I walked with zombies!

Yes, I was a zombie. No, not the real kind. The fun kind. The movie kind. See, a buddy of mine is the DP (Director of Photography) on a low-budget zombie movie. I mentioned to him recently that I’d love to be a zombie for a day. I also have a bit of experience doing stunt work, so I can fall down real good. So my buddy calls me the other night and asks, “Hey…you wanna be a zombie tomorrow?” I said, “Sure!” So yesterday morning I get myself to the downtown L.A. set around 10:30. (I should mention that this is waaaay too early for me. I’m usually not even up until about 11:30 or so.) A handful of other actor/extra types are walking around with various stages of blood and decay on their face. They all look pretty cool. Nice guys, too…for zombies, that is. So I get my wardrobe on, sit myself in the make-up chair, and spend some time getting latex and blood (and who knows what else) applied to my face. Then, as is typical on a movie set, I spend a lot of time sitting around and waiting. And waiting. After several hours, I get to do my first shot. I won’t go into detail here, but I spent the next few hours being shot-gunned, pummeled with a large sledgehammer-type thing, hacked to bits by a samurai sword-wielding ninja, as well as punched and kicked by the hero (a guy who looked like Schwarzenegger in Predator). So, by the end of the day, I died something like five or six times. At one point during the action, I had to change into a different outfit and modify my zombie look. The make-up guy accomplished this modification by pouring roughly a full gallon of blood all over the upper portion of my body...my face, hair, down my back...ugh. Let me tell ya, blood might look awfully cool on the silver screen, but in reality it’s very gooey, VERY sticky, and when it dries, it hardens and clothing sticks to your skin. After every fall, I’d get up and peel my shirt off my skin. Ouch! But hey, that’s the price you pay when you…WALK WITH ZOMBIES.