In the early 1980's, the South Carolina Educational Television folks put together a group of actors for a series of programs for their instructional network. The programs would be sent out to students in the schools around the state. I was chosen to participate in a program called The Palmetto Special, which was designed for 8th grade history classes. The first one I did was called "The Charleston Tea Party", and it was filmed in 1981. As far as I know, it was shown in classes into the 1990's and maybe beyond.
The program was about a little known event in South Carolina history that occurred in 1774. Everyone knows about the Boston Tea Party, but the one in Charleston was more about taxes and contraband. I played the evil Mr. Lindsay, who was one of three Charlestonians who brought in tea to the colony over the objections of the residents.
We filmed the majority of the program in and around Charleston. Most of those in the cast had Theatre experience, and the crew had a lot of TV experience, so it made for a professional look. We were dressed in wigs and period costumes. They put us up in a motel off Meeting Street in downtown Charleston. Our first location was at a bank about two blocks away. I walked in costume over to the bank. Some tourists thought I was a tour guide and was asking me about where one thing or another was located. I sent several tourists in the wrong direction. Sorry guys.
The scenes at the bank had an outdoor courtyard scene in the back of the bank, and the other scene was upstairs in a meeting room. The outdoor scene required dialogue between the three evil tea merchants. Because there were cars and planes around town, we had gone out about a week before and recorded our dialogue in the depths of Sesqui Park outside Columbia in the dead of night, so that there would not be any noise. There is also an earlier scene of a bonfire, which was also done in the park. So, when we got to the bank in Charleston, the crew put up giant speakers behind the bank, and we mouthed our lines to the audio. We had to do several takes. I also had to work without glasses, and I was pretty blind. There was a narrow brick walkway that we had to proceed down toward some steps. There was a brick spot that jutted out, and I kept tripping at that spot. If you ever see the finished product, you will see me glancing down as we walked. I was looking for that spot.
As we walked up the steps, I had a line about "bowing to Mr. Gadsden". I thought of doing a bow with my hat. The director liked that idea and kept it in the film. We got up to the meeting room for the next scene. I had my glasses tucked into the cuff of my coat. There was an actor (one of the evil three) that had to make a short speech. He was flanked by me and another actor. He had a tough time keeping a straight face while making his speech, and he would laugh. The director would have to stop the film, and he would do it again. We did several takes. The actor on the other side of him and me began pinching the actor to try and get him to stop laughing. If you see the program, he looks like he is in pain while delivering his speech. He was. One regret about that scene for me was I was not consistent in tilting my head. One shot it was one way, and then another shot was another way.
Our other big scene was the dumping of the tea into Charleston Harbor. We shot that scene at Charles Towne Landing on a very cold day. The wind was blowing off of the water. The crew had made boxes out of Balsa Wood, so they were very light to pick up. Nothing was in the boxes, and we had to look like we were dumping the tea into the harbor without actually doing it. The boxes were down in the hold of this period ship that was moored to a pier. One actor got at the bottom of the steps in the boat and picked up a box, supposedly full of tea, and gave it to me. I was at the middle of the steps, and I had to carry it up the steps to another actor at the top of the steps. He then proceeding to carry it over to the side of the ship for dumping later. First of all, it was hard for me as I couldn't see to carry the box up the steps without falling. But, the first actor in the hold made it look like it was a heavy box. He gave it to me, and I just carried it up the steps like it was nothing. The third actor took the box, and he made it look like he was getting a hernia. I looked like I was the strongest man around.
We then had to look like we were dumping the tea. The two actors did a box together. They then gave me a box to "dump". The thing is that the boxes were sealed, so it had to look like we were dumping the tea, when nothing would be coming out. After we had done this, the director decided that he wanted a shot of someone breaking open the box with a wooden club and to do it in slow motion. One of the crew members did that. They then wanted me to use another box to dump more tea flanked by the other two actors. It was one of those already sealed boxes. I was to then take the box and bring it back down to the deck of the ship. I asked the director about that, and he said that I would be out of focus and no one would see that the box was sealed. It was while the narrator was finishing up the story on camera. I was right behind him. When I brought the box back down, I was in focus, and everyone could see the box was sealed. I wish I could have used the box they broke open, but that one had been destroyed by the crew member. I just hope 8th graders didn't catch those errors.
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