Tag Archives: Movie

Dancing with John Travolta

Conquistador
El Conquistador Resort, Fajardo PR

We had another opportunity to be extras in the John Travolta movie that is currently filming in Puerto Rico. This time it was held at El Conquistador Resort in Fajardo and I was almost as excited to see this famed locale as I was to do the movie!

Conquistador tram
Tram up the steep slope of El Conquistador

We took the Mustang again, and again had car troubles, this time with a form of overheating. Thankfully we made it. Though it made the day a little more stressful not knowing if we would be able to get home or not!

Travolta trophy scene cassie
If you look closely, you will see me in the background of this shot in the movie

The first scene I was in was a trophy award ceremony for the main protagonist (John Travolta’s character). I loved my 70’s style pants in this one. Dressing up is so much fun!

Hippie chick awesome pants Slick BK
Full outfits from the front

Unlike the other day of filming, most of the day was spent in a huge ballroom of the hotel which meant it was a lot more comfortable and air conditioned! We ran into a few friends and met many more!

Terrie and us
With friends Terrie and Mark

Extras
With the group of extras in the trophy scene

After that initial scene they moved me in to get changed for the elegant dinner lounge scene. For this one, we were to be fancily dressed. I bought my own dress because that was part of the instructions, but they ended up saying that since I am the right size for wardrobe I could use one of the vintage dresses on the rack. I haven’t particularly liked any of my outfits in the other movies/scenes, but I just loved this coral-colored one!

Pretty background cassie Cassie dress conquistador 2
My dress for the dance scene

All the extras need costumes as well as hair styling and the lines can get pretty long!

Line of hairdo
The line for just two hair stylists!

Rafa Priscilla Cassie Britton
¡Qué elegancia! With friends Rafa and Priscilla

The dinner scene was pretty cool because I actually sat at the same table as John Travolta! You will definitely see me if you look for me! Here is a covert shot as they set up to shoot the scene.

Dinner scene
From Britton’s table across the room in the dinner scene

Band of movie
They had an awesome local Puerto Rican band for the scene. What a boon to their career!

There was one final scene that the assistant director called for: anyone want to dance? They had already had a couple’s dance scene, but this one would be a little funkier and dance to the song Fire. Me, me, me!! I jumped out of my seat and danced my booty off on the dance floor with John Travolta. It was an awesome moment in my life as I don’t think many people can say they’ve danced with John Travolta in one of his movies! Overall, it was a very memorable day and I can’t wait to see the movie!

Cinematographer Director crop
With acclaimed cinematographer Andrzej Sekuła and director John Luessenhop

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The Rum Diary and Coffee Shops

We have been having what we call “vacation weekends” for the last few weeks.  This is where we do things we’d normally just do on vacation.  Like going to movies and visiting coffee shops.  That’s what we do when we are in Rincon and  Puerto Rico anyway.


Cassie Using the Computer at the new coffee shop Blue Mug in Greeley

Last weekend we went out to see the Rum Diary in the theater.  It is  based on a Hunter Thompson creation and takes place in Puerto Rico in the early 60’s.   It stars Johnny Depp too so we figured it was worth checking out. Cassie had read the book a few years ago and even then they were planning on making a movie.  It turned out pretty good.

But of course we are biased since it is a PR story! A lot of the scenes we knew exactly where they were filmed! I thought it did a good job of showing both the poverty and wealth of the island through the eyes of an outsider who attempts to uncover some of the news stories on the island in between Depp’s character’s drunken romps. It even went a little into the history of the US military bombing ranges on Vieques and Culebra and rampant corruption.

Depp’s character gets to drive a sweet 53 Corvette.

I’ve always thought it would be fun to take my Corvette down to PR but it’s not as cool as this 53 and it would be pretty expensive to ship it.   That and the sea air would most likely destroy the frame!

In other sort of related news, the offer we put in on the other house didn’t go thru otherwise we would most likely be working on weekends and nights.  It’s nice to have some downtime although it’s going to get really boring over the next few winter months until we get down to our place in Rincon. We are thinking January or early February depending on my work on-call schedule. With all of these ‘vacation weekends’ we are really geared up to get down there and get some work done on our house and property. But we’ll probably still take a few breaks at the Banana Dang and see a movie or two at Caribe Cinema for good measure. 🙂

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Feel the Noise- Puerto Rico Movie

Britton and I just watched the movie Feel the Noise. I think it is one of Jennifer Lopez’s films and I thought it was pretty good. They had a lot of music, especially reggaeton and hip hop. The parts I liked best were the scenes in Puerto Rico. There were a couple of scenes where they were playing basketball by the Fort -El Moro. We were like, I know exactly where that is…except when we were there a horse was on the court! Truly! See below…

Horse on basketball court
Click for a bigger view-Horse is in middle of picture…only in PR

Anyway, I’d recommend the movie. It’s not spectacular or anything, but it’s fun and gives you a feel for Puerto Rico and the connections to New York which they call Nuyorican.

feel_the_noise

I liked this song because of the coqui frog sounds incorporated into the beat.

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Connie Willis Event and New Kress Theatre

By Cassie
Saturday was a pretty fun day. We had to run a few errands, but then Britton and I went to an event sponsored by the local library district that was promoting Science Fiction in general and the book Fahrenheit 451 in particular. They invited Connie Willis, a local author who has written many sci-fi books and won lots and lots of awards including the Nebula and Hugo Awards, to come and talk about Ray Bradbury’s book as well as science fiction and writing in general. Afterward, they had a book signing and Britton took a few pictures of us.


Connie Willis signing Bellwether
Connie Willis and Me

Later that evening we went out with Melissa and Alan to the new independent movie theatre that just opened downtown. It was pretty fun. We saw the new Woody Allen movie, Vicki and Christina in Barcelona, I think it’s called. They serve alcoholic drinks and dinner, and you can eat dinner during the movie. The movie was so-so, and half the food order took FOREVER to come (I think Melissa’s food finally came about half-way through the movie), but it was still a good time. I hope it is able to stay in business. Small, local businesses have a hard time thriving in downtown Greeley.


All four of us, after

Afterward, we went back over to Melissa and Alan’s place, chatted, drank more beer and watched the new Chris Rock show on HBO. It was a great night.

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