December 11, 2024 • 31 mins
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Kaleb Cook and Liam Buckley share an extraordinary journey into the world of filmmaking with their project "The Last of Us Immunity." Discover how a simple idea centered around Ellie from "The Last of Us" blossomed into a feature film with a rich narrative and original characters. Kaleb and Liam, of Magic Numbers Studios, reveal the excitement and challenges of shooting in authentic locations, the collaborative spirit that fueled a seamless production, and what it takes to bring a lightsaber duel to life on screen. Their experiences offer invaluable insights into the filmmaking process for both seasoned creators and newcomers alike.
Follow them @magignumberstudios on Instagram and TikTok, and https://www.youtube.com/@magicnumberstudios
Sponsored by Jana McCaffery Attorney at Law. Have you been injured? New Orleans based actor, Jana McCaffery, has been practicing law in Louisiana since 1999 focusing on personal injury since 2008. She takes helping others very seriously and, if you are a fellow member of the Louisiana film industry and have been injured, she is happy to offer you a free consultation and a reduced fee to handle your case from start to finish. She can be reached at Support the show
Follow us on IG @nolafilmscene, @kodaksbykojack, and @tjsebastianofficial. Check out our 48 Hour Film Project short film Waiting for Gateaux: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5pFvn4cd1U . & check out our website: nolafilmscene.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, my name is Caleb Cook.
My name is Liam Buckley.
I am a producer and actor.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
I am a director, writer, producer.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
And I am thrilled to be on the NOLA Film Scene
podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
And I am extraordinarily pumped to be on
the NOLA Film Scene.
Speaker 4 (00:33):
Welcome, gentlemen, thank you, thank you, yeah,
welcome.
Good to see you guys.
It's been a while you as well.
We met.
I had the privilege of workingon one of y'all's projects the
Last of Us Immunity and that wasan incredibly fun project for
me.
That was over in Austin, texas.
Everybody everybody on set, Ithink got to meet just about
everybody during the media dayevent before we filmed.
(00:53):
Everybody was very welcoming.
I kind of felt like the old manon set and everybody was
welcoming, very kind, very, veryfun to work with.
I had a fantastic time on thatshoot.
Who came up with the idea to dothat one?
Y'all kind of come up with ittogether.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
So I guess originally I had decided to.
After we finished the Star Warsproject we were like, well,
we've got to come up withsomething else that we want to
do.
So we had a general pitchmeeting with probably about 15
of the people that are kind ofstill involved with Magic
Numbers Studios and we had, likeit was maybe seven to 10 ideas
(01:28):
that got pitched and everyonevoted on it at the end to see
what would be the next one.
And I had originally pitched anidea that was a continuation of
a story with Ellie from theLast of Us, where it would be
Ellie meets another immuneperson and they kind of go over
what that means to them.
What does immunity truly meanin this world, with flickers and
(01:51):
bad people and all that kind ofstuff?
Eventually Liam came on and waslike, really interested in
helping write, and so we startedwith that concept and then we
completely went in a differentdirection and we got to the Last
of Us Immunity with all of theoriginal characters that we
ended up with.
And that's kind of theinception of it, liam, if you
(02:13):
want to speak on anything elseabout your involvement in it, I
mean, yeah, I think you nailedit with its origins and
conception.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
I remember Caleb pitched the idea and I was like
this just makes so much sensefor a fan film, in my opinion,
because we have the Last of Us.
It's coming out soon, it'srelevant, but also more than
that, we're just giant fans andI feel like it's very fun,
producibility wise, because youget to go and look at places,
because we didn't build anythingfor the sets.
We used all real locations, andso just thinking about that and
(02:44):
thinking about what we wouldneed and need to do in
preparation for a film like thatgot me really excited, and so I
was 100% on board.
Yeah, it started out with thatidea of Ellie being the main
focus, and then it was funnybecause Caleb and I were talking
recently and you were like,remember when this movie started
with Ellie and it was supposedto be 12 minutes, and now it's
going to be this 15 minuteginormous thing that we never
(03:04):
anticipated, and I'm very happywith the trajectory.
It's where it started from andwhere it is now.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Yeah, we definitely got pretty carried away when we
started writing.
We were like, wait a second,this is 30 pages, wait a second.
We just it's now 50 pages long.
How are we going to do this?
Speaker 4 (03:20):
Yeah, and filming went so well that it was perfect
for a feature.
Right From what I understand, Iwas only there for that one day
, but from what I understand,the way it grew, the script and
the filming was just so welldone.
What's the runtime of it goingto be?
Speaker 1 (03:40):
That's a Caleb question.
It's still being piecedtogether on the timeline but I
think amongst all of the partsit's probably going to be hour
to an hour and five minutes long.
Speaker 4 (03:46):
Yeah, that's.
I thought I had heard that,because I think when I
auditioned, y'all were stillcalling it a short right, and it
was sometime between auditionsand filming that it grew to a
feature.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Yeah, I mean, I think the entire time writing it we
were in our minds it was justshort, short, short.
And then, like Caleb said, wegot carried away and realized
that the narrative structurethat we had is like this kind of
loosely follows the beats of afeature, with like an act one
and act two and act three, amidpoint, etc, and so it's kind
of a weird in between we'recalling it a short feature,
(04:17):
because I think a lot of thecriteria for something to be
called a short is to be 45minutes or less, and we're just
over that and also kind offollows the feature structure.
And, like I said, we neveranticipated that at all.
And then we were like well, weplanned out the shooting
schedule, this could work, andso we kept it, gotcha.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
I do want to expound on one thing, brian.
This is the project that I toldyou about.
That was so well done.
Y'all worked like an oldmachine.
Just Y'all worked like an oldmachine, just perfect.
Everybody seemed to know theirjob, where they needed to be,
what they needed to do.
Setups moved really fast.
Everybody was just efficient.
I don't remember how far intothe filming my day was I don't
(04:55):
think it was very far in, buty'all were just.
Y'all were firing on allcylinders and, from what I
understand, a group of peoplethat came together kind of came
from different areas, didn'tthey?
Yeah, I've been on other setsthat weren't as well organized.
Your call sheet, shot list,everything came out and just, I
don't know, that's how it seemedto me Just very smooth, very
(05:16):
efficient.
I thought y'all did a fantasticjob and it was just.
It was one of my better timeson set.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
I've got to say I'm glad that we could provide that
for you, because we saw yoursubmission and we're like we got
to have this guy as a Firefly.
He's just perfect right off thebat, and so we appreciate you
being there, thank you.
I wish we could have had youfor more days, because it was
super fun working with you.
Oh, thank you.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
And yeah, I appreciate you saying that we
really wanted to just try andemulate like a higher budget
thing just with the resourcesthat we had.
We had a lot of challenges interms of, like scheduling, and
trying to fit all of that into atwo week lock was really
challenging, and it was also themiddle of summer and it was
getting up to temperatures of105, 104.
(05:56):
So we had to block out themiddle of the day because we're
like we cannot make people shoota film in this heat right now
and so logistically, it was areally fun challenge to just
figure out how to work aschedule because there's so many
moving parts.
There were, I think, at itspeak, which was Bartlett, the
unit that you were at TJ.
I think we had 20 to 25 peopleon the crew there with six to
(06:20):
seven people on cast.
We were shooting on that streetin Bartlett, which was super
cool.
So it was just.
It was a really fun experienceto kind of be like well, we
wrote this story and like we'vegot to figure it out now.
We've got people coming in fromall over the country.
Their tickets are really notrefundable, so we've got to get
something going.
Speaker 3 (06:38):
Yeah, that organization is impressive
because I've been on independentshoots a budget, nothing major,
yet with no money with one ofthem.
We've been doing since my firsttime was in 2020.
And the principal's done.
I think they just have thesound to do so, no money on
their spare time, so he's beenfocused, even though it's been
spread apart.
I've walked into something andit was a clusterfuck.
You know what I mean.
(06:59):
And then so that's impressive.
I wanted to ask because you hadsaid fan film and people might
not understand because you'renot part of the HBO Last of Us
or the video game.
So how can you make a filmusing someone else's property
like that?
Speaker 2 (07:12):
That's a good question and Caleb and I had
concerns about that from thestart with like what can we use
in this movie?
Are we allowed to use thesecharacters?
And it's something that wespent a lot of time just harping
on that we actually reallydidn't need to, because what the
soul of a fan film is like youmentioned with our, the previous
film that we created, the starwars eye of the forest, eye of
(07:35):
the forest a star wars story I'mgetting the title wrong.
It's like star wars fans havebeen making movies about jedi
and since its initial releaseand it's just something that we
always wanted to be a part ofthat kind of creative community.
Because when Caleb and I wereplanning Eye of the Forest and
others, we were just looking atother Star Wars fan films for
reference like, yeah, we couldtotally do that.
Oh, I like that element thatthey did.
(07:56):
They can't afford this CGIelement, so how do they
practically shoot that?
Oh, yeah, let's do that in thisfilm.
But there wasn't a lot of thatfor the last of us franchise and
so it was kind of just liketaking inspiration from the
games, primarily because theshow had been.
I was trying to remember theshow had been up at the point of
shooting, but not at the pointof the idea that we want to make
(08:16):
a last of us short film, and soit kind of started with taking
elements from the game and soforth cool, yeah, that's the big
thing is as long as you don'tprofit off of it.
Speaker 4 (08:25):
I mean, y'all didn't even want to take crowdfunding
for it either, just to be on thesafe side.
Everything was volunteer,everything was equipment owned
by the crew and y'all thatbrought your own stuff, I mean
even wardrobe, everything y'allkind of sourced just out of your
own pockets to not break any ofthose rules.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Yeah yeah, you can never be too careful with that
kind of stuff, exactly.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Exactly, yeah.
And even then, like I oftenforget how expensive making a
movie is, because we started outwith, I think, a collective
pool of it's not a lot like.
We're all students, so it'svery much just like what we make
in our jobs that we balancewith also having not a lot.
We're all students, so it'svery much just like what we make
in our jobs that we balancewith also having an academic
life, and so all of it comingfrom that and we're thinking
(09:11):
like all right, we're done.
All of our budget allocated topre-production, we're chilling
now it's kind of us just on ourcomputers.
Post-production Nope, money.
You keep having to spend moneyon stuff, and it's a lot, but
it's all worth it because thisis our passion.
Money on stuff, and it's a lot,but it's all worth it because
this is our passion.
We love the Last of Us, we lovemaking movies and we just
wanted to put those two togetherto make something cool.
Speaker 4 (09:29):
So the Star Wars film I want to circle back to that.
We talked about it just alittle bit on set and I've seen
other Star Wars fan films and tome y'all's is the best that
I've seen the CGI, thelightsabers I mean as a Star
Wars fan you have to be kind ofsnobby about doing that right,
(09:49):
and I think y'all did it rightand my mind is just utterly
blown with the way you did theCGI for the lightsabers.
Can you speak to that?
Tell us a little bit about that.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Yes, and thank you.
That really does mean a lot.
And thank you, that really doesmean a lot.
There was the two weeks leadingup to the release of Eye of the
Forest.
We had a VFX artist working onit and I was really excited.
I had seen this guy do workbefore and I was really
impressed with the quality ofhis work.
And then I get a text one weekbefore he's like hey, man, I
(10:23):
haven't done any of it and alsoI can't do it.
So really sorry about that, andI was like, no, devastating.
So that week I taught myselfafter effects and I the concept
of it is rotoscoping.
You basically just paint acolor over the unlit blade and
(10:44):
then you just glow it up howeveryou want in After Effects and
you have to go over eachindividual frame of the fight to
make sure that that blade iscovered with the digital
lightsaber.
And so I was kicking myselfbecause in pre-production we
were like let's do a fight withfour lightsabers.
That would be so awesome.
(11:05):
We're going to have a doubleblade, it's going to be sick.
And then I'm in post-production.
I'm like why did I ever decide?
Because as soon as you add asecond lightsaber, it doubles
the amount of lightsabers thatyou've got to use.
So it was a really interestingprocess because I myself see
where I first started working onit and then where I ended up at
(11:27):
the ends, like with the firstscene versus the last scene.
I went chronologically and Ithink that the last scene looks
much better because I hadlearned tips and tricks and how
to make it go faster, and so Ithink if I were ever to do it
again, there would definitely besome knowledge from how it
works on the output to figureout how to do it better in the
beginning.
But yeah, I mean it was areally fun challenge to get
(11:49):
through.
Speaker 4 (11:50):
So I have After Effects.
I haven't gotten into it.
I mainly stick to Premiere andAudition for editing.
And so there's a.
I'm a gamer I don't know ify'all game but there's a guy
that I watch.
If you're gamers, you'veprobably heard of this guy
called the Russian Badger, andhe started out just doing like
(12:11):
After Effects cartoonycharacters over his gameplay and
his friends they all say funnystuff.
Well, after he started makingreally good money, he bought a
motion capture suit and he doesanimated videos.
It's kind of a like an overlayon top of his gameplay and it's
funny moments from the games andit's just incredible.
(12:33):
He spent like 26 K on the suitand then he's running like a 10k
machine.
But that was, you know, rightafter the problem with getting
graphics cards because of thechips, so everything was
probably a lot more expensive.
And then also a reallyexpensive camera and I mean his
streaming setup is very justplain, not much to it.
It's what he does with that.
(12:55):
With after effects.
Do you have to have the motioncapture dots on the device that
you're capturing or are you justhaving to manually do every
single frame?
Speaker 1 (13:05):
We had.
On the blades themselves we putpieces of blue painter's tape
so that there would be some kindof a reference.
But the After Effects in-unittracker is not that fantastic
and so I ended up just manuallygoing through and doing them.
That's how they did it in theprequels as well, like you can
see.
If you pause it at specificelements you can see like the
(13:27):
line that the mask is in,whatever software it is they use
.
So it's not a hard process tolearn, it's just mastering.
It is what kind of setsdifferent ones apart, like the
sequels or the prequelsobviously look fantastic with
their lightsabers and you cankind of tell that there's
something about fan films thatyou're like that's a little bit
(13:48):
off, but the process is the samein that regard.
Speaker 4 (13:52):
I got you.
Did y'all build them yourselvesor did y'all purchase them?
The actual, the handles.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
We actually got them donated from a lightsaber
company that we were kind ofclose with and we had some
people that we knew over there Ithink it was imperial workshop
and we went in and we said, hey,we've got this fan film.
Would you guys be interested incoming on as a sponsor?
And they were really gung-hoand really excited about it.
So they even let us use someunreleased hilts and we were
(14:22):
like their promo for it, nice.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
I just want to add, not to get us in trouble, but it
was sponsored in terms of like,they gave us props and they
don't have that license fromDisney because they're not
replicos per se, so they have to.
If it's Anakin's lightsaber,they have to call it like space
warrior, yeah, and so we gotthose.
So like everything was totallylegit, finessed around.
(14:45):
How do we not get in trouble?
Not that disney would care,that a bunch of you know college
students are in the woods likeswinging lightsabers at each
other.
But yeah, but it was.
It was cool to see that you'realmost in the parody realm yeah,
yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:58):
So it's not Anakin's lightsaber, it's grown-up
sourpuss boy who you know nobodylikes saber.
Right right, I did want to hityou with three Star Wars fan
films.
I don't know if you've seenthem.
One of the originals from the70s was called Hardware Wars.
It's mostly a trailer.
It's fabulous.
Hardware Wars Two Troops.
Have you ever seen that one?
Speaker 2 (15:19):
I have not seen that one either.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
No, Troops is the Star Wars versions of Cops.
Okay.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
That actually is really really cool idea, I think
.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
It was very cool.
It was pre-internet when Ifirst saw it, so it was comic
conventions.
I bought the videotape.
That's cool, so we're talkingbootlegs back in the day.
The third one is called PinkFive, picture of Valley Girl on
the outskirts of Star Wars.
So like Luke is Red Five, she'slike I'm Pink Five and that was
hilarious.
Speaker 4 (15:45):
Nice, that's funny.
Speaker 3 (15:47):
Hardware Wars like it's a commercial line.
You'll laugh, you'll cry,you'll kiss seven bucks, goodbye
.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
It's so long ago.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
That's what it costs to get in the movie and TJ if
you want to tell them how, whatthey inspired you to do after
their media day, things you haveto go through an oral board to
get a certain qualification.
Speaker 4 (16:21):
So there's a lot of interviews.
You have to check a bunch ofboxes and I always felt
comfortable doing that because Iknew the material and I knew
what to expect.
But a media interviewespecially being new to acting
at the time, I didn't feelprepared to do it and we started
talking when I got back fromTexas from shooting and we both
(16:44):
had individually thought aboutdoing a podcast and I said you
know, it might help us becausethis could come up again when
we're filming.
We could be getting interviewedbehind the scenes and of course
I did.
And the very next one I didthey had a similar thing and I
thought that would be great.
We'll get to know people in theindustry and learn some things.
Maybe we don't know about theindustry and maybe help hear
(17:08):
because we were in the same boatin terms of just starting out,
because we had only made onemovie before and that was
amongst friends.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Really we hadn't networked kind of past that like
hey, we have a friend who knowshow to do this, let's get them
on.
I was working with people, Iwas directing people that I had
never met before, and so it wasall very new to us and to hear
that something like thatinspired this, which is super
professional.
I took a look at anotherepisode and I was like, wow,
this is a cool thing I'm goingto be part of.
It's super cool to hear that.
Speaker 4 (17:46):
Yeah, so wait a minute.
You know I was thinking y'allhad done a couple of other
projects that we just hadn'ttalked about yet in between the
Star Wars one and this one.
So Immunity was y'all's secondfilm together.
Wow, correct, wow, that.
I mean I was already reallyimpressed, but that is just
(18:06):
incredible.
On your second project, didn'tyou do accounting in school?
Speaker 1 (18:10):
I did.
Yeah, I just graduated in Maywith my accounting degree.
Congratulations.
Speaker 4 (18:15):
Thank you.
I remember that on set when wewere talking.
Maybe that's where some of thatorganization comes from,
because y'all were meticulous,not like I don't mean like
micromanaging meticulous, butjust well organized.
Speaker 1 (18:28):
I don't know, maybe that's got something to do with
it yeah, I would say it's helpedme figure out how to be
intentional with just beingintentional about things, and I
think we in the pre-productionprocess, we really wanted to
hone in on the fact that we werehaving all of these people
coming in and we just wanted tobe respectful of their time,
(18:50):
that they were volunteering forus.
So if we said that we weregoing to get them in and out in
six hours, we were going to getthem in and out in six hours,
because that's what we committedto do and I'm not speaking for
Liam here because I don't knowif this is something he agrees
with, but I think that that'slike just telling people what
you're going to do and thendoing it and being honest about
doing it.
I think that's just one of thebest ways that you can be in
(19:12):
charge of something to thatcaliber.
Speaker 4 (19:14):
Yeah, and y'all both did really good going around and
talking to people and gettingto know people.
I think that helps with thedirecting process is to have
that rapport.
Liam, you mentioned that youwere working with people you
never worked with before and Ithink you did really good
talking to everybody and kind ofgetting a feel for us because
(19:35):
everybody takes directiondifferently.
I think that is something thatyou did really well.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
Thank you, I appreciate that.
Yeah, that that brings me to theinfamous first night of
shooting at Bartlett.
I mean, it's the first day, likeobviously it's going to be one
of the most challenging because,like you're kind of getting the
rhythm of getting into theshoot, the chemistry is still
establishing between, like thecrew and the actors and everyone
involved.
And I remember during a takethere was something going on
(20:01):
with the lighting that needed tobe adjusted and I didn't know
the gaffer's name.
On that day I was like what amI doing?
And so I remember, after a take, when we came to a lull setting
up for our next shot, all thecrew members were like sitting
on the street on the sidewalk inBartlett and I was just like
gotta know these people.
And on the sidewalk in Bartlett, and I was just like got to
know these people.
And it was a lot because Calebknew these people coming from
(20:22):
his college and then all thesestrangers that are now working
under me.
It was a very strange feelingand so I like to think that I
made a good effort to get toknow them before the shoot moved
on.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
Yeah, yeah, and I've stayed in contact with people
from the shoot.
I'm following everybody that Ican think of and have
communicated with a lot of themand I feel like I've made
lifelong friends from that shootOther shoots not as much, Even
just in that short period oftime.
What y'all did bringingeverybody together on that one
day for the media day, themingling before we got
(20:56):
interviewed that's somethingit's kind of hard to do,
especially on a big shoot,because shooting is spread out
in different days and it's veryrare that everybody's going to
be there on the same day.
And the way y'all timed that Ithought was pretty cool.
And I like to stay in touchwith people anyway, because you
never know when somebody's goingto have that answer you're
looking for hey, have you everexperienced this or done this?
(21:18):
And it's a good source ofinformation.
Speaker 2 (21:21):
Yeah, no, I agree I think I'm not going to speak for
Kayla, but I would love to workwith every actor that we had in
the movie.
In the last first movie, again,everyone was on top of their
stuff.
Everyone, like, really wantedto get into their character.
There were improv moments thatI absolutely loved.
I remember Blake, yourco-firefly.
He was so into it that hewanted to, like, jump off of the
(21:43):
truck during a take.
I love that you want to do thatfor this, but we cannot risk
your safety for a cool shot likethat.
So, yeah, like everyone, all theactors were so into it and if
you remember Caroline, whoplayed Logan, she's like one of
Caleb and I's best friends.
Now we hang out.
She lives in LA and closer tome than anyone else, and so we
see each other often and it'slike everyone was just such a
(22:04):
joy to work with.
Speaker 4 (22:05):
So are you in LA?
Are you close?
Speaker 2 (22:07):
to LA.
I grew up in Boston.
I'm in Boston right now forThanksgiving.
It's funny.
I go back to the LA area tofinish the semester for two
weeks and then I come back.
So a lot of fly.
Oh, actually no.
I go to LA and then I go toAustin for the premiere and then
I come back home.
So a lot of moving around inthis next month.
I'm excited for it.
Speaker 4 (22:27):
You don't have a really heavy Boston accent, I
don't think.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
It's funny.
A lot of people, when I tellthem I'm from Boston, it's like
oh, that's weird.
You don't have the accent atall.
But all of the kids I'd say 90%of the kids at my high school
never had it.
My parents don't really have iteither.
I'd say it's my grandma'sgeneration is like the last
generation of strong Bostonianaccents, unless you live in the
heart of this city.
That's where it really comesout.
Oh, I got you.
(22:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Brian, I'm hogging up all the airtime.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
No, no, that's nothing wrong with that.
You're obviously closer to thembecause I'm just meeting them
and there are times when I'mhogging up all the airtime which
is every other episode, no, outof the airtime which is every
other episode.
No.
So, guys, what I like to askdirectors?
Because in one of myexperiences a director pulled a
performance out of me.
I had to be thinking aboutsomething and I was very surface
on everything he goes for.
(23:13):
This take right before we do,I'm going to ask you who's your
favorite Spider-Man, and thenjust think about that, don't say
anything, action and cut.
It's like.
In that vein, are there anytechniques or things that you've
experienced that you've used topull a performance out of an
actor?
Speaker 2 (23:29):
And no, is a perfectly good answer because we
can cut it.
Speaker 1 (23:31):
That's a really good question, Caleb do you have any
ideas off the top of your mind?
Well, I was almost going todefer to you because I was
acting in most of this, so Iwasn't really directing because
Liam's really like the directorof this movie really directing
because Liam's really like thedirector of this movie.
There were a couple of momentswhen just example of like you
giving me notes where we were inthat one scene New Grandparents
(23:52):
Garage with Caroline and I, andit's a moment where it's like a
very close moment between thetwo characters and I almost
don't remember exactly what yousaid, but there was something
that I wasn't getting.
And then you said something Iwas like, oh, I understand it
now.
And so it was just like I thinka good director is able to kind
(24:16):
of give an actor almost adifferent sense of what the
underlying emotion is in thescene, because that will change
a performance entirely.
Yes, I think Liam wasparticularly good because I
helped write and produce.
I was like I had an idea aboutit and I was so set in my idea
about it.
When Liam would challenge mehe'd say, well, why don't you
try this way?
Speaker 2 (24:32):
And I was like, oh gosh, I can't remember anything
because the entire shoot wasjust like a blur of practicality
, like I wasn't remembering,like the oh hey, yeah, like I
did do a good job there.
It was like no, I need to getthis done.
(24:53):
Did we get it done?
Like, thank God, it's likethat's what you remember in the
time of the shoot, but I'm gladI could help you out in that
moment.
Speaker 3 (24:59):
It's not giving someone a line reading, but
exploring the emotion and themotivation, the underlying thing
.
And you had a media day, whichI heard TJ talk about.
Did you have a table read?
Did you have a chance to sitdown with the actors to explore
those emotions beforehand?
Because you were pullingeverybody in from different
parts of the world.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
The pre-production timeline was really tight.
After casting, I think, wecasted and then it was probably
two to three weeks later that westarted shooting.
It was quick, yeah, it was aquick turnaround, and so we
didn't really get much timebeforehand with the actors to
kind of go over character beatsand that kind of stuff, which I
(25:39):
guess you're just a testament tothe people that we got on it,
because everyone did anincredible job with their
characters.
And obviously there are momentslike when Liam and I would say
this is kind of what we're goingfor with this character.
If you could kind of lean intothis emotion or if you could
kind of lean into something likethis and people were really
good at taking direction andkind of running with that, we
(26:00):
would have benefited greatlyfrom having some table reads
beforehand and I also think thatthat kind of helps build
chemistry early on amongst theactors.
But we didn't really have anissue with that because everyone
gelled so quickly.
That wasn't really an issue.
Speaker 2 (26:15):
That reminds me of a memory like our cast got so
tight, so quickly.
There was a moment where therewas a scene by a pond or a small
river and my direction was likeall right max.
The main character is off,brooding, he's alone, he's like
kind of in his feelings rightnow.
He doesn't want to socialize,but he's also jealous that you
guys kind of have this connectand you feel comfortable with
(26:38):
each other.
And he's still trying to findthat, and so I want you guys to
kind of be like thevisualization of family and
having fun and like helping eachother out after a long day.
You're all like bathing in thewater and they're like all right
, got it.
And then so I went off to doanother thing for like a minute
and then I come back.
I was like all right, actressset, and then I genuinely could
not tell that they were actingbecause they were already so
(26:59):
tight.
So I thought they were stilljust like talking about whatever
, and so I thought they werestill just like talking about
whatever and I was like guys,come on, let's go.
And then I remember Carolinelooked at me like this is it
Liam?
Like we're ready.
I was like oh oh, okay, Sorry mybad, and so like, yeah,
everyone was just on top of it.
I couldn't have asked for abetter chemistry between the
cast, and all the cast memberswere so nice to each other too.
(27:20):
There was never, ever likedanything close to an issue.
It was great, right, very cool.
Speaker 3 (27:24):
So what's next for y'all?
I mean, I know you just saidyou're about to have your
premiere.
Any plans, any thoughts?
Speaker 1 (27:36):
or you just need a break, caleb.
Do you take that one?
We don't have any plans yet forwhat our next project is going
to be.
That's not saying that there'snot going to be a next project.
It's just we have to take thetime to kind of deliberate and
think about what it's going tobe.
But I think after we releasewe're going to take a little bit
of time to kind of build up ourstudio and more and make it a
little bit more official,because we don't even have a
logo yet.
We're kind of just like usingwhatever font the movie uses and
(27:58):
just typing our name out andthat's our logo.
For the next little bit, yeah,just coming up with and
establishing what Magic NumberStudios is to everyone and to
its members and kind of what ourgoals are in terms of bringing
people in, that just passion ismore important than anything
else and dedication to the craftand so bringing in people that
(28:19):
are equally as passionate as usand equally willing to kind of
get into the nitty gritty andfigure it out, and just kind of
establishing ourselves more andkind of figuring out what we
want to do going forward.
Speaker 4 (28:33):
Are y'all going to run it out of Dallas?
Are you going to staydecentralized until everybody's
in one place?
Speaker 1 (28:40):
Yeah, definitely decentralized.
Or is it top secret?
Speaker 4 (28:43):
That's okay too.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
No, not top secret.
I mean we don't even know yet.
It's decentralized becauseeveryone's still.
I mean we've got people inNorth, south, east and West.
People are all over.
At some point there will be amove to get everyone in the same
spot.
We will be so much moreproductive when we're all in the
same place.
It's kind of hard when it feelslike we're all living our
separate lives and you can onlyget to somebody through one of
(29:06):
these things.
That's definitely in the cardsfor the future.
It's just kind of CBD up in theair.
Yeah, Understood.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
I'm trying to convince people to come to where
I am, because whenever I drivethrough LA it's a little bit
intimidating.
The driving is intimidating inmy opinion, but the resources
are there.
So I'm like guys, just trust me.
I know it's expensive, but it'sworth it.
I think we can do good stuffout here.
So I'm still working on that.
Maybe they'll win me over tolike moving to austin.
Speaker 4 (29:33):
We'll see, I don't know there's been a lot of work
in austin.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
I see stuff all the time casting calls louisiana
just pre-approved the new seasonof tax credits.
Speaker 4 (29:44):
I'm just saying I saw that I mean it was a close call
.
We thought it was going to gothe other way.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:51):
It seemed like we might lose the tax credits, and
if that happened everythingwould dry up and spread out even
more to Atlanta, and I meanthere's a lot happening up in
Boston too.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
Boston's starting to sprout again.
The early 20-teens there was alot happening up in Boston too.
Yeah, boston's starting tosprout again.
The early 20 teens there was afilm scene kind of building up
and it kind of died down COVIDand everything died down and now
I see it sprouting again.
So lots of fun options.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
Guys, this is the last of our time together today.
It's been a blast.
Caleb and Liam, thank God thatI can read your names on the
screen, because I'm old and Iforget things, but it's been a
pleasure talking to you.
It's fascinating.
I can't wait to see where yougo next.
Speaker 4 (30:30):
Yeah, guys.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
Thank you so much and thank you for having me.
I can't wait to see where thispodcast goes.
I know TJ's passion.
I only got to talk with him forone podcast.
I'm excited, thank you.
I hope you guys have us backwhenever we shoot something new.
Yeah, of course.
Speaker 4 (30:48):
I hope I get to work with y'all again.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
We'll have you back to talk about how you brought us
to where you were filming andput us on.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
Exactly, was that too much TJ, was that too much?
Speaker 4 (30:59):
No.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
We got to plug ourselves with the future of
filmmaking.
Speaker 4 (31:06):
Some people say I'm too pushy, and they're right.
No, no, no, that sort of isgood, they're right.
You have some social media thatyou want to plug.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
Yeah, you can find us on most platforms.
We've got Instagram, we've gotTikTok, we've got YouTube.
It's all Magic Number Studios.
Just one big word the film willbe premiering on YouTube Stream
.
Last of Us Immunity, december20th.
Hey, my name is Caleb Cook.
My name is Liam Buckley.
I am a producer and actor.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
I am a director, writer, producer.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
And I am thrilled to be on the NOLA Film Scene
podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:17):
And I am extraordinarily pumped to be on
the NOLA Film Scene.
Speaker 4 (00:33):
Welcome, gentlemen, thank you, thank you, yeah,
welcome.
Good to see you guys.
It's been a while you as well.
We met.
I had the privilege of workingon one of y'all's projects the
Last of Us Immunity and that wasan incredibly fun project for
me.
That was over in Austin, texas.
Everybody everybody on set, Ithink got to meet just about
everybody during the media dayevent before we filmed.
(00:53):
Everybody was very welcoming.
I kind of felt like the old manon set and everybody was
welcoming, very kind, very, veryfun to work with.
I had a fantastic time on thatshoot.
Who came up with the idea to dothat one?
Y'all kind of come up with ittogether.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
So I guess originally I had decided to.
After we finished the Star Warsproject we were like, well,
we've got to come up withsomething else that we want to
do.
So we had a general pitchmeeting with probably about 15
of the people that are kind ofstill involved with Magic
Numbers Studios and we had, likeit was maybe seven to 10 ideas
(01:28):
that got pitched and everyonevoted on it at the end to see
what would be the next one.
And I had originally pitched anidea that was a continuation of
a story with Ellie from theLast of Us, where it would be
Ellie meets another immuneperson and they kind of go over
what that means to them.
What does immunity truly meanin this world, with flickers and
(01:51):
bad people and all that kind ofstuff?
Eventually Liam came on and waslike, really interested in
helping write, and so we startedwith that concept and then we
completely went in a differentdirection and we got to the Last
of Us Immunity with all of theoriginal characters that we
ended up with.
And that's kind of theinception of it, liam, if you
(02:13):
want to speak on anything elseabout your involvement in it, I
mean, yeah, I think you nailedit with its origins and
conception.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
I remember Caleb pitched the idea and I was like
this just makes so much sensefor a fan film, in my opinion,
because we have the Last of Us.
It's coming out soon, it'srelevant, but also more than
that, we're just giant fans andI feel like it's very fun,
producibility wise, because youget to go and look at places,
because we didn't build anythingfor the sets.
We used all real locations, andso just thinking about that and
(02:44):
thinking about what we wouldneed and need to do in
preparation for a film like thatgot me really excited, and so I
was 100% on board.
Yeah, it started out with thatidea of Ellie being the main
focus, and then it was funnybecause Caleb and I were talking
recently and you were like,remember when this movie started
with Ellie and it was supposedto be 12 minutes, and now it's
going to be this 15 minuteginormous thing that we never
(03:04):
anticipated, and I'm very happywith the trajectory.
It's where it started from andwhere it is now.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Yeah, we definitely got pretty carried away when we
started writing.
We were like, wait a second,this is 30 pages, wait a second.
We just it's now 50 pages long.
How are we going to do this?
Speaker 4 (03:20):
Yeah, and filming went so well that it was perfect
for a feature.
Right From what I understand, Iwas only there for that one day
, but from what I understand,the way it grew, the script and
the filming was just so welldone.
What's the runtime of it goingto be?
Speaker 1 (03:40):
That's a Caleb question.
It's still being piecedtogether on the timeline but I
think amongst all of the partsit's probably going to be hour
to an hour and five minutes long.
Speaker 4 (03:46):
Yeah, that's.
I thought I had heard that,because I think when I
auditioned, y'all were stillcalling it a short right, and it
was sometime between auditionsand filming that it grew to a
feature.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
Yeah, I mean, I think the entire time writing it we
were in our minds it was justshort, short, short.
And then, like Caleb said, wegot carried away and realized
that the narrative structurethat we had is like this kind of
loosely follows the beats of afeature, with like an act one
and act two and act three, amidpoint, etc, and so it's kind
of a weird in between we'recalling it a short feature,
(04:17):
because I think a lot of thecriteria for something to be
called a short is to be 45minutes or less, and we're just
over that and also kind offollows the feature structure.
And, like I said, we neveranticipated that at all.
And then we were like well, weplanned out the shooting
schedule, this could work, andso we kept it, gotcha.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
I do want to expound on one thing, brian.
This is the project that I toldyou about.
That was so well done.
Y'all worked like an oldmachine.
Just Y'all worked like an oldmachine, just perfect.
Everybody seemed to know theirjob, where they needed to be,
what they needed to do.
Setups moved really fast.
Everybody was just efficient.
I don't remember how far intothe filming my day was I don't
(04:55):
think it was very far in, buty'all were just.
Y'all were firing on allcylinders and, from what I
understand, a group of peoplethat came together kind of came
from different areas, didn'tthey?
Yeah, I've been on other setsthat weren't as well organized.
Your call sheet, shot list,everything came out and just, I
don't know, that's how it seemedto me Just very smooth, very
(05:16):
efficient.
I thought y'all did a fantasticjob and it was just.
It was one of my better timeson set.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
I've got to say I'm glad that we could provide that
for you, because we saw yoursubmission and we're like we got
to have this guy as a Firefly.
He's just perfect right off thebat, and so we appreciate you
being there, thank you.
I wish we could have had youfor more days, because it was
super fun working with you.
Oh, thank you.
Speaker 1 (05:34):
And yeah, I appreciate you saying that we
really wanted to just try andemulate like a higher budget
thing just with the resourcesthat we had.
We had a lot of challenges interms of, like scheduling, and
trying to fit all of that into atwo week lock was really
challenging, and it was also themiddle of summer and it was
getting up to temperatures of105, 104.
(05:56):
So we had to block out themiddle of the day because we're
like we cannot make people shoota film in this heat right now
and so logistically, it was areally fun challenge to just
figure out how to work aschedule because there's so many
moving parts.
There were, I think, at itspeak, which was Bartlett, the
unit that you were at TJ.
I think we had 20 to 25 peopleon the crew there with six to
(06:20):
seven people on cast.
We were shooting on that streetin Bartlett, which was super
cool.
So it was just.
It was a really fun experienceto kind of be like well, we
wrote this story and like we'vegot to figure it out now.
We've got people coming in fromall over the country.
Their tickets are really notrefundable, so we've got to get
something going.
Speaker 3 (06:38):
Yeah, that organization is impressive
because I've been on independentshoots a budget, nothing major,
yet with no money with one ofthem.
We've been doing since my firsttime was in 2020.
And the principal's done.
I think they just have thesound to do so, no money on
their spare time, so he's beenfocused, even though it's been
spread apart.
I've walked into something andit was a clusterfuck.
You know what I mean.
(06:59):
And then so that's impressive.
I wanted to ask because you hadsaid fan film and people might
not understand because you'renot part of the HBO Last of Us
or the video game.
So how can you make a filmusing someone else's property
like that?
Speaker 2 (07:12):
That's a good question and Caleb and I had
concerns about that from thestart with like what can we use
in this movie?
Are we allowed to use thesecharacters?
And it's something that wespent a lot of time just harping
on that we actually reallydidn't need to, because what the
soul of a fan film is like youmentioned with our, the previous
film that we created, the starwars eye of the forest, eye of
(07:35):
the forest a star wars story I'mgetting the title wrong.
It's like star wars fans havebeen making movies about jedi
and since its initial releaseand it's just something that we
always wanted to be a part ofthat kind of creative community.
Because when Caleb and I wereplanning Eye of the Forest and
others, we were just looking atother Star Wars fan films for
reference like, yeah, we couldtotally do that.
Oh, I like that element thatthey did.
(07:56):
They can't afford this CGIelement, so how do they
practically shoot that?
Oh, yeah, let's do that in thisfilm.
But there wasn't a lot of thatfor the last of us franchise and
so it was kind of just liketaking inspiration from the
games, primarily because theshow had been.
I was trying to remember theshow had been up at the point of
shooting, but not at the pointof the idea that we want to make
(08:16):
a last of us short film, and soit kind of started with taking
elements from the game and soforth cool, yeah, that's the big
thing is as long as you don'tprofit off of it.
Speaker 4 (08:25):
I mean, y'all didn't even want to take crowdfunding
for it either, just to be on thesafe side.
Everything was volunteer,everything was equipment owned
by the crew and y'all thatbrought your own stuff, I mean
even wardrobe, everything y'allkind of sourced just out of your
own pockets to not break any ofthose rules.
Speaker 1 (08:45):
Yeah yeah, you can never be too careful with that
kind of stuff, exactly.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
Exactly, yeah.
And even then, like I oftenforget how expensive making a
movie is, because we started outwith, I think, a collective
pool of it's not a lot like.
We're all students, so it'svery much just like what we make
in our jobs that we balancewith also having not a lot.
We're all students, so it'svery much just like what we make
in our jobs that we balancewith also having an academic
life, and so all of it comingfrom that and we're thinking
(09:11):
like all right, we're done.
All of our budget allocated topre-production, we're chilling
now it's kind of us just on ourcomputers.
Post-production Nope, money.
You keep having to spend moneyon stuff, and it's a lot, but
it's all worth it because thisis our passion.
Money on stuff, and it's a lot,but it's all worth it because
this is our passion.
We love the Last of Us, we lovemaking movies and we just
wanted to put those two togetherto make something cool.
Speaker 4 (09:29):
So the Star Wars film I want to circle back to that.
We talked about it just alittle bit on set and I've seen
other Star Wars fan films and tome y'all's is the best that
I've seen the CGI, thelightsabers I mean as a Star
Wars fan you have to be kind ofsnobby about doing that right,
(09:49):
and I think y'all did it rightand my mind is just utterly
blown with the way you did theCGI for the lightsabers.
Can you speak to that?
Tell us a little bit about that.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
Yes, and thank you.
That really does mean a lot.
And thank you, that really doesmean a lot.
There was the two weeks leadingup to the release of Eye of the
Forest.
We had a VFX artist working onit and I was really excited.
I had seen this guy do workbefore and I was really
impressed with the quality ofhis work.
And then I get a text one weekbefore he's like hey, man, I
(10:23):
haven't done any of it and alsoI can't do it.
So really sorry about that, andI was like, no, devastating.
So that week I taught myselfafter effects and I the concept
of it is rotoscoping.
You basically just paint acolor over the unlit blade and
(10:44):
then you just glow it up howeveryou want in After Effects and
you have to go over eachindividual frame of the fight to
make sure that that blade iscovered with the digital
lightsaber.
And so I was kicking myselfbecause in pre-production we
were like let's do a fight withfour lightsabers.
That would be so awesome.
(11:05):
We're going to have a doubleblade, it's going to be sick.
And then I'm in post-production.
I'm like why did I ever decide?
Because as soon as you add asecond lightsaber, it doubles
the amount of lightsabers thatyou've got to use.
So it was a really interestingprocess because I myself see
where I first started working onit and then where I ended up at
(11:27):
the ends, like with the firstscene versus the last scene.
I went chronologically and Ithink that the last scene looks
much better because I hadlearned tips and tricks and how
to make it go faster, and so Ithink if I were ever to do it
again, there would definitely besome knowledge from how it
works on the output to figureout how to do it better in the
beginning.
But yeah, I mean it was areally fun challenge to get
(11:49):
through.
Speaker 4 (11:50):
So I have After Effects.
I haven't gotten into it.
I mainly stick to Premiere andAudition for editing.
And so there's a.
I'm a gamer I don't know ify'all game but there's a guy
that I watch.
If you're gamers, you'veprobably heard of this guy
called the Russian Badger, andhe started out just doing like
(12:11):
After Effects cartoonycharacters over his gameplay and
his friends they all say funnystuff.
Well, after he started makingreally good money, he bought a
motion capture suit and he doesanimated videos.
It's kind of a like an overlayon top of his gameplay and it's
funny moments from the games andit's just incredible.
(12:33):
He spent like 26 K on the suitand then he's running like a 10k
machine.
But that was, you know, rightafter the problem with getting
graphics cards because of thechips, so everything was
probably a lot more expensive.
And then also a reallyexpensive camera and I mean his
streaming setup is very justplain, not much to it.
It's what he does with that.
(12:55):
With after effects.
Do you have to have the motioncapture dots on the device that
you're capturing or are you justhaving to manually do every
single frame?
Speaker 1 (13:05):
We had.
On the blades themselves we putpieces of blue painter's tape
so that there would be some kindof a reference.
But the After Effects in-unittracker is not that fantastic
and so I ended up just manuallygoing through and doing them.
That's how they did it in theprequels as well, like you can
see.
If you pause it at specificelements you can see like the
(13:27):
line that the mask is in,whatever software it is they use
.
So it's not a hard process tolearn, it's just mastering.
It is what kind of setsdifferent ones apart, like the
sequels or the prequelsobviously look fantastic with
their lightsabers and you cankind of tell that there's
something about fan films thatyou're like that's a little bit
(13:48):
off, but the process is the samein that regard.
Speaker 4 (13:52):
I got you.
Did y'all build them yourselvesor did y'all purchase them?
The actual, the handles.
Speaker 1 (13:57):
We actually got them donated from a lightsaber
company that we were kind ofclose with and we had some
people that we knew over there Ithink it was imperial workshop
and we went in and we said, hey,we've got this fan film.
Would you guys be interested incoming on as a sponsor?
And they were really gung-hoand really excited about it.
So they even let us use someunreleased hilts and we were
(14:22):
like their promo for it, nice.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
I just want to add, not to get us in trouble, but it
was sponsored in terms of like,they gave us props and they
don't have that license fromDisney because they're not
replicos per se, so they have to.
If it's Anakin's lightsaber,they have to call it like space
warrior, yeah, and so we gotthose.
So like everything was totallylegit, finessed around.
(14:45):
How do we not get in trouble?
Not that disney would care,that a bunch of you know college
students are in the woods likeswinging lightsabers at each
other.
But yeah, but it was.
It was cool to see that you'realmost in the parody realm yeah,
yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (14:58):
So it's not Anakin's lightsaber, it's grown-up
sourpuss boy who you know nobodylikes saber.
Right right, I did want to hityou with three Star Wars fan
films.
I don't know if you've seenthem.
One of the originals from the70s was called Hardware Wars.
It's mostly a trailer.
It's fabulous.
Hardware Wars Two Troops.
Have you ever seen that one?
Speaker 2 (15:19):
I have not seen that one either.
Speaker 3 (15:21):
No, Troops is the Star Wars versions of Cops.
Okay.
Speaker 2 (15:25):
That actually is really really cool idea, I think
.
Speaker 3 (15:28):
It was very cool.
It was pre-internet when Ifirst saw it, so it was comic
conventions.
I bought the videotape.
That's cool, so we're talkingbootlegs back in the day.
The third one is called PinkFive, picture of Valley Girl on
the outskirts of Star Wars.
So like Luke is Red Five, she'slike I'm Pink Five and that was
hilarious.
Speaker 4 (15:45):
Nice, that's funny.
Speaker 3 (15:47):
Hardware Wars like it's a commercial line.
You'll laugh, you'll cry,you'll kiss seven bucks, goodbye
.
Speaker 4 (15:53):
It's so long ago.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
That's what it costs to get in the movie and TJ if
you want to tell them how, whatthey inspired you to do after
their media day, things you haveto go through an oral board to
get a certain qualification.
Speaker 4 (16:21):
So there's a lot of interviews.
You have to check a bunch ofboxes and I always felt
comfortable doing that because Iknew the material and I knew
what to expect.
But a media interviewespecially being new to acting
at the time, I didn't feelprepared to do it and we started
talking when I got back fromTexas from shooting and we both
(16:44):
had individually thought aboutdoing a podcast and I said you
know, it might help us becausethis could come up again when
we're filming.
We could be getting interviewedbehind the scenes and of course
I did.
And the very next one I didthey had a similar thing and I
thought that would be great.
We'll get to know people in theindustry and learn some things.
Maybe we don't know about theindustry and maybe help hear
(17:08):
because we were in the same boatin terms of just starting out,
because we had only made onemovie before and that was
amongst friends.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Really we hadn't networked kind of past that like
hey, we have a friend who knowshow to do this, let's get them
on.
I was working with people, Iwas directing people that I had
never met before, and so it wasall very new to us and to hear
that something like thatinspired this, which is super
professional.
I took a look at anotherepisode and I was like, wow,
this is a cool thing I'm goingto be part of.
It's super cool to hear that.
Speaker 4 (17:46):
Yeah, so wait a minute.
You know I was thinking y'allhad done a couple of other
projects that we just hadn'ttalked about yet in between the
Star Wars one and this one.
So Immunity was y'all's secondfilm together.
Wow, correct, wow, that.
I mean I was already reallyimpressed, but that is just
(18:06):
incredible.
On your second project, didn'tyou do accounting in school?
Speaker 1 (18:10):
I did.
Yeah, I just graduated in Maywith my accounting degree.
Congratulations.
Speaker 4 (18:15):
Thank you.
I remember that on set when wewere talking.
Maybe that's where some of thatorganization comes from,
because y'all were meticulous,not like I don't mean like
micromanaging meticulous, butjust well organized.
Speaker 1 (18:28):
I don't know, maybe that's got something to do with
it yeah, I would say it's helpedme figure out how to be
intentional with just beingintentional about things, and I
think we in the pre-productionprocess, we really wanted to
hone in on the fact that we werehaving all of these people
coming in and we just wanted tobe respectful of their time,
(18:50):
that they were volunteering forus.
So if we said that we weregoing to get them in and out in
six hours, we were going to getthem in and out in six hours,
because that's what we committedto do and I'm not speaking for
Liam here because I don't knowif this is something he agrees
with, but I think that that'slike just telling people what
you're going to do and thendoing it and being honest about
doing it.
I think that's just one of thebest ways that you can be in
(19:12):
charge of something to thatcaliber.
Speaker 4 (19:14):
Yeah, and y'all both did really good going around and
talking to people and gettingto know people.
I think that helps with thedirecting process is to have
that rapport.
Liam, you mentioned that youwere working with people you
never worked with before and Ithink you did really good
talking to everybody and kind ofgetting a feel for us because
(19:35):
everybody takes directiondifferently.
I think that is something thatyou did really well.
Speaker 2 (19:39):
Thank you, I appreciate that.
Yeah, that that brings me to theinfamous first night of
shooting at Bartlett.
I mean, it's the first day, likeobviously it's going to be one
of the most challenging because,like you're kind of getting the
rhythm of getting into theshoot, the chemistry is still
establishing between, like thecrew and the actors and everyone
involved.
And I remember during a takethere was something going on
(20:01):
with the lighting that needed tobe adjusted and I didn't know
the gaffer's name.
On that day I was like what amI doing?
And so I remember, after a take, when we came to a lull setting
up for our next shot, all thecrew members were like sitting
on the street on the sidewalk inBartlett and I was just like
gotta know these people.
And on the sidewalk in Bartlett, and I was just like got to
know these people.
And it was a lot because Calebknew these people coming from
(20:22):
his college and then all thesestrangers that are now working
under me.
It was a very strange feelingand so I like to think that I
made a good effort to get toknow them before the shoot moved
on.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
Yeah, yeah, and I've stayed in contact with people
from the shoot.
I'm following everybody that Ican think of and have
communicated with a lot of themand I feel like I've made
lifelong friends from that shootOther shoots not as much, Even
just in that short period oftime.
What y'all did bringingeverybody together on that one
day for the media day, themingling before we got
(20:56):
interviewed that's somethingit's kind of hard to do,
especially on a big shoot,because shooting is spread out
in different days and it's veryrare that everybody's going to
be there on the same day.
And the way y'all timed that Ithought was pretty cool.
And I like to stay in touchwith people anyway, because you
never know when somebody's goingto have that answer you're
looking for hey, have you everexperienced this or done this?
(21:18):
And it's a good source ofinformation.
Speaker 2 (21:21):
Yeah, no, I agree I think I'm not going to speak for
Kayla, but I would love to workwith every actor that we had in
the movie.
In the last first movie, again,everyone was on top of their
stuff.
Everyone, like, really wantedto get into their character.
There were improv moments thatI absolutely loved.
I remember Blake, yourco-firefly.
He was so into it that hewanted to, like, jump off of the
(21:43):
truck during a take.
I love that you want to do thatfor this, but we cannot risk
your safety for a cool shot likethat.
So, yeah, like everyone, all theactors were so into it and if
you remember Caroline, whoplayed Logan, she's like one of
Caleb and I's best friends.
Now we hang out.
She lives in LA and closer tome than anyone else, and so we
see each other often and it'slike everyone was just such a
(22:04):
joy to work with.
Speaker 4 (22:05):
So are you in LA?
Are you close?
Speaker 2 (22:07):
to LA.
I grew up in Boston.
I'm in Boston right now forThanksgiving.
It's funny.
I go back to the LA area tofinish the semester for two
weeks and then I come back.
So a lot of fly.
Oh, actually no.
I go to LA and then I go toAustin for the premiere and then
I come back home.
So a lot of moving around inthis next month.
I'm excited for it.
Speaker 4 (22:27):
You don't have a really heavy Boston accent, I
don't think.
Speaker 2 (22:30):
It's funny.
A lot of people, when I tellthem I'm from Boston, it's like
oh, that's weird.
You don't have the accent atall.
But all of the kids I'd say 90%of the kids at my high school
never had it.
My parents don't really have iteither.
I'd say it's my grandma'sgeneration is like the last
generation of strong Bostonianaccents, unless you live in the
heart of this city.
That's where it really comesout.
Oh, I got you.
(22:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Brian, I'm hogging up all the airtime.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
No, no, that's nothing wrong with that.
You're obviously closer to thembecause I'm just meeting them
and there are times when I'mhogging up all the airtime which
is every other episode, no, outof the airtime which is every
other episode.
No.
So, guys, what I like to askdirectors?
Because in one of myexperiences a director pulled a
performance out of me.
I had to be thinking aboutsomething and I was very surface
on everything he goes for.
(23:13):
This take right before we do,I'm going to ask you who's your
favorite Spider-Man, and thenjust think about that, don't say
anything, action and cut.
It's like.
In that vein, are there anytechniques or things that you've
experienced that you've used topull a performance out of an
actor?
Speaker 2 (23:29):
And no, is a perfectly good answer because we
can cut it.
Speaker 1 (23:31):
That's a really good question, Caleb do you have any
ideas off the top of your mind?
Well, I was almost going todefer to you because I was
acting in most of this, so Iwasn't really directing because
Liam's really like the directorof this movie really directing
because Liam's really like thedirector of this movie.
There were a couple of momentswhen just example of like you
giving me notes where we were inthat one scene New Grandparents
(23:52):
Garage with Caroline and I, andit's a moment where it's like a
very close moment between thetwo characters and I almost
don't remember exactly what yousaid, but there was something
that I wasn't getting.
And then you said something Iwas like, oh, I understand it
now.
And so it was just like I thinka good director is able to kind
(24:16):
of give an actor almost adifferent sense of what the
underlying emotion is in thescene, because that will change
a performance entirely.
Yes, I think Liam wasparticularly good because I
helped write and produce.
I was like I had an idea aboutit and I was so set in my idea
about it.
When Liam would challenge mehe'd say, well, why don't you
try this way?
Speaker 2 (24:32):
And I was like, oh gosh, I can't remember anything
because the entire shoot wasjust like a blur of practicality
, like I wasn't remembering,like the oh hey, yeah, like I
did do a good job there.
It was like no, I need to getthis done.
(24:53):
Did we get it done?
Like, thank God, it's likethat's what you remember in the
time of the shoot, but I'm gladI could help you out in that
moment.
Speaker 3 (24:59):
It's not giving someone a line reading, but
exploring the emotion and themotivation, the underlying thing
.
And you had a media day, whichI heard TJ talk about.
Did you have a table read?
Did you have a chance to sitdown with the actors to explore
those emotions beforehand?
Because you were pullingeverybody in from different
parts of the world.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
The pre-production timeline was really tight.
After casting, I think, wecasted and then it was probably
two to three weeks later that westarted shooting.
It was quick, yeah, it was aquick turnaround, and so we
didn't really get much timebeforehand with the actors to
kind of go over character beatsand that kind of stuff, which I
(25:39):
guess you're just a testament tothe people that we got on it,
because everyone did anincredible job with their
characters.
And obviously there are momentslike when Liam and I would say
this is kind of what we're goingfor with this character.
If you could kind of lean intothis emotion or if you could
kind of lean into something likethis and people were really
good at taking direction andkind of running with that, we
(26:00):
would have benefited greatlyfrom having some table reads
beforehand and I also think thatthat kind of helps build
chemistry early on amongst theactors.
But we didn't really have anissue with that because everyone
gelled so quickly.
That wasn't really an issue.
Speaker 2 (26:15):
That reminds me of a memory like our cast got so
tight, so quickly.
There was a moment where therewas a scene by a pond or a small
river and my direction was likeall right max.
The main character is off,brooding, he's alone, he's like
kind of in his feelings rightnow.
He doesn't want to socialize,but he's also jealous that you
guys kind of have this connectand you feel comfortable with
(26:38):
each other.
And he's still trying to findthat, and so I want you guys to
kind of be like thevisualization of family and
having fun and like helping eachother out after a long day.
You're all like bathing in thewater and they're like all right
, got it.
And then so I went off to doanother thing for like a minute
and then I come back.
I was like all right, actressset, and then I genuinely could
not tell that they were actingbecause they were already so
(26:59):
tight.
So I thought they were stilljust like talking about whatever
, and so I thought they werestill just like talking about
whatever and I was like guys,come on, let's go.
And then I remember Carolinelooked at me like this is it
Liam?
Like we're ready.
I was like oh oh, okay, Sorry mybad, and so like, yeah,
everyone was just on top of it.
I couldn't have asked for abetter chemistry between the
cast, and all the cast memberswere so nice to each other too.
(27:20):
There was never, ever likedanything close to an issue.
It was great, right, very cool.
Speaker 3 (27:24):
So what's next for y'all?
I mean, I know you just saidyou're about to have your
premiere.
Any plans, any thoughts?
Speaker 1 (27:36):
or you just need a break, caleb.
Do you take that one?
We don't have any plans yet forwhat our next project is going
to be.
That's not saying that there'snot going to be a next project.
It's just we have to take thetime to kind of deliberate and
think about what it's going tobe.
But I think after we releasewe're going to take a little bit
of time to kind of build up ourstudio and more and make it a
little bit more official,because we don't even have a
logo yet.
We're kind of just like usingwhatever font the movie uses and
(27:58):
just typing our name out andthat's our logo.
For the next little bit, yeah,just coming up with and
establishing what Magic NumberStudios is to everyone and to
its members and kind of what ourgoals are in terms of bringing
people in, that just passion ismore important than anything
else and dedication to the craftand so bringing in people that
(28:19):
are equally as passionate as usand equally willing to kind of
get into the nitty gritty andfigure it out, and just kind of
establishing ourselves more andkind of figuring out what we
want to do going forward.
Speaker 4 (28:33):
Are y'all going to run it out of Dallas?
Are you going to staydecentralized until everybody's
in one place?
Speaker 1 (28:40):
Yeah, definitely decentralized.
Or is it top secret?
Speaker 4 (28:43):
That's okay too.
Speaker 1 (28:45):
No, not top secret.
I mean we don't even know yet.
It's decentralized becauseeveryone's still.
I mean we've got people inNorth, south, east and West.
People are all over.
At some point there will be amove to get everyone in the same
spot.
We will be so much moreproductive when we're all in the
same place.
It's kind of hard when it feelslike we're all living our
separate lives and you can onlyget to somebody through one of
(29:06):
these things.
That's definitely in the cardsfor the future.
It's just kind of CBD up in theair.
Yeah, Understood.
Speaker 2 (29:14):
I'm trying to convince people to come to where
I am, because whenever I drivethrough LA it's a little bit
intimidating.
The driving is intimidating inmy opinion, but the resources
are there.
So I'm like guys, just trust me.
I know it's expensive, but it'sworth it.
I think we can do good stuffout here.
So I'm still working on that.
Maybe they'll win me over tolike moving to austin.
Speaker 4 (29:33):
We'll see, I don't know there's been a lot of work
in austin.
Speaker 3 (29:37):
I see stuff all the time casting calls louisiana
just pre-approved the new seasonof tax credits.
Speaker 4 (29:44):
I'm just saying I saw that I mean it was a close call
.
We thought it was going to gothe other way.
Speaker 3 (29:51):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (29:51):
It seemed like we might lose the tax credits, and
if that happened everythingwould dry up and spread out even
more to Atlanta, and I meanthere's a lot happening up in
Boston too.
Speaker 2 (30:02):
Boston's starting to sprout again.
The early 20-teens there was alot happening up in Boston too.
Yeah, boston's starting tosprout again.
The early 20 teens there was afilm scene kind of building up
and it kind of died down COVIDand everything died down and now
I see it sprouting again.
So lots of fun options.
Speaker 3 (30:15):
Guys, this is the last of our time together today.
It's been a blast.
Caleb and Liam, thank God thatI can read your names on the
screen, because I'm old and Iforget things, but it's been a
pleasure talking to you.
It's fascinating.
I can't wait to see where yougo next.
Speaker 4 (30:30):
Yeah, guys.
Speaker 2 (30:31):
Thank you so much and thank you for having me.
I can't wait to see where thispodcast goes.
I know TJ's passion.
I only got to talk with him forone podcast.
I'm excited, thank you.
I hope you guys have us backwhenever we shoot something new.
Yeah, of course.
Speaker 4 (30:48):
I hope I get to work with y'all again.
Speaker 2 (30:54):
We'll have you back to talk about how you brought us
to where you were filming andput us on.
Speaker 3 (30:56):
Exactly, was that too much TJ, was that too much?
Speaker 4 (30:59):
No.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
We got to plug ourselves with the future of
filmmaking.
Speaker 4 (31:06):
Some people say I'm too pushy, and they're right.
No, no, no, that sort of isgood, they're right.
You have some social media thatyou want to plug.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
Yeah, you can find us on most platforms.
We've got Instagram, we've gotTikTok, we've got YouTube.
It's all Magic Number Studios.
Just one big word the film willbe premiering on YouTube Stream
.
Last of Us Immunity, december20th.
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