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Living history | Behind the scenes
Series Producer Sallie Clement describes the blood, sweat and tears that went into the making of Pioneer House.
I spent 17 months of my life obsessed with the making of Pioneer House. It's true to say that nothing in all my years of working in television could have prepared me for the events that unfolded. Here's a glimpse of what went on behind the scenes of this amazing and slightly surreal production.
Within a week of taking on the project, I was trudging across Native American tribal land on the eastern seaboard of North America. Freezing winds, deep snow, and me strapped into snowshoes I could barely stand up in. I was searching for a site where we could build an authentic 17th-century settlement.
We needed a minimum of 300 acres of land, partially wooded, with a natural clearing for the main settlement and a sheltered bay for fishing and clamming. The land had to be rich in natural resources, with fertile soil for growing crops. To maintain the authenticity of living in 1628, the site also had to be free from any 21st-century contamination such as buildings, roads or flight paths. Apart from discovering a recluse living in a Mongolian yurt deep within the 1,000-acre boundary, we found everything we were looking for.
The production team, from England and America, spent the first half of 2003 in New York before relocating to a remote part of Maine near the Canadian border. We never fully adjusted to what was to become a parallel existence to the colony, living in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by bear, moose, howling coyote and snuffling porcupine. Twenty of us lived in an assortment of accommodation – lighthouses, boathouses and cottages. Base camp, where we cut the films and began work on the music score, was a vast mansion on a private lake where swimming, fishing and line dancing for entertainment became the norm.
As the work snowballed, the pressure on the team grew intense. Our panel of historical consultants rarely agreed on anything. History and the different interpretations of it drove me insane. I am very black and white. History is not. While the academics battled with words and reams of microfiche, the team were on site marking out land boundaries, sweeping the area for edible and dangerous plant and animal life, applying for clamming conservation orders, hunting permits and permission for the colonists to use traps and snares.
We analysed the precipitation of the soil to find out where natural sewage could flow (there were no latrines in 1628) and despite wanting to erect a few mud huts on private land, we were still bound by building and planning regulations. From chamber pots and poo pits to the risk of losing an eye during musket training, our discussions during the making of this series ranged from ridiculous to downright disturbing.
The village took three months to complete and was built by the Plimoth Plantation museum near Boston, Massachusetts. We could have just built a 'set' but with the very real threat of fires and the odd hurricane passing through, we thought it best to go for the real thing: earthfast houses (built with corner posts sunk into the ground) and hand-riven boards covered in wattle and daub mixed with horse hair. This was a fully functional, hand built, authentic early settlement.
A team of historical artisans also had to accommodate the needs of a TV crew: extra windows for natural light so we could film, a slightly wider hatch in the loft for camera and soundman to fit through, and houses facing each other to create a high street. The original plans had all the houses in a row, looking out to sea.
As soon as the 26 colonists had been selected from 10,000 applicants, I flew across America to try to persuade them not to take part. Despite my horror stories of possible death and destruction, all 26 stuck with their decision.
Many months later, as Michelle Rossi Voorhees was being staked out in the cornfield for not attending the Sabbath service, her son slammed an axe in to the back of his hand and her dog writhed in agony from 200 porcupine quills in its nose and throat, I wondered if she had changed her mind.
Despite 24-hour emergency medical treatment being available, accidents happened frequently. We had cancer scares, stomach upsets, dehydration, corn kernels stuck in gums, fevers and a hospital visit for what was thought to be a burst appendix. I sat in the local A&E department at three in the morning with a colonist in a filthy woollen frock with a big floppy hat. She hadn't washed properly for four months. The doctor didn't bat an eyelid. Very professional.
The recurring theme in the behind the scene story is that we ran ourselves ragged juggling the demands of what had become a costume drama / historical / reality / observation documentary / comedy show. My line producer, Rebecca Kelly, and I had dealt with big productions before but even we felt overwhelmed when the worst winter since 1896 hit Maine and our site was buried under several feet of snow two weeks before the colonists were due to arrive. We needed to drill for water but risked the machinery getting stuck right in the middle of our 1628 time capsule, with no guarantee we would even strike water.
Beautiful made-to-measure clothes – cassocks, breaches, doublets, smocks and farthingales – were shipped out from England (ever tried to convince a 21st-century fireman to wear a peach-coloured 17th-century coat?). We had props and paperwork coming out of our ears: quills and ink, violas and lutes, dried fish, fullers earth, bushels of this, pecks of that and firkins galore. So many possessions; so few people who knew what to do with them.
Before the colonists set sail on the tall ship, they went to Plimoth Plantation for a two-week intensive training programme. They learnt about the 17th-century world-view and practical skills such as cooperage, leathercraft, toolmaking and sailing. Despite a slight hiccup in the cookery class, when the Lay Preacher's wife, Caroline Heinz, insisted on beheading a chicken with a blunt knife, training went well.
In June, the tall ship finally set sail with our tearful contributors on board (tears being the women's reaction to their itchy woollen costumes and unflattering farthingales). Half my team were already at the settlement trying to get the animals into pens – despite the help of an experienced animal handler, it boiled down to a researcher holding on to a pregnant sow's tail as she ran amok with a bucket on her head.
As the series progressed over the months, the madness seemed to reach epic proportions – both in the colony and back at the production house. The colonists' sense of smell became so acute they would smell us before they saw us (apparently we stank of soap and shampoo). The site started to feel like a wildlife park. As you wandered in across the fields you would spot the colonists, like a rare species of wild animal – in the woods, hanging out on the rocks or disembowelling a porcupine.
Just in case you were wondering, the colonists smelt like smoked chicken. No surprise after living and sleeping next to an open hearth. They really did live the life you see on screen and they have my utmost respect for doing so. I don't know how they did it. Or why.
As played out on screen, we had a total of seven people leave, four people return, one person run away, the death of a loved one back home, and an influx of nine new settlers who came unannounced, with inadequate food and no housing. As we raced to the finishing line with just one week to go, the last bomb dropped: Oprah Winfrey came to town.
A celebrity of presidential standing in America, she was fascinated by the project and wanted to visit. At this point we were all counting down the days and I didn't want a media circus upsetting our colonists' last few days in 1628. There was an interesting ripple of nostalgia in the village and a fear of what life held on the 'outside'. I had said no to Oprah's visit, but took a rap on the knuckles from a head honcho in New York. Oprah was coming. Fine.
I did my best to make her feel welcome. I insisted she dress in period clothing, remove her underwear, hand over her jewellery and head to the colony on foot. She struggled over the hill in a floppy hat, with a cheese wheel in one hand and a chamber pot in the other. Respect.
Oprah ended up staying the night in a mouse-infested attic (she is terrified of mice). She attended the Sabbath service, worked in the gardens, cooked on the open hearth and asked for no favours. She was in awe of the colonists and their achievements. I was in awe of her. I wouldn't have stayed over if you'd paid me – there were mice nests, mould, bugs and rancid urine in some of those houses.
When the colonists finally left the site they were hairy, smelly, tearful and traumatised. We took them straight to a local chemist's where, still in costume and utterly filthy, they slid on polished floors in their battered and worn out shoes, cried at the choice of shampoo and gagged at the overpowering smell of antiseptic and perfume in the air (despite the gagging, many of them still managed to shovel choc-ices into their mouths before reaching the checkout).
With the initial excitement over we all travelled on to Bar Harbour where we booked the girls in to have their hair and nails done and arranged a party for everyone. I remember many of the girls in floods of tears under the hairdryer. It was all too much for them. And for us.
Readjusting to life back home, let alone 400 years later, has by all accounts been the hardest journey of all. Picking up the threads of a previous life is far from easy when there's no one and nothing you feel you can connect to. Luckily, we all kept our sanity and, to my knowledge, no one has any regrets.
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