The Making Of: "Caught in a Fantasy"
It's not often that a shoot that seems to be so perfectly planned and simple to execute falls apart at the last second, but that's what happened here. With the help of Facebook, some friends and some personal favors, we were able to pull this shoot off.
I spoke with Jay, Redd Da Killer Bee’s manager back in November. He liked my concept, and we scheduled the shoot for early December, though we hadn’t set a specific date. We didn’t need much- a female lead, a hotel room and basic grip gear. I had a specific vision and wanted a hotel downtown to utilize the night skyline, but on such short notice, it wasn’t going to happen. We probably could’ve booked one, but that would’ve put us over budget.
Alonzo was nice enough to call in a favor and get us a room at the Hampton St. Charles (shout out to the Hampton in St. Charles, check them out!). The girls Jay was talking to for the female lead all fell through at the last minute. Karmen came to our rescue. Without her, we would’ve had to cancel the shoot- so thank you Karmen! I owe you.
Fast forward. Gear rented, hotel booked, female lead booked, concept ready to go. Now I know the video is unreleased, but the video is essentially a drug fueled sex dream mixed with some performance. How do you get two people that don’t each other to play out a sex scene over and over and have it be believable while not making anybody too uncomfortable? Well the answer is quite simple- Hennessy.
Looking back, the Hennessy may have been a mistake. If it wasn’t a mistake, sending Zo to get a bottle of Jack after the Hennessy was gone definitely was. The shoot was a good time. I learned more about my cast/crew during that shoot than I have on any other music video. Lesson learned, though. Don’t get the artist too liquored up when you have a finite amount of time to shoot at the location.
We wrapped the shoot around 3am- Karmen left around 2. Redd passed out around 1:30am- I guess he’s a lightweight. My original plan was to shoot the whole performance with Redd sitting at the foot of the bed, but since he was unconscious at the end of the shoot, we left him in the room with a note giving instructions for the morning.
Redd texted me around 8am the next morning and we planned out the performance as best we could. Though it wasn’t my original plan, shooting his performance on Chicago’s South Side contrasted really well with the colors of the fantasy scenes.
“Caught in a Fantasy” has been one of my best projects to date. We’ll do it even bigger for the next project.
The video is scheduled to release on January 8, 2016. Make sure you check it out!