to rush about and forget things. However, this was going to be a half-day shoot so that wasn’t too bad. It was short but intense nonetheless. Production Assistant, Juan Silva was on set and the beautiful, and quite sexy, Claudia Mora lent her barmaid skills and helped out as stand in for Vanessa Morales' lead character, Lisa Hendricks.
Claudia read with one of the lead actors and GC’s resident comedian, CJ Maldonado (Mike Andrews). 
Vanessa arrived and she immediately got into makeup (Shakira…where are you HELP!), wardrobe and ran through her lines before her call time—in ten minutes! Mr. Tee Alford (Funkypeopleonline.com) stepped into the bit part of playing Vanessa’s co-worker. Mr. Alford operated several record labels and owns a marketing/consulting company. He was a natural on set, rocking the coolest black Kangol cap (Yeah, yeah…no worries, you’ll get your cap back!). The scene with CJ & Vanessa went by smoothly and without incident. When she yelled, “Book”, CB scrambled to find the line, after a few seconds he found it. Script Supervisor is not an easy job. They have to pay attention to EVERYTHING at all times while the scene is being shot and be ready to quickly recall whatever line or continuity issue in the last take.
DB a/k/a Derek Brantley is the epitome of coolness. He takes his profession seriously and his performance is a shining one. Off set, he is quite the character, cutting up with everyone (like CJ) or chilling out in a corner reading his lines or finding a secluded area for “DB” time.
In the scene with CJ & DB, Brantley has a gun concealed in his jacket. By the looks of it, DB handles a gun pretty well; let’s hope he received his training on the range LOL!
The cast is really a group of fun loving, “keep-you-in-stitches” sort of folk. From Douglas Sines to Keisha Zollar who plays DB’s side moll Zack, Keisha is a professional comic and she is hilarious. When she gets into Zack’s character, she is so convincingly menacing it’s hard to believe she cuts up as she does—fantastic!
Even the production’s fearless leader JJC lent his acting skills for a brief cameo appearance (Good job brother!). Akinyele Stephens, the photographer on set captured some great stills. He pulled Claudia to the side had his own photo shoot and mini video interview with the GC’s diva extraordinaire. He’s a marvelous photographer and we’re sure he did Ms. Mora justice. Overall, it was a productive day and once again The Creator shined his blessings on the Getting Caught crew to acquire Club Dolce. Finding and securing locations for filming can be an ordeal for the indie-independent filmmaker; he or she has to really tap into their resources, contacts and friends who may be able to assist. All things are possible when there is faith. JJC & Getting Caught crew humbly extends special and heartfelt thanks to DJ Manny and the Dolce's owner, Mr. Felice Tanga for their time, consideration and support. See you on the next set!
