Maura Elizabeth Cunningham

I gazed at the sheet of paper in my hand, trying to convey intense fascination with the picture of a panda printed on it. I fought the urge to flick my eyes to the right, to acknowledge the presence of Chris, the cameraperson who hovered in my peripheral vision. Instead, I kept my sight trained on the panda and fought to arrange my face into an expression that conveyed something approximating “studious and smart,” even though I felt anything but by that point on Saturday afternoon. What seemed like five minutes (but was probably thirty seconds) passed before I heard the calm voice of the producer, Allister, say, “Okay, good”—my signal to relax before we would start again.

I spent the entirety of Saturday working with Chris and Allister, who arrived at my house early in the morning to film me talking about the history of panda exhibitions and panda diplomacy. This all came about after I received a message on Instagram in early January from Hui Huan, a journalist with Channel News Asia in Singapore, who had read a blog post I wrote back in 2016 about the history of pandas at the Bronx Zoo. Hui Huan has been working on a documentary about panda diplomacy, and she wanted to bring me in as one of the talking heads giving historical background. Her colleague in the U.S., Allister, would be in touch soon to discuss the logistics.

Assuming that this would all take place over Zoom—what media organization has money for anything else these days??—I agreed. An email from Allister upended my assumptions: based in Washington, D.C., he would fly to Detroit and meet up with a cameraperson, then the two of them would come to my house in Ann Arbor for filming.

😳😳😳

I’m comfortable with public speaking, and I’ve done plenty of interviews—I was confident in my ability to handle the content side of the equation. But … real filming, not just on Zoom? Yikes. I scheduled a haircut, started deep-cleaning my house, and dove into my closet to figure out what I should wear.

Hui Huan and Allister provided me with a list of questions and topics to prepare, and we had a pre-meeting over Zoom to review my talking points. In total, I had about an hour of material to cover, but Allister asked me to clear a full day for filming, explaining that a significant amount of that time would be devoted to setting up in various locations around my house.

When he and Chris arrived on Saturday morning, I realized how extensive an undertaking even a “simple” video shoot like this one was: they hauled in boxes and bags of equipment, and soon my living room was a maze of lights and cords and gizmos that I couldn’t identify. I sat on the couch while Allister and Chris worked around me, turning this way and that on their directions so they could make adjustments. Should I have an arm resting against the side of the sofa? Should this scarf wind around my throat, or lie open? Did I have a blanket or throw pillow that might add a pop of color? Glasses on or off? Glasses on—which meant that the lights had to be angled at just the right way to avoid glare. Each time even the smallest detail was adjusted, Allister took a photo of the new setup and sent it to Hui Huan in Singapore for assessment.

Finally, everything was in place and we started the main interview. This was, all in all, the easy part—I sat on the couch and answered questions Hui Huan asked over Zoom, repeating and refining the language of my replies multiple times in response to her feedback. The biggest struggle was remembering not to break eye contact with Allister, who sat slightly off to the side; I was supposed to keep my gaze focused on him, not look directly at the camera or at Hui Huan on the laptop screen as she asked me questions.

The real challenge came when we reconvened after a lunch break and Allister explained the various “action” scenes they wanted to film: me showing several pictures and articles to the audience, explaining the stories behind them. Me walking into a room and around my home office. Me working. Me, in other words, moving—at the same time I was talking and handling different props.

😳😳😳

These afternoon scenes were so much more difficult than the sit-down interview in the morning—even though I talked much less, I had to do so while simultaneously running through a mental checklist. Was I maintaining eye contact with Allister, not the camera? Were my clothes shifting or bunching up as I walked? Had the microphone slipped from its position taped underneath my shirt? Did I make sure to place that book on the table face-up, not face-down? What does a natural arm gesture look like? We rehearsed, discussed, shot, and re-shot four or five scenes over and over, Allister and Chris reassuring me that everything I did was basically fine, it just needed small tweaks to be smoother. Still, I was intensely conscious of every slip-up, every time I messed up the continuity of a scene, every bungled attempt to look relaxed while feeling anything but. I’ve undergone basic media training to handle straightforward interviews, but it had never occurred to me that saying yes to documentary work might also involve a fair amount of something like acting.

We finished late in the afternoon, Allister and Chris chatting with me as they packed up their gear and I attempted not to collapse from relief and exhaustion. The days of preparation combined with the adrenaline that had built up over the course of filming left me completely drained; I was thankful I hadn’t attempted to cram in the film shoot amid my workweek. This was a completely new type of experience for me, and more physically and mentally demanding than I had expected—never had I put so much thought into actions like walking up a short flight of stairs!

I think the documentary will be available on CNA and then YouTube later in 2024. When I have a chance to see how my parts turned out, I’ll post the link here.

(Or not, if I look half as awkward as I felt …)

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Feature Photo: Panda living in a conservation base, Sichuan Province, China, June 23, 2015.