Thursday, December 2, 2010

A Behind the Scenes Look

Instead of talking about the sad occurrences of last night's Bulls game I will instead focus on what happened to me on Tuesday. This past Tuesday I had the honor of working as a Production Assistant for a NBA Entertainment shoot involving Derrick Rose and Ahmad Rashad at Rose's house. Needless to say it was great. I arrived early, the shoot was at 12:45 I got there at 12:30. One of his buddies, or brothers (I'm not sure which) let me in and made me feel at home. Everyone I met at Derrick Rose's house was extremely friendly and no one ever gave off that sense of superiority that you read about all the time (I'm looking at you LeBron). When the rest of the crew arrived we began setting everything up. It was a pretty standard shoot, nothing to shocking. We moved lights in, furniture out, set up the cameras, and got the room ready for when Ahmad and Derrick arrived.

One thing to note, camera guys and light guys will change the setup a million times if they are allowed. Because Derrick was a little late, nothing terrible (Plus he was working out, which is a good thing), the guys changed the lighting about 20 times. Ahmad arrived about an hour before Rose and got settled, and let me tell you he hates AND I MEAN HATES the cold. He complained about it for at least 20 minutes. It's hard to believe he used to play football in Minnesota, in an outdoor stadium.

Rose arrived and Ahmad and him exchanged pleasantries and then sat down for the interview. It was a good interview, nothing to shocking. One thing I really like is Rose comes off as truly humble. I don't think it's an act and he is very thankful for everything he has. Basically, I'm glad he's the Bulls franchise player, it's a pleasure to root for a guy like that.

The interview was a half hour than we broke the stuff down and loaded it up. Rose shook my hand and thanked me for coming and we were out the door. The whole thing lasted a total of 4 hours and paid me a decent amount. It was probably the best work experience I've ever had. Anyway, a bunch of pics below with an occasional comment.




Ahmad with the crew, there is a lot of standing around and waiting once everything gets set up.



Derrick isn't the most exciting interview, but every once in a while he did bust out in laughter.





Rose is one of the nicer guys I've met in professional sports. It really was fun to be in his house and working with him.


Rose's house. It's nothing crazy big and he doesn't have a lot of expensive things lying around. It's good to see him stay humble and also not spending crazy money. Not after hearing about Antoine Walker blowing through a hundred million. It is in a great neighborhood that is nice and quiet and is right down the street from the practice facility. Apparently several players live in the area which makes sense after seeing everything.


Rose does own a sweet Camaro, which as some of you know is my favorite car. Also if you look closely you can see the Skittles machine in the background that was sent to him for free because he loves skittles. Rose did say he eats a lot of candy, but no where near the amount Lamar Odom eats. I thought that was funny.