A Few Notes about FrontBurner: The Movie

I’ve fielded several questions offline about our video project. And I’ve been meaning to share a behind-the-scenes detail. Jump, if you’re so inclined.

WHY WE DID IT: Our staff photographer, Elizabeth Lavin, misread a company memo calling for karaoke teams to enter a contest at our Christmas party last week. She somehow thought a video could be entered into the contest instead. She convinced me of same. Eric, coming late to the conversation, thought Elizabeth had been given the official task by Wick or someone else higher up of creating a video for the Christmas party. Upshot: the project began because Lavin is a spider monkey.

WHY NANCY HAD SUCH A SMALL ROLE: We filmed a longer scene with Nancy. But in trying to avoid the NC-17 rating, we had to cut it. Seriously.

HOW WE GOT THE CELEBS TO PARTICIPATE: I’m still scratching my head about this one. Thanks again to the Kunkles, Brendan Higgins, Gordon Keith, Steve Bock (we’ll pretend for a minute he’s a celeb), James Aydelott, and especially Champ and Mavs Man. And speaking of those Kunkles …

BEHIND-THE-SCENES DETAIL: For their scene in our kitchen, we asked the Kunkles to kunkle. The idea was that Trey, looking for coffee, would happen upon their private moment. We needed just a few moments of them having a private conversation. But rather than fake it, Sarah asked the chief to tell her what his favorite memories were from their first year of marriage (their anniversary was December 8). I don’t know about you, but if my wife had asked me to do that with a camera rolling, I would have cracked wise to compensate for being nervous and feeling silly. Not the chief. Now, I was standing out of the shot and couldn’t hear everything he was saying. But I did hear the chief talking about his first dance with his betrothed and how much he’d enjoyed it. As we rolled tape, he quietly told her some of the other high points from their first year. When we yelled cut, Sarah asked for a towel to blot her eyes. She’ll say it was because she was laughing. But I’m here to tell you that wasn’t the case. Them was real tears of joy. My hat’s off to him. When it comes to the romance, Chief Kunkle is a stud.