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Dear diary,
Today I infiltrated the world of Greek
television as well as that of the airforce!
What girl would ask for anything more than to
be surrounded for a full seven hours by
testosterone-driven, handsome men with
courage, creativity and brains? And who needs
Tom Cruise in Top Gun when you've got
Socrates Alafouzos in Aerines
Siopes?
For a start, the latter is a real person, not
a scientology freak, far taller than a fire
extinguisher and kind enough to baby-sit this
perky journalist at the filming location for
MEGA channel's mega-successful new TV
series.
The idea was mine, and how was I to imagine,
dear diary, that a multi-talented and
professional theatre, film and television
actor such as Alafouzos would take my proposal
seriously? The plan was to visit the real
airforce base location in Tanagra - where the
parts of the series about the professional and
personal lives of five sexy, smart and (yes!)
sensitive fighter pilots is shot - and get a
taste for how it all happens.
But I came away with more than I'd bargained
for. It starts when we arrive at the airbase
and Alafouzos almost immediately changes into
his character, Orestis Panagiotou's,
uniform.
Suddenly, he becomes one of them, and
spot the odd one out! As we sit outside the
base's cafeteria on a large, light-drenched
balcony with benches overlooking the endless
runways and fields, another man in an
identical uniform appears and they warmly
greet each other. After, I ask very cleverly,
"Who does he play?" and Socrates laughs at me
(for the first of many times that day, I'm
sure.). "No, he's a real pilot!"
The base is engulfed in silence inside and
out. Apparently, this is because the
noise-blasting, roaringly loud flying
exercises were by then over, and you know how
when something really strong has hit the
atmosphere its absence is more palpable? So
this is a place that goes from
window-shatteringly fortissimo to a
meditation-idyllic hush, serene bird-chirping
and all. A sharp contrast with enough
metaphorical largesse to represent the overall
life of the pilots who work here, since their
work makes their being pend, daily, in the
nanosecond between life and death.
Upon first entering the airbase one comes
across a wall covered in framed photographs of
proud, grinning pilots that were and are
standing upright and firmly holding their
helmet against their hip exactly as the
characters of the series do in the promotional
clip that got
Greece
's audience tuning into MEGA at
9.40pm
every Friday night.
Real and make-believe pilots keep coming and
going, and I start to have genuine fun trying
to differentiate between the two. Alafouzos,
who is here for the umpteenth time, is twice
mistaken for a real pilot by another from
afar. That's until a crew from MEGA's
Prive programme, a tele-magazine which
features the rich and famous and
Greece
's other glitterati or talented individuals,
turns up to interview him and his fellow
actors for their next slot. Their filming
takes place in a colossal rust-coloured hangar
where six metallic fire-breathing monsters
rest their wings. There, Alafouzos and another
charismatic and prominent actor from the
series, Costas Kazanas, are interviewed
standing proudly before the silver Mirages.
Drifting around the grounds I stop to gossip
with the mechanics. "Yeah, we watch the
series! It's great! It's not actually like our
real lives here, but it's very good
nonetheless, and it's fun to see the place
where you spend your every day on TV!" says
Nikos. "They (the crew) do sometimes kind of
get in the way when we're really busy, but
generally we love having them around." I'm
reassured he does as he soon brings out his
28.5 children out of nowhere to greet the
actors, pose for photographs together and get
their autographs.
Suddenly, I see one of the actors standing
messiah-like in the smiling sunlight flanked
by sweet adoring children and Aris the dog,
the base's bouncingly affectionate
mascot.
Kazanas, who in real life looks even cooler,
more sleek and tougher in a Humphrey Bogartish
way, than his plucky womanising character in
the series, stares out into the silent gulf as
he sips his "quadruple" Greek coffee and
squinting, smokes his cigarette. I ask him how
different this project is to anything he's
done before. "Completely," he answers, "I've
played in four or five Festival (art) films -
you may have heard of Telos Epohis?"
(The End of an Era, Antonis Kokkinos'
1994 success.) Kazanas also starred with great
aplomb in Dimitris Athanitis' 1997 No
Sympathy for the Devil. "Yet I find this
role very different to all the other ones," he
continues, "perhaps because it's very closely
based on a particular breed of people, and
because I'm aware those people watch me
portraying them and we associate when we're
here." He tells me that, like Alafouzos, he
has in essence brought his character to life
via thorough research; talking with and
studying the behaviour and environment of
pilots, and then adding his own inventive
touches. "The atmosphere here [at the base] is
unique," he says, "it's really quite an
experience." Dimosthenis Papadopoulos, who
plays the fourth pilot of the series - the one
Kazanas' character is closest friends with -
was unfortunately unavailable for comment.
From one moment to the next it becomes
cold-to-the-bone, and what better than a real
pilot to join and entertain us with "battle
tales" as we sip steaming cups of strong
coffee? The lads (members of cast, production
and the authentic pilot) huddle together
around the wooden bench and light-heartedly
discuss work (acting as well as flying) and it
becomes as clear as fascinating that the
actors are constantly soaking in information
to use further on in creating their
characters.
There's no awkwardness between them as the
down-to-earth pilot talks about his uniform
(they ask whether he gets a cool-cat leather
jacket in winter), and explains how his
ribbed, white T-shirt functions as a means of
preserving body temperature for an extra 20
minutes in case they land in the sea. They
admire his large and bulky "Italian-made"
boots as he gets up to tie his shoe-laces, and
although he's clearly lapping up the attention
he doesn't appear big-headed.
Then, the songs of the jungle (women-jokes)
commence. I switch off so as not to seem nosy
but I catch a gag about men only paying for a
gal's dinner if she's "a sure thing". I
refrain from enlightening them, dear diary, by
revealing that most women will only
expect to have their dinner paid for as
recompense, if their date is not the
sure thing. It's all very familiar and cosy,
yet there are no cameras and no reasons to
play roles.
"You don't present us as we really are!" an
officer shrieks facetiously as he thunders by,
"you make people believe we all live in
elegant homes and drive pricey cars and have
beautiful wives whom we have enough time for!"
We chortle at this, and he turns to me, the
sample female of the group: "I mean, would you
ever marry a pilot?"
"It depends on the man," I respond. "Are you
sure about that?" Er... "Yes, why not?" I
chuckle, crossing my fingers under the table.
"But we do like the series!" he adds as he
takes off. "It's a dramatic television
series," shrugs Alafouzos, "we can't exactly
be real about everything." It's an unfortunate
fact of life that even the most astounding
things in life need to be embellished on
screen, otherwise they quickly lose their
lustre. Completely out of the blue, the scene
is chaotically cluttered with women, men,
children, cameras, technical equipment and
food. The remaining cast and crew are back and
it's dinner time. Now everyone's famished
after a demanding day of shooting and there's
yet more ahead. Director Errikos
Anagnostopoulos sits at our bench and wolfs
down his meal, eager to finalise the day as
productively as possible. The air is buzzing
with conversation and laughter in true Fellini
style, but it's just a charged interlude.
Lights, cameras and mikes are set up and
people start disappearing off to make-up. I
follow to the interior, where scenes will be
shot along the corridor. I stay in make-up for
a while as my guide Alafouzos is sprayed,
brushed, patted and blended, ready for his
next scene. His much-talked-about eyes shimmer
with grace as a ripple of laughter pours from
his throat at the proverbial time-pressed
urgency of the situation.
I'm in the way. And although everyone here is
far too polite to tell me to move it, dammit!
(thank God because being among thesps only
brings out the dangerously unabashed spirit of
a drama queen in me). Anagnostopoulos is
totally tuned into the scene and, as he
charges around, I find the gall to inquire
where, on this very narrow corridor, I can go
to catch the action without being detrimental
to the production. "Go to the very end of the
hall!" he quips sternly, but with a half-smile
on his face because I'm so obviously
lost.
I follow the orders (being in a military
environment brings back the value of
quasi-forgotten discipline) and am pleased to
discover he's directed me to the room where
he, script-writer Ada Gourbali and the
producers sit pouring over the monitor. I
perch myself by the door frame. A mobile phone
rings during an otherwise faultless scene and
the director explodes with anger. My eyes
glaze over as I watch Alafouzos repeatedly
walk down the corridor, slipping off his
sunglasses and placing them into his left
shirt-pocket and coming across Costas
Apostolides. The actor, who most recently
starred in Antenna channel's TV series
Epithymies and has extensive experience
in theatre and film, plays Andreas, also a
senior pilot who is sufficiently chummy with
Orestis to offer him pearls of wisdom on his
crumbling married life (no wonder it's
stormy! His wife is a hysteric!
-)
The evening ends at a nearby taverna chomping
on paidakia (lamb-chops) with
Alafouzos, Apostolides, the latter's old
friend, who is a real pilot, and his wife.
Thrilled at the chance to finally indulge in
some girl talk, I tell her about the previous
conversation with the airman who asked me
whether I would ever marry a pilot. She nods
knowingly and relates that "every single time
my husband flies I need to receive a call from
him telling me he's OK until I can relax. We
have two children, and when you have a family,
it's even harder to deal with the
fear."
The pilot - who says some in his profession
actually grow increasingly, rather than less,
afraid of flying with time "though will
continue flying for as long as they can
because they love it so much!" - is bombarded
with more flight-related questions by the
actors and myself, which he patiently answers
concisely: "What is black-out? What is
red-out? How does the body react when the
air-pressure gets too high? What is a black
hole?"
The actors compare their field with his by
explaining the crucial importance of
precision, improvisation, instinct and skill
required in their own work, and the pilot in
turn listens intently. We drink wine and feel
dizzy with a refreshing joy for life and all
it provides - if you risk to soar into it. The
chance to savour the practical science as well
as the inexplicable magic behind our existence and to experience somewhat
effortless, yet rewarding, days
like this is a drum we're pleased to dance
to.
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