Got to the studio today to find out that I now had my own trailer dressing room. The assistant director said I must have done well yesterday, but the truth is that yesterday we had 4 name actors playing expert witnesses, each of whom had a trailer, so today there are trailers to spare.

As I sit at counsel table on the set, I thought I would blog a bit about technical advisers. I was not included as a technical adviser but the director, cast and crew are using me as one. There is very little about this hearing on a petition for a writ of habeas corpus that is realistic. What input I have on what remains is so obviously constrained that I hesitate even to raise obvious objections. Yesterday we filmed the cross examination of an expert witness in which the petitioners objected to leading the witness. Leading the witness is perfectly proper on cross examination. But (1) the actors had prepared for these lines (I had corrected a previous version of the script in many ways, but the original version was eventually restored.) (2) The actor playing the witness was having problems with some very long complicated lines (and eventually got one completely wrong), and most importantly it was the end of the day, everyone was tired and we were overtime. Even though this could easily have been fixed--just overrule rather than sustain the objection--I knew there was NO WAY any changes would be made. Still out of a feeling of professional obligation I spoke with the director about it and his response was, "We can live with this." True enough. And he has asked me for advice numerous times. This morning he said, "I'm going to do this anyway, but would it be OK if . . . ." Turns out what he wanted to do was perfectly all right, but his preface was still funny. I told him he was like a law school dean. "I am going to do this anyway, but I just want your input."

On the other hand, Eric Avari who is playing the petitioner's lawyer asked me about a bit of dialog in which he gives a long statement of facts before asking a question. He wanted to know if a lawyer would really to that. I told him he was summarizing the testimony of another witness for this witness to assume for purposes of rendering an opinion. All he had to do was preface his dialog with "It has been testified that . . . " and it would make perfect sense. That's just what he did.

Marina is a big Law and Order fan so she has a decent legal sense and is raising good questions about her dialog. I don't watch the show but it must be legally decent because she seems to have a legal background. I told her she should go for a part on Law and Order now that Fred Thompson is off the show. She's the perfect age and look for the part and has a lawyerly demeanor, she should submit the film of her scenes in this film. I just told her what I was blogging about and asked her if she would do it, and she said she will.

We're starting the scene now. I am in this shot, if only out of focus behind Marina. So I better go now.

Update: We just finished doing 5-6 takes of yesterday's scene only this time facing Marina (and counsel table) when she is questioning the witness. I know I am on camera because they touched up my make-up in between takes and the make-up person told me I was in the beginning of the shot. (So the make-up is a clue.) When we were all done, Marina said, "See they took your note. They overruled the objection." Assuming it was still wrong, I had paid no attention to what the judge said today in response to the objection. And because the camera was on Marina at this point, this is the take they are likely to use. I have to admit, I was pretty surprised.