Dong, Shlong, Tits & Ass

Don't get too excited. I haven't decided to make this into a x-rated blog. One of the joys of my job is that I deal with clearances and standards & practices concerns when it comes to our scripts.

Yes I act as the script police.

And on the show I work for, we reference porn in almost every episode. The show's got a lotta horny men in it, what can I say.

In fact I deal with porn so much, the art department coordinator and I have dubbed the area where our desks reside as porn alley.

There's even a box of remote control playthings under one of the desks that one of the big porn congloms donated for our use on the show. To be returned, of course, at the end of the season.

Our art department coordinator keeps the box closed at all times. One of the reasons for this is because otherwise we'd have people looking at the goodies all day - as we had before she kept the box closed. The other is because apparently our cleaning person is a Jehovah's Witness and might have a stroke if she saw what we kept in said box.

On Wednesday I had a lovely conversation with a network exec about a scene that didn't "exist." The script hadn't been officially released to the studio and the network, but since we were filming the non-existent scene on Friday, I had to check and make sure the above listed words wouldn't get us in hot water.

So I got to read the "hypothetical" scene over the phone to the understanding gentleman on the other line.

Luckily they were all cleared for use. Then it was a matter of finding whether Shlong and Dong (titles abbreviated to protect the innocent) are real porn titles and if we could get said titles in time for Friday's shoot. Otherwise we'd have to "fake" it. Meaning the actor would hold a product other than the real one but we'd shoot it in a way where you couldn't tell it wasn't the real DVD.

See one of the joys of clearances is if you mention a product on screen and want to show said product, you actually have to be holding said product. If you aren't, it means you are misrepresenting the product - a big expensive no no.

For example last year, the main character improv'd a line about drinking a Caramel Frappuccino. But he was holding a generic coffee cop. Starbucks has Frappuccino trademarked so we had to go in and have the actor dub the line as Caramel Cappuccino.

Fun.

Anyway I finally got a literal moment to ask my boss about my being on set again. He said I was to stay in the office "for now." And so it goes...