Desperate Sound Mixer Saved!

On most Saturdays I sleep in and rest up from another busy workweek at Trew Audio. But this particular Saturday I was finishing moving the Rental Department into our new US location.I was exhausted from days of packing, moving to the new rental office, but after the first cup of fresh ground, fresh brewed coffee I was ready to embark on another day.

We still had a few bugs to work out in the new phone system, which I mention only because of what happened next. Glen Trew's cell phone rang. It was Brian Harefeld, the office manager from our Toronto store, calling the cell phone because our office phones weren't working yet. Brian relayed a message from a production manager in desperation, calling from Phoenix, Arizona, saying that they needed us to call them immediately. Glen called the production company and came back with a list of equipment they needed. A long list. He proceeded to tell me that sound mixer, Lisa Pinero, a Trew Audio regular, had lost most of her equipment in a fire on a movie set in Tucson. Fortunately no one was hurt, but all of the equipment was either burned, soaked, or otherwise made useless.

It turns out that the production wanted to start shooting again the next day - Sunday. The production company had not been able to reach our US office, but they noticed on our website that the Toronto store is open Saturdays from 9am to 1pm. They explained their desperate situation to Brian, who then called Glen, who then called the production company, who then asked us to do the impossible.

This is when my mission for the day quickly shifted from moving into my new office space to helping out a customer in desperate need. The movie that Lisa was working on, ironically enough, is a Steven King television movie titled "Desperation." Trew Audio to the rescue! As soon as Glen finished the phone calls with Lisa and the production manager, we knew specifically what we needed to ship out. I was informed that there would be a courier at the office in an hour to pick everything up and get everything on the next flight from Nashville to Phoenix. This was no easy task. Most of the rental equipment was still in cases from the move, but I located the equipment and began to sort out everything that Lisa needed. A Deva V, PD-4, quad pack of Lectro 411A's with COS-11's, Sennheiser MKH60, Schoeps CMC6 with MK41, Cooper CS106 mixer, DVD-RAM burner, boom cable system with talkback, and all of the necessary cables, etc, etc. With a little help from Southwest Airlines, we were able to get the sound equipment the production needed delivered from our Nashville office to Tucson, Arizona that night, in time for them to resume Sunday morning. Impossible? Yeah, but it usually is.

I wonder what will happen this week?