San Juan, Puerto Rico

By now beginning the day with Dan fetching coffee from the cafe on Deck 5, had become established as the routine. Over coffee we decided what to do with our morning; Dan decided to go to the ‘behind the episode’ session on directing with Roxanne Dawson, whilst Alex opted for some more time in bed.

Dan ran into Kimberly at the directing session, we had been expecting to see her at the party the previous evening, but it seems her pre-party nap had turned into more of a sleep. As the session kicked off and it became apparent Roxanne intended to screen the entire episode Riddles (her directorial debut) Dan felt a little short changed (other talented celebrities were doing all-new shows elsewhere on the ship after all) but that soon changed. Its rare to really watch an episode (as opposed to just listen to the story whilst going about other things). The opportunity to ask the director a question really focuses things; choices like the one scene that uses hand-held camera jump out in a way they don’t normally (even with nobody pointing it out at that time).

When Roxanne re-took the stage, she spoke for only spoke for about 20 minutes, out of her 60 but she got a lot across with the time. She spoke about the value of not knowing how unusual it was for women to direct in the 90s, and her explanation of coverage and episodic direction finally joined the dots with remarks other directors had made in their DVD commentaries. In the mean time, Alex had found that Kate Mulgrew’s interview was being streamed on the in cabin TVs; with a long day ahead that seemed like a great way to squeeze in an extra event.

No time to hang about; we had a walking tour around old San Juan booked and its hosted by Nana Visitor.Read more