The

Ivory Coast.
By Stephen Donnini

Copyright 2009
Stephen Donnini
Donnini Studio
407-645-4705

Carrying my luggage through airports in San

Francisco, Denver, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Mexico City,

Chicago, Detroit, Toronto, Miami, Atlanta, Charlotte, New

York, Boston, London, Milan, Rome, Paris, and my home

Dallas, I had become lonely, disoriented and loveless.

Waking up in hotel rooms, not knowing where I was. One

morning I looked at my ID tag on my luggage, because I

couldn’t remember my name… Frank Maldonado, 2745

Mockingbird Lane Dallas, Texas USA. Many things happened

along the way that left me longing for the truth about who

I was. After years of hard work, I was living my dream.

My native Italian grandfather showed me the ways of

the world. He was a professional gambler and Circus owner

that was famous for his flat stores. Flat stores are the

games like three card Monty, the ring toss and milk bottle

throw. A flat store or “Joint” is designed to flat take

your money. He said, “Show business is like gambling, it’s

all about the action. Sometimes you win, sometimes you

loose. But, people always go back for more action.” I

traveled with him from Florida to Maine when school was out

for summer. It was the training ground for my first job.

The first day of my first real job, I agreed to lie, cheat

and pilfer for a paycheck.

I became a creative director for one of the largest

Advertising Agencies in the world, now known as Omnicom.

I’ve won over 100 creative awards from ad clubs in New

York, LA and London. We are the best group of liars in the

world. Here we created the illusion of truth for mass

consumption. Just like the Circus Midway.

 One of my assignments was to work on Phillips

Petroleum. Our ad campaign premise was that Phillips

Petroleum is a company that was looking everywhere in the

world for new deposits of petroleum, including at the

bottom of the ocean. We planned to film 30 sec & 60 TV

spots showing under water drilling ship operated by Global

Marine. The ship was drilling test wells in 200 feet of

water of the coast of West Africa in the territorial waters

of Ivory Coast. The idea of the TV spots was simple, “We go

to the bottom the ocean to find the energy you need.” The

storyboard showed fish swimming across in front of the

camera as it breaks the surface to reveal the Global Marine

Drill ship at sea. So, we had some specialized underwater

filming to do and some helicopter shots as well. Plus,

there were the political concerns with the government of

Ivory Coast to satisfy.

The Phillips people in Abidjan, Ivory Coast were

dealing with a dictator. So, we had to give them something

in return for their cooperation. In this part of the world,

the pay-off is the fastest and surest way to get what you

want. They wanted us to shoot a tourists film about Ivory

Coast while we were there.

We departed Kennedy Airport in a snowstorm at 11pm

with a first stop in Dakar, Senegal there we changed planes

and passed thru customs. Our line producer Hugh Herbert

Burns, is an experienced world-class producer. He knew

that it was necessary to let the customs guys steal

something; he had cases of Johnnie Walker Red waiting for

them to take. We went thru without a problem. But, all the

equipment had to be un-packed and shown to officials before

we could proceed. The underwater photography gear was the

property of Stanton Waterman. Stanton and his son Gordy

was our underwater crew. They had the level of experience

we needed to shoot the film. Stanton had taken his whole

family to Bora Bora to produce a National Geographic film

about sharks and reef life there.

After a brief stay in Dakar we flew south to Monrovia,

Liberia. It has been at war with itself for many years. The

different factions have been fighting for control of the

rich diamond trade. It’s a scary place indeed. At that time

the airport was still working. It’s overgrown now; the

jungle has slowly reclaimed it. The main street in

Monrovia is named “Smell No Eat”. In the colonial days

this was the dividing line between the white colonist and

the African villagers. They could smell the colonist food

cooking but couldn’t eat it, because they were not allowed

to cross the street. I was over powered by the smell of

human waste in the air. The people there don’t have

toilets, the side of the street is as good a place as any.

 When we landed in Abidjan, things were more civilized.

Abidjan is a melting pot of the equatorial Africa. There

are people from mountain jungle tribes that don’t have a

common language. The French and Dutch colonized this area

for the ivory, coffee, mahogany, and bananas. Today, it’s

coffee, mahogany, bananas and tourism. The tourism is a

big business for them because of the miles of beautiful

beaches and the equatorial climate. The French and

Italians tourist fill the nude beaches, dance clubs and

hotels. We arrived by helicopter on the lawn of the Hotel

Intercontinental complex in Abidjan to be greeted by

hundreds of inquisitive African children at the fence

surrounding the compound. The big attraction at the hotel

is the bowling alley in the basement. We spent many off-

hours’ there drinking the local beer and of course bowling.

The Global Marine Drill ship was stationed 50 miles

south of port city, the helicopter was our way out there.

We arrived at about 10:00 am at the ships helicopter-

landing pad on the stern of the ship. It was covered with

a large net rope to prevent the chopper wheels from rolling

around. Great idea since the pad was so small and slippery

with diesel oil. The crew was a composite of many nations.

All men, French, Germans, Filipinos, Dutch, and a few

Americans. The divers that maintained the underwater

equipment were Comex Company Frenchmen. They spoke good

English, so did the Dutch. We gathered with the ship

Captain and officers to explain what we would need to

accomplish our mission. They were not impressed. Theirs

was serious business and we were in the way. But, because

they we hired by Phillips they didn’t have a choice be to

accommodate us. Everything was going fine until Stanton

Waterman explained what he wanted to do to get the shots he

needed. His idea was to drop himself and Gordy down though

the “Moon Well” (a hole in the middle of the ship where the

drill pipe goes) and film the giant thrusters on the bottom

of the ship that keep it “on station”. The idea was that

the giant thrusters would push them out away from the ship

as they were filming the thrusters in action. The Comex

crew said no way because they didn’t know which way the

thrusters would turn and the divers could be sucked into

the 8,000 hp thrusters blades. There was a macho

confrontation between Stanton and the Comex team leader

that lasted through lunch. In the end Stanton got his way

and the distinguished title as the crazy American. The

best advice they could share was that it wasn’t a good idea

to were wet suits because the sea spiders will get in under

the rubber suits and bite the skin, something they had

learned the hard way. They suggested cutoff mechanic

jumpsuits that were loose fitting, so the spiders would

pass through without getting stuck inside.

Another shot we needed was of a huge funnel shaped

homing device that was resting 200 ft down on the ocean

floor. It sent an electronic signal to the ship computers

that directed the drill bit to the correct spot on the

ocean floor. We were going to send a cameraman down in a

mini-sub to shoot that. That was the only way to accomplish

this safely. Sending divers down was out of the question.

A dramatic shot we needed was from the surface of the

water looking back at the drill ship. Here I would go in a

zodiac with a cameraman and shoot back toward the ship from

a mile or so away.

The master shot of the ship was from the helicopter

looking down pulling away from the drill ship. We had a

gyroscopic camera mount that would be installed in the

helicopter bay door opening and hang out the side with the

camera and cameraman balanced on it. The pilot had to do

most of the work to maneuver for the correct angle for the

camera lens.

The first thing that went wrong was a cause for pause

and an example of what can happen even if you know what

your doing. The crew was lowering the mini-sub out over

the ocean from the starboard side of the ship. It was

hanging from a steal cable when it unexpectedly dropped

about 30 feet to the water. The impact knocked out the

cameraman and pilot inside the mini-sub. They went 200 ft

down at full speed and slammed into the muddy bottom. The
only thing that was connected to them was the

communications line and that wasn’t a great connection.

They would have to find a way to get them selves up. The

sub had hit bottom with great force and driven it into the

mud. The drill ship Captain was concerned that they would

not be able to rescue them and they would run out of air

and die. We all had different degrees of excitement about

the men in the sub. About an hour went by and the crew was

getting pissed at us. They were talking in German and

giving us dirty looks. We were talking about how this

could happen. Anything can go wrong and people can get

killed around this kind of equipment. We realized that the

“Moon Well” diving idea Stanton had in mind could be yet

another disaster in the making. The pilot of the mini-sub

decided to drop his lead weights, that would make the sub

lighter and it might begin to pull out of the mud. Inside

the sub things were getting tense and desperate. They had

released the weights but nothing change they were stuck.

There was only one thing that could free them, that was for

the guys in the sub to try to rock it back and forth in the

mud. After an hour of rocking the sub was free and floated

to the surface. Everyone was on deck cheering when they

broke the surface. That event bonded us together. We were

a team from that point on and had the respect for one

another.

That night we talked about every detail over dinner in

the ships dinning room. Many stories were exchanged between

us. That night I was transferred by helicopter to a supply

ship that stationed about a quarter of a mile away.

Cameraman Jim Bush and I flew over in a rope net hanging

from the helicopter and were dropped on the deck of the 150

ft supply ship. The captain was an old sea dog from New

Orleans. He didn’t think too much of us. I was seasick;

the Dramamine I was taking wasn’t working very well. The

sea swells were 10 to 12 ft. Smelling the diesel fuel was

making me sick as well. I’ve done a lot of offshore sailing

but the feeling of bobbing around like a cork is the worst.

I tried to sleep that night but was unsuccessful; I lay in

a bunk and tried to rest.

In the morning we were served an American style

breakfast and assorted to the stern where a zodiac was

sitting with an outboard motor and a full gas tank. It was

a do it yourself kind of deal. I looked around at the open

ocean and then at Jim. Our eye met and we didn’t say a

word. I handed Jim the bowline to the zodiac and pushed it

into the water 25 ft below. The swells looked to be 10 ft,

with about 15 sec. in between tops. I went over the side by

rope to meet the zodiac coming to the top of a swell and

road it down. When I came back up a deck hand passed me

the motor, the next time the gas tank, then Jim and all the

camera gear. I was struggling with the motor mount and I

almost dropped overboard. We got everything hooked up and

started the motor. As we pulled away I was thinking I’m not

going to turn off the motor and we’re not going too far

away. Jim got everything ready to shoot as I lined him up

for the shot. He was sitting at the bow shooting almost

straight ahead when he started to throw up his breakfast

all over the camera. He couldn’t stop himself but he kept

shooting. After 10 minutes, I realized that the supply ship

was blowing its horn for us. So, I turned around and

started back to the ship. We were covered in gas and the

plywood deck in the zodiac was slippery with oil and mixed

with what was, at one point, Jim’s breakfast. All I wanted

was to get back on the deck of the supply ship. The closer

we got to it the more doubtful I was that Jim or I had the

strength to climb back up a 20 ft of oily rope that was

hanging over the port side. In fact, the swells helped us

rise high enough to make it. We were pitiful; I was not in

the mood to take any shit from the captain about the fact

that we had gone out to sea in the zodiac without any life

vests. But, I was bracing for a safety lecture from him.

We walked into the wheel house where the Capt said

with a big smile, “I though you guys were a couple of

fagots. But you are the craziest son of a bitches I’ve ever

met in all my days.” I had to agree. He reached down to a

locked cabinet and got out a bottle of Jack Daniels. He

told an Indonesian crewman to get a couple of juice

glasses. We had more than a few drinks together. For the

next three days we had a great time together, eating,

drinking and learning everything about what it was like to

be a sea captain.

We were happy to get back to the drill ship in time

for Stanton and Gordy go down through the “Moon Well”. As

they disappeared into the dark muddy water, I thought what

they were doing was not in the safety manual and a lot more

dangerous than we knew. Somehow drilling mud fell into the

water. Gordy and Stanton couldn’t see anything. Gordy was

in a free fall and didn’t know it. Stanton got caught in

the blast from the thruster and was pushed away from the

ship as planned, so he got the shot we needed. But Gordy

was coming to the surface 200 yards away. Stanton was

outwardly cool but uneasy when we saw his son coming up the

side of the ship. Gordy was the most shaken up. That

evening we shot the helicopter shot and were done. The crew

of the drill ship had come to like having us around.

The next morning we flew back to Abidjan to a hot

shower and clean bed. Every one was ready to party. We

were treated well at the hotel; they had a special native

feast laid out for our dinner. Goat stew was the main dish.

It was full of little red hot peppers that we had seen in

the Abidjan street markets. The sting from the peppers

will make you cry crocodile tears for 20 minutes.

 That day we got the news that the Phillips managers

wife was riding in a company car to do some grocery

shopping, the car was stopped by a policeman, and her

driver got into a screaming fight with him. Her driver was

shot in the head. She was going home to Oklahoma as soon as

possible. This event had a cooling effect on everyone. We

had to watch what we did and what we said.

We hired a driver named Julio, a young African man

with a yellow Datsun. Producer Jack Hubler and I wanted to

scout the beaches and a French Colonial village down inter-

coastal waterway. It had been dug by slave labor. It

stretched about 90 miles following the shoreline from

Abidjan to the village. We road on a small boat like “the

African Queen.” When we arrived it looked deserted, all

the French style buildings looked empty. We walked through

a graveyard and discovered that most of the people died on

the same day. An uprising of slaves digging the inter-

coastal waterway killed most of the French Colonist and

many slaves.

During the trip back to Abidjan, Jack and I talked

about the people in the village we were leaving behind and

speculating about what had happened at the uprising. I was

feeling a lot more mortal and very much out of place. This

was a place of extremes. Extreme heat, humidity, passion,

and loathing of white people. They smiled at us, but there

was an emotional response I had that it didn’t fit. I

wondered about what they were really thinking.

We had a long car ride through banana plantations,

Julo was helpful in that he spoke a little French and

whatever the other language was the people spoke. That

depended on what tribe they were from. We stopped at a

small village with 5 huts and a met the chief. He was

sitting out front of a hut watching a very old B&W TV. The

women of the village did all the labor and most of them

were clearly with child and caring for babes at the same

time. The woman’s movement hadn’t reached this part of the

world yet.

The next part of the assignment was to film a tribal

ceremony in a mountain village called “Man”. It’s 100

miles northwest in the mountain rain forest. The roads are

red dirt that becomes slippery red mud very quickly in the

rain. We were told to take two vehicles, so that if one

breaks down we could leave it behind. In the jungle

anything that is left is taken apart quickly, stripped to

the bone. The celebration was a show for the cameras and

was interesting to see. But, I couldn’t help think that

this was a forced event given the nature of the oppressive

government. It made good film for PR.

While walking through the village with Julo we came to

a child sitting on the side of the road with a blanket laid

out. On it he had different collectables for sale. Elephant

hair bracelet, ivory, seashells and a strange bronze statue

of an African hunter caring a Gazelle on his head. Julo

talked to him for me. I asked, “What is this statue about?”

Julo answered, “It’s about life.” “What do you mean?” I

asked. “It all started with Man? You mean with this man or

another man?” Julo said, “Yes. That’s why the name of the

village is Man. This is the place where all men come from.”

I thought this is a scam, just a clever selling tool, to

hook me into buying something. What the hell, I was going

to get some stuff to bring home anyway. “I’ll take one of

each thing he has.”

That night we had a delightful dinner and native

dance. The camera guys where having a great time shooting

the people. I found myself listening to the music, looking

up at the bright stars in the night shy and wondering is

this the spot where it all began? I asked Julo, “Is it

part of the lore that this is the place is where humanity

began?” “That’s what they believe. When a man leaves his

village, he takes the name of the village as his. When he

passes to the spirit world he becomes a guide for others

that follow. Listen to the music, its all there,” he said.

I couldn’t take me eyes off one young woman that was

singing and dancing with a group. Her eyes were light

chocolate color; her skin reflected the firelight. Later, I

asked Julo to introduce me to her. He was uncomfortable

with it. But he did it with some pushing. We spent the next

few days together. I didn’t understand anything she said,

nor did she me. She showed me around the village and

introduced me to her family. Her name was Jett. I asked if

she would come back to Abidjan with me for a few days, she

agreed.

At the docks in Abidjan, we were setting up to shoot

the beacon we didn’t get when the mini-sub got stuck in the

muddy ocean bottom. The Phillips guys had a spare part

beacon at the supply dock and it was a shot we needed in

the edit. We would superimpose it on stock footage of

ocean bottom. The dock workers were covered with the white

power from cement bags they were unloading. There were

thousands of mahogany tree lying on the docks ready for

shipment. Others were being cut up to make charcoal, the

favorite fuel for home cooking. Our Phillips guy told me

that it wasn’t safe to go into town after dark because

there we a cult of cannibals that were snatching people of

the streets and using them for ceremonies. I didn’t want

to believe him, but what I had seemed so far was enough to

change my mind. I was possible he was right. Jett

understood the ceremonies. The national newspaper didn’t

report crime or anything that wasn’t good for the

government. Everything that was real news was, word of

mouth.
 It was time to pack things up, have a rap party at the

Inter-continental Hotel and fly back to New York. We took

a few days to see the things we wanted before we left. I

went with Jett and Julo to the Comoe National Park. We were

taking photos in front of the entrance when a guard came

running at us with a gun screaming. I didn’t know what was

going on. Julo ran over and stood between us and talked to

the guard until he calmed down. It is illegal to photograph

a government sign. “Punishable by extreme measures,” he

said. He didn’t tell me what that was.

When it was time to go home I wasn’t ready. Jett and

I were having a once in a lifetime romance that was coming

to an end. It was a tearful goodbye in the hotel lobby.

When we landed in New York after 12 hours of flying, I

wanted to kiss the dirty cement floor at customs. I came

home a changed man, yet I didn’t know how. I just felt

different on a physical level, biologically.

We processed the film at a lab in New York and started

the editing process, pulling takes I liked. We had David

Ford come into a recording session and do the Voice over

copy. He has the voice of an intoxicated god. I was

impressed with myself as the epic took shape. The client

at Phillips was very happy and hopeful that everyone back

in Ivory Coast would love it.