The Sounds of Silent Cocktails

SO YESTERDAY THERE was a little cocktail-party-y thing on the set of The Border. Ostensibly, this media event by the PR company Media Profile was put together to try to bump some coverage for the show, post-launch – and also to celebrate an addition to the cast of The Border, Grace Park (Battlestar Galactica.)

Having the thing in situ was a reasonable idea. There’s something about sets that are kind of funky and cool if you’re not around them all the time. And the “ICS Locale” -- really the disused Port Authority Rochester Ferry Terminal (now used for its primary purpose – passenger unloading and customs, only a couple times a year) does have a pretty spectacular view of the Toronto skyline.

Unfortunately, we were running a tiny bit behind yesterday. Director Brett Sullivan and the crew were working hard to get coverage of the monitors in the tech area right after crew lunch – the first half hour of which overlapped with the cocktail party.

So now you have to picture the scene: there are servers and a bartender, and some of the actors who aren’t in the scene are meeting and greeting the intimate group of attendees. (this was not the usual Toronto PR clusterfuck where, you know, you’ve got people with no connection to the biz rubbing shoulders with that P.A. from the dance station, the blogger from Boats & Fish.blogspot.com, that dude who was the host of that thing about ten years ago, the PhD student from Concordia, the random agent who reps ten people you’ve never heard of, that guy in the hat, and the fugly sociopath who writes for [insert publication here]
Oh, and then the drag queens arrive and nobody can quite figure out what they’re doing there.)

So, you’ve got Gillian on walkie there at the entrance door to ICS, and every few minutes she says, “Rolling, quiet please” and the chatter on the floor, as people just sip their wine, just stops. Dead. At a cocktail party.

It was one of the funniest, most gloriously Canadian things I’ve ever seen. Somebody tells a group of people – who all are drinking alcohol, remember – to please be quiet for a minute, and lo and behold, it happens. Silence. You could hear a pin drop. One of the servers had just been asked what the so-and-so was, and I swear to Mike I saw her try to explain what was on the tray entirely in mime.

I told a couple of people that it wasn’t a cocktail party at all – that they were now part of some art installation. Somebody said they saw Banksy outside with a few cans of spray paint.

The crew got their takes, and moved on to another part of the terminal, dressed to look like an airport lounge.
Meanwhile, back at the soiree, I was now into full field spotting mode. For those of you making your way gently in the early stages of your media career, here is the field spotting guide to Canadian P.R. events:

In the corner, you will find scriptus serius. These are the common TV writers. They are there only for the command performance aspect of it. They talk mainly to each other, about other things, blissful in the knowledge that there is absolutely no way whatsoever that anyone will wish to speak to them. There is much dissection of the various types of hors’ d’oeuvres, and the relative merits of each. Eventually, the writers will scatter – one will go to a play, one to a screening, and the remaining one will toddle back to set having had two (ish) glasses of wine to guiltily watch the crew work. The buzz will wear off somewhere around nine, when he will find himself shivering outside on Cherry Beach, watching Nick Campbell smoke.

Interviewus Big Getus is the star people are there to talk to. She will be charming, and introduce herself when there’s no one there to lead her. She will disappear to do one on ones every few minutes with this camera crew or that one, and just generally show how it’s to be done. The writers in the corner will look upon her as an exotic and different species, because, let’s face it, she is. The relation between the two groups is only similar on the DNA level.

Printus Reportorius just keeps jotting everything down in his notebook. He never looks up. Ever.

Savvius Thespius is the cast member who always manages to be talking to the most important person in the room. They also get in all the pictures. It’s uncanny.

Flackus Professionalus are the P.R. people. They all have ponytails. They smile a lot and are enthusiastic and nice when you talk to them. They have suspiciously nice teeth. They guard their screener DVD’s like leprechaun’s gold. (They are also not to be confused with Communicatoris Directorius, who works directly for the Production and who I apparently owe a burger at that-watering-hole-I-like-to-go-to.)

Classiest Beenaroundtheblockius is the cast member who asks you to borrow twenty bucks, only to go over and put it in a glass in front of the Bartender to tip them and all the servers. Classy. (Especially when he indeed repays the 20, as promised, the next day.)

Networkius Promosaurus are the promotion types at the network. They are wonderful and mythical creatures who always have clean, strong teeth and perfect hair and shower lots and lots and lots of shiny promo time on the show like beneficent and golden gryphons. They may also provide ad copy to the papers. The cutlines are always awesome, and the names of the shows’ characters are always spelled right.

So, there you go. Promo in action. It’s a dirty business, but hey, it’s a long way to the top if you want to rock and roll.

Wish you could have seen the silent cocktail party. That was something else entirely.