'I was hired to film a billionaire's wedding in Capri, and it was the worst five days of my life'
The brief seemed too good to be true. A five-day trip to Capri, the epicentre of La Dolce Vita glamour. The gig? To make a glitzy video for a Russian oligarch’s wedding.
At the time, I headed up an award-winning film production company, and was experienced in working with high-end clients in the form of luxury brands. Arranging a film for a wedding wasn’t our normal territory, but entirely do-able.
I’ve scaled diamond mines in Angola with militia watching our every move so a few days capturing some tender moments and fluttering confetti against the lapping waters of the Bay of Naples sounded straightforward, and rather fun. How hard could it be?
The couple in question was shrouded in mystery - we were initially contacted by a PR company - which meant that until we had arrived at the venue and signed NDAs, we weren’t given an inkling as to the sheer volume of what was needed during their five-day cavalcade of excess.
It quickly became clear that this high-rolling, spend-happy pair required a 24/7 documentary crew to cover their every move, as well as those of their guests, across multiple locations across the island, over five days and nights of festivities. They wanted a Hollywood blockbuster of a wedding video.
We scaled the crew and equipment as best we could to cover all eventualities. This included filming the couple’s arrival from the Balearics via private jet after their guests’ arrival from Russia via charter flights, extensive wedding cortege preparations at a hotel in the hills, a mountain-top marriage ceremony at an exclusive spa resort followed by a ten-course wedding breakfast at the privately hired marina, accompanied by live performances from international pop stars.
The next day a nine-yacht flotilla would sail wedding guests to neighbouring Positano for a five-course lunch in a private cove with entertainment from top comedy stand-up acts. And for those not yet on life support, a blowout final night of revelry ending with a 45-minute firework display across the spellbinding Amalfi Coast set to another live music line-up.
Atmospheric montage shots of Capri were also a must, in between time. With so much to cover we soon got used to the hairpin bends on the cliff tops of the island.
But it became clear that even the expansive organised schedule of non-stop events wasn’t enough. Once the happy couple had landed, a steady trickle of increasingly frantic demands started almost immediately, which seemed to correlate with how much vodka had been consumed.
Our first filming extravaganza involved the bride - during what turned out to be a Stolichnaya-fuelled unpacking frenzy - insisting that her 40-plus trousseau of all-white designed ensembles captured for prosperity. Each outfit. Filmed repeatedly. As she changed and topped up her glass in between.
Let’s just say that by the end of our fashion parade, some of the white outfits were less than pristine.
Working with luxury clients, no demand is too outrageous - it’s something you come to expect. Money was no object. Nor, we swiftly realised, was a second of shut-eye. The first evening, having wrapped up a five-course welcome dinner complete with a famous comedy stand-up act, I hit the pillow at 3am ahead of an agreed 7am start time.
No such luck; one hour later I received a call to my room that the bride needed us back at the villa within the next hour. The reason? She wanted to be captured asleep so that we would catch the blessed moment she awoke, Disney princess-like, from slumber on the morning of her big day. The language she used when we tried to reason with her was far from Sleeping Beauty.
I also had to turn my hand to tasks more usually found on a wedding planner’s list rather than those of a video producer; if we wanted the shots to look a million dollars, we would have to get the various venues set up and ready ourselves. On the day of the nuptials, the flowers began wilting in the baking midday sun as the bride’s arrival crept ever later; cue frantic spraying to keep the petals buoyant.
The couple were set to spend their wedding night in a private villa separate from their guests, so as celebrations got underway at the marina - involving the aforementioned ten-course feast accompanied with turtle doves and many, many magnums of champagne - I scooted up the mountain to the villa to make sure it was looking suitably dreamy for their filmed arrival.
Except as the light breeze turned into a prevailing headwind, and with no wedding planner to be found, I found myself wading into the pool in my dress to light hundreds of floating candles, dancing flames singeing my hands in the process. No matter, the newly-weds turned up three hours late and so lubricated that, having insisted that we capture that 'lifting over the threshold' moment, their team of flunkies asked for all cameras to be switched off. I believe the groom spent his wedding night asleep in the hallway.
Another last-minute request was capturing the nine - count them, nine - yacht flotilla taking guests to Positano the following day. The crew had rented speedboats so that we could zip alongside the yachts, weaving in and out of them to capture the glamour, but with an hour to go before the planned departure, a helicopter was commissioned at vast expense so that we could also capture aerial footage.
Two hours of gravity-defying flying - courtesy of an Italian ex-naval pilot - ensued, punctuated by texts from the couple, during what should have been one of the happiest days of their lives, ordering us to swoop lower and lower to get close-ups. Our pilot, performing all sorts of kamikaze stunts as my crew clutched their equipment and sick bags, eventually refused: "I want to see my kids again" was his plea.
Back on dry land, and in the safer terrain of our London office, you’d think our job was done; not so. Appropriately, the five days of theatrics on the island were nothing compared to the drama that unfolded in sending the various video edits to the couple.
Perhaps influenced by the manipulations of social media, we were asked to make the bride’s mother "look less tired", the sea "more blue" and the champagne "more gold". After more cuts than a Scorsese epic, we reached a passable version of their five-day fanfare, ensuring that their Capri dream lived forever for posterity. As for me? I now have a strict ‘no weddings’ stipulation.
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