Episode 27: Michael Merryman

Michael Merryman: Police arrive. There's like six of them. And I'm like, what is going on? And then a detective arrives and he says, you're gonna have to come with me. So now I'm in the police car, I'm taken down to the station, and the whole this whole thing is so ridiculous.

Josh Caldwell: Atypical daydreamers, welcome to the show. We're back for season four, and today my guest is Michael Merryman. He's a veteran producer of commercials, music videos, documentaries, stills, art, and experimental productions. In today's journey, Michael travels the globe in search of the tallest, longest, and biggest wonders, all to create a car commercial.

Michael Merryman: You know, it came a time years ago where my daughter was at an age where I just came back after a trip to Argentina and she had changed so much. She was like eighteen months at the time, and it was like, okay, I gotta stop this. And I've been in LA for her whole life basically, and now she turns eighteen. I've started kind of a new chapter in my career. It's just interesting to now be back out on the road as a nearly fifty-year-old man versus growing up on the road.

One particular project I did round about 2005, I got a call to do a job. It was a still campaign for a major automotive brand. We were essentially charged with going to find the longest, tallest, highest, widest around the world. And we started out in Ecuador shooting the world's highest active volcano. So many stories about this particular trip because it was all compacted into about a two month period.

I should probably preface it by saying I was a very different person than I am now, bordering on dangerous, if not just nutty. I was separated from the crew for a couple days because I was in the hotel where I had proper communications and they were up at base camp. I had been out there once on the scout. This is before the era of easily accessible digital maps. So I kind of memorized my way back to the city, which is this pretty interesting wild place, and found my way out to this village and up to the pass. And I met a couple of the location guys there.

From the point where you left the little village up to base camp was just a rutted road. So they met me with some beers and gave me like two beers. I opened one and had a sip. And you know, at altitude it goes straight to your head. And so I'm driving up in this rented SUV, it was like a little Suzuki Samurai, teeny but with four wheel drive. So I'm kind of going up, up, up, up, up.

Michael Merryman: As you reach a certain point, which happens to be the tree line, you also get the radio signal back from Quito. And so I'm kind of driving along, feeling a little lightheaded. And at this moment where the radio pops back on, I had it turned up loud and forgotten about it. I'm just sitting there wending my way through, the air getting thinner and thinner. I think the base camp up there was around twelve or fourteen thousand feet. The radio pops on and there's Sade, Smooth Operator, just playing. And it was just this such surreal juxtaposition. Such a bizarre thing.

And then I get up to base camp and I was working with a German photography team and we sat there and enjoyed a couple more beers, looking up at the volcano. People I guess climb up there so they can summit at sunrise and then come down safely in the light. And you could see this little tiny trail of headlamps.

Michael Merryman: And then we went up and shot the ice roads in Inuvik, which was interesting. It marked the shortest shoot day of my entire career because the sun rose at like 11 a.m. and it set again at like 1:30 or two. But it was 38 below zero. And I remember it happened to be the same temperature where Fahrenheit and Celsius come together. I was working with a German crew. We always had differences in Celsius and Fahrenheit throughout the whole trip. But at one point we were standing out there and I kind of said during a lull in the conversation, well, I think we can all agree that it's fucking cold.

There are no real rental car companies there. You just kind of find some people and make a deal with them. And we rented this woman's Subaru, very nice woman, and we accidentally left a case of Coca-Cola in the back of her car that was for the crew. And it exploded in the middle of the night. I felt so bad. What are we going to do? How do we get this clean?

So we drove to set and shot the day, which was short. By the time we got back in the car, there wasn't a trace of anything. It almost smelled like a scratch and sniff sticker, like the way Coca-Cola would smell if it was faked or synthetically recreated. And then by the time I got back in the car it was just gone. Not a trace of it, just disappeared.

So the next day we brought the car back to this woman. And I said, listen, I'd be remiss not to tell you that this happened. And she said, don't worry about it, it happens all the time. And I was like, well, where does it go? And she said, none of us really understand it. It's some sort of weird anomaly where when this pressurized whatever you left in the car comes out, it doesn't, it's better with sugary drinks than it is with beer. But even with beer, it just disappears when the temperature changes, either lower or higher. And it was just a very interesting kind of memory. And then we moved on to China.

We shot in Shanghai, the world's longest on ramp, the on ramp from Shanghai onto the Pudong Bridge, which is like this circular corkscrew that goes all the way up to this bridge that probably sits at Golden Gate height, maybe a little less. And we got there and quickly found out that there really are no permits there. It's more just like sanctioned bribery, if you will. And they're like, well, we know you wanted to shoot on this day, but it's gonna have to be next week. So we completely reworked the schedule and from there caravanned out across through a series of flights and then actually like a car ride out to the Taklamakan Desert, where we connected with the portion of the Silk Road that passes through far, far western China. We were about four hundred kilometers from the area where Pakistan pushes into the Himalayas into China.

Michael Merryman: When we got to the Taklamakan, we went out into these dunes in this old army truck that was basically a dune truck, an eight-wheel truck. When they took us into the desert, they said, if you have to pee, do not go any more than a single dune away from the main crew because it's very dangerous. People get lost.

So I kind of went one dune away and felt a little weird to be that close to the crew. So I did go two dunes over. And by the time you get there, it's overcast. So you have no sun reference. The wind blows to a degree that you look back and there's no sign of your own footprints. So I did my thing and turned back around. I was like, my god, okay. I'm exactly two dunes away in this direction. I was sure of it because I turned around, did a full 180, and just walked back over the first one. By the time I get to the second depression in the dune, it was terrifying because I literally was only going on memory. I was like, okay. I'm like 99.9 percent sure I have to go just one more. But if I'm off, I was just kicking myself. I was like, why did I not listen more carefully to these guys? Of course they know what they're doing.

And I happened to come up to the top of the dune, and the crew is just moving on. And one of the guys had stayed with me and he's just sitting there shaking his head, just like, you went two dunes, didn't you? I was like, yeah, sorry. And then I started to get really sick. Like you feel like your body's like a radiator. And I was just like, man, this is gonna be horrible. We're in the middle of nowhere. And one of the translators said, you don't look well. And I said, yeah, I'm feeling super hot. She said, okay, we'll send one of the drivers back into town. And they came back a little while later with what looked like a dime bag, really. Full of all these different dried herbs. And the instruction was eat them all at once, no water, and sleep. Which I did.

I slept for like an hour in the back of this van and I woke up feeling absolutely fine. I have no idea what I ate, but I described my symptoms and how long they'd been, ate these bitter tasting herbs, and woke up totally fine. It was so strange, such a bizarre thing.

Josh Caldwell: Hey Josh here. I love making this podcast and I'd love to make it my full-time gig. Besides telling the stories, I'm basically a one-man band, and that takes time. If you're enjoying the podcast, please consider becoming a patron. You'll have access to loads of great bonus stories, and you'll have the satisfaction of knowing that you're supporting a truly independent podcast. Find the Patreon link in the show notes. And thanks.

Michael Merryman: By the time we got back to Shanghai and were able to get on that bridge, we were all just really exhausted. And each and every day the owner of the company would come back and say, I want to treat you to a massage at the hotel. We were staying at the Peace Hotel in Shanghai, beautiful place, they call it the Paris of Asia. There was this really nice spa, but it was only open until like nine at night or something. And each night we'd come back too late. So we finally get back on the very last night. We're about to fly home the next day. We've been on the road for a little more than two months.

We had been to dinner. And we had this bizarre dinner of snake that came to the table live. They would slice the belly of the snake and pull its skin off and it's writhing. And then they take the gallbladder of the snake out and place it into these four glasses. And then they pour what I guess is like a moonshine, some sort of distilled plum wine, over it, and you shoot it. And evidently this gallbladder shot is supposed to lower your body temperature by like a degree or something. There's a lot of sort of mythology involved, and you kind of never know if somebody was pulling your leg or if it was true. But I did at least feel quite cold afterwards. And the snake itself was prepared and very delicious.

So I go back to my hotel and I'm feeling pretty otherworldly. And the phone rings and it's like, massage. And I was like, great, that sounds perfect. Clearly not thinking clearly, realizing it's 10 at night, this masseuse shows up, but there's a man with her who's standing outside the doorway, and I'm immediately embarrassed. And I'm like, okay, this is not what I think. I'm in a little bit of trouble here. This person makes a gesture, which you can imagine what the gesture is, and it's communicated to me that she's here for this other reason. And I'm just embarrassed and I don't know what to do.

Michael Merryman: So I just go into my bathroom and I'm like, my god, I'm here for work. How could I have not realized what this was? And I hear her outside speaking in Mandarin. And I'm like, okay, she wants money. What do I do? And when I come out, she had stolen my petty cash. It wasn't a ton, but it was significant.

So I call the owner of the company who's staying with me. I was like, you're not gonna believe what just happened. I feel so embarrassed. What a stupid thing to have done. And he's like, we've spent so much money at this hotel and we've been here for two weeks. This is predatory. And so he calls down to the front desk and he said, we're gonna call the police. And the manager said, sir, that's not a good idea. He was a bit of a hot-headed guy. He's like, I demand that you call the police right now. We want to recover this money. This is clearly something that's happening in your hotel and you knew about it.

So the police arrive. There's like six of them and they're photographing my room and taking fingerprints, putting on a whole show. It was like being in an NCIS episode. And I'm like, what is going on? Now by this time the manager has come up to the room and the owner of the company is looking at me like, I think I've made a terrible mistake. And then a detective arrives. And this detective is in my room smoking a cigarette. And he says, you're gonna have to come with me. So now I'm in the police car, I'm taken down to the station.

Michael Merryman: I'm sitting in this room that looks like it was dressed by someone pranking me. There was a window that wasn't a two-way mirror, but it was so dirty and dingy that it may as well have been. And I was like, you know, in my brain, I look back on this and at that time in my life, I always liked to push things for the adventure. And I was like, okay, let's see what happens next.

Well, the officer pushes essentially a confession to me on the table. He speaks to the manager of the hotel who's come with me. They've allowed the manager to come with me, but not the owner of the company, who's back there freaking out because he thinks his hot-headedness has gotten me into trouble. And I'm sitting there kind of thinking, well, let's see what happens next. And I look to the end of the table and the manager of the hotel looks at me, his eyes are wide, and he just gives me this almost imperceptible shake of his head. Like, don't sign this.

And basically the translation was, we know these people, we know what they're up to. All you have to do is sign a confession saying that you partook in these services and we can get your money back. Otherwise we can't get the money back. And I'm like, what is this?

And on and on this thing goes. The cop offers me a cigarette. I smoke a cigarette. It was like a movie. And then I look back at the hotel manager, he gives me that kind of shake again. I said, no, I just can't. That's fine, the money's gone, it's stolen. We get out.

We come back, we pull in front of the hotel, the manager gets out of the back seat. I'm in the front seat with the detective. And he looks back, says something in Mandarin to the manager, who gets out and gives me this nervous look. Now I'm alone in the car with the cop. He looks over at me and says in English, you made the right decision. Hope you enjoyed China. Have a nice trip home tomorrow. And that was it.

Josh Caldwell: I want to thank Michael for sharing his experience. Be sure to check out the show notes for Michael's recommendations, including The Glue Society, Rogue Captains, and the book The Storm Before the Calm. All amazing stuff. This podcast was created and produced by me, Josh Caldwell. Music by Visual Aid, my side music project. General support and copywriting by Miranda Caldwell. If you like the show, please follow, subscribe, rate, and review wherever you listen to podcasts. And if you'd like to financially support the show, check out my Patreon page. You'll have access to loads of great bonus stories. You can find the link in the show notes. Thank you for listening, and I hope you come back next week.