Behind the scenes ... the Making of:
The Quest for Captain Kidd

December 2000 -- Long Beach Harbor, California

(all photos and text by Christine Lampe)

As part of the filming for "The Quest For Captain Kidd" for The Discovery Channel & Compass Light (premiere broadcast was June 10, 2001), several West Coast pirates from the Port Royal Privateers, and friends, were hired by VANDERPOOL FILMS to act as crew and other characters that Kidd encountered aboard the Adventure Galley.  The Lady Washington was a stand in for the Adventure Galley.  Three fun-filled days were spent filming scenes aboard her at the dock and at sea.   I was present for day 2 and 3, with camera in hand.  So let me tell you a little what it's like to make a documentary ...

Michael Lampe (the other half of No Quarter Given) had been hired on as production manager for the West Coast shooting.  This not only involved driving the production crew around in our van, wrangling up pirates to fill out the crew of the Lady Washington, and doing a multitude of go-fer jobs, it also meant he needed to procure a lot of props.  Many of them came from our house.  As I wandered the ship on the second day of shooting -- I kept running into familiar items in unfamiliar settings.  Half my house was on that ship!  Chests, barrels, crates, rugs, etc.  Even the spyglass that Kidd is seen using in the documentary, and the pearls that he pours into his hand were ours.   In this photo -- the rug the  cannon is laying on came from our house.  Those props not from our house, were most likely borrowed from the Port Royal Privateers.

Not only did Michael have to find pirate crew actors, but he had to find people to fill a few other jobs.  Jon Rose, a long time stunt actor, stunt coordinator and licensed pyrotechnician,  was hired for Special Effects.  He created the "burning ship" effect seen in the documentary, depicting the demise of the Adventure Galley.   Louie Lambie, an experienced nautical craftsman and stunt actor, became Michael's assistant with procuring and creating props.  

Jerry Reyes, longtime actor, was hired for Craft Services.  Here he is in the Lady Washington's galley preparing lunch.  Older NQG readers will be familiar with Jerry in his guise as Francisco de la Beltraneja -- author of the "Tales of a Spanish Pirate".  Jerry did double duty -- he also performed the role of Kidd's friend, Capt. Culliford -- and is rather prominent in the documentary for a few minutes.

Another position to fill was that of costume mistress and make-up person.  Satin Clifton came out from Phoenix, AZ, to do this job (she's worked on many a movie in the past).  Here she is preparing Jerry Reyes for his role as Capt. Culliford.  Notice, Jerry is not the least bit shy with her!  Actually -- he is steadying her -- because the ship was at sea, and rolling quite a bit, making it a bit tricky to adjust wigs and apply make up.

Speaking of steadying, here's a shot of Michael (in his pirate crew garb) and Satin steadying the camera man during the filming of the "hitting Moore on the head with the bucket" scene.  Everyone pitched in where needed.  The cameraman is Charles Vanderpool, director of cinematography for Vanderpool Films.

Here's what they were filming.  Captain Kidd (portrayed by Robert Leenbruggen) is grabbing the bucket to hit gunner William Moore on the head with it.  They did this scene over and over again because it was so important.  The actor playing Kidd was so sea-sick during this scene, but you wouldn't know it from his acting.  He was a real trooper.  

The person playing gunner Moore, Devin Davis (in yellow scarf), was not a professional actor, but one of the Lady's crew.  With a little coaching from our stunt coordinator Jon Rose (red scarf), and stunt assistant Louie Lambie  (lower left), he did a very realistic job of falling after being hit with the bucket.  Captain Ryan Meyer (aka Captain Evil) of the Lady Washington observes the lesson.

You know  . . . 
-- acting can be soooooooo tiring!

Kenneth Clifton, showing why his pirate
nickname is Catnapper

Here's the Lady's crew going quickly up into the rigging.

And even more quickly coming  back down . . .

(Kidd's -- don't try this at home)

Here they are shooting the scene where Kidd obtains the French passes by pretending to be a French ship and fooling a passing Dutch ship.
Italian crewmember Antonio Mazzarisi (right), serving a short stint as crew aboard the Lady, may not have spoken English very well, but he sure knew the French language.  Thus he landed the role as the crew member who pretended to be the captain of Kidd's ship, thus luring in the Dutch ship sailing under French protection.  Greg Devore (left) plays the Dutch Captain.

Jerry Reyes (top center), as Capt. Culliford, supervises the transfer of plundered goods from one ship to the other.

Louie Lambie (left) as one of Kidd's crew  & Jerry Reyes (right) as Capt. Culliford

 Who is this scurvy lookin' beggar?

There's a good shot of him in the film as he steps up to sign the articles and loudly announces his name.

(If you haven't figured out who he is, he's Michael MacLeod, aka Michael Lampe)

A scurvy crew:  (left-to-right)  Jerry Reyes, Michael Lampe, (notice the eye patch is in the UP position),  Antonio Mazzarisi, & Greg Devore.

 Jerry is buried beneath a pile of silks, brocades, and other costly fabrics from the pirate's plunder.  They were about to be carried down to the captain's cabin to portray some of the rich plunder in a scene.

Captain Kidd (Robert Leenbruggen, left) with our pyrotechnician, Juan de la Kaboom (Jon Rose, on right).

It was decided that Kidd needed some navigational instruments, so Louie stayed up all night creating a backstaff.  It may not be as precise as a "real" one -- but we could still take sightings with it.  The actor playing Kidd had a lot of fun with it pretending it was a machine gun, and rat-tat-tatting until it almost accidentally went over the side.  A stop was put to the machine-gunning.  

The light was such that the filming with the backstaff was done from the other side - showing the "wrong" side of the backstaff -- no brass plates with the readings.  Oh - well, Louie could have spent a lot less time creating it if he had known that.

Heaving the lead line to measure the distance to the sea bottom.

Mutinous talk amongst the crew.

A menacing Kidd squelches the mutiny attempt.

Louie just seems too happy as he belays and coils down the lines.

The agents of the British East India Company -- Steve Allen (left) and George Rogers (right). They did not use this scene in the broadcast version of the documentary, but I understand there is more footage in the video cassette version.  So perhaps they are in that version.

This is my son Michael Dugal, portraying one of Kidd's crew.  They had him belaying lines over and over again, for a couple of hours.  He should be an expert on it by now.  But this part didn't make the broadcast -- instead he can be spotted briefly when a group of about four crewmen are shown sitting down  together -- he's the only one wearing a red head scarf.

Behind the two actors is a glimpse of Marilyn Vanderpool, of Vanderpool Films, as she directs the action.

At the end of a long day of shooting at sea, we headed home, watching the sun set over the island of Catalina on the horizon.

For much more, visit the Discovery Channel On Line and learn more about:

The Archaeological Dive for Captain Kidd's Adventure Galley
Learn about Captain Kidd 
Read daily dispatches from the crew at the dive site
Read Biographies of the crew members at the dive
MORE! 

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