No one has heard much from Joey since he left, so we took take a trip to Chicago – with the cameras – to see what he’s doing.  Joey said he’s maintained a very low profile since returning home; stayed sober and far away from his so-called bad influences.  We worry about him, and want to see what his life is like today. 

Chicago is also the home base for the roommate’s Improv teacher, Charna Halpern.  When she is not coming to LA to teach three days a week, she is back in Chicago working at the original IO.  We asked her to invite Joey over to the IO, and check him out and see how he’s doing. 

The headshots for all of the roommates are taken by Molly Hawkey, a fellow IO improv actress – and photographer.   Her photographs are the same ones featured in the opening titles of The Real World Hollywood.  And that happened quite by chance…

In the past, we always set aside a few days to shoot the opening titles with the roommates.  This takes quite a bit of planning – locations, wardrobe, makeup, lighting, etc. – and it became difficult to schedule this season with Joey coming and going, and Greg leaving permanently.  So, as an alternate idea, Director of Photography Mike Pepin, took Molly’s headshots of the roommates and posted them around Hollywood.  Then he shot the headshots in stop action photography – still photographs rather than moving video – but when you edit the images together the cars and people in the backgrounds appear to be moving.  It was the first time an opening title sequence to The Real World was shot completely with a digital still camera.  No video or film was used at all!  The headshots were posted and mounted in those locations; there are no special effects – except the editing of hundreds of still shots together.