Well, I Did Stay at the Holiday Inn Express Last Night

Well, I did stay at the Holiday Inn Express last night.
 Seriously, I did:

 This was photo was taken on my third day in Oklahoma, as I was there to reprise my role as the Adelantado for the completion of the De Soto and the Chickasaw documentary that began filming at De Soto National Memorial last June.

 See for last June's fun:
Typecast and Its a Wrap

and for the Chickasaw perspective on the matter check out:
The Winter of Discontent
http://www.chickasaw.net/history_culture/index_5590.htm

 http://web.archive.org/web/19971009161936/http://www.chickasaw.com/~cnation/art/firsten.htm

and a visual:
http://clio.missouristate.edu/chuchiak/Battle%20of%20Mobile%20(Mabila).jpg


Chickasaw Multimedia built a semi permanent village / set with  on some tribal land in Davis, Oklahoma.

The Village to be Pillaged:

Behind the scenes: One of the Winter Houses was only 3/4 constructed to allow cameras and crew to get inside for interior shots.

Clearly wo years of marching across the realm of La Florida have aged Soto.  -<):{)}  The scenes shot here take place C. the Winter of 1540-4, in the area northeastern Mississippi. Soto's entrada had barely recovered from the battle of Mabila, where most of the expedititon's spare supplies had been burned up.  They faced an opposed river crossing, and will spend the winter in a Chicsa (Chickasaw) village.  The Castillians will be attacked at night and fire set to the village they are staying at, forcing them one again to regroup, recover, rebuild their equipment and move on to the northeast eventually encountering the Mississippi River.                             

 Now that I've done quite a few of these film and video projects I've leared the routine.  Get dressed up, get made up.

..and wait..and wait...and do the same thing three times and wait some more.  Repeat for 12 hours.

In position while the cameras and lighting get set up:

Yes, my instructions are to lie back and relax!

Add caption

What I'm looking at while the crew focuses on my face.

Some of the other "talent" waiting for their cues.

 

One of the horses, getting the Blue/green screen treatment for the village on fire sequence.

T-Bone the Horse much happier with a companion nearby.

My last day of shooting was at the Chickasaw Cultural Center, Sulpher.  The lrge council house was used for an interior sequence.  We arrived on set after normal museum hours, but I did get the the really quick 15 minute tour (the museum director was portraying one of the conquistadors!) I wish I had had the time to check it out further. I was quite impressed.  Eventually the finished production should be playing at the museum's theater.

 

 

 

Some of the Indians in the cast were practicing the the traditional stickball game.  Apparently the get as many as fifty players on a side and the play gets rather rough and tumble.  Rather like English rugby with sticks.  I should imagine that the Spanish who enjoyed semi-military games like canes would have enjoyed the spectacle on those rare occasions when the chronicles describe joint Indian/ Spanish feasting and celebrations.  While I was thre I tried to pick up a couple of Chickasaw phrases for greetings and asked for a translation for "Where is the gold?"  The Chickasaw language evidently doesn't have a word for "gold."  Which I think says a lot about the two cultures and just how hopless Soto's quest in North America really was.

I had a great time out in Oklahoma.  The Chickaswas were great hosts and the film crew very professional.  My only really regret is that the phisical village burning won't be shot until the end of the month, so I spent my last eventing in OK in front of a green screen.  In the mean time a couple of photos from Camp Ucita's prevois burnings: