Craft Service, or Crafty, is one of the greatest fringe benefits of working in film. There are two types of Crafty: Set Crafty and Office Crafty—they’re a little different, so we’ll touch on both.

Before we get to that, let’s talk about that other delicious set food source, Catering. Catering is meals and Crafty is snacks (Catering is a Set thing. For meals in the office, take-out menus are passed around, ordered and then picked up by a P.A.). Catering makes an appearance twice a day, for Breakfast and Lunch. Breakfast is usually ready before the earliest crew members’ call time and goes until about an hour after general crew call time. Lunch is usually served six hours after the general crew call time and lasts half an hour after “last man.”

Unlike Catering, Crafty is available all day long. The size and quality of Crafty is greatly dependent on the size of the show. Big budget show = More Money = Bigger Crafty. However, although this usually holds true for Office Crafty, this is not always the case with Set Crafty. My most delicious Set Crafty experience came from an under-$20 million horror film in South Carolina. Crafty on that set was the two-person team of Blanche and her son, Ian.

Let me tell you about my fondest memory of Ian. It was one of the first days of shooting. Ian had just put out a bowl on the Crafty table, so I had to go investigate. The bowl was filled with that fruit cocktail stuff mixed with sour cream. I started going bonkers because I knew there was a name for it, but I had no idea what it was. Ian was nearby, so I said, “Ian, Ian! This stuff that you just put out…oh hell, what’s it called?!!” Ian just looked at me for a second and then said, “That’s called fruit salad.” I’ve never laughed so hard. I know the humor probably won’t translate as well in word as a live reenactment, but believe me when I say it was funny. And that fruit salad is called ambrosia.

Now, Blanche and Ian always had a table set up, but the real action was in their truck. There was a fridge and freezer that were always stocked with all kinds of goodies. Blanche made the best egg salad I’ve eaten to this day. She made it every morning. I started hovering near the truck around 10 a.m. every day, waiting for my fix. Once she and Ian found out that I LOVE frozen desserts, the freezer was never without ice cream or ice cream bars. I was eating about three Dove Bars a day. Someone once said, “Hey, it’s fuel for the machine,” but I knew better; it was called over-indulgence and a complete lack of self-restraint.

But not all Crafty set-ups encourage as much gluttony as Blanche and Ian’s. Not everyone deep-fries turkeys and pork chops on a regular basis. Maybe it’s just a southern thing, I don’t know. I’ve worked on some shows where most days, we’d see just three granola bars and a couple of Cup-O-Noodles (rendered useless because of the lack of hot water necessary to make said Noodles).

It’s also easy for things to get monotonous. My longest show on set was nine months. To this day, I can’t eat trail mix anymore. Sometimes, things just get weird. After a while, strange things started showing up on the Crafty table…things like bottles of clam juice or what looked to be items from the International aisle that no one ever bought…ever. Everyone wondered who was requesting these, but we later found out that the Crafty guys were just trying to “spice things up” and “keep the crew on its toes.” But I can’t hate on these guys. Once they found out that candy and desserts were my favorite, they always tried to have some kind of diabetic nightmare on the table. I’m pretty sure I still hold the Prison Break record of 19 mini cream puffs in an hour (you know what kind I’m talking about…the ones in the white tub from Sam’s Club or Costco.) And it wasn’t even a contest. I just happened to keep going back again and again. I think the only reason I stopped was because #19 was the last one in the tub.

But for the most part, Crafty is amazing. It’s free snacks all day long! And unlike Catering with the hierarchy of “last man,” there’s no rule about who goes first. If you want a snack, go grab one!

Now let’s talk about Office Crafty. There’s no Craft Service dept. in the office. Typically, Production is in charge of keeping the kitchen stocked. Even then, some departments will have “private” Crafty just for themselves. On The Dark Knight, the Art Dept. was in a separate building from Production. We shared the building with Set Dec, Props, and Picture Cars; but we had our own kitchen and fridge, and it was amazing. Let me break it down for you. I only had to worry about Crafty for our department; that’s 11 people vs. 150+ on set. One of the first things I like to do when I start a show is go around to all the members of my department and get a list of favorites. Then we start shopping. Boss liked sparkling water, so our shelves were stocked with bottles and bottles of San Pellegrino. He also liked tea, so the cabinets were filled with all kinds of it. And not just Lipton; we’re talking specialty teas like the kind that come in pearls or are sold at actual tea shops. A lot of us loved chocolate, so we tried Vosges chocolates. (Vosges is the brand that blends chocolate with weird things like bacon, coconut and Indian curry, or wasabi and ginger. I highly recommend the Woolloomooloo. It’s fantastic.) We stocked all kinds of cheeses, prosciutto, Genoa salami. All our fruits and nuts were organic, organic, organic. I started a “Good Times Drawer” filled with all kinds of candy and other things that are terrible for you like Fruit-By-The-Foot and Gushers. And I got the freezer of my dreams filled with Dove Bars, Ben & Jerry ice cream cones, Fudgcicles, Creamsicles, strange and expensive ice creams in tins from Whole Foods. The whole experience was incredible. We all gained about 15 pounds, but hey, we’re big time, baby.