Okay, with my track record, I know there's a very good chance that nobody else will think this is as funny as I do, but I'm mentioning it just the same (darn those closet Pollyanna tendencies anyway).

The FFofFII episode aired yesterday and while I watched the video tape this afternoon, I noticed that the first Assistant Director character not only had clothes pins stuck to his jacket, he had one more clothes pin stuck to his jacket every time we saw him (until Lo Gi disappeared - then he went back to the original one or two).

This is a crew game and a terrific insider joke for this particular episode. (that and 'when is lunch?') It was great fun to see it.

Typo alert.
This is what I get for typing and laughing at the same time.

Kung Fu: Flying et cetera...

While I wince with most of season 3 & 4 eps, I really loved this one. It was truly funny and totally stuffed with crew and insider jokes. Everyone got to work in something!

>The FFofFII episode aired yesterday and while I watched the video tape this afternoon, I noticed that the first Assistant Director character not only had clothes pins stuck to his jacket, he had one more clothes pin stuck to his jacket every time we saw him (until Lo Gi disappeared - then he went back to the original one or two).
>
>>This is a crew game and a terrific insider joke for this particular episode. (that and 'when is lunch?') It was great fun to see it.

Pan,

Can you explain what's the signicance of that clothespin thing? :-) I think I've gotten a lot of the other insider stuff, but somehow I've missed that one.

Thanks.

Linda J.

[FONT COLOR=RED]Can you explain what's the significance of that clothespin thing?[/FONT]

Oh, I can field that one! Call on me! Call on me! Ok...

In days past, people had no electronic means to dry newly-washed clothes, so they used to take the clothes outside and hang them from a long rope stretched taut. The clothes were attached using clothes pins, small wooden objects that opened and closed to grip the clothes, sort of like pliers with a rubber band to hold them closed (or if you prefer, sort of like what most people would like to see done to Martha Stewart's mouth). But mostly, people went outside to hang their laundry so that they could inconspicuously spy on neighbors in order to find out which church-going lady was taking up with which other spouse's husband, and see which couple had been "busy" that winter and were now visibly "expecting", etc. And the kids really loved sticking the clothes pins upon the tail of the unfortunate family pet.

Later on, TV became more pervasive, and people got their "cheap thrills" from watching very, very, extraordinarily, impossibly attractive actors (such as Chris Potter) doing what their neighbors were doing (except that you didn't have to crouch behind some bushes to view it, nor go to the trouble of imagining it and then wishing you hadn't because your neighbors don't look anything like Chris Potter, unless he's your neighbor). So rather than haul the TV outside every day and have to "look away" while fastening the clothes pins, the "dryer" became pervasive too.

So the connection here is that Chris Potter indirectly made clothes pins obsolete.

I should write a history book. No school would ever buy it, but it sure would be an entertaining read.

....huh? :-( What? I think I'd like to buy a vowel, Pat.


JG, do you follow directions or read maps?

[FONT COLOR=RED]What?[/FONT]

Joke. Got you.

[FONT COLOR=RED]Do you follow directions or read maps?[/FONT]

I recommend that people do both. There's a lot of construction going on lately. You don't want to be looking at the map and thinking "Now I turn left here onto the bridge", and discover that the bridge is now a Starbucks. You could go crashing through the window, and those people are nervous enough with all that coffee.

[font color = red]Can you explain what's the signicance of that clothespin thing? :-) I think I've gotten a lot of the other insider stuff, but somehow I've missed that one.
[/font]

Surely, as long as you understand going in that my explanation can't possibly be as entertaining as some other person's .

There are a few variations on the clothes pin game. They are all sophomoric and usually perpetrated by one or more film crew members trying to lighten the load (or boredom) of the twelve to sixteen hour day.

One variation is that just one poor schlemiel is targeted. The goal is to pin him as many times as possible without him noticing. As we saw happening to the first AD in FFofFII. (See? Kind of like Junior High School.) He probably noticed just about the time Peter slammed him into the wall or the side of the trailer. Ow.

I have a friend who has a variation on the single target game. The on-set electricians usually walk (or stand) around with large gloves hanging off their large tool belts. My friend thinks it's hilarious to try and fill up an electrician's glove with grapes or gummy bears or whatever is at hand. Don't ask me why.

Another popular variation is the lone pinner game. In this game one really really bored (and probably slacker) set worker has dozens of clothes pins he doesn't want and he just 'gets' everybody near him. Sometimes the pnner will write something witty on the pin first. The goal is to pin nearly everyone on set. Of course, after you've seen fifteen other people pinned, you'd be an idiot not to check your back, so this game doesn't usually last all day.

'Everybody near him', of course, doesn't include actors for the obvious reason that the pinner would be in deep doo-doo if the actor actually walked in front of the camera with a clothes pin stuck to him. Also, it usually doesn't apply to anybody else 'above the line'. A lot depends on how friendly the set is.

Pan