Friday, 17 May 2002: Part I New York City, New York

First day of shooting. We should be nervous wrecks. But we're not, though that soon changes... Our intern - who’s reading 'Narrative In A Political Context' at NYU - is late picking us up. It also becomes rapidly apparent that he does not know where we are going. After a u-turn on the FDR followed by an almost fatal skid as he crosses a concrete divider while trying to catch a missed exit, we ask him to pull over. This he does, colliding with the curb. We drive to the location in stony silence. When we get there we ask he be quietly let go. But half an hour later he's still there...

We are set up for the first shot - dunking young James' head in the toilet. We are shooting both cameras and watching the monitors when suddenly the kid steps forward and says 'I notice you watching the close-up on the monitor on the left, but you should also be paying to attention to the wider shot on the monitor on the right'. He's smart. Cute.

Finally the kid is out of the picture. Later he wrote a very sweet note apologizing for failing to grasp what the job entailed. He'll probably grow up to be a Spielberg or a Cameron and not take our calls.