The logistics of Juno were a symphony of calculated modesty.
For the first time since he had set foot in Los Angeles, Daniel felt the weight of a proper budget behind his decisions. While $4.5 million was considered "pocket change" for a studio like Legendary or Vanguard, it was a staggering fifty times the budget of 12 Angry Men. He no longer had to beg for favors or bribe building managers with the promise of "special thanks" in the credits.
The locations were finalized with an efficiency that made Tom's head spin. They had secured a quiet, suburban house in the Valley to serve as the MacGuff residence—a place that smelled of lived-in comfort rather than staged perfection. The local high school had agreed to a weekend and after-hours filming schedule, and the "Dancing Elk" pharmacy was actually a local independent drugstore that looked like it had been frozen in the late nineties.
The crew was a lean, professional machine. Sarah and Sam were now leading their respective teams with a confidence that had been forged in the fire of their debut. The food wasn't day-old sandwiches from a corner deli; it was a rotating menu from a local catering company that actually understood the concept of a balanced meal.
"I could get used to this, Dan," Tom said, leaning against the craft services table as they prepped for the first shot of the day at the high school track. He was holding a plate of actual eggs and bacon. "I haven't had a stress-induced stomach cramp in forty-eight hours. It's eerie."
"Don't get too comfortable," Daniel replied, checking the framing on the monitor. "The peace is a luxury. Hollywood is all about storms."
The first day of shooting Juno felt like a homecoming to the truth of the medium. The opening shots featured Ellie Page as Juno, walking down a suburban street in her signature oversized flannel, nursing a giant jug of SunnyD. The aesthetic was soft, naturalistic, and vibrantly human—a far cry from the high-contrast, sweat-stained walls of his first film.
"And... action," Daniel said quietly.
Ellie moved with that effortless, slightly awkward gait that Daniel had seen in his mind the moment he read the script. She reached the mailbox, took a swig of the orange juice, and let out a dry, rhythmic sigh.
"Cut. Beautiful. Reset for the reverse," Daniel commanded.
As the crew scrambled to move the sticks, Daniel's phone vibrated in his pocket. He pulled it out and saw the caller ID: DANTE FERRETTI.
He stepped away from the monitors, signaling to Sarah that he'd be back in a minute.
"Dante, tell me you have good news about the cockpit," Daniel said, his voice shifting from the soft cadence of a suburban director to the sharp precision of a studio architect.
"The hydraulic gimbals for the Falcon mock-up arrived, Daniel," Dante's voice crackled over the line, filled with the excitement of a child with a new toy. "But the engineering team from Legendary is worried about the weight. They want to swap the steel frame for aluminum. I told them you wanted the 'heaviness' of the shake during the light-speed jump. If we go to aluminum, it will feel like a tin can, not a starship."
"Stick to your guns, Dante," Daniel said firmly. "I want the vibration to be visceral. Tell them to reinforce the flooring of the stage instead of weakening the ship. I'll sign off on the extra cost for the structural reinforcement this evening. How's the scale for the R2 units?"
"We have three functioning prototypes. One for the rolling shots, one for the gadgets, and one for the 'personality' close-ups. They are... they are beautiful, Daniel. They look like they have lived in the sand for a thousand years."
"Excellent. I'll be at the studio at 7:00 PM for the review. Keep pushing."
Daniel hung up and walked back to the track. He didn't feel the "split" that most directors feared when juggling projects. The [Director's Lens] skill seemed to categorize his brain into different silos. When he was on the Juno set, the world was intimate, colorful, and quiet. When he took the calls for Star Wars, the world became mythic, mechanical, and vast. It wasn't about spreading himself thin; it was about operating at a higher frequency.
Ten minutes into the next setup—a scene where Juno watches Paulie Bleeker (Jesse Eisenberg) running laps in his impossibly short gold shorts—his phone buzzed again. This time it was John, the casting director.
"Daniel, sorry to interrupt the shoot," John said, sounding harried. "But the agents are hounding me about the next round of Star Wars auditions. We have the extras and the sub-casts for the Rebels and the Imperial officers locked, but we still have the 'Gaps.' We need our Chewbacca, our R2-D2 operator, Tarkin and Darth Vader."
Daniel looked at Jesse Eisenberg, who was currently doing a nervous stretch on the track, looking every bit the awkward teen Paulie.
"Give me two weeks, John," Daniel said, his eyes tracking Jesse's movement. "I'll have them ready by that time. Schedule the public callbacks for Friday. I want the physical actors—the tall guys for the suit roles—to be pre-screened for movement. I don't care about their voices yet; I care about how they occupy space."
[Talent Hunt] was still on cooldown for another two weeks, he needed to track down the actors for the other major roles as soon as it went off cooldown.
"Got it. Tuesday it is. Good luck with the kid in the gold shorts."
"He's running well, John. Talk soon."
The shoot continued. Daniel was managing the duality with a calm that bordered on the unnerving. To the crew of Juno, he was the focused, empathetic director who spent ten minutes talking to Jesse about the "emotional weight of a headband." To the titans at Legendary, he was the ghost in the machine, sending midnight emails with precise technical specifications for the VFX pipelines.
Legendary was being "patient," but it was a corporate kind of patience. They were keeping tabs on him through Tom and through the veteran department heads. They sent "observers" to the Burbank studio once a week—men in suits who looked at the models and the concept art with a mixture of skepticism and awe. They wanted updates on the location scouting, which Daniel had slowly finalized: Tunisia for the desert of Tatooine, and the forest of Endor (which he was already planning for the future) in the redwoods of Northern California.
"They want to know why we haven't announced Juno yet," Tom said as they sat in the back of the catering van during a rain delay on Day 5. "The trades are starting to sniff around. They think you've gone into hiding to focus on the 'Space Movie.' Some of the gossip columns are saying you've got 'Director's Block' because the scale is too big."
"Let them talk," Daniel said, watching the rain hit the windshield. "In Hollywood, being 'forgotten' is a weapon if you use it right. If the media thinks I'm only working on Star Wars, they won't look for the small girl in the flannel. When Juno arrives, I want it to be a sneak attack. I want the audience to realize I haven't just been building a galaxy,"
The plan was ambitious, even for him. He would finish the twenty-two-day shoot for Juno, and then, without a single day of rest, he would dive directly into the principal photography for Star Wars. It was a schedule that would have broken a normal man, but Daniel had the System, and more importantly, he had his people.
He had made a pivotal decision: he was handing the post-production of Juno entirely to Benny and his new team on the first floor.
"You want me to do what?" Benny had asked when Daniel called him into the office before the shoot.
"You're the Head of Sound and Post, Benny," Daniel had told him, placing the hard drives for the first day's dailies on the desk. "I've personally hired every editor and colorist in that room. They're talented, they're hungry, and they're loyal to the vision. I've given you the 'Bible' for the look and sound of this movie. I'll be guiding you through the dailies every night, but I'm trusting you to build the first cut."
"But Dan, you're the one who edited 12 Angry Men into a masterpiece," Benny protested. "What if we mess up the rhythm?"
"You won't," Daniel said firmly. "I'll be looking over your shoulder, and I'll tweak the final lock myself. But I can't be in two places at once anymore. If Miller Studios is going to grow, I have to trust my departments to function. You know the 'frequency' I want, Benny. The mundane, the warm, the real. Now go and show me why I hired you."
Benny had taken the drives with a look of terrifying responsibility. He knew this was more than a job; it was a test of the studio's soul.
As the shoot for Juno hit its stride, the "Discreet" nature of the production became its greatest asset. They were filming in the quiet corners of the city, using small crews and mobile equipment. The paparazzi were all stationed outside the Legendary lot or the Burbank office, waiting for a glimpse of a "starship" or a famous actor. They completely ignored the small van parked outside a local pharmacy or the director in a plain hoodie talking to a girl with a fake pregnancy bump.
By Day 12, the rhythm was perfect. Daniel would wake at 5:00 AM, head to the Juno set, and direct eight to ten pages of dialogue. During the lunch break, he would review the VFX renders for the Star Wars space battles on a secure tablet. At 6:00 PM, he would wrap the Juno crew and head straight to the Burbank studio. There, he would walk the floors with Dante and Bob, reviewing the set constructions and the lighting rigs until midnight. Then, he would spend an hour with Benny, looking at the rough assemblies of the Juno scenes.
He was a man living in two worlds, and for the first time, he felt like he was finally winning the game.
He looked at Jesse and Ellie on the track—two kids who had no idea of the potential they had. He looked at his phone, where a notification from Legendary confirmed the shipping of the heavy camera rigs to Tunisia.
"Everything is on schedule," Daniel whispered to himself, a small, tired smile touching his lips.
He wasn't just a director anymore; he was a man whom a lot of people depended on. And as the sun set over the high school track, he took a pledge to take a proper vacation after the end of both projects.
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A/N: Here's the bonus chapter you absolute legends. Clutching up on the power stones on the final day of the reset.
Anyways, Juno's shoot will mostly be skimmed over (kind of) but the same won't be the case for Star Wars. I nerded out a bit while writing those.
Support me and read ahead on my Patreon: patreon.com/AmaanS