Director John Badham on “Wargames” and more.

Gaspard: So, thank you for talking to me. I could talk about every single movie you've done. But I'm not going to do that. I have focused myself to take principles from the two books, both of which I love, and take some of those principles and see how you applied them in different situations on three different movies. So, just to get some background to make sure I've got the history right, your first TV directing gig was on The Bold Ones, right? The Senator.

Badham: Yes. Yes, that's right.

Gaspard: And then your first TV movie was The Impatient Heart.

Badham: Right, right, yes.

Gaspard: Okay. So, I'm just doing some rough figuring and before you shot Bingo Long, which was your first theatrical feature, you did somewhere between 35 and 50 hours of TV. You had a lot of stuff under your belt before you tackled that theatrical feature, because of all the series you did, and the Made-for-TV movies. So, you were pretty well learned by that point for that first feature. How did that help you on that first one?

Badham: Well, it certainly helped you learn how to prepare things, what you needed to do, and working with actors, getting attuned to working with actors. The mechanical parts of it are fairly easy to learn—

Gaspard: Right.

Badham: —the cameras and lenses and the microphones and the lighting and and stuff like that.

I feel very comfortable just from my years at the Yale Drama School, working in theater where you're doing somewhat analogous things along the way. And then as I was working my way toward directing—once I came to California and was working at Universal—I was able to sneak down to people's sets and meet directors and kind of hang out with them and found an interesting approach. Because, initially, going and hanging out on a set sounds like a lot of fun. And it's good for about 10 minutes and then it is just boring as hell.

And I realized I don't want to, this is boring. What could I do better? And then it came to me: The truck just ran over the director, and I have to do it. What am I gonna do? So I would get hold of the script and try and prepare the day's work roughly, and then come down and be able to watch what the director was doing.

And it didn't matter who was right or wrong. What it did matter was because I had thought it out. I had a basis on which to judge, you know, was it a good idea they were doing, what stuff would I have forgotten? I just learned by watching that that way.

And so, after, four or five years of doing television, I was pretty well versed in a lot of high speed, quick filmmaking for, episodic television in particular. But then the movies of the week, you know, were a nice step in between. There you had a chance, you're still working quickly, but not nearly at the silly lightning pace of the episodic.

Gaspard: So, was the speed at which the features were shot, was that easy to ease into? Or were you always just thinking, why is it going so slowly? Why aren't we going faster? Why, why, why, why?

Badham: Yeah, it seemed to me on, on Bingo Long where they said, well, we're going to shoot this in 38 days. And I thought, 38 days, what am I going to do in the afternoon? Oh my God, I can go home after lunch. We'll get this. Well, little did I know how long camera would take and baseball games to shoot and stuff like that. And the production manager kept telling me, “it's going to be 52 days.” And I said, “No, no, we promised 38, that we would do 38. I'm going to do it.” “No, it's gonna be 52.” Because he was right. It was 52, right on the money.

Gaspard: Yeah.

Badham: He knew it. So, I just had to regear my brain. Same thing on Saturday Night Fever. Same 38 to 52 days, you know, just me getting to understand what that next level up of filmmaking requires. And in terms of the detail of the filmmaking and the careful performances and things like that.

Gaspard: When you look back on, on the hours and hours and hours of, you know, on the job training you had before that first feature … and then you think about directors starting out today, who simply don't have that, getting all that experience is hugely helpful. And I know you've taught for years. What, advice do you have for someone who's diving into a feature for the first time who doesn't have 40 hours, 50 hours of finished TV work under their belt?

Badham: They're in a lot of trouble. That's what the truth is. You know, it's so much harder than it looks. And I see that with my students, with the filmmaking that they come up with. It's really difficult to learn it. And the thing that turned out to be really good in my case and some other friends of mine is that we got a lot of practice and learned how—if we stubbed our toe—it was not the end of the world. That you could get through it, because it is harder than it looks.

And they've got a great, harsh awakening coming for them. You know, I've worked with several cameramen who've become directors. And of that, several, almost all of them, never did it again. It drove 'em crazy, and they were brilliant cameramen. You know, these were top of the line, the best guys in the world. And they said, “oh my God, we're going to get a so-and-so to direct this.” And they hated it, because you had to deal with actors. And they were used to a crew that would just jump: If you, said jump, and you know, how high? Ten feet. They'd jump 10 feet. But the actors are going, “What?” They didn't like that.

Gaspard: That's your special gift I think. You can direct action like nobody's business, but when it comes to getting an actor where you need them to be, I mean, you, straddle both sides really, really nicely. I do want to talk about Isn't It Shocking? I don't know why I know it as well as I did. It must have aired at least twice when it came out. And that's around 1973.

Badham: Right. Yes.

Gaspard: I know that I was a big Harold and Maude fan, so I wanted to see Ruth Gordon in something. But I was really taken by it, and it stayed with me for years and years. And I found it recently on YouTube. You can see the whole thing on YouTube, not a terrible print of it. And some questions came up. First: one of the first credits on it says David Shire did the music. How did that happen?

Badham: I was at Yale when David was there and worked on two musicals that he and his partner Richard Maltby wrote. And, so we were friends from there and I was, you know, excited to be able to bring on a composer. I think it was the first one that he had ever done, the first film he had ever done. I mean, he might've done some low budget things, but my recollection is, that he had been playing the piano for The Fantasticks off Broadway forever and ever. That was his day job.

Gaspard: How did Isn't It Shocking? come to you?

Badham: I think my agent at the time was able to talk two very young producers into taking a look at work that I did, which was at that point, I think. The Impatient Heart was probably what they might have looked at, at that point.

And, it was just a wonderful script, you know, it was just laugh-out-loud reading and so much fun to do. And we shot it really quickly, like in 12 days up in Mount Angel, Oregon.

Gaspard: The casting of it is so terrific. You know, besides Ruth Gordon, you've got Will Geer, you've got Alan Alda, you've got Louise Lasser, you have Lloyd Nolan. I know you kind of started out in casting and you've consistently had really smart casting on all the movies. Do you remember how that cast came together?

Badham: Well, my producers were New York based and they had a great sensibility for actors, like Louise Lasser, who I didn't know at all. Will Geer I certainly knew, and Lloyd Nolan I had worked with. Alan Alda was, you know, we all admired his work and thought we were really lucky to get him right at the end of the MASH season.

Gaspard: Yeah, it looks like was right at the end of the first year of MASH.

Badham: Right. And we were shooting on the lot at Fox where MASH shot any anyway, so I was able to go over visit with him and talk with him and get to know him. But, as I say, my producers were very helpful because they were just into every detail. They were over my shoulder, breathing down my neck in the middle of closeups, you know, “We need more goop on them. We need, this is not goopy enough. “

Gaspard: Goop is very important in that movie that you needed enough goop, because it gets bad when he runs out of the goop,

Badham: It drove me a little bit crazy. And, at one point, as they're whispering in my hair during a take, I call “cut.” I reached for my wallet, pulled out my Director's Guild card and said, “Here, you fucking do it.”

Gaspard: Oh boy. You know, this is at least two or three years before Mary Hartman. So, at that point Louise Lasser is from Bananas and—

Badham: A couple of Woody Allen movies.

Gaspard: Yeah, a couple Woody Allen movies, but not that famous. It felt to me like this could have been a backdoor pilot, that if MASH didn't go, here we have these two wonderful characters of Louise Lasser and Alan Alda solving crimes every week. With, you know—not that Ruth Gordon wanted to do a TV series—but it would've been a fun way to continue those characters. Because they were really charming together.

Badham: They were wonderful. And we forgot about Eddie O'Brien.

Gaspard: Oh, exactly. He looks so upset in that movie. It's hard to watch him sometimes.

Badham: I had seen him in a pilot that Jack Lord was starring in, and he played a bad guy. He had these thick coke bottle glasses on, and he was quite a treat. He was quite a handful. Because he wasn't always very focused and sometimes getting him off, “Okay, that's that shot, now we're going to focus on this shot.” And he's still back in the earlier shot.

Gaspard: Well, you were juggling so many different kinds of acting styles, and that's one of the things that I want to talk about from the book: When you have, you know, in one scene, an Alan Alda, Louise Lasser and a Lloyd Nolan. I'm guessing they're acting styles were a little different, or their approaches were a little different. How do you juggle different techniques when you need to get everybody on the same page pretty quickly?

Badham: It's a real challenge to do that because you have some people that like to rehearse a lot. Some people that don't like to rehearse very much at all. Some people that are good on take one and other people who don't start to get good till four or five. And you're going to find, every single time, you're always going to run up against these disparate characters.

If they haven't worked together a lot, you're now trying to massage. You know, “Am I going to shoot Will Geer first in this scene? Or am I going to wait because he gets better later on?” And if I shoot over his shoulder, he is kind warming up, so when I'm ready to turn around onto him, he's at that good cooking point. He's simmered, you know, he is done. You can stick a fork in him, and it will be all right.

Gaspard: That's invaluable knowledge to have when it comes to planning out your day and your setups.

Badham: Oh yeah. I mean, once you start to get a fix on how the people like to work. I learned once from Jodie Foster—I worked with her when she was very young and we were kind of become friends—and I was asking her how she likes to work with actors. She said, “The first thing I do, is I go up and I ask them how they like to work?”

You know, do you like notes from the director? Do you like to go first? Do want me to let you move, find your own blocking? And just kind of having these conversations lets you know a ton of stuff. Elia Kazan talks about it all the time in his book, saying actors will tell you anything, you've just met them, and they'll tell you their entire life story in a few minutes. And you can learn so much about their acting style, just from the stories that they tell and their perspective on the world. And you're so smart to be able to go and have dinner with 'em a couple of times, to sit with them and just not talk about the business, but just their life and understand, you know, what you may be able to get from 'em.

Gaspard: That’s so smart. Just that idea of, well just ask him. You don't have to pretend to know everything. And that's one of the things you keep coming back to in both books is: don't pretend to know everything. Ask, ask. And that's so smart to just ask them the way they want to do it.

A friend of mine was one of the editors on Veep. And he said it took them a little while in that show to realize that, you know, most things are shot, you do a master and then a closeup, and a closeup and a closeup. And he said it doesn't work on an improv show. You have to do all your closeups first until everyone's sort of settled into what they're going to do. And then you do the master at the end, because that'll match. He said, you do a master up front, it's not going to match anything you're doing. And it's like, well, duh, obviously. But we're so attuned to this idea of, well, you know, you start out and then you move in and move in. They just turned it on its head and went, no, it's got to go the other way. Or the master is just useless.

Badham: Right. Well, those are outrageously funny.

Gaspard: So. speaking of improv, you mentioned I think in one of the books, one of my favorite Ruth Gordon stories. I was lucky enough to meet her when she came through town here in Minneapolis, Harold and Maude played for two and a half years, when I was a teenager. And I got to meet her and Bud Cort and hang out with them a little bit during that time. And in one of the books you talk about, where she came up to you and said, “This line isn't working for me.” And you said something along the lines of, “Well just, you know, say what you want.” And do you remember what her response was?

Badham: Oh yes, absolutely. I said, “Well, Ruth, what would you say?” And she looked me right in the eye, kind of waggled her finger and said, “Oh no. I get paid for that.”

Gaspard: Yeah.

Badham: And she went ahead and said the line as written, the one that she started out complaining about.

Gaspard: A couple more things on Isn't It Shocking? There's one point in it where Alan Alda is walking through, I believe it's Ruth Gordon's home. And you did—for that movie—a pretty long continuous shot. Now you said you shot in, was it 12 days?

Badham: Right.

Gaspard: How risky did you think it was? Maybe you did do coverage on it, we just didn't see it. But when it comes down to setting up shots like that, what are you weighing in your mind when it comes to how much time I have and what I need to get done today, and continuous shots versus a lot of coverage?

Badham: Well, you know, usually the continuous shots, you can get several bits of coverage in the shot itself. And so if you write down the amount of time it takes to do a continuous moving master versus a lot of separate shots, it works out about the same.

Gaspard: Okay.

Badham: It's just a different way. And in that particular shot, if I remember it right, we pick up Alan Alda coming in the front door and then as he's walking through, there are cats hanging everywhere and cats dropping down out of the ceiling onto him. And you could see them hanging on light fixtures. They're all over the place. And I,remember our production manager had an arm full of kittens and he's walking behind the camera, putting them up in all these places and you could see them kind of hanging on by the front paws or whatever it was. It was very funny.

Gaspard: It's a delightful movie. It was crafted in such a way that at least it seemed to me like you had very cleverly gone, “Well, I can get name people because they're only going to be here for a couple days. It's not a big deal.” You know, “I only need Will Geer for a few days,” if you're shooting it that way. “I only need Ruth Gordon for a couple days. I only need Lloyd Nolan for a couple days.” So, it's kind of fun for them, but it's not a huge commitment.

I think a lot of filmmakers don't think that through when it comes to, you know, you might be able—if you're making a low budget, no budget movie—you might be able to get somebody to come in for very little if they like the script. And if it's only going to take a couple days. If they're going to be sitting around for three weeks, well that's a whole different consideration. But if they can have fun for a couple days, that's just a really smart way to write it, I think.

Badham: Yeah, it was nice. It was easy to get to, because we fly 'em up to Salem, Oregon. I think everybody was from LA. I forget where Ruth Gordon was coming from, but that was not bad. And it's a very pleasant area there in Oregon. The air is just fabulous compared to LA air, especially at that time. And, you know, just really, really pleasant. 

Gaspard: Well, if you haven't seen it for a while, it is on YouTube. Give it look. And I think should talk to the producers about getting it out on Blu-ray and you should do a commentary on it. It's just a little lost gem. Okay. Enough on that. We'll move on now to probably my favorite John Badham movie, and that's WarGames. What I was surprised to learn, was that you came into the movie when it was already up and running. Some stuff had already been shot, right?

Badham: Yes. They had shot for maybe a week and a half, I'm guessing.

Gaspard: Okay. And that was Marty Brest who started it and then went away?

Badham: Right. Yes.

Gaspard: Another terrific director, with Midnight Run being one of the best comedies, maybe of all time. So, what do you do in a case like that, when they say, you know, the phone rings and they say, “This movie's up and running. Get up to speed as quick as you can.” What does that mean? How quickly can you get up to speed?

Badham: Well, my agent calls me and says, “There's a picture that they would like you to take over, and I don't think you should do it.” “Why is that?” “Well, it's always when they're in trouble and they have to replace the director, there's, going to be real trouble there in River City, so stay away.”

I said, “But what if it's any good?” And he said, “Well, I don't know.” I said, “Well, I think we should read it.” So, I read it and I said, “This is really wonderful.” And I go in to meet with Paula Weinstein, who was running UA at that time. And after we talked for a while, she said, “When could you start shooting on this?”

And it was about two in the afternoon. I said, “I can walk over there and start shooting right now.” She went, “What?”

I said, “The trouble is, it won't be any good.” She said, “Why not?” I said, “Because I barely read the script. I needed time to, you know, kind of absorb it and get my head wrapped around the thing. I think it's a wonderful script and, and I could do it, but the shots I would be doing would be pretty generic. And that's not what you want. You need something, you know, that is not as dark as Marty was bringing.”

Because I did have a chance to look at the dailies that he had shot and was watching the scene where Matthew Broderick first takes Ally Sheedy up to his bedroom and shows her how he can change her grade on the computer.

And I'm looking at this scene and I'm kind of thinking, “The actors are good. I don't know who these kids are. Photography's wonderful. What's the problem here? Why is it not working?” And then it came to me, they're not having any fun. If I could change a girl's grade on the computer and I was that age of 15, 16, I would be peeing in my pants with excitement, you know? I would not be treating it like we were sixties rebels on the dark web—if there had been such a thing at the time. It's not that at all. It's a kid who's into games and playing. So that was the first thing that I re-shot—I took them right back to that bedroom on the stage.

And it took us, oh my gosh, several takes before we could even get them warmed up. Because Matthew and Ally figured that they were going to get fired any minute too. So, they were terrified of me. And as we kept doing takes, I would just run in there and tell jokes and tickle 'em and do anything to make it, ‘this is light and breezy and we can have fun.’

And so around take 12 or 13—I never do that many takes, but I figured I can't turn in dailies, that look only a little bit better. They've got to be a hundred percent better for the studio to have gone to all this trouble. So, I said to them, I said, “Okay, we're going to have a little break here. We're going to take 10 minutes for coffee. Matthew and Ally, you and I are going to have a race around the outside of the stage, and we'll race around here, and the last person back has to sing a song for the crew.

Gaspard: That was going to be you,

Badham: I knew who that per person was. You know, I'm like 20 years older than them already at that point. I know who's going to lose. And as we get back to the stage, of course I'm last. And I remember this old song that we used to sing in Glee Club in high school called The Happy Wanderer, where a guy yodels. And that just kind of helped break the ice and, loosen them up so that they started to get more playful with it.

Gaspard: How did the bit of business where she traps him between her legs come about? Was that a rehearsal thing? Was that you? Was that them?

Badham: Oh, I think it was something Ally just did.  It was very, very erotic in its own little way.

Gaspard: And his reaction is great too. because he doesn't know what to do.

Badham: Yeah. Yeah. That's right. I forgot, totally forgot about that, but I do remember it happening.

Gaspard: You know, if in a parallel universe I'd be interested in seeing what a finished WarGames by Martin Brest would look like, but I'm glad we got your version, because I think that's the one that's more of a crowd pleaser.

By the time you were pulled in, was the NORAD set already designed and built?

Badham: It was. Yeah, pretty much built, they were already shooting tests in there to see how to sell the thing the best. And Billy Fraker, the cinematographer and myself, went over there and spent a lot of time walking around saying, you know, “how would we shoot this?” You know, how was I thinking about shooting it versus whatever Marty had in mind.

Gaspard: Right. Was all the casting done at that point? Was Dabney Coleman already cast and John Wood?

Badham: Dabney Coleman was cast. John Wood. I recast, Matthew's father.

Gaspard: Okay.

Badham: I didn't care for the father they had. And I recast the general, who they had. He was okay, but it needed a bigger personality.

Gaspard: The visuals on the Crystal Palace set on those screens, were those already in production when you came on? Because there's a lot going on on those screens and that's all happening live while you're doing it, right? This is not today. This is back then, and everything that happens happens right in front of the camera. Were those all ready to go when you came on, or were you part of getting that ready? Because there's so much stuff going on in those screens.

Badham: This movie, as far as that concerned, was brilliantly prepared. I mean, they were creating film that would take you several minutes per frame in the optical printer to create. And that had been going on for quite a long time because they had six front projectors, four rear projectors, and 82 video monitors. All of these hundred and whatever had to work in sync with each other, which had never been done before.

Nobody had ever tried to gang that much equipment together to run. And the Hollywood family that did this for years, the Hansards, were able to solve the problem, so you had all these projectors running in sync and you could photograph from any angle which, you know, you maybe might have trouble doing if you were doing blue screen. It used to be with front projection, rear projection, you didn't want to move the camera because you didn't want to get off the hotspot of the arc light. If you got off to the side, it would fade out. But the film had gotten a lot faster. And Fraker was just the best at making all this stuff go together.

Gaspard: The sequence at the end when everything's blowing up, you get so much bang for your editing buck and you're shooting it all live. That's what just kills me. I mean, nowadays they would just, “okay, we'll deal with all that in post.” But you had to go into the edit suite with all those shots of all those screens, doing all those different things for that last big, WOPR explosion thing. For the time, it's really incredible.

Badham: Well, I much prefer it that way. You know, Jim Cameron in the latest film of Avatar, he is managed to get it so what he sees through the camera is what you're going to see on the screen. He is not waiting for stuff to come back from some horrendously tedious project. And so, we are doing a much cruder version of that than what Jim was able to accomplish. But it's, you know exactly what you've got at that time, and you're not suddenly stuck with bad exposures and nasty looking bad blue screen work.

Gaspard: That's the balance that I think is so amazing in your career. Great performances, highly entertaining stories, but my goodness, the action and getting all the pieces you need. Just an education in itself.

John Wood. I'm a huge fan of John Wood. He wasn't in enough movies. What was it like working with him?

Badham: This was an absolute lovely English pro of the first order. You know, English actors are so disciplined and so together, compared to our American actors who tend to be a little loosey goosey. So, I had somebody who was just totally focused on doing the best job that he possibly could.

And he was so humble, maybe falsely humble. I used to think that. But he would come up and say, “Oh, dear boy, I'm ruining your movie.” And I'd say, “Oh, John, that's bullshit. Just shut up. You're doing great, it's just lovely.”

And he was at that point just starting rehearsal for Amadeus, to play the Salieri part on the road. And he was asking me, he said, “They've got us on a raked stage, for this, which is fine,” he said. “But my back is killing me. I can't be on this raked stage with the high heel shoes of the period.” And I sent him to my chiropractor, in Culver City. And he came down to where they were rehearsing and managed to completely solve his back problem with different kinds of shoes and stuff like that. So, John was just, you know, so, grateful for that, because he was miserable.

Gaspard: In WarGames he is the center of one of my favorite shots of yours in the war room, when he first enters, and he comes down the stairs and crosses the entire room.

Badham: Mm-hmm.

Gaspard: Do you remember how you did that shot?

Badham: Oh yeah. Well, we did it with a crane that was designed to work inside and was one of the first cranes that would extend out and pull back through the space that he was going through.

Gaspard: Was that the Luma Crane?

Badham: Yes, it was, thank you.

Gaspard: I remember that from Polanski's Tenant film. He had it where it snaked up through a stairway, but it's such a lovely shot.

Badham: It did work out really nicely. The war room was stepped up as you went toward the back of it, it went up, you know, four or five steps. So, it wasn't a matter of being able to dolly straight back, because you couldn't do that. But the Luma Crane was better than your average Chapman Crane because it had this extender on it. The mechanics of it were very difficult, however, and it slowed you down to a crawl because it took so long to get it set up, rigged and = right. And now, there's better equipment, so I'm sure nobody except Mr. Luma uses it anymore.

Gaspard: Right, but at, but at the time it was—

Badham: —oh. It's great.

Gaspard: An audience member watching the movie is unconsciously aware of the fact that this room has steps and goes up because you've seen people coming down the steps, going up the steps, even to the stairs on the side. But I mean, the room is just tiered. And so, when you see John Wood come down the stairs, cross the room and go up and up and up and the cameras with him the whole time, you mentally go, “how were they following him? They're going up steps.” And it's not steadycam, because I don't think steadycam came about till maybe—

Badham: Steadycam was around since 74.

Gaspard: Anyway, it's just a fabulous shot. Two more things on WarGames. The opening scene, with the two guys who are in the bunker, is such a great tension scene. It's beautifully staged, but it also sets up the theme of the movie so perfectly. Was that always the opening of the script?

Badham: As long as I worked on it, it was always the opening.

Gaspard: Did you make any changes or go back to previous drafts when you came on board?

Badham: I did. I asked them to send me every draft that they had, and they had taken the original writers Lasker and Parks and had replaced them with a couple of other writers, and they had changed the script quite a bit. And I went back and read Lasker and Parks and said, “this is the one that we need. I'm throwing these other ones out.” And I called the guys up and I said, “Come back. Help me out here. You know, we can tidy up the script the way you like it, the way it should be.” So, we were able to do that and to finetune it to where I think it was doing the right thing or doing the best job.

Gaspard: Okay. One more WarGames question. In the I'll Be In My Trailer book—and in both books—you talk about being totally honest with actors. But you are occasionally willing to keep them in the dark, or I wouldn't say trick them, but not necessarily tell them everything is going to happen, just to see what they do. The example in WarGames is when Matthew Broderick tussles, Dabney Coleman's hair, after his hair has been tussled by Dabney Coleman. And I believe that that was something you told Matthew to do, but you didn't tell Dabney. How often does that come up, and how often should you use that sort of technique of surprising people on camera?

Badham: Well, I think it can be fun. You get a spontaneous reaction from them and if it works, that's great. If not, you've always got what was scripted.

Gaspard: Right. 

Badham: And sometimes you just get an idea watching it. For example, the Dabney Coleman/Matthew Broderick example that you give: they had to kind of shake hands or hug or whatever, and in the excitement of it, Dabney rubs Matthew's hair in the rehearsal. And so, I went over and told Matthew on the quiet, “Hey, you do it to him, you know, to surprise him.” Because Dabney has a temper and he kind of reacts and I knew he was not going to just take it lying down. And yet he's like, you know, six or eight inches taller than Matthew. So Whatcha gonna do You gonna hit the kid?

Gaspard: It's a lovely moment. And what I love about that ending of WarGames is that when the movie's over, it ends. You don't drag stuff out, the movie’s over and we're done. I wish more films did that. Is that just a built-in barometer with you that you just know when it's time to just put up The End?

Badham: To get out. I mean, I hate watching movies where you just have one ending after another and you've gotta wrap up every single character. And I understand why people do that, but it just bores me silly. And that's probably coming from working in television where they always have to have—at the end of an episode—an epilogue. You know, we've convicted the murderer, we've gotten the bad guy, you know, and then they go to commercial and they can come back and they have a two minute scene. And usually it's just deadly stuff. There's nothing, much fun about it.

I did a lot of episodes of Supernatural and they had hit on a formula that actually worked great. Which was, you went to commercial, when you came back, you'd always have a scene with the two brothers that was sort of off topic from what the rest of the thing had been. And it was just great fun. And you hung in there to watch it. because it was a delightful addition. It was not some, you know, millstone hung around the series neck.

Gaspard: It's not literally filler where you're trying to fill those two minutes. You've actually come up with something fun. Do you have a couple more minutes? Just talk about Dracula very quickly.

Badham: Yeah. Let's do that.

Gaspard: What a great version of Dracula. I believe in one of the two books, one of the things you said was, “Don't be afraid to say, ‘I don't know, let's figure it out.’” And I got the sense you did that a lot on Dracula. There was a lot of, how do we do this? I don't know, let's figure it out.

And you had some of the best people. One of them I want to ask about is working with Albert Whitlock and matte paintings, which are beautiful in that movie. And, of course, seamless, because his stuff was seamless. I should know how this is done. I don't. Is he painting the painting and you're bringing it live to the location and setting it in front of the camera with the part open that you need for the live thing? Or is that all placed on in post?

Badham: The old-fashioned way to do it is you would set a frame up in front of the camera and, now let's say you were extending a building up, so you would literally stand there and paint it on the spot.

Gaspard: Okay.

Badham: That was the first way that they did it. So that when you shot the film, you had a combined matte painting: it was all together as one piece. Albert, what he did was, he would block off in black all the parts where he's going to paint and just leave open the parts that we're going to photograph and make it so that none of that black part was exposed to anything. He would make you put down a platform that was rigid, it would take an earthquake to move, because nothing could move, everything had to be absolutely stone rigid and you would shoot two or three takes of whatever it was, the castle, Dracula’s castle was one that we did, you know, several of.

And now take that film back to his studio and put it in the refrigerator. Do not develop it. Now he would go in and clip off a few frames from the unexposed negative and develop that. And now create a matte where he painted in everything. And he could now take the original film out of the refrigerator and he would run that through the camera again, not exposing the part that had already been exposed, but now just exposing the top. And so, it was all original negative. That was his whole feeling, that he was not working with dupe negative at all.

Gaspard: That's why it so great.

Badham: And it is absolutely perfect. By that point in England, the guys had kind of tried to go beyond that and figuring—with new film stocks—they could make dupe negatives. Albert only gave us 10 shots, and other ones that we had were done in a newer style, where they didn't have original negative and they don't look as good as what he did.

Gaspard: One last question about actors, because you had a great example in Dracula of dealing with an actor who was sort of playing with you to get more time on camera. And that was Donald Pleasance and his bag of candy. At what point did you realize that he was doing that, and what advice do you give to someone who has an actor who's playing games to be on camera?

Badham: When you realize what's going on, you have to decide how are you going to deal with this? I had a similar situation with James Woods in a movie called The Hard Way, and he's the same kind of same kind of guy. Exactly. Always looking to kind of sneak more time on camera, how to upstage other people.

Donald is the genius at up staging other people. And I would just call him on it and say, “Donald, let's give Lord Olivier his close up here. Let's give Larry his closeup.” I never called him Lord Olivier. If you called Olivier ‘Lord Olivier,’ he’d say “Larry, dear boy. Larry.”

Dying to make a feature? Learn from the pros!

"We never put out an actual textbook for the Corman School of Filmmaking, but if we did, it would be Fast, Cheap and Under Control." 
Roger Corman, Producer

★★★★★

It’s like taking a Master Class in moviemaking…all in one book!

  • Jonathan Demme: The value of cameos

  • John Sayles: Writing to your resources

  • Peter Bogdanovich: Long, continuous takes

  • John Cassavetes: Re-Shoots

  • Steven Soderbergh: Rehearsals

  • George Romero: Casting

  • Kevin Smith: Skipping film school

  • Jon Favreau: Creating an emotional connection

  • Richard Linklater: Poverty breeds creativity

  • David Lynch: Kill your darlings

  • Ron Howard: Pre-production planning

  • John Carpenter: Going low-tech

  • Robert Rodriguez: Sound thinking

And more!

Write Your Screenplay with the Help of Top Screenwriters!

It’s like taking a Master Class in screenwriting … all in one book!

Discover the pitfalls of writing to fit a budget from screenwriters who have successfully navigated these waters already. Learn from their mistakes and improve your script with their expert advice.

"I wish I'd read this book before I made Re-Animator."
Stuart Gordon, Director, Re-Animator, Castle Freak, From Beyond

John Gaspard has directed half a dozen low-budget features, as well as written for TV, movies, novels and the stage.

The book covers (among other topics):

  • Academy-Award Winner Dan Futterman (“Capote”) on writing real stories

  • Tom DiCillio (“Living In Oblivion”) on turning a short into a feature

  • Kasi Lemmons (“Eve’s Bayou”) on writing for a different time period

  • George Romero (“Martin”) on writing horror on a budget

  • Rebecca Miller (“Personal Velocity”) on adapting short stories

  • Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) on adaptations

  • Academy-Award Nominee Whit Stillman (“Metropolitan”) on cheap ways to make it look expensive

  • Miranda July (“Me and You and Everyone We Know”) on making your writing spontaneous

  • Alex Cox (“Repo Man”) on scaling the script to meet a budget

  • Joan Micklin Silver (“Hester Street”) on writing history on a budget

  • Bob Clark (“Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things”) on mixing humor and horror

  • Amy Holden Jones (“Love Letters”) on writing romance on a budget

  • Henry Jaglom (“Venice/Venice”) on mixing improvisation with scripting

  • L.M. Kit Carson (“Paris, Texas”) on re-writing while shooting

  • Academy-Award Winner Kenneth Lonergan (“You Can Count on Me”) on script editing

  • Roger Nygard (“Suckers”) on mixing genres

This is the book for anyone who’s serious about writing a screenplay that can get produced! 

Amy Scott on "Hal" (The Hal Ashby Documentary)

First, I want to say thank you for making the movie and thank you for making such a great movie because he totally deserved it. I would always wonder why of all the directors of the 70s and 80s, he was never really heralded the way he should have been. I think part of it has to do with that he had no discernible style. So, you couldn't really pick him for something. But before we dive into that, tell me a little bit about your background before you made Hal?

Amy Scott: Well, I'm from Oklahoma. I moved to Chicago, out of college and in college, we studied a lot of, I had a great professor at ODU at the University of Oklahoma. I don't think he's there anymore. But he really hipped us to the coolest documentaries. I had no idea that you could be a documentary filmmaker, like from Chris Marker to the 7-Up series to Hands on a Hard Body. It was just a really great, great, well-rounded Film and Media Program.

Anyway, I moved to Chicago. I wanted to be a director and a DP, but I fell down, I had gotten a job at the University of Chicago. I think I faked my way into it. I was supposed to start on a Monday, and I fell on the ice and broke my arm on a Friday. So I was like, “I can't shoot. I can't film. I can't use my arm to film and hold the camera. I need to learn how to edit. So I learned how to edit with my right hand, and I loved it. And then I just did that for like 10 years. Well, I mean, I still do it. But it was like this accidental career path.

You're an accidental editor.

Amy Scott: An accidental editor. That became something that later, I just valued as such an important skill set. I use it now. I have wonderful editors that I work with. But we speak the same language. And I think with the story structure, that you have an eye for things in the edit bay and now it really, really helps my ability to break down a three-act structure or figure out where the narrative arc is, and things like that. I think would have taken me a lot longer, had I not fallen and broken my arm.

It was sort of a similar path for Hal Ashby, starting in editing.

Amy Scott: Totally. I loved his films and then when I read Nick Dawson's book, and I started to learn more about him, I really, really connected with him. Because of things that he would say about filmmaking and editing and being in the edit bay and being obsessed with every frame. I felt like, being seen and heard. Like, “Oh, this is how I feel about it, too. I don't feel like such a freak of nature, and lots of people feel this way.” I really connected with Hal and he didn't make The Landlord I believe until he was 40 years old.

He was up there.

Amy Scott: Yeah, up there.

For a first-time filmmaker, that's a late start.

Amy Scott: And that was about the same age that I made the Hal movie.

What was your first experience with a Hal Ashby movie?

Amy Scott: The first film that I saw that I can remember was with my friend Jason in college. I was watching Truffaut and Cassavetes and so I thought that I had a very well-rounded understanding of the new Hollywood. And my friend Jason said, “Have you ever seen Harold and Maude?” I had no idea what he was talking about. He was a couple years older, and he was like, “Oh, honey, you're gonna skip school today. We're gonna watch it.” And I swear to God, we watched it. I couldn't believe what it was. I couldn't believe I'd never seen it. It somehow gone past me.

As soon as it was over, I was like, “Stop. Start it again.” We have to rewatch it. We where there for like eight hours, watching it on a loop. David Russell compares it to The Catcher in the Rye as a sort of like rite of passage for people at that age. It hit me right straight through the heart. And then from there, I think I saw The Landlord, someone had screen of The Landlord in Oklahoma City. And I was like, oh my god, this is incredible.

I live in Minneapolis, where Harold and Maude ran at The Westgate theater for two and a half years. I saw the movie quite a bit there. And then, because I was in a film program, and knew someone who knew the film critic for the local paper, when Ruth and Bud came to town for the two-year anniversary, he sorts of dragged me along with him. So, I had dinner with Bud Cort and hung out a little bit with Ruth Gordon. I made a little documentary on Super 8mm of my perspective on their experiences.  I was 15 years old or something and although I knew their itinerary, I couldn't drive. And so I would go to the TV station and shoot some stuff there with them and then they were on to something else. I had to hop on a bus to keep up with them.

Amy Scott: That's incredible.

Yes, my only regret was on that when I had dinner with Bud that I didn't ask better questions. I was sort of starstruck and there's a lot of question. I would ask him now—that I've tried to ask him—but you know, he's not too communicative.

Amy Scott: Yeah. That's incredible that you that you have that footage and I would love to see it.

It was really, really fun and interesting. Ruth Gordon was very much Ruth Gordon, very much Maude. She didn't suffer fools. So, you've seen Harold and Maude, seen The Landlord. At what point did you decide that a documentary had to be made?

Amy Scott: Well, okay, I was pregnant with my first child, and was finishing up Nick Dawson's book on Hal, you know, on Hal’s life. And I thought, I just couldn't believe there was a documentary. But this is before the market became oversaturated with a story about everyone's life. At the time, I just thought, oh my gosh, there's so much here. This guy, his films should be really celebrated. And he should be more known and revered in the canon of American 70s New Hollywood, because he's so influential.

And that's why it was important that we include David O Russell and Adam McKay, and Allison Anders, Judd Apatow. They could draw a direct connections, like the film family tree. When you see the wide shots in Harold and Maude, you think of Wes Anderson. Or, you know, the music, you think of David O Russell. I mean, his influence was everywhere. I started to connect the dots and I thought, oh, my gosh, we've got to, we've got to make a film here.

But I'd never done anything like that. I had directed smaller documentaries. I tried to make a film about this band called The Red Crayola and that was a hilarious attempt on my part. To try to chase them around the globe and on no money. That was my only experience outside of editing. So, fortunately, I had hooked up with my producing partners that I still work with now. I just met them at the time and they hired me to edit some cat food commercials. So it was editing Friskies or Purina, I don't know what it was. It was just looking at cats all day.

And I was about to give birth but I was working trying to lock down the rights And the rights came through one afternoon and I just pulled them (the producers) in and I was like, let's do this together. We didn't know what the hell we were doing, but it was so great and so fun. We approached it, like, all hands-on deck, and we were a little family making this thing. So, that spirit has continued, thank goodness, because of what we put into the Ashby movie.

What do you think were his unique qualities as a director?

Amy Scott: Gosh, so much. I just think he really had an eye. He could see stories. You said something earlier, that all of his films are not the same and therefore it's hard to go, oh, he's this style of filmmaker. But the thing that they all have in common is that he has a very real and raw approach at looking at humanity. Sort of holding the mirror up and showing us who we are, with all of our faults and complexities and layers of contradictions and failures. So he's able to see that and find the stories of humanity. And that's the connective tissue for me. He also had a sick musical taste; I mean, he sort of found Cat Stevens. The soundtrack to Shampoo—I think that's why it's not in wide release right now, as I can’t imagine having to license Hendrix and Janis and the Beach Boys, you know?

That's true. But I'll also say he had the wisdom to let Paul Simon do the small musical things he did in Shampoo, which are just as powerful or if not more powerful.

Amy Scott: So, powerful. So much restraint. Incredibly powerful. I feel like Hal, because he was not—from all of our research and talking to everyone and girlfriends and collaborators—he wasn't a dictatorial director. He didn't lay down mandates. He was really open to hearing from everybody and making it feel like it was a democratic scene and everyone has an equal voice. If you had an idea, speak up.

But at the end of the day, he was like, okay, here's the vision. And once he had that vision, I think that's where he really got into problems with the studio system. Because that was such a different time. The studio guys thought that they were also the director, that they were also the auteur. I cannot imagine a world where you throw your entire life into making a film and then a studio head comes along and tries to seize it from you. I mean, that would give me cancer, you know, from the stress. I can't imagine.

It certainly didn't match with his personality at all.

Amy Scott: No, not at all. What I thought was so fascinating was how open he was to ideas. I love that about him and it resonates in my microscopic ways of connecting to that now. Man, every time it pops up, I'm like, I feel this little Hal Ashby devil angel on my shoulders.

Yes, but it's odd. Because it's not like they didn't know what they were getting. It's not like he hid that part of his personality. You would know, immediately from meeting him that...

Amy Scott: Yeah.

With Harold and Maude, it was just a weird perfect storm of a crazy executive like Robert Evans saying yes to all these weird things. And then the marketing team at Gulf and Western/Paramount going, “we have no idea what to do.” You know, I had the Harold and Maude poster hanging for years. And it's the most obvious example of a studio that cannot figure out how to market a movie. The Harold and Maude different color name thing. It's just so obviously they didn't know what do.

Amy Scott: I know I love when Judd Apatow was talking about that. That's really funny.

So, what was the biggest thing that surprised you as you learned more about Hal?

Amy Scott: What surprised me was that side of his temperament. He did look like this peace love guy.  He was an attractive man but, you know, this long hair and long beard and so cool and I had a really myopic like view of what I thought his personality was. I thought he was a super mellow guy. And then I got in and started reading the letters. My producer, Brian would read the letters in his voice as a temp track that we would use that to edit to cut the film. And we were rolling, dying, laughing, like falling down, like, oh, my God, I cannot believe that Hal would write some of this shit to the head of Paramount or whoever. It was like, wow, this guy is not at all who I thought. These were fiery missives that he was shooting off into space.

It wasn't like just getting mad and writing an email. I mean, he had to sit on a typewriter.

Amy Scott: Typewriter and they were very, very long. I mean, the sections that we used in the film, were obviously heavily cut. We couldn't show like six pages of vitriol. The best part about the vitriol though, he wasn’t just vomiting, anger. It was a very poetic. He had a very poetic way of weaving together his frustration and expletives in a way that I just loved.

And then we turned the papers over to Ben Foster. That's why we wanted him to narrate—be the voice of Hal—because he's always struck me as an artist that totally gets it. Not a studio guy and he was all over it. He was right. You can really identify with this sort of, you're either with us or against us artists versus, the David and Goliath. So, that was most fascinating to me.

I knew—because of the book, because Nick did such a great job—I knew Hal’s story. Leaving his child, leaving Leigh. It's one thing to read about it in a book and it's a completely different thing to go meet that person, to sit with her. She's since become a dear friend to me. I feel like she'd never really spoken about that, about her dad and that time of her of her life. I think revisiting trauma on that level, and working through a lot of those emotions with her, was really heavy and not what I intended. When I set out to make the film, I was thinking about the films of Hal Ashby. I didn't think it would get as heavy as it did. I'm glad that we went there and that she took us with her. I feel really, really thankful. I think she got a lot out of it. We certainly did.

It really did show you just how complicated he was, the reality of his life, when you see the child. And she was so eloquent on screen.

Amy Scott: So great. He had some generational trauma too and then you put it all together, and you're like, okay, well, this is somebody that's really adept at looking deep into the human condition. He’d been through a lot. He'd made a lot of mistakes and he's been through a lot. So, of course, this checks out. And he's just so talented and creative, that he can make these films that are this really accurate, fun and funny and sad and tragic and beautiful portrayals of humanity.

Well, let's just if we can't dive into a couple of my favorites just to see if anything you walked away with.

Obviously, Harold and Maude hold a special place in my heart. I've just loved reading Nick’s book and reading and hearing in your film and in listening to commentaries about what Hal did to wrestle Harold and Maude into the movie that it is. I forget who it was on one of the commentaries who said there were so many long speeches by Maude that you just ended up hating her. And Hal’s editor's ability to go and just trim it and trim it and trim it. I compare what he did there to what Colin Higgins went on to do when he directed and he simply didn't have it. He had the writing skill, obviously, and the directing skills. He didn't have that editor’s eye. I don't think there's a Colin Higgins movie made that couldn't be 20 minutes shorter. If Hal had gone into Foul Play and edited it down, it would have been a much stronger comedy. 9 to 5 would have been 20 minutes shorter. Probably a little stronger. Anyway, you don't recognize that. It's all hidden. It's the edit. You don't know what he threw away and that's the beauty of Harold and Maude: within this larger piece he found that movie and found the right way to express it. So, what did you learn about that movie that might have surprised you?

Amy Scott: Everything surprise me about it. You know, we were never able to get Bud Cort. You know Bud Curt, he's so special and so elusive and we thought we thought we were gonna get him a couple times and then it was just a real difficult thing.

But you have him from the memorial service, and that's a great thing.

Amy Scott: Oh, yeah. Anytime he's on camera, he's bewitching. He's incredible. So we went again with the letters. I just didn't realize that Bud and Hal we're so close. I mean, obviously, they were close. But they were very tight. They had a real father son, sort of bond.

Charles Mulvehill, the producer, also talked about how difficult it was to make the film. I didn't know that Charles ended up marrying one of the women that is on the dating service that Harold's mom tries to set up. That was interesting, too. It's hard for me, to tell you the truth. We did so much research on all the films, so there's little bits and pieces of all.

Jumping away from Harold and Maude—just because my brain is disorganized—Diane Schroeder was with Hal for a number of years and she's in the film. She was sort of a researcher archivists, she wore many hats. I did not realize that on Being There, she really needed to nail down what was on the television Chauncey Gardiner learned everything from TV, so it was really important what was on it. When he's flipping, it's not random. She and Hal would take VHS tapes in or I guess it would have been Beta at the time, whatever the fidelity was, but they would record hundreds of hours of TV and watch it. She got all these TV Guides from that year, 1981. But what was a three year’s span, she had all the TV Guides.

She had everything figured out. It was like creating the character of Chauncey Gardiner, with Hal and then Peter Sellars got involved, and he had certain thoughts about it, too. I was just so blown away by the fact that that much care and effort and painstaking detail would go into it. When you see it on screen, it's definitely a masterpiece because of those things. Just the defness of editing, of leaving things out, is what makes it good. That is such a such a really hyper detailed behind the scenes thing to know that. When we were going through his storage space. I remember asking Diane, why are there boxes and boxes and boxes of TV. She said, “oh, yeah, that's Chancy Gardener's.” I said, I cannot believe you guys saved this. Really funny.

It's interesting because they would have done all that in post now. And they had to get that all figured out, before they were shooting it. That’s a lot of pre-production.

Amy Scott: Oh, an immense amount of pre-production. Hal set up an edit bay in his bedroom. It’s the definition of insanity. I had that going on at one point in my life and it's not good. It's not good thing to roll over and it's like right there like right next to pillows staring at you. You need some distance.

When I saw Being There for the first time for some reason I was in Los Angeles/ I saw it and of course loved it. And then came back to Minneapolis and someone had seen it and said, “don't you love the outtakes?” And I said, “What outtakes?” They said, “over the end credits, all those outtakes with Peter Sellars.” And I said, “there were no outtakes.” In the version in LA, they didn't do that.

Amy Scott: I wanted to add this, but we just ran out of time. We found all these Western Union telegrams that Peter Sellars wrote to Hal, just pissed, just livid, furious about that. He said, “You broke the spell. You broke the spell. God dammit, you broke the spell.” He was so pissed that they included those outtakes and I agree with them.

It’s not a real normal Hal move, is it?

Amy Scott: No, it's honestly the first time that I'd ever seen blooper outtakes in a film like that. That’s such an interesting 80s style, shenanigans and whatnot. But, yeah, no, you want them to walk out on the water after watching him dip umbrella in the water and think about that for the rest of your life.

Exactly. I think they left it out of the LA version for Academy purposes, thinking that would help with the awards. But then years later to look at the DVD and see the alternate ending and go, well, that’s terrible. I'm glad you guys figured that out. And then apparently, was it on the third take that somebody said, he should put his umbrella down into the water?

Amy Scott: That's so smart.

It's so smart. Alright. Shampoo is another favorite.  I'm curious what you learned about that one, because you had three very strong personalities making that movie with Robert Towne on one side and Warren Beatty on the other and Hal in the middle. It's amazing that it came out as well as it did. Somehow Hal wrangled it and did what he did. What did you learn there that sort of surprised you?

Amy Scott:  Well, that aspect is what we wanted to really investigate. Because Hal had a pretty singular vision. Hal as a director—at that stage—was becoming a very important filmmaker. So, then how do you balance the styles of Robert Towne and Warren Beatty? These guys are colossal figures in Hollywood, Alpha dogs. I wish that we could have sat with Warren. It was not for lack of trying. I think a lot of these guys that we couldn't get, it's like, yeah, that's what makes him so cool.

Bruce Dern. I was trying to chase down Bruce Dern at the Chase Bank, and he got up one day and I was just like, I knew, let it go.

But Shampoo, everything we learned, we put in the film. Robert Towne talked to us. And then there was the audio commentary that Hal had from his AFI seminars. Caleb Deschanel spoke pretty eloquently about it being like watching a ping pong match going back and forth between Robert and Warren about what the direction should be. And then the director sitting in a chair probably smoking a joint, waiting for them to finish. It seems like they might have needed a sort of mediator type presence to guide the ship, like have a soft hand with it, you know?

You can't have three alphas in the room at the same time. Nothing would get done. You need a neutralizing force and it seems like that's what Hal was it. He just had a really great taste, you know? My favorite element of that movie—besides Julie Christie's backless dress—would be Jack Warden. Anytime Jack Warden comes on screen, I'm like, just want to hang with him for another half hour. I can just watch that man piddle around and be funny.

I remember reading an interview with Richard Dreyfus after Duddy Kravitz came out, in which he was blasting the director, saying that they ruined Jack Warden’s performance in post-production. And Jack Warden is amazing in Duddy Kravitz. I don't know what they he thinks they did to it, because he's just fantastic.

Amy Scott: He must have just been astronomically amazing and funny, which is what I imagined he's was like.

I took away two things from Shampoo. One was—having seen Harold and Maude as often as I did—recognizing that the sound effects of the policeman's motorcycle as being the same one as George's motorcycle as he's going up the Hollywood Hills. Exact same ones.

But the last shot as he's looking down on Julie Christie's house and the use of high-angle shot, it is one of the saddest things I've ever seen. It's just a guy standing on an empty lot looking down onto the houses below, but it's … I don't know. Given the guys he was dealing with, I don't know how he made that into a Hal Ashby movie, but he did.

Amy Scott: He did. Well, it seems like it's moments like that yeah, there's so much melancholy loaded into that moment. Because George is such an interesting character. Now, I'm realizing that you and I have just blown, we've just spoiled the ending shots of both Being There and Shampoo.

Anybody listening to this who hasn't seen those movies deserves to be spoiled.

Amy Scott: Get on the boat. But yeah, that always got me. I think it's all of those really like, foggy misty Mulholland Drive shot of George on his motorcycle, anytime he's alone. Because he crams his life so full of women to try to fill the hole or the void or whatever he's got going on that's missing in his life. And he's just trying to shove it full of women. So, when he's alone, and he has nothing and no one you're like, oh, my God, this is the saddest thing I've ever seen.

It really is. I don't know. Maybe you can fill me in on this. I remember reading somewhere that the scene—his last scene with Goldie Hawn—they went back and they reshot it because somebody said he's standing. He should be sitting. And I'm always interested in directors who hear that and are willing to go back and do it.

The other example is Donald Sutherland in Ordinary People in his last scene. Telling Redford, “I did it wrong. I should be done crying. I was crying when I should have been done crying.” and they went back and reshot. His portion of it is no longer crying because the director went, you're right. And that simple notion of Warren Beatty should be sitting down, and she should be standing over him.

Amy Scott: She's got the power.

Yes. But I'm not sure a lot of directors would have said yes to that. Like, “We don't need to go back and do that. We're overscheduled we got other stuff to do …”

Amy Scott: Oh, I don't think Hal cared about the schedule at all. Everything that I read or, you know, even Jeff Bridges talked about, like them being over budget and he's like, “you know, all right, let's figure out a creative solution to this. It's going to take as long as it's going to take.” He never seemed to really get riled onset or let those sorts of parameters hold all the power and guide the filmmaking. He was in complete control of that.

Having that sort of attitude about things, that just spreads to the whole set. That spreads everywhere and makes it easier for everybody to work.

Amy Scott: It does.

Let's do one last one. Coming Home is interesting for me because I had friends who ran a movie theater here in town. It was just a couple of running it and I would come by from time to time if they were busy. I’d go up and run the projector for them. They had one of those flat plate systems, so you only had to turn the projector on. It wasn't that big a deal. But you know, I was young and it's like okay, now I'm going to turn the house lights down … I got to see the first five minutes of Coming Home a lot. Probably more than I saw the rest of the movie. Was there anything you learned about the making of that film that surprised you?

Amy Scott: Yeah, I didn't realize how hard it was to get that film made. Jane Fonda is the one that's really responsible for Coming Home even existing. Nancy Dowd had a book and Jane really fought hard to get it made. By the time it got to Hal, it was different, there was a number of rewrites. And it obviously had to be cut down significantly.

I never think—it's never my go-to—to think that one of the actors is the one responsible. Usually it comes to you in a different way, and especially if he's working with Robert Towne and the like. But I thought that was really cool and really interesting that Jane spoke about showing what our veterans were going through. This wasn't new, because you had like The Deer Hunter would have been the comparable. And that's a wildly different take on what coming home from the Vietnam War was like. But also, the woman's journey in that film, and the sexuality of all of that was just like, wow. Only Jane Fonda can speak about it eloquently as Jane Fonda does.

I also didn't realize— when we were sitting with John Voigt—that he was really method in the way that he didn't get out of his chair, I mean, for days on end. Going into crafty in the chair, learning how to do go up ramps and play basketball and all the things that you see was because he wouldn't get out of the chair, which was wonderful.

I really enjoyed talking with Jeff Wexler, and Haskell. That interview that we did with Haskell, I'm so thankful for because, you know, Haskell passed away, not that long after we film. That was one of his last interviews. So, it was really special. He came to the set and Haskell is like, a film God to me and my team. For me, I lived in Chicago so Medium Cool, was one of the coolest things ever. Meeting him and talking with him was so interesting.

I loved hearing about the opening. You can just tell it’s Haskell Wexler. You know it's a Hal Ashby film, but the way it starts and having seen Medium Cool, and going into that opening scene, where the all the vets are non-professional actors. They were actual vets that had come home and those were their true real stories. Now we would say it's sort of hybrid documentary and scripted, but it was like a really early use of that kind of style. And that's what made it feel so real and then you start in with the Rolling Stones, it's just such a masterly, powerful film.

I'm always curious about that sort of thing where he has a lot of footage and he's creating the movie out of it and what would Hal Ashby be like today? How different would his life be if he had everything at his fingertips and it’s not hanging out a pin over in a bin and he had to remember where everything was? I don't know if that would have been any made any difference at all?

Amy Scott: He was an early pioneer of digital editing. He was building his giant rigs and was convincing everyone that digital is the way to go. Which is so cool and so mind blowing. But I think it was born out of a place of independent film, of democratizing the access and taking the power away from the studios. And knowing that you could do this cheaply in your home. It was so actually tragic to learn that. What could he have done? Because his output was just, he put out so much so many great movies. So, what could he have done if the infrastructure was even more accessible and sped up technologically?

Imagine an 8-part streaming series directed by Hal Ashby, what would that be?

Amy Scott: Just be incredible. Well, I know that he was wanting to work. He had so many films that we found. And we found script after script. One of them, I was so, “damn, that would have been cool,” was The Hawkline Monster. A Richard Brautigan science fiction Western novel. It's so trippy and so cool. I feel like every couple of years, I hear about some directors says, “we got the rights, we're gonna make it.” And I'm like, when are they gonna make it? It's so long.

And imagine what his version of Tootsie would have been.

Amy Scott: Oh, I know. Yeah. No joke.

Just seeing those test shots. Wow.

Amy Scott: I know, it would have been a different film.

I read a quote somewhere that one of the producers or maybe it was Sydney Pollack, who said, they took the script to Elaine May. And she said, “yeah, it just needs…” And then she listed like five things: He needs a roommate that he can talk to …  the girl on the TV show, she needs a father, so he can become involved with him … there also has to be a co-worker who is interested in him as a woman … the director needs to be an ass, he should probably be dating the woman. It was like five different things. She said the script is fine, but you need these five things. So, what did they have? She just listed the whole movie.

Amy Scott: Right. Well, we're talking about Elaine May. She’s someone that needs a film.

She does. And why aren’t you doing that?

Amy Scott: Listen, I'm telling you. I've tried. This is another one that I've tried for years. You know, here’s a real shocker: It's hard to get a film about a female filmmaker funded. It's a hard sell.

She probably wouldn't want to do it anyway

Amy Scott: She's so cool. My approach has always been that she has so much to teach us still. So, I would love to get her hot takes on all those films. A New Leaf. I mean, the stories behind that thing getting made.

Like the uncut version of A New Leaf.

Amy Scott: Exactly. I want to hear it from her. So, yeah, that's high up on my list. I really, really want to make one with Elaine.

Was there anyone else you really wanted to get to? You mentioned Warren didn't want to talk to you. Anybody else?

Amy Scott: I would have loved Julie Christie or, you know, more women would have been great. Bruce Dern was so great and so funny and I’d seen him a number of times. I saw he was at a screening of one of his movies. He talked for like, an hour and a half before they even screened the film. He was whip smart in his memories. I was so upset that we couldn't work it out because I knew that he would be incredible.

Just his knowledge of movie industry, having been in it so long.

Amy Scott: My gosh, yeah.

He even worked with Bette Davis.

Amy Scott: Yeah, he's national treasure. Exactly. I was just staring at a poster. I have framed poster of Family Plot in my kitchen.

That's the movie that was going to make him a star, according to Hitchcock. It still has one of the greatest closing shots of all time. I think I read that Barbara Harris improvised the wink, and that's another person who you should make a documentary about.

Amy Scott: Oh my gosh. Barbara Harris is something. Do you remember what was the film that she was in with? Dustin Hoffman and Dr. Hook scored it. It's a really long title.

Who Is Harry Kellerman And Why Is He Saying These Terrible Things About Me?

Amy Scott: That is such a phenomenal Barbara Harris performance. I mean, Dustin Hoffman is incredible. He's always great. But Barbara Harris really shines and I guess I'm like, that's who she was. Yeah, I think she was difficult. Well, I don't know, difficult.

She had stuff she was dealing with.

Amy Scott: She had issues and Hal had to deal with those on Second Hand Hearts too.

From a production standpoint, people are interested in hearing what your Indiegogo process was Any tips you'd have for someone who wants to fund their film via Indiegogo?

Amy Scott: Oh, boy. Well, that was a different time, because I really don't know how films are funded at the moment. This came out five years ago, but it took us like six years to make. So, during in that time, you could at least raise enough capital to get through production.

The Indiegogo campaign enabled it so that we could even make the movie, because everything past that point, nobody ever got paid at all. But at least that way, we could buy film stock and pay the camera operators and our DPs and stuff. So, that was hugely important.

At the time, I remember thinking like, oh, no, how are we ever going to get anybody to because you had to make these—I don't know if this is still the case—but you had to make these commercials for your project or like a trailer to get people's attention. And you had to be all over Facebook and crap like that. So, I was like, oh, no, how am I going to make a thing that shows that Hal Ashby's important to people that want to give money?

A friend somehow knew John C. Reilly and mentioned it to him. It was like, we just need a celebrity to come in for like, you know, half a day or one hour. And he said, I'll come on down and do that. And he came. I couldn't believe it. The generosity of this man. He didn't know us at all. But he knew and loved the films of Hal Ashby and wanted to give back and pay it forward.

So, he came down and because of him, we have a really funny, awesome little commercial trailer.  I have no idea where that thing even is. I'd love to see it because I had to do it with him, which was terrifying, because I am not a front of camera person. I didn’t know what to say. And he said, All you have to do is ask for money. I'll all do the rest of the talking.

I remember seeing it.

Amy Scott: It’s been stripped from Indiegogo which probably means that we used a song that we weren't able to. That was back in the early days of crowdfunding, where you could just take images or songs and  I'm sure I used the music of Cat Stevens, and then, loaded up with a bunch of photos that we never paid for.

Well, that brings up a question of how did you get all the rights to the stuff you got for the finished movie? Was that a huge part of your budget?

Amy Scott: No. The most expensive thing always to this day is music. Music is going to get you. Outside of that, thank goodness, there's this little thing called fair use now, which wasn't the case in documentary filmmaking for a very long time. But now you can fair use certain elements, photographs, or news clips, video clips, anything that sort of supports your thesis that you're making about your subject and supports your storyline falls under the category of fair use.

So, I think what our money did pay for is the fair use attorneys that that really go over your product. They went over out fine cut, because we couldn't afford to pay for multiple lawyers to look at it. So you give them a fine cut, you hold your breath and hope that they say, oh, you know, you only have to take out a couple things. And you're like, oh, thank God. Okay, and then you change it.

I believe, because we never had any money, that we submitted to Sundance and got in on a wing and a prayer. And then had, you know, two weeks to turn the film around and get it, finished. I remember we were like, you know, pulling all these all nighters, trying to change the notes that the legal said XY and Z was not fair use and trying to swap out music with our composer. It was a wild, wild run.

Isn’t that always the way? You work on it for six years and then suddenly you have two weeks to finish it.

Amy Scott: That's how it shook out for us. It was like really, really pretty funny, because you're going on a leisurely pace until you're not. And then it's like, alright, it's real now. I thought for years, I think my friends and casual acquaintances thought that I've lost my mind. Because every year, I'd see people that I would see occasionally and they're like, hey, how's it going? What are you working on? I'm like, I'm just working on this Ashby's movie. And they were like, year after year, like damn. She's like, we need to reel her in and we need to throw her a lifeline. No, really, I really, really am. So, it was pretty funny. We were. We did it.

People have no idea how long these things take.

Amy Scott: It's unfunded. But you know, then we got lucky after that, because we nearly killed ourselves on Hal. Then we kind of fell into the era of streaming deals and streamers. And then people were like, oh, we want to make biopics and we want to give you money to make a biopic. And that was truly our first rodeo. We're like, oh, my gosh, what? This is incredible. We can get paid for this.

Now that's falling away. This streaming industry is, you know, collapsing in on itself as it should, because there's no curation anymore. And it's like, let's return to form a little bit here, guys. So, we're just riding the wave. I say it's like we're riding trying to learn how to ride a mechanical bull this industry. I’m a tomboy. So, every local Oklahomans is up for the ride.

Let me ask you one last question. I'll let you go then. So, as a filmmaker, what did you learn doing a deep dive into the work of this director and editor and you are a director and editor? So, that's sort of a scary thing to do anyway, to be the person who's going to edit Hal Ashby. What did you learn in the process that you can still take away today?

Amy Scott: Well, listen, we joke about it all the time. My producer, Brian Morrow and I are constantly going, oh, what would Hal do? Everything that he stood for, as a filmmaker. The film will tell you what to do. Get in there, be obsessed be the film, all of those things.

I get this man because I feel the same way. So, when we like took a real bath in Hal Ashby's words for years, that sort of that shapes the rest of your life as a filmmaker. You're not like a casual filmmaker after going through like the Ashby's carwash. That stuff's sticks.

But I'm proud. I'm proud that that we pulled it off. I'm proud that we were able to make the movie. Somebody would have done it, because Hal is too great and too good, and he just has deserved it for so long.

The only thing that we've ever wanted was that we wanted people to go back and watch his films, or to watch him for the first time if they had never seen him. And then to take his creative spirit forward. Be in love with the thing that you make. It’s your lifeforce.

So, otherwise, what is it all for, you know? So, yeah, that's what I got from him.

Dying to make a feature? Learn from the pros!

"We never put out an actual textbook for the Corman School of Filmmaking, but if we did, it would be Fast, Cheap and Under Control." 
Roger Corman, Producer

★★★★★

It’s like taking a Master Class in moviemaking…all in one book!

  • Jonathan Demme: The value of cameos

  • John Sayles: Writing to your resources

  • Peter Bogdanovich: Long, continuous takes

  • John Cassavetes: Re-Shoots

  • Steven Soderbergh: Rehearsals

  • George Romero: Casting

  • Kevin Smith: Skipping film school

  • Jon Favreau: Creating an emotional connection

  • Richard Linklater: Poverty breeds creativity

  • David Lynch: Kill your darlings

  • Ron Howard: Pre-production planning

  • John Carpenter: Going low-tech

  • Robert Rodriguez: Sound thinking

And more!

Write Your Screenplay with the Help of Top Screenwriters!

It’s like taking a Master Class in screenwriting … all in one book!

Discover the pitfalls of writing to fit a budget from screenwriters who have successfully navigated these waters already. Learn from their mistakes and improve your script with their expert advice.

"I wish I'd read this book before I made Re-Animator."
Stuart Gordon, Director, Re-Animator, Castle Freak, From Beyond

John Gaspard has directed half a dozen low-budget features, as well as written for TV, movies, novels and the stage.

The book covers (among other topics):

  • Academy-Award Winner Dan Futterman (“Capote”) on writing real stories

  • Tom DiCillio (“Living In Oblivion”) on turning a short into a feature

  • Kasi Lemmons (“Eve’s Bayou”) on writing for a different time period

  • George Romero (“Martin”) on writing horror on a budget

  • Rebecca Miller (“Personal Velocity”) on adapting short stories

  • Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) on adaptations

  • Academy-Award Nominee Whit Stillman (“Metropolitan”) on cheap ways to make it look expensive

  • Miranda July (“Me and You and Everyone We Know”) on making your writing spontaneous

  • Alex Cox (“Repo Man”) on scaling the script to meet a budget

  • Joan Micklin Silver (“Hester Street”) on writing history on a budget

  • Bob Clark (“Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things”) on mixing humor and horror

  • Amy Holden Jones (“Love Letters”) on writing romance on a budget

  • Henry Jaglom (“Venice/Venice”) on mixing improvisation with scripting

  • L.M. Kit Carson (“Paris, Texas”) on re-writing while shooting

  • Academy-Award Winner Kenneth Lonergan (“You Can Count on Me”) on script editing

  • Roger Nygard (“Suckers”) on mixing genres

This is the book for anyone who’s serious about writing a screenplay that can get produced! 

Russell Emanuel on "Occupants"

What was your filmmaking background before making "Occupants"?

RUSSELL: “Occupants” is my fourth feature film.  I started making films in 2002 with “Her Knight” and “Girl with Gun” after studying cinema at the University of Southern California and taking UCLA Extension courses.  There, I met my filmmaking partner Emile Haris whom we have worked on all my films since then.  

Because of the success of “Girl with Gun”, which got into numerous festivals including San Diego Comic-con, it got the attention of my future producer Howard Nash who had put together a feature film script called “P.J.” which had John Heard and Robert Picardo already attached.

Since then, we worked on the features “Chasing the Green” starring Jeremy London, Ryan Hurst, William Devane, Robert Picardo, “The Legends of Nethiah” starring Robert Picardo, Jeremiah Sayys, Jared Young, “Occupants” starring Briana White, Michael Pugliese, and Robert Picardo, and most recently “The Assassin’s Apprentice” starring Tarah Paige, Marina Sirtis, and Robert Picardo, which we shot in early December 2016.

How did you get connected to Julia Camara's script and what was the process for getting the script ready to shoot?

RUSSELL: It was the producer Howard Nash who optioned her script in February 2014.  He then showed me the script and I was immediately hooked.  The process involved getting the funds which we successfully raised on the crowdfunding site Indiegogo (106% raised).  

Once that happened, we cast the film and hired the crew and turned Julia’s wonderful script into a shooting script based on the location we found.

What was your casting process, and did you change the script to match your final cast?

RUSSELL: The casting process involved holding auditions for the main role of Annie Curtis – we had 24 actresses whom we auditioned alongside our lead actor Michael Pugliese (who played Neil Curtis, the husband of Annie).  Also, there was our Director of Photography, the aforementioned Emile Haris.  Once Michael and Emile and I discussed whom we liked, we called back five actresses and picked Briana White who was a perfect fit for the role.

And yes, one role we changed to reflect the actual cast – that was the role of Dr. Alan Peterson of the Peterson Research Institute, played by Robert Picardo (the role was originally for a woman, but was changed because of Julia’s love of “Star Trek” and the fact that Howard and I have worked with Robert before on four projects).

What type of camera(s) did you use and what did you love (and hate) about it?

RUSSELL: We used the Canon 7D and HVX200 cameras.  I loved how they were able to get us the vibrant colors we needed in the film.  I really enjoyed shooting with these cameras, even though it was 2K and not 4K.

Did the movie change much in the editing, and if so, why did you make the changes?

RUSSELL: The movie did change during the editing and that was to reflect some videos that Robert Picardo’s character sent to Annie and Neil Curtis to show they aren’t the only ones experiencing the parallel universe phenomena that was seen in the film.  

Originally in the script, it just mentioned “some video.” So, during post-production, we actually created an official Peterson Research Institute video with actor Chris Winters as the representative and shooting various people around the world who recorded their sightings.  You can actually see them at this site: http://www.pri-research.info/

Can you talk about your distribution plan for recouping costs?

RUSSELL: We got distribution through ITN Distribution headed by Stuart Alson who is busy going to various markets including Berlinale and selling the film.  In order for him to be able to do that, we got the film into thirty-plus film festivals all over the United States, Canada, and Russia.  

We also won awards such as the “Best Sci-Fi Feature” award at Shriekfest, one of the top horror festivals in the United States, seven awards at the Dazed 4 Horror Film Festival, and just last week the “Best Director” and “Audience Choice” award at the SoCal Film Festival. To date, we won 19 awards and have been nominated for 12 more.

What was the smartest thing you did during production? The dumbest?

RUSSELL: The smartest thing we did during production was finding our location through Air Bnb. This was a suggestion by the producer Howard Nash and I was so relieved when we found the house we shot at.  Since we technically “owned” the place for 12 days, I was able to stay there for the duration of the shoot. We were also able to leave the equipment there for each of the days, which helped with set-up times.  It made for an efficient 10-day shoot.

The dumbest thing was not getting a professional hair-dye job for our lead actress Briana White when she transformed from real Annie Curtis to parallel Annie Curtis on Day 8.  It took our makeup artist Alisha Baijounas 3 tries because the over-the-counter hair dye job turned our actresses’ hair from blonde to gray (and not brunette as we wanted).  We ended up using a permanent dye and paying for her to turn it back to blonde after production wrapped.  Basically, we tried to save money but ended up spending way more.

And, finally, what did you learn from making this feature that you will take to other projects?

RUSSELL: Always have a preparation day that helps with setting up equipment and production design and giving the actors a chance to see the set during pre-production so they can prepare for their roles.  I was glad we were able to do this and it helped tremendously.

Dying to make a feature? Learn from the pros!

"We never put out an actual textbook for the Corman School of Filmmaking, but if we did, it would be Fast, Cheap and Under Control." 
Roger Corman, Producer

★★★★★

It’s like taking a Master Class in moviemaking…all in one book!

  • Jonathan Demme: The value of cameos

  • John Sayles: Writing to your resources

  • Peter Bogdanovich: Long, continuous takes

  • John Cassavetes: Re-Shoots

  • Steven Soderbergh: Rehearsals

  • George Romero: Casting

  • Kevin Smith: Skipping film school

  • Jon Favreau: Creating an emotional connection

  • Richard Linklater: Poverty breeds creativity

  • David Lynch: Kill your darlings

  • Ron Howard: Pre-production planning

  • John Carpenter: Going low-tech

  • Robert Rodriguez: Sound thinking

And more!

Write Your Screenplay with the Help of Top Screenwriters!

It’s like taking a Master Class in screenwriting … all in one book!

Discover the pitfalls of writing to fit a budget from screenwriters who have successfully navigated these waters already. Learn from their mistakes and improve your script with their expert advice.

"I wish I'd read this book before I made Re-Animator."
Stuart Gordon, Director, Re-Animator, Castle Freak, From Beyond

John Gaspard has directed half a dozen low-budget features, as well as written for TV, movies, novels and the stage.

The book covers (among other topics):

  • Academy-Award Winner Dan Futterman (“Capote”) on writing real stories

  • Tom DiCillio (“Living In Oblivion”) on turning a short into a feature

  • Kasi Lemmons (“Eve’s Bayou”) on writing for a different time period

  • George Romero (“Martin”) on writing horror on a budget

  • Rebecca Miller (“Personal Velocity”) on adapting short stories

  • Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) on adaptations

  • Academy-Award Nominee Whit Stillman (“Metropolitan”) on cheap ways to make it look expensive

  • Miranda July (“Me and You and Everyone We Know”) on making your writing spontaneous

  • Alex Cox (“Repo Man”) on scaling the script to meet a budget

  • Joan Micklin Silver (“Hester Street”) on writing history on a budget

  • Bob Clark (“Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things”) on mixing humor and horror

  • Amy Holden Jones (“Love Letters”) on writing romance on a budget

  • Henry Jaglom (“Venice/Venice”) on mixing improvisation with scripting

  • L.M. Kit Carson (“Paris, Texas”) on re-writing while shooting

  • Academy-Award Winner Kenneth Lonergan (“You Can Count on Me”) on script editing

  • Roger Nygard (“Suckers”) on mixing genres

This is the book for anyone who’s serious about writing a screenplay that can get produced! 

Raymond Guarnieri on "Buffalo Boys"

What was your filmmaking background before making "Buffalo Boys"?

RAYMOND: I started out in the industry as a professional actor. After I graduated from The American Academy of Dramatic Arts—New York, I was hired to work on two-major projects, “Rendezvous Point” by Korean Director D.K. Lee, which won Best Picture at the CUNY AIRR Film Festival, and “Payin’ The Price,” which won Best Picture at the HBO Martha’s Vinyard Film Festival. I was very observant during the production of these projects, and became more and more interested the overall process of filmmaking.  

Shortly afterward, I met with fellow actors Matt Tester and Mckenzie Trent and we formed Better StirFry Productions in hopes of making shorts that we could use to pad our acting reels. But once I got behind the camera and started shooting my own scripts, I realized I was exactly where I was supposed to be in life.

Where did the idea come from and what was the writing process like with your co-writers?

RAYMOND: In 2009, a friend of mine (the young man on whom the main character of Buffalo Boys is based), passed away. This was around the same time that The Better StirFry Team and I had completed a few successful short films and we were looking for new material. I was deeply moved by the story of my friend’s life, and everyone agreed that it would make a fantastic movie.

I researched by interviewing the young man’s family and friends before writing the first draft of the script. It was pretty awful the first time around. But we all still agreed that the story was good if we could just get the script right, so Mckenzie and I teamed up and developed it over the next eight months. About nine or ten drafts in, we solicited the help of my novelist girlfriend, Elana Lott, and she helped polish the script up until we began production.

Writing is one of the most challenging parts of the process. I believe that it’s where most filmmakers go wrong. When you start- there’s nothing but a blank page. When you turn on a camera with the lens cap off, there’s always something happening in front of it already. If you don’t have a great script, you’re just practicing. Mckenzie and I fought a lot during the process. It was a battle. But I wouldn’t do it again any other way, because what we came out with I’m truly proud of. 

What was your Kickstarter experience like for raising pre-pro funds? 

RAYMOND: We knew from the beginning that we were going to need to be modest, so we only asked for a $1,250 goal to get us through pre-pro. We ended up raising $6,000. Most of this came from family and friends. It was humbling. It gave us the momentum and confidence we needed to go out and raise more from private investors until we reached our final production budget.

What's the upside and downside of using a crowd-funding source?

RAYMOND: Kickstarter is great, and running a campaign is a full-time job. We’ve just launched a new Kickstarter where we’re offering tickets to the World Premiere in NYC, as well as copies of the DVD, all so that we can raise the necessary funds to send the movie to film festivals worldwide.

The upside is that you have the opportunity to not only raise money on a platform that gives you added legitimacy, but to promote your project to the general public as well. The downside is that these platforms are film saturated. This also has a lot to do with the digital filmmaking boom. Everyone and their mother has a DSLR nowadays. It’s exciting because it democratizes filmmaking and gives great artists the opportunity to produce works, they never would have been able to ten years ago.

But it’s also terrible because you see a lot of poorly thought-out projects appearing on places like Kickstarter. But in the end people will know the difference when they watch your video and read your story. It’s just frustrating because when some people hear that you’ve got a Kickstarter going, they roll their eyes and remember the fifty other people with mediocre ideas that told them that today.

What kind of camera did you use to shoot the movie -- and what did you love about it and hate about it?

RAYMOND: We used a two-camera setup with the Canon 5D MKII and 5D MKIII. We are the instant gratification generation. I’ve only ever shot on film once. (If there are any filmmakers with 20+ years of experience reading this, I’m sorry for the heart attack). It’s tough for me to think of anything I don’t like about DSLR filmmaking. It’s fast, cheap, you have instant playback, and with proper color correction and post-production techniques you can end up with very, very beautiful pictures- on TV/Computer screens, but also even small cinema screens. If we had shot Buffalo Boys on super 16mm we’d have spent something like $300,000 on film stock and development alone. That’s 100 times our entire budget.

You wore a lot of hats on this project -- director, writer, producer, actor. What's the upside and the downside of working that way?

RAYMOND: I feel like all indie filmmakers end up doing this. It just comes down to the fact that you don’t have money to hire people so you end up doing multiple jobs. In my case it’s a little different- the story was very personal to me, so I was one of the screenwriters, and I’m a professionally-trained & experienced actor, so I wanted to continue doing that because I love it.

The upside for me is that I not only got to oversee the project as a Director, but I got to participate more specifically in other ways that I love.

The downside is probably the lack of sleep and toll it takes on your body after a year or two of working on a project. We held the wrap party at my house outside of Buffalo and after I made a little speech and thanked everybody- I snuck upstairs and slept for about a week.

What was the smartest thing you did during production? The dumbest?

RAYMOND: This is a tough question.

I suppose the smartest thing I did was in pre-pro and not production, and that was making sure we had a solid game plan. Production was really a process of just making sure we stuck to that plan while still getting everything we needed creatively.

But I’d say that asking for resources (for free or for very little) whether it be locations, equipment, crew, etc., was the smartest thing I did. Some people have a tendency to not ask for things at the crucial moment.

One of the biggest things I learned is that if you have a good idea and charisma, people will believe in you and want to support you in any way they can. That’s not to say you should ever take advantage of that- but you should have the confidence to ask for the things you need to make your project come to life. The worst thing that can happen is that people will say no.

The dumbest thing I did happened on the 3rd or 4th last day of production. I was recently awarded The Colin Powell Fellowship for Leadership and Public Service and had to attend an all-day seminar in NYC the day after we wrapped production. I forgot to pack a suit for this and went one morning before call time to the mall to pick one out.

But it turned out that the whole process took forever and even though I was rushing through it, I caused us to be almost two hours late into the schedule. My AD, Tom Quigly was NOT happy about this. We ended up catching up throughout the day, and I learned two important lessons: don’t try to buy a suit in 30 minutes and DON’T piss off your AD by making stupid mistakes.

What's your game plan for distribution of "Buffalo Boys" and recouping your costs?

RAYMOND: In the end, we just want people to see the film. If that means going to film festivals and no distribution deal then so be it. But I really believe that this film is well written, produced, and acted enough to receive at least some kind of DVD or Netflix distribution.

I’m not going to delude myself- I know that the chances of a first-time filmmaker getting a distribution deal are slim, but that doesn’t mean we’re not going to try. As of right now, we’re pretty under the radar so we’re trying to get some press and film festival screenings to establish credibility. Once people in the industry have had a chance to see the film is when we’ll see where we might end up.

And, finally, what did you learn from making the film that you have taken to other projects?

RAYMOND: I haven’t really had the chance to move on to the next big thing yet. Buffalo Boys is still a full-time job for me. But like I said before- asking for help is a big thing I learned. That, and really take the time to make sure your story is not only well-written, but that is says something (artistically) that you want to say as an individual.

In the case of Buffalo Boys, it’s that the consequences of your actions are much more far reaching than you ever might have thought. And don’t ever forget to treat each member of your production team like the invaluable gear in the machine that they are- from extras to PA’s and your DP.

Keep your team happy and the energy on set positive and clear and everything will go much smoother and you’ll get exactly what you need to make a great movie.

Dying to make a feature? Learn from the pros!

"We never put out an actual textbook for the Corman School of Filmmaking, but if we did, it would be Fast, Cheap and Under Control." 
Roger Corman, Producer

★★★★★

It’s like taking a Master Class in moviemaking…all in one book!

  • Jonathan Demme: The value of cameos

  • John Sayles: Writing to your resources

  • Peter Bogdanovich: Long, continuous takes

  • John Cassavetes: Re-Shoots

  • Steven Soderbergh: Rehearsals

  • George Romero: Casting

  • Kevin Smith: Skipping film school

  • Jon Favreau: Creating an emotional connection

  • Richard Linklater: Poverty breeds creativity

  • David Lynch: Kill your darlings

  • Ron Howard: Pre-production planning

  • John Carpenter: Going low-tech

  • Robert Rodriguez: Sound thinking

And more!

Write Your Screenplay with the Help of Top Screenwriters!

It’s like taking a Master Class in screenwriting … all in one book!

Discover the pitfalls of writing to fit a budget from screenwriters who have successfully navigated these waters already. Learn from their mistakes and improve your script with their expert advice.

"I wish I'd read this book before I made Re-Animator."
Stuart Gordon, Director, Re-Animator, Castle Freak, From Beyond

John Gaspard has directed half a dozen low-budget features, as well as written for TV, movies, novels and the stage.

The book covers (among other topics):

  • Academy-Award Winner Dan Futterman (“Capote”) on writing real stories

  • Tom DiCillio (“Living In Oblivion”) on turning a short into a feature

  • Kasi Lemmons (“Eve’s Bayou”) on writing for a different time period

  • George Romero (“Martin”) on writing horror on a budget

  • Rebecca Miller (“Personal Velocity”) on adapting short stories

  • Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) on adaptations

  • Academy-Award Nominee Whit Stillman (“Metropolitan”) on cheap ways to make it look expensive

  • Miranda July (“Me and You and Everyone We Know”) on making your writing spontaneous

  • Alex Cox (“Repo Man”) on scaling the script to meet a budget

  • Joan Micklin Silver (“Hester Street”) on writing history on a budget

  • Bob Clark (“Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things”) on mixing humor and horror

  • Amy Holden Jones (“Love Letters”) on writing romance on a budget

  • Henry Jaglom (“Venice/Venice”) on mixing improvisation with scripting

  • L.M. Kit Carson (“Paris, Texas”) on re-writing while shooting

  • Academy-Award Winner Kenneth Lonergan (“You Can Count on Me”) on script editing

  • Roger Nygard (“Suckers”) on mixing genres

This is the book for anyone who’s serious about writing a screenplay that can get produced!

Nelson Cheng on “The Magic Life”

What was your filmmaking background before setting out to make "The Magic Life"?

NELSON: I had just produced my first web series (The Consultants) -- so my background was pretty light. However, after the rush and angst of learning everything that you do the first time you produce something, I realized that I both had a decent amount of film equipment (or knowledge of) and connections to cinematographers and other film professionals that my mind started expanding in terms of the types of projects I could do. A documentary seemed daunting but feasible.

Where did the idea come from and what was your process for determining the film's subjects? 

NELSON: At the time, I was a member of the Magic Castle -- it's sort of the home / clubhouse for magician's all around the world and as a consequence, I got to know a lot of magicians.

A story I often heard was something along the lines of that these magicians would meet someone, and that person would inevitably ask what they did. They would say they're a magician and the person would say something like, "Oh that's fantastic! That's great!" Then there would be this pause and they would be asked, "So what is it you actually do?" The original conceit was a documentary looking at "the business side of being a magician" -- this profession that people couldn't even conceive of as being a profession. 

In terms of determining the film's subjects -- initially, I just started filming magicians. I would then ask those magicians if they knew anyone else I should talk to and one magician led to another until I reached Dale Salwak -- a significant character in the film who runs the Chavez Studio of Magic.

At the time, one of his students was Yang Yang, one of the film's main subjects. He had a certain joie de vivre that I responded to and we filmed a lot of Yang Yang and originally built much of the film around him. However, after sharing some early footage with a very important contributor -- Penelope Falk (who won the editing prize at Sundance for "Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work") -- Penny just thought we needed more and asked who else I had / knew.

The first two names I mentioned were Matthew Noah Falk (I described him as a 20-something living a block from the Magic Castle and performing for tips on Hollywood Boulevard) and Michael Friedland (I described him as an NYU MBA graduate, successful in business, and just moved to L.A. to pursue a career in magic.) She said, "Those two sound interesting. I would go film them." So we did. 

Can you talk about how you raised your budget and your financial plan for recouping your costs? 

NELSON: This project was self-financed. It's never cheap making films, but certainly the production costs of a documentary can be kept quite manageable. For me, at least, it's post and then festival / marketing related expenses which proved to be the majority of expenses.

Regarding a financial plan for recouping costs -- I think the strong likelihood is I won't recoup the costs. Statistically, there are just very few docs that recoup their costs. The sale prices and other revenue simply aren't high enough. That being said, and I'm certainly not alone among filmmakers who feel this way, but simply hearing from and interacting with people who respond to and with whom this film resonates with has made it all worthwhile. 

What camera(s) did you use and what did you love and hate about it? 

NELSON: We used a number of different cameras. We primarily shot on the HVX-200 but also used the AF-100, the 7D, and -- believe it or not -- there's some footage from the Flip HD. I was pretty stunned that the Flip HD could hold up when blown up to a theater-size screen. It's not ideal, but usable.

Also, a lot of those shots we simply would not have gotten or would've had a lot of trouble getting if we didn't have such a small / convenient camera available. The HVX-200 is a good camera -- it's a real workhorse. The main drawback for me is that it's not that good in low light conditions.

Also, no interchangeable lenses and the offloading of footage is a little cumbersome. The AF-100 (at the time I had only rented the camera -- now I own one), I think, is better than the HVX in every way. Bigger chip size, very good in low light conditions, interchangeable lenses, shoots to CF, etc. It's really terrific -- if I did another doc, I would primarily use the AF-100. The 7D (and 5D Mark II) are really difficult cameras to use for shooting docs. Much harder to manage because you'll want to record sound to something like the Zoom H4n and the camera has that automatic shutoff thing after 10 min, etc. It's just not designed for docs -- the workflow is quite messy.

The Flip HD -- I certainly can think of improvements. Would love even higher picture quality (terrible in low light conditions) and just an overall upgrade in terms of its audio which can be quite bad -- but it's hard to beat its portability. I usually had a couple of Flip cams lying around just to take something spur of the moment.

How long did shooting take and did your vision for the movie change much during the shooting and editing process?

NELSON: We shot for about a year and a half. The vision changed quite a bit, frankly. I started off wanting to make something probably a lot more analytical -- investigating the business side of being a magician.  

Over time, it evolved into something -- for me at least, that was much more visceral -- following the stories of three fairly different individuals as they try and turn their passion into their career. What was great about how it evolved was that it both gave a framework with which to look at the larger world of magic (talking to builders of magic, world champions of magic, famous magicians, etc.) but also asked questions along the lines of why some people make it and some don't -- how much of it is talent vs. attitude vs. perspective vs. support system, etc.

What was the smartest thing you did during production? The dumbest?

NELSON: The two smartest things were getting more experienced people involved and to just start filming. Re: getting more experienced people involved -- as an example, I met Seth Keal -- one of the producers on "Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work" after one of their Sundance screenings. I just loved that film and frankly, started randomly talking to him. He's a magician himself, became interested in the project, and offered to help.

In addition to literally sharing all the details of what they shot "Joan" on (literally sending me links to the various pieces of equipment on B&H), he also introduced me to Penny Falk -- their editor.

As I mentioned earlier, Penny was instrumental in helping guide and shape the film from some of its earliest stages and introduced me to our wonderful editor, Erik Dugger, with whom she had previously co-edited a film. Penny felt that Erik's sensibility would both work well for this film and also that he and I would work well together -- and she was absolutely right. 

The reason I also mention to just start filming was that I think it would been easy for me to sort of sit in stagnation -- especially because I didn't have any experience. So I could hang out for a long time paralyzed by fear of not knowing what I was doing, or that I was making a mistake, or even being afraid of what other people might say.  

What was good about filming immediately was that one thing always led to another and, frankly, you start seeing problems and solving them -- especially when you get people involved.  

As a minor example, there's a scene in the film where one of our characters, Yang Yang, meets Lance Burton. I remember looking at the footage and just thinking it was a bit dark -- I mentioned this to Seth and he immediately told me, "Oh, buy an onboard light." That solved it. So sometimes it was small things and other times it was big things -- but by doing, we could get to fixing issues quickly rather than planning ourselves into oblivion.

The dumbest thing, and I'm not trying to be clever with this answer -- but it's the same two things, but on the flip side. I wish I got even more people involved. I'm certainly more secure and knowledgeable now in terms of what I know I can do and what I don't -- but at the time, everything was just such a mystery to me and I didn't always feel comfortable reaching out for help.

Or even knowing who to go to. I've thought about this in the context of when I was a product manager. When I worked as a PM, I liked to gather as much information as possible -- at times, I would literally read every customer service email for the products I worked on. The vast majority of information I came across was not actionable -- but some percentage was and all of it helped shape my view of the product.

So someone might have a thought on a particular sequence or music cue or even a magician that could strength a storyline -- all of it helps contribute to making an even stronger film and so I would've liked to have really pushed myself more in that aspect.

Re: filming right away -- I think it's always a fine balance between preparation and just doing it. I know people on the extremes -- those that plan so much they never do anything and those that do things too soon and could benefit from even a modicum of planning. I recently read an interview with David France, whose documentary, "How to Survive a Plague" is Oscar-nominated for Best Documentary this year.

In it, he mentions that in preparation for making the doc (he was a first time filmmaker), he watched a documentary every day, for two years. What fantastic preparation. So that's a great lesson for me -- do but always push yourself in terms of how much you can prepare. 

What has been the reaction to the movie by its subjects?

NELSON: I would say surprisingly good. Positive feedback from all of them and a number of subjects have appeared with us for various Q&As and the like. I only use the word surprisingly because being in a documentary is quite an intimate experience -- and we get to see many of our subjects in fairly substantive / private moments, so you never know how someone will react when they see it in that format.

I think one of the pieces of feedback that I've felt most proud of is when subjects or their friends say something along the lines of, "That's you." -- which I interpret as us having really captured the spirit and essence of who they are and those circumstances.  

And, finally, what did you learn from making the film that you have taken to other projects?

NELSON: I found making a film to be a fairly complete and fascinating process. I mentioned earlier that I used to work as a product manager -- as great and challenging of a job as that is, it's very different in the sense that there's a lot of visible and invisible institutional support / structure.

That's something that was quite apparent when I started making this film -- there's no structure around you. Everything has to be built from the ground up -- from the nuts and bolts logistics to the network you invariably need. I think the biggest thing I learned was that anything -- whether it's something completely brand new or a close variant of something you've previously done -- there's just a process and a way things are done or could be done.

It's learning those things and just incrementally learning, getting better, and moving forward. Not to be paralyzed by the enormity of it all. There may be 1000 things you don't know at the start, but if you learn 3 of them every day -- you'll get there in a year. 

Dying to make a feature? Learn from the pros!

"We never put out an actual textbook for the Corman School of Filmmaking, but if we did, it would be Fast, Cheap and Under Control." 
Roger Corman, Producer

★★★★★

It’s like taking a Master Class in moviemaking…all in one book!

  • Jonathan Demme: The value of cameos

  • John Sayles: Writing to your resources

  • Peter Bogdanovich: Long, continuous takes

  • John Cassavetes: Re-Shoots

  • Steven Soderbergh: Rehearsals

  • George Romero: Casting

  • Kevin Smith: Skipping film school

  • Jon Favreau: Creating an emotional connection

  • Richard Linklater: Poverty breeds creativity

  • David Lynch: Kill your darlings

  • Ron Howard: Pre-production planning

  • John Carpenter: Going low-tech

  • Robert Rodriguez: Sound thinking

And more!

Write Your Screenplay with the Help of Top Screenwriters!

It’s like taking a Master Class in screenwriting … all in one book!

Discover the pitfalls of writing to fit a budget from screenwriters who have successfully navigated these waters already. Learn from their mistakes and improve your script with their expert advice.

"I wish I'd read this book before I made Re-Animator."
Stuart Gordon, Director, Re-Animator, Castle Freak, From Beyond

John Gaspard has directed half a dozen low-budget features, as well as written for TV, movies, novels and the stage.

The book covers (among other topics):

  • Academy-Award Winner Dan Futterman (“Capote”) on writing real stories

  • Tom DiCillio (“Living In Oblivion”) on turning a short into a feature

  • Kasi Lemmons (“Eve’s Bayou”) on writing for a different time period

  • George Romero (“Martin”) on writing horror on a budget

  • Rebecca Miller (“Personal Velocity”) on adapting short stories

  • Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) on adaptations

  • Academy-Award Nominee Whit Stillman (“Metropolitan”) on cheap ways to make it look expensive

  • Miranda July (“Me and You and Everyone We Know”) on making your writing spontaneous

  • Alex Cox (“Repo Man”) on scaling the script to meet a budget

  • Joan Micklin Silver (“Hester Street”) on writing history on a budget

  • Bob Clark (“Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things”) on mixing humor and horror

  • Amy Holden Jones (“Love Letters”) on writing romance on a budget

  • Henry Jaglom (“Venice/Venice”) on mixing improvisation with scripting

  • L.M. Kit Carson (“Paris, Texas”) on re-writing while shooting

  • Academy-Award Winner Kenneth Lonergan (“You Can Count on Me”) on script editing

  • Roger Nygard (“Suckers”) on mixing genres

This is the book for anyone who’s serious about writing a screenplay that can get produced! 

Kathleen Behun on "21 Days"

What was your filmmaking background before making "21 Days"?

KATHLEEN: I had written and directed three dramatic short films prior to 21 Days which had garnered a fair amount of acclaim on the festival circuit. I also had written several feature spec scripts that had won a number of screenwriting awards; one of which was optioned by Academy Award-winning producer, Irwin Winkler

But before I was a filmmaker, I had been an actress.  And I’ve always told people that Acting taught me how to direct; Directing taught me how to act; Writing made me better at both, but that reading, being a voracious reader, was the foundation of all of these disciplines. There’s something about reading- novels and short stories especially- which feeds the imagination and creativity in ways than any other art form.  In fact, when James Dean first burst onto the scene in the 1950’s, he once was interviewed and asked what he attributed his talent to as an actor, and he replied simply, “Reading.
Where did the idea come from and what was the process for writing the script and getting the script ready to shoot?

KATHLEEN: The idea for the film was first born out of frustration. I had another feature spec script, a supernatural thriller, which for five years had been financed on five different occasions with financing falling through each time for a myriad of reasons.

I realized the years were passing and I still hadn’t directed my first feature, so I decided to take matters into my own hands and write another script that was low budget enough I could self finance, yet commercial enough to attract studios and distributors. Even though I had made my name in the indie world as a filmmaker of dramatic short films, I was being encouraged by my agent at the time and various producers, to channel my energies into more genre-oriented material for my first feature. This was actually an easy transition for me as I had long been interested in the classic genre films such as, The Exorcist and The Omen, as well as Gore Verbinski’s version of The Ring.

21 Days was actually inspired by all of the paranormal investigator shows that had become popular on television, especially those where a group of investigators lock themselves inside a house for one night to capture on film the supernatural phenomena which occurs. I then thought, one night locked inside a haunted location would be scary, but something longer such as, 21 days, would be terrifying.

I also became intrigued by a few true stories I had read about where people had abandoned their home with all their belongings behind, even letting their home fall into foreclosure, because they were too terrified to live there any longer because of the paranormal events that were occurring. Can you imagine? A place that haunted where you’re willing to leave behind everything and lose your home to foreclosure because you can no longer bear to stay in the home?  These were some of the stories that served as inspiration for my film, as well as the notion that it’s not the house that’s haunted or evil, but rather the land it sits on.

I wrote the script in about a month and then took another two to three months to polish it, all the while searching for film locations. It took me a total of five months of traversing Southern California to find the right house for the film. Because to me, the house is the main character in the film, and until I found the right house, I was unwilling to begin filming.  And I was fortunate enough to find that perfect house.
What was your casting process, and did you change the script to match your final cast?

KATHLEEN: The entire casting process took us three months.  I hired Luis Robledo, who’s an actor, filmmaker and founder of Actor’s Gym, to be the casting director. He did an absolutely amazing job finding the perfect actors for the film. 

We received a staggering 6,000 submissions to fill only 20 roles in the film. And for a micro budgeted feature which paid little money, that’s pretty stunning. It just shows how many actors in Los Angeles want to work.

Once the film was cast, I didn’t change the script to fit the cast, but prior to shooting, I did instruct the actors to memorize their lines, yet be open and prepared to improvise.  

Since the film is found footage, the actors needed at times to make their lines their own in order for it to feel more “real” and off the cuff. I also firmly believe that a large part of the director’s job is selecting the right actors for the film; and once that’s been accomplished, you don’t have to “direct” them as much.

The actors were hired for the roles because they deeply understood their respective characters.
Can you talk about your distribution plan for recouping costs?

KATHLEEN: In order to recoup our costs for the film, which fortunately were minimal by independent film standards, we selected Galen Christy of High Octane Pictures to serve as our sales agent. To date, the U.S. and Canadian rights to the film have been acquired by Gravitas Ventures who will be releasing the film on VOD in April 2017, and later, on DVD.

Other territories that have sold are Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Luxembourg and Taiwan. And we’re currently in negotiations to sell the film to a number of other distributors from other countries.
Did the movie change much in the editing, and if so, why did you make the changes?

KATHLEEN: For the most part, the final edited version of the film is very true to the script.  I had the good fortune of securing seasoned horror editor, John Quinn (The Grudge 3), to work on the final cut of the film. He really taught me an enormous amount of how by using fewer cuts, you heighten tension and suspense in a film. He did an amazing job of going through 24 hours of footage and paring it down to 89 minutes. His eye for how to cut a scene is just brilliant.

The one change he did make that was different than the script was by having the final scene of the film play over the credits and it works much better than how I initially wrote and envisioned it. I’ll definitely be using him to cut my next film.
And, finally, what did you learn from making this feature that you will take to other projects?
KATHLEEN: Trust your instincts.  Prior to shooting, and even on set, there are many people who want to offer their opinion on how best a scene should be shot/played, etc or even how the overall film should be.  

Yet at the end of the day, you need to make the decision and trust your own gut instinct for what’s best for your film. Most especially in the independent film world where the director/filmmaker has that sort of freedom to make those decisions and is not beholden to a studio.  

Why do you make films? What do you aim to do when you set out to make a film? To express the inexpressible... As a filmmaker, or any artist, the goal is to convey some deeper truth; a silent mystery, that ultimately cannot be articulated or even clearly defined, but yet, somehow, through the magical moving image of film, we can come close...

Dying to make a feature? Learn from the pros!

"We never put out an actual textbook for the Corman School of Filmmaking, but if we did, it would be Fast, Cheap and Under Control." 
Roger Corman, Producer

★★★★★

It’s like taking a Master Class in moviemaking…all in one book!

  • Jonathan Demme: The value of cameos

  • John Sayles: Writing to your resources

  • Peter Bogdanovich: Long, continuous takes

  • John Cassavetes: Re-Shoots

  • Steven Soderbergh: Rehearsals

  • George Romero: Casting

  • Kevin Smith: Skipping film school

  • Jon Favreau: Creating an emotional connection

  • Richard Linklater: Poverty breeds creativity

  • David Lynch: Kill your darlings

  • Ron Howard: Pre-production planning

  • John Carpenter: Going low-tech

  • Robert Rodriguez: Sound thinking

And more!

Write Your Screenplay with the Help of Top Screenwriters!

It’s like taking a Master Class in screenwriting … all in one book!

Discover the pitfalls of writing to fit a budget from screenwriters who have successfully navigated these waters already. Learn from their mistakes and improve your script with their expert advice.

"I wish I'd read this book before I made Re-Animator."
Stuart Gordon, Director, Re-Animator, Castle Freak, From Beyond

John Gaspard has directed half a dozen low-budget features, as well as written for TV, movies, novels and the stage.

The book covers (among other topics):

  • Academy-Award Winner Dan Futterman (“Capote”) on writing real stories

  • Tom DiCillio (“Living In Oblivion”) on turning a short into a feature

  • Kasi Lemmons (“Eve’s Bayou”) on writing for a different time period

  • George Romero (“Martin”) on writing horror on a budget

  • Rebecca Miller (“Personal Velocity”) on adapting short stories

  • Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) on adaptations

  • Academy-Award Nominee Whit Stillman (“Metropolitan”) on cheap ways to make it look expensive

  • Miranda July (“Me and You and Everyone We Know”) on making your writing spontaneous

  • Alex Cox (“Repo Man”) on scaling the script to meet a budget

  • Joan Micklin Silver (“Hester Street”) on writing history on a budget

  • Bob Clark (“Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things”) on mixing humor and horror

  • Amy Holden Jones (“Love Letters”) on writing romance on a budget

  • Henry Jaglom (“Venice/Venice”) on mixing improvisation with scripting

  • L.M. Kit Carson (“Paris, Texas”) on re-writing while shooting

  • Academy-Award Winner Kenneth Lonergan (“You Can Count on Me”) on script editing

  • Roger Nygard (“Suckers”) on mixing genres

This is the book for anyone who’s serious about writing a screenplay that can get produced! 

JT O'Neal on "Au Pair, Kansas" (aka, “The Soccer Nanny”)

What was your filmmaking background before setting out to make "Au Pair, Kansas"?

JT: I graduated with a degree in history of art from Kansas University, though did my junior year "abroad" at USC film school, but returned to Kansas to complete pre-med. Then I got an MD from Kansas, an MPH (masters of public health) from Harvard, then eventually an MFA (masters of fine arts) in screenwriting from UCLA in 2004.  Au Pair, Kansas was the last script I wrote while in grad school at UCLA (which, by the way, is an absolutely amazing place to learn about screenwriting.  

NYU's okay for directing, USC's okay for producing, but UCLA ROCKS for screenwriting.)  I made 5 short films while living in LA (one cost less than $10, and played at about 25 festivals around the world.)  Luckily I made the major mistakes on the shorts, so I didn't really screw anything up on the feature.

Where did the idea come from and what was your writing process?

JT: One of my scripts was a finalist in the screenplay competition at Cinequest Film Festival in San Jose, CA, and I attended the festival in 2004.  The opening night feature, United, was about this funny Norwegian soccer player dreaming of turning pro. The star, Havard Lilleheie, was in attendance, and I met him at the opening night party, and invited him to lunch the next day.  He was such a great screen presence, I knew I had to do a project for him.  

So before the luncheon meeting, I tried to figure out how I could come up with an idea for Havard to star in a movie.  How could I get a Norwegian soccer player to the US?  Why not make him a male au pair, that teaches the kids soccer. Why a male au pair?  Maybe the father died and the family needed a father figure.  And that's what I pitched to him. He said something like "yah, sure you will write me a movie" and just smiled.  

I returned to UCLA the next week, pitched this idea about a Norwegian soccer playing coming to a small town in Kansas to be a male au pair and help a recently widowed woman raise her two sons. The class (and teacher) just looked at me like what planet were you from. Ten weeks later I had the first draft.  

Then I moved back home to Kansas to make regionally based movies, spent a week in Oslo rewriting with Havard, then rewrote again, then the script placed as a semi-finalist at the Austin Film Festival screenplay competition, and that got buzz enough to get some investors interested, and I shot the movie.  

Can you talk about how you raised your budget and your financial plan for recouping your costs? 

JT: I raised $200K from private investors.  You never know who will invest in your movie.  I was in this antique shop (knick knacks, not really antiques) in Lindsborg, Kansas, a great little Swedish town in central Kansas, and this elderly man overhead me talking about location scouting for a potential movie.  I sent him a copy of the script.  He loved it.  Said he'd invest a small amount.  

Two years later he contacts me and says he really wants to see this movie made, and writes a check for $100K.  Within two weeks I found the rest of the money, and two months later we were shooting the movie in Lindsborg (and my Angel investor, Ron, had a supporting part in the movie.)  I have no idea if I'll get money back on the movie.  

At this point, I have an international distribution deal (TV and dvd), but the distributor has to sell about $125K before the company sees anything back.  Probably won't see anything from international sales.  I'm currently working on some domestic deals.  Theatrical way too expensive.  

I had great interest for theatrical distribution in Germany (the acquisitions person for the top art cinema chain there loved AU PAIR, KANSAS, but deliverables, including dubbing and 35mm and high def prints, etc, would have been $100K.  Not going to happen, and it didn't.)  Who knew making the movie was the easiest part of the whole process.  

It took me three times as long to get the deliverables together for distribution than to actually shoot the movie (which we did in 18 days.) 

What camera did you use and what did you love and hate about it?

JT: I used a Red One (it was hot shit back in Dec 2008.)  I loved it.  Amazing camera (even with the older chip.)  I can't imagine how good the new smaller Reds are.  

Why did the movie's title change and what was the thinking behind that?

JT: For international distribution I decided to change the title of the movie from Au Pair, Kansas to The Soccer Nanny.  It's just too hard to translate a French term into other languages, and very few people understood what it meant.  Even in the US, lots of people (well, from the midwest at least) didn't know what an au pair was.  

The Soccer Nanny just sounds fun (and it's actually a family movie.)  If the main character had been playing football or basketball (American football that is), the movie would not have been picked up for international distribution.  It's much better marketing internationally, to have soccer in the title, than either Kansas or au pair.  

What was the smartest thing you did during production? The dumbest?

JT: The smartest thing I learned was to get the best actors you can.  I was initially going to use all local talent in Kansas. Then a friend from London (great indie screenwriter and director Sean McConville), said it's too good of script, get it to a casting director in Hollywood, there are all sorts of great actresses over 40 who would love the part.  

So I did, and got the script to a casting director he used on his move The Deadline (one of Brittany Murphy's last movies--she was a mess on set, but that's another story), and the casting director (Cathy Henderson Martin, who is fantastic, by the way) liked the script and got it to Traci Lords' manager, who loved the script, and got it to Traci, who loved the script, and she signed on.  

Then with Traci attached, all sorts of other actors (including the amazing Spencer Daniels, who played the young Benjamin Button) signed on.  I cannot believe what experienced actors bring to their parts.  I can still watch the movie and be surprised. Traci is one of the most professional actresses I've ever seen (I didn't realize how truly amazing she was until editing, when my editor and I discovered that she matched perfectly on all continuity issues, sipping tea, turning head, standing up, looking, etc.  This is a true professional.  

I've spent a lot of time on regular Hollywood movies--my best friend, Peter James, is an A league Hollywood cinematographer, and I take my vacations and sit in his DP's chair on movies. The only actress I've seen that hit marks better than Traci was Kathy Bates. I cannot express how professional and wonderful Traci was on set and in the movie.)  

The dumbest thing I did was hire an immigration lawyer from NYC who said she knew how to get work visas through for actors. Nine months after I started, and one day before shooting was to start, I finally got the US to issue a work permit so Havard could come from Norway to star in the movie.  We had to delay his fist scene by a day, since he arrived later than planned.  

A few days before we were to start filming, I didn't know if I'd get my lead actor.  It was a nightmare.  I should have just used someone experienced in LA (but I was living in NY at the time.)  It cost me more than twice as much for the work permit and fees than Havard got paid to act in the movie! 

And, finally, what did you learn from making the film that you have taken to other projects?

JT: I learned that I loved making a movie (writing and directing) and hated producing.  They are totally different things.  I'll never make another movie without an experienced producer to help.  The best thing you can do as a director is find a great producer.  It's over four year since shooting, and I'm still (today, in fact) working with the accountant to do taxes for 2012 so I can get statements to the investors.  NIGHTMARE.  

On the other hand, I probably shouldn't complain, as at least I got the movie made, and it has some type of distribution deal, and people have actually liked the movie.  Oh, I forgot about that, I LOVE the movie (of course, I'm biased), and I had the pleasure of making the movie I wanted to make, how I wanted to make it.  

Lastly, I paid for all cost overages (I call it UBO, United Bank of O'Neal), and I'll probably never see any of that money back (I could have bought two new Lexus cars, or five houses in Detroit).  But I got it done.  

I may never make another movie, but the proudest I've ever been was hearing that's a wrap called out and the cast and crew cheering.  

The main lesson I want to take to other projects: Don't use your own money to make your movie!  

Dying to make a feature? Learn from the pros!

"We never put out an actual textbook for the Corman School of Filmmaking, but if we did, it would be Fast, Cheap and Under Control." 
Roger Corman, Producer

★★★★★

It’s like taking a Master Class in moviemaking…all in one book!

  • Jonathan Demme: The value of cameos

  • John Sayles: Writing to your resources

  • Peter Bogdanovich: Long, continuous takes

  • John Cassavetes: Re-Shoots

  • Steven Soderbergh: Rehearsals

  • George Romero: Casting

  • Kevin Smith: Skipping film school

  • Jon Favreau: Creating an emotional connection

  • Richard Linklater: Poverty breeds creativity

  • David Lynch: Kill your darlings

  • Ron Howard: Pre-production planning

  • John Carpenter: Going low-tech

  • Robert Rodriguez: Sound thinking

And more!

Write Your Screenplay with the Help of Top Screenwriters!

It’s like taking a Master Class in screenwriting … all in one book!

Discover the pitfalls of writing to fit a budget from screenwriters who have successfully navigated these waters already. Learn from their mistakes and improve your script with their expert advice.

"I wish I'd read this book before I made Re-Animator."
Stuart Gordon, Director, Re-Animator, Castle Freak, From Beyond

John Gaspard has directed half a dozen low-budget features, as well as written for TV, movies, novels and the stage.

The book covers (among other topics):

  • Academy-Award Winner Dan Futterman (“Capote”) on writing real stories

  • Tom DiCillio (“Living In Oblivion”) on turning a short into a feature

  • Kasi Lemmons (“Eve’s Bayou”) on writing for a different time period

  • George Romero (“Martin”) on writing horror on a budget

  • Rebecca Miller (“Personal Velocity”) on adapting short stories

  • Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) on adaptations

  • Academy-Award Nominee Whit Stillman (“Metropolitan”) on cheap ways to make it look expensive

  • Miranda July (“Me and You and Everyone We Know”) on making your writing spontaneous

  • Alex Cox (“Repo Man”) on scaling the script to meet a budget

  • Joan Micklin Silver (“Hester Street”) on writing history on a budget

  • Bob Clark (“Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things”) on mixing humor and horror

  • Amy Holden Jones (“Love Letters”) on writing romance on a budget

  • Henry Jaglom (“Venice/Venice”) on mixing improvisation with scripting

  • L.M. Kit Carson (“Paris, Texas”) on re-writing while shooting

  • Academy-Award Winner Kenneth Lonergan (“You Can Count on Me”) on script editing

  • Roger Nygard (“Suckers”) on mixing genres

This is the book for anyone who’s serious about writing a screenplay that can get produced! 

Joshua Sanchez on “Four”

What was your filmmaking background before setting out to make "Four"?

JOSHUA: I went to film school at Columbia University in my early 20's. I've done a handful of short narrative and experimental films in and out of film school since then. Before this I was just a fan of movies and I made music videos and skate videos with my friends in Texas. I studied Radio-TV-Film as an Undergrad at UT-Austin, but didn't really specialize in making films. I just had a passion for it and started doing it.

What was your process for adapting the play and what challenges did you face?

JOSHUA: The main challenge was to try to preserve the essence of the play without the movie seeming too much like a filmed play. I wasn't interested in literally adapting the material, but rather to use the character dynamics and situation as a jumping off point to tell the story. I also wanted to preserve as much of the perspective and the wonderful language of Christopher Shinn and not lose his unique perspective on this story, that was coming from a place of youth and purity.

My process tends to be a bit scattered. I write in short but intense fits and starts, then put it down for awhile to get some perspective on it and test what I've written. It took me about a year, off and on, to adapt the play into what eventually became the shooting script, although the final film is somewhat different even from what we intended to shoot.

Essentially the Joe/Abigayle story is a bit more flushed out and the second half of the movie reveals more about what is going on in the inner lives of the characters than the play does, which I think is necessary for the story to work as a movie.

Can you talk about how you raised your budget and your financial plan for recouping your costs? 

JOSHUA: The producer Christine Giorgio and I raised the money together through private investors and through a few grants and a couple of small Kickstarter campaigns. Our plan is to release the movie in a small theatrical run next year and through digital and DVD then to go into some foreign markets. It didn't cost that much to make the film so I think we have a good chance of at least making our money back, but obviously it's such a challenging time for small American independent films.  

You also have to think about these things in terms of building a career. This is my first feature film and I think its gotten a solid response enough for me to be able to make my next film. It's good for everyone involved because they have something solid to show to keep working and building on what we've done here.

What camera did you use and what did you love and hate about it?

JOSHUA: We shot with the Arri Alexa. Mostly I loved it. I think it was the right camera for what we needed and I think the end result was far and away more compelling that I originally thought it was going to be. We shot with these vintage lenses called Super Baltars which were used a lot in the 70s. The two combine to make everything look very wet and milky, which I liked because we shot mostly everything at night so it creates a really neat effect.

You can also shoot on this 'log c' mode that gives you so much latitude in the coloring process. It looks sort of shitty while you're shooting it, almost like a film negative would look, but you can do so much with it in the end. 

I guess the downside of that camera is that we didn't shoot the full uncompressed format because you need this really expensive drive to do that with the Alexa. But the post was a breeze because you don't have to do all that lame processing that you have to do with the Red camera to work in Final Cut.

I'm not the most techy director, so for me it was mostly a really great experience.

Did the movie change much in the editing process, and if so, how?

JOSHUA: The essence of the play is definitely still there, but we did rearrange and cut some scenes that were really different from how I envisioned them in the script. If you watch the film, the scene where Abigayle sees her father in the car is kind of a hybrid of like four scenes put together and that's how it worked best in the film. Some scenes were totally cut out of the movie as well.

I really loved working with David Gutnik, the editor of FOUR. He's the first editor I've ever worked with that thinks like a writer. Both of us are really story oriented, so we weren't too precious about what to leave in and didn't feel so committed to the original text. It was more like 'if it works, it works'. 

What was the smartest thing you did during production? The dumbest?

JOSHUA: Probably the smartest and the dumbest thing I did were both the same...trusting and not trusting the actors. My main process in making film is always in the casting process first and foremost. If I can choose the right people to inhabit the role, then a lot of my work becomes just steering the ship so to speak.

For the most part, I did that with FOUR and it worked and that was the best thing I could have done to make the film good. But there were a few times when I was unable to provide the actors with the space enough to explore how to best do what they needed to do. 

The dumbest thing you can do as a director is always to give in to the pressure cooker situation of a film set and then pass that bad energy on to the actors. I regrettably did that a few times, but thankfully not too much for it to affect the over all work of the actors in the end.  

And, finally, what did you learn from making the film that you have taken to other projects?

JOSHUA: I think with every film I've made I've been able to take big lessons and pass them on to the next project. With this film I think that trusting my instincts will be the thing I take with me in the long run. Every time that I was pressured into something I didn't fully believe in, it turned out to be a mistake. Thankfully there was not anything major on that front, but still there were a few things I would have made different choices about. 

You should always trust your gut with creative decisions. After all, it's the director's job to protect the vision of the film and even if it makes people uncomfortable, the end result is always the thing that matters the most.

Dying to make a feature? Learn from the pros!

"We never put out an actual textbook for the Corman School of Filmmaking, but if we did, it would be Fast, Cheap and Under Control." 
Roger Corman, Producer

★★★★★

It’s like taking a Master Class in moviemaking…all in one book!

  • Jonathan Demme: The value of cameos

  • John Sayles: Writing to your resources

  • Peter Bogdanovich: Long, continuous takes

  • John Cassavetes: Re-Shoots

  • Steven Soderbergh: Rehearsals

  • George Romero: Casting

  • Kevin Smith: Skipping film school

  • Jon Favreau: Creating an emotional connection

  • Richard Linklater: Poverty breeds creativity

  • David Lynch: Kill your darlings

  • Ron Howard: Pre-production planning

  • John Carpenter: Going low-tech

  • Robert Rodriguez: Sound thinking

And more!

Write Your Screenplay with the Help of Top Screenwriters!

It’s like taking a Master Class in screenwriting … all in one book!

Discover the pitfalls of writing to fit a budget from screenwriters who have successfully navigated these waters already. Learn from their mistakes and improve your script with their expert advice.

"I wish I'd read this book before I made Re-Animator."
Stuart Gordon, Director, Re-Animator, Castle Freak, From Beyond

John Gaspard has directed half a dozen low-budget features, as well as written for TV, movies, novels and the stage.

The book covers (among other topics):

  • Academy-Award Winner Dan Futterman (“Capote”) on writing real stories

  • Tom DiCillio (“Living In Oblivion”) on turning a short into a feature

  • Kasi Lemmons (“Eve’s Bayou”) on writing for a different time period

  • George Romero (“Martin”) on writing horror on a budget

  • Rebecca Miller (“Personal Velocity”) on adapting short stories

  • Stuart Gordon (“Re-Animator”) on adaptations

  • Academy-Award Nominee Whit Stillman (“Metropolitan”) on cheap ways to make it look expensive

  • Miranda July (“Me and You and Everyone We Know”) on making your writing spontaneous

  • Alex Cox (“Repo Man”) on scaling the script to meet a budget

  • Joan Micklin Silver (“Hester Street”) on writing history on a budget

  • Bob Clark (“Children Shouldn’t Play with Dead Things”) on mixing humor and horror

  • Amy Holden Jones (“Love Letters”) on writing romance on a budget

  • Henry Jaglom (“Venice/Venice”) on mixing improvisation with scripting

  • L.M. Kit Carson (“Paris, Texas”) on re-writing while shooting

  • Academy-Award Winner Kenneth Lonergan (“You Can Count on Me”) on script editing

  • Roger Nygard (“Suckers”) on mixing genres

This is the book for anyone who’s serious about writing a screenplay that can get produced!