TC3 professor cooks up broadcasters among her students

Written by Rachel Stern. Published in the Ithaca Journal.  Photos by Simon Wheeler/Staff

Callen Golden was on her first television set when she fell in love with art direction. It was a love that she did not know was coming. Matter of fact, she didn't really know much about art direction, she said.

After a few weeks as a broadcast student at Tompkins Cortland Community College, Golden found herself on the set of her professor's cooking show. She helped out in the art department -- picking out place-settings, making sure the ingredient measurements were right, cleaning up the set between takes -- and a few days later she was named art director."Luckily, they liked what I was doing," Golden said. "I was using reds, golds and yellows, and that just fell in sync with what they were looking for. I was giving the show its look and I love that."

A year later, Golden will attend Full Sail University -- an art, music and film school -- in the fall. Last week, she was one of 30 former or current TC3 students on set again, this time producing the second season of "The Sweet Life with Chris Xaver."Xaver, the chairwoman of the communications and media arts department at TC3, said it is exciting to now enter the second season of her own cooking show, but it is more about the students, like Golden, who have learned so much and discovered new passions. Students worked as personal assistants, camera operators, camera assistants and sound people."It is about teaching folks how to do these positions and teaching them what this means and what that means and the lingo," she said. "There is a whole lot of teaching and learning. It is less about me having a national television show than it is about 30 students being a part of this and getting exposure from a national series."

The first season was filmed in October and has aired on about 76 percent of available households on PBS, she said. The 13 episodes in the second season were taped last week at her home in Cortland and will start airing in March.

Xaver is still cooking some of her favorite dishes -- such as pork spiedies, lasagna, meatloaf and Thai-styled monkfish -- all with a healthy emphasis. But there are some changes this time around, she said.
"The first season was a lot of learning," Xaver said. "This season, everyone has really gelled. The show has a much better groove now, so I am really thrilled about that."

When Xaver sat down and watched the first season, her initial reaction was that she was talking too much. As a broadcaster, Xaver said she was always taught that you cannot have any dead air on television, so she would always fill the silence with chatter. This season, she has a code with Director Christine Guest, also a TC3 professor, which reminds her it is okay to have silence.
Then, there has been viewer feedback.

Fan mail from all over the country has flowed in since the first season aired. A group of people from Michigan wrote to Xaver, along with people from Omaha, Nebraska and Florida, she said.
One woman said that after Xaver finished cooking, the food appears on camera, magically plated. So, this season, Xaver will show the plating process on a few episodes.

"The fan mail is really kind of cool," she said. "It is a real morale booster and just shows us people really are watching this."

On a recent afternoon, the windows at Xaver's home were covered with sound blankets to cut out any outside noise and light. "Video village" was set up in her bedroom. A box of Red Bull was on the bed -- to help the crew get through 14-hour days -- with various other energy drinks scattered around the room.

A table with three computer monitors was set up at the edge of her bed, each screen dedicated to one of the three cameras taping the show. The garage was full of tables with glasses, plates, bowls, vases, and pots and pans. A fridge and a stove were also in the garage to help the prep kitchen set up the food.

The crew, all dressed in dark clothes, raced around the set. But as soon as someone yelled, "Lock it down," the house turned silent."I have had to learn a lot of new lingo on set," said Sam Lambertson, an assistant and digital cinema major at TC3. "And 'lock it down' definitely means be quiet. The microphones can literally pick up every sound."

Lambertson, of Candor, said the work can be stressful and tiring at times, but it is worth it. She has not only learned a ton in just a few days, but she now has real experience to add to her resume, she said.
"I cannot say enough good things about this experience," she said. "I don't know how I got so lucky. This is a great opportunity. It is cool to find out how a cooking show really works."

Xaver is hoping this second season yields something else, too: a buyer. To date, Xaver has produced the show out of her own pocket. She sold her foreign rights, but it was not for any money. The show will go to Cannes, France, in October and see if that attracts any buyers.She said there has been some interest, but no final sales. Taping the show is the easy part, she said. The sale side of things is much more difficult.

"At this stage in the game, there hasn't been a dime coming in yet, and so everything is out of pocket," she said. "It just gets to a certain point where it is like, okay, the well is dry."But Xaver never had any hesitations about doing a second season, she said. Not only is she getting to do what she loves, but she is offering that same opportunity to her students. "I know I definitely want to do art direction in the future," Golden said. "I would have never known that if it was not for this show."