We Filmed a Movie

Journal Entry – 11/23/17

A lot of you saw a picture I posted recently about a movie. A movie containing yours truly. In fact, my cinema debut. It was a thing I didn't tell many people about since the filming 14 months ago, because if wrestling has taught me anything, it is “Do not, under any circumstances, get your hopes up.” And I know what it boils down to and what a lot of people can (and will) say, “Jake, you were just an extra. Whatever.” To that I say, in a way, you are correct. In another way I say, “Hellllll nah, it focused around my company, for which I've busted my ass, and involved my unique skill set. So you can't take it away from me!” That being said, a handful of funny stories came out of the filming and I will share one day of production here that I found hilarious and eye-opening.

In August of 2016, I embarked on my second journey to the Orient for WRESTLE-1. I strolled into the dojo, got settled into my room, and assumed that dojo life would be rather similar to that I experienced the February prior. In short; wake-up, eat chanko, train, eat chanko, train, clean-up, maybe go out, maybe Netflix way too much (side note, WWE Network was not operational in Japan at the time, obviously archaic). I was soon to learn that dojo life would not be quite as calm as this.

On day two or three I woke up and walked into the hall. To my surprise, there was a crew of about 15 people running around, various things in hand, every one looking more official than the last. Now, the dojo houses many things, so one can never be sure what is going on. Our company W-1 sometimes holds small wrestling shows in the facility. The sister company, K-1 Kickboxing also sometimes holds kickboxing events in the facility. There are numerous martial arts classes, karate and capoeria demonstrations going on from time to time. The presence of so many people was not shocking, but also seemed different. I went about my day as if nothing was unusual.

The next day I awoke again to find a whole ton of people in the building and it was obviously no longer for a kickboxing event. I asked one of the guys in the dorms what was going on. “Making movie.” My interest was piqued. I began to wonder exactly what this movie was about, what was the focus, how were they utilizing us, etc. I dug for information over the next few days. I will clarify now that you would think I could get all of this in one quick conversation, however no one with my company speaks English besides a stray word here or there. I pieced together most of it. A major Japanese film was being made, and W-1 was the backdrop and setting for where a young woman in the movie finds herself as a new employee with zero idea the craziness that goes on in such a business. Such craziness also seem to be shared a bit by the movie making business. One day would be insanity in the building, then the next day the dojo was dead silent.

Eventually came the first day I would be on camera. On this morning I was lounging in my room and bed, and a woman knocked on the door, looked in, said “hello,” with a puzzled look on her face, and walked out. A few minutes later, Shibuya, one of our awesome production guys came in and asked if I could be in the movie. The woman, a producer, was stunned to see a non-Japanese person hanging around and wanted me to be another wrestler in certain group scenes. We spoke a few minutes later, and seeing as she spoke English well, I got a lot more information about what was going on. I was told “wait here” in my room. Silly me thought that might be less than the two hours I chilled, doing nothing in a dorm room. Eventually she came and got me and explained the first scene.

I was positioned on the second floor of the building, not far from the staircase and was told, “when we give cue, run fast upstairs.” Simple enough. Asking around for reasoning, all I got was “like fire alarm pulled.” From here, my confusion would only grow. I stood in my area for probably twenty minutes then heard the first “Action!” A flood of people ran up the stairs from three different floors, some in gym clothes sprayed with a water bottle like me to simulate a workout interruption, and some in no clothes from the showers interrupting what we can only imagine. We raced up a few flights of stairs, went back to reset, waited about ten minutes and did it again. Ten or twelve times. After that two hours (for 15 seconds of film), we started the next scene actually in the gym/basketball court upstairs. Another ten takes of another short sprint from stairs to ring, with adequate ten minute reset times, we were ready for the next part. During this break, another Japanese woman came up to me and began speaking with me in English (seriously, this is a very rare occurrence here). Immediately I was caught off guard by the language and her looks. She was a beautiful woman, and if you know my opinions on Asian women, this admission should be a shocker. We spoke for quite some time since we had long breaks between scenes and we got to know a bit about each other. She was the main actress in the film and had been out of movies for a minute due to having a baby. After she was called away, another wrestler asked if I knew who she was and informed me that she is very famous. To me, she was merely a sweet, genuine individual.

Next our fearless leader, wrestling legend Great Muta cut a promo in the ring and gave us a signal. Upon said signal, all the wrestlers circled the actress, picked her up and proceeded to throw her far into the air, over and over. Cut scene, break, and go back to picking up the lovely young woman again and mercilessly throwing her in the air as she seemingly panics. I never received clarification on this scene. We (but not actually me because I was on the edge of the toss mob) threw that poor young woman probably sixty times. Annnnd cut for the day.

The next day of filming in which I was involved was a few days later, and to me, even funnier. However, that is more of an in-person story for me to tell. Not for any terrible reasons, but ones I could more easily explain in person. A few poor actors got the hell beat out of them by us. I felt pretty bad when I saw this scene got cut from the movie and those guys got really roughed up for a scene that didn't even make the final film.

On another day, I’ll talk about my adventure to going to see the movie in theaters and my opinions on it. I also totally want to have viewing parties of it back in the States upon my return and its DVD release, hopefully with English subtitles, and that scene that got cut where so much innocent actor blood was spilled.

Key:

Chanko is Japanese “Sumo Stew,” made of (usually) broth, chicken, napa cabbage, daikon, more veggies and randomness and spices.

The actress's name is Eriko Sato.

The movie is called, “Ringside Story,” or “The Ringside Story” on IMDB. It took me a long time to actually figure out the name of the movie.

ringside.jp is the official site with trailers!