actually, it was called The Bloated Toad but when "someone" miss-spoke we just couldn't let her live it down. :)
On Twilight's last night of production in our little town I was able to go watch the action. It was so cool to be so close! We stood on one side of the street and directly across from us was the restaurant in the Port Angeles scene where Edward & Bella have a big bonding moment / Q&A session. In the book I believe it was called "Bella Italia", but for the movie they went with "The Bloated Toad". Not sure why, but it was actually pretty cute. There was a big sign out front and a big toad statue carved out of wood. He looked pretty happy. And bloated.
(I have to apologize for the quality of my photos. We weren't allowed to use our flash and my camera only has a 3x zoom!)
When I arrived on 1st street it was still light outside so the windows of the "restaurant" were draped with black fabric, as they were filming inside and needed it to look like night-time. Every once in a while someone would yell "Rolling!" followed by 7 other people repeating the same thing and everyone (the crew and the crowd of people on the sidewalk) would immediately get very very quiet. Most of the takes seemed pretty long -- obviously because there was quite a bit of dialogue that is exchanged in those scenes.
While we were hanging out we got to talk to Jeff -- he's the guy who shoots the behind-the-scenes footage and bonus features for the DVD. He was very very very friendly and was very happy to talk to us and answer any of our questions.
Eventually it got dark and the fabric was removed from the windows and pretty twinkling lights were lit all over the front of the restaurant. Pretty soon Kristen and Rob came outside to shoot a scene with Angela & Jessica. There was also a large group of extras that were filed onto the sidewalk several times, Catherine would talk to them, and then they'd return to their tent with the propane heaters. It was sooo cold!
Eventually I left at about 10:15pm. We heard that they were going to be filming throughout the night & into the morning. Yikes! Because this was their last night in town, and production had been going on for 2 months now, and at some point everyone in the crew had been sick, and it was freezing cold outside . . . .they were all very focused on their work and getting the job done. It was obvious that there was not going to be any time for the fans. I got what I needed . . . I got to see some live filming, I got to see Rob in person (see video below!), I got to stalk the trailer camp, I got to walk through Charlie's house! . . . . I thoroughly and totally got the Twilight movie experience that I needed.
