BPS 447: Turning a Script into a Movie: The Indie Filmmaking Story of Jamie Buckner

Jamie Buckner’s filmmaking journey is one built on passion, persistence, and pure creative drive. After exploring careers in music, architecture, and art, he realized filmmaking combined everything he loved into one pursuit. Starting as a production assistant, Jamie worked his way through Hollywood’s ranks on major films like Seabiscuit, The Departed, and John Wick: Chapter Two. But while learning from industry giants, he continued writing his own scripts — most notably Split, a romantic comedy centered around bowling. Determined to bring his vision to life, Jamie self-financed the project, ran a successful Kickstarter campaign, and transformed a short proof-of-concept into a full feature film.

His experience on Split became a masterclass in independent filmmaking — from balancing day jobs to managing budgets, post-production challenges, and distribution. The result was a feel-good movie that found audiences on multiple streaming platforms. Through his story, Jamie reminds aspiring filmmakers that creativity must be paired with discipline, resourcefulness, and an unshakable belief in your own ideas. His message is simple but powerful: if storytelling is in your blood, keep writing, keep filming, and never stop creating — because that’s what makes you a true filmmaker.


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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
You are listening to the IFH podcast Network. For more
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Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, Episode number four forty seven.
Your dream doesn't have an expiration date, Take a deep
breath and try again. Kat You Whitten broadcasting from a dark, windowless.

Speaker 1 (00:25):
Room in Hollywood when we really should be working on
that next draft. It's the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, showing you
the craft and business of screenwriting while teaching you how
to make your screenplay bulletproof.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
And here's your host, Alex Ferrari. Welcome, Welcome to another
episode of the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast.

Speaker 3 (00:44):
I am your humble host Alex Ferrari.

Speaker 2 (00:46):
Now, today's show is sponsored by Bulletproof Script Coverage.

Speaker 4 (00:50):
Now.

Speaker 2 (00:51):
Unlike other script coverage services, Bulletproof Script Coverage actually focuses
on the kind of project you are in the goals
of the project are, so we actually break it down
by three categories micro budget, indie film, market and studio film.
There's no reason to get coverage from a reader that's
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(01:13):
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So if you need your screenplay or TV script covered
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(01:34):
Enjoy today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.

Speaker 3 (01:39):
In this next episode, I have a filmmaker who comes
to us from Louisville, Kentucky. He lives in New York now.
He has worked with some of the biggest directors of
all time. He's worked on as a production manager, production coordinator,
he's worked as a PA, He's worked his way up,
and he's also made his own movie. And we talked
about how he found time to actually write this thing

(02:00):
as he as he's going to all these different productions
and what did he learn by reading all these scripts
and all this other good stuff. So sit back and
get ready to hear tail about two filmmakers, each of
whom has a movie called Split. This isn't Split, the
one with m Night Shyamalan. By the way, if have
you listened to the episode with producer Mark Bienstock. I

(02:22):
was actually his TA when he was teaching at Drugson
University here in Philadelphia. It's a great episode, by the way,
we kind of brush on that in this episode. But
this is a different split. This is a bullet This
is the romantic bowling movie split with guests Jamie Buckner.

Speaker 4 (02:41):
Yeah, I would go to say many few you know, really,
what's a number? It's a number? How many years ago? Yes,
So there are many short and long versions of this,
but so effectively, I back in high school sort of
came to this revelation. Well, I guess it was kind
of early college trying to figure out a college major. Basically,

(03:02):
I started as an art major, thinking like, okay, I
like to draw, maybe I could. I kind of wanted
to draw comics for a little while, didn't really tried
that for a little bit, found out that wasn't for me,
and was like, all right, maybe I'll be a music major.
I love making music. I've been playing bass and guitar
for a while. Let me like learn the actual like
mathematics of music and like learn to read it and

(03:23):
learn the theory and all that sort of stuff. Got
into that that wasn't for me. I thought I was
gonna be architect for a while thought, and I just
kind of dabbled in so many different things, and it
just sort of dawned on me at one point. I
think it was just mid conversation with a friend about
how I had always been really into movies just as
of just a thing. It's just like I was like
the guy that people talk to about movies. I was

(03:44):
like really into particular directors and particular types of genres
and all these things. Like I was just one of
those kids back in the nineties that was just you know,
I'm sure you count yourself amongst this number. That was
just like one of the you're like, oh, yeah, the
movie guy. That's Jamie. You'll talk to Jamie. I'll tell
you all about like, you know whatever, different Spielberg, you know,
Tarantino coming around at the time, you know, like down

(04:06):
to you know, like I was getting into sturges and
like truefaux and stuff like that, like whatever, just all
of the like early days like film nerids stuff, And
it sort of dawned on me at a certain point
that all of these things that I had been dabbling in,
and I was sort of interested in from a creative,
creative way of looking at things, all sort of came

(04:26):
together in this one medium. All sort of were just like,
you know, storyboarding is drawing, you know, music is heavily
involved in you know, you know, even photography. It just
basically everything that I really sort of wanted to do
but didn't want a hard commit to one or the
other all sort of came together in this one thing
that I already loved. So I went to Northern Kentucky

(04:48):
University up by Cincinnati, which did not have a film program,
but what did have a terrific theater program and had
what was is now known as an informatics eMedia program,
but back in the day when I was going there
was just a communications a radio and television communications program.
Took all of the film ish movie ish classes that

(05:08):
I could screenwriting, playwriting and all that sort of stuff
as well, sort of made the best of what was
available there, and read a lot of books on my own,
screenwriting books, you know, production books, film theory books, et cetera,
or so on. And one day, as I was working
in a Sunglass hut in downtown Cincinnati, I saw in

(05:29):
the Tower Place mall that I was working in. There
was a flyer for people to come to a certain
hotel on a certain day to be extras in the
movie Seabiscuit, this horse racing movie that was shooting down
in Lexington. So I go. Turns out I fit the
costume parameters, which is really all you needed to do
to be a part of that, and I went in
was an extra in the movie Seabiscuit in freezing cold

(05:51):
November of two thousand and two, I believe, and maybe
three I think it was two thousand and two, But
I got down there. I slept on the floor of
my friend's dorm room at Eastern Kentucky University, and I
bugged the holy hell out of all of the production
people down there until they would give me the time
of day. I made just enough friends to make some

(06:12):
more friends from there, to make some more friends from there,
started working as a camera person camera pa as I
was also mid mining as a day school teacher during
the day at my old high school. Worked on an
indie project for a director that is also from louisvill
who's a good friend of mine now who we've actually
worked on several other projects together. So on and so forth.

(06:34):
Did his many project because I could in Kentucky. Ultimately
decided to move to New York versus La. Came up
to New York, worked on my first production up here,
which was this movie that was a remake of The
Honeymooners called The Honeymoers with like John Maguizamo and Cedric
the Entertainer. I believed, but that was a few weeks.
It was my first job. My foot was in the
door up there up here in New York. That happened

(06:57):
to be happening in the same building as the production
office for War of the Worlds. They called downstairs and
were like, do you have any PA's that are, you know,
not terrible? Luckily they threw my name in there. I
worked on more of the Worlds for a little while.
I have some cool stories from that. That was fun.
Office uptown for the new Martin Scorsese movie The Departed
calls same question, do you have any pas that aren't awful?

(07:18):
And they're like, yeah, this kid's not terrible. We dig him.
He's kind of fun to be around and he doesn't
screw things up too bad. So I end up working
on The Departed for almost a year, and then another
Warnerbers movie comes after that, called August Rush, So we
stay in the same office, we work on that, and
I'm now in with this team, and we roll on
from another production to another production, and then I you know,

(07:38):
and the resume kind of speaks for itself from there.
It just kind of it just becomes this. You work
with enough people and they get jobs and they call
and see what you're doing, and you go and you
bounce onto that, and you bounce onto that, and all
the while I was still working on my own things
and shooting music videos for friends bands between jobs and
doing little shorts when I could doing those silly, little
weak make a movie in a weekend, forty eight hour

(07:59):
projects in all that time, working on this, rewriting, rewriting, reworking,
planning for Split, my first feature, which we just put
out last August. So that is sort of the I'm
sure I missed some things, but that is basically the

(08:19):
trajectory of how I got here.

Speaker 3 (08:22):
Yeah, I see, I'm actually looking at your IMDb right now,
and like you were a production coordinator on john Wick
Chapter two. I actually had the writer of john Wick
one and two. Derek Cole said on the podcast before
how is.

Speaker 4 (08:34):
He's like the coolest guy on the planet. He found
out me and one of our coworkers on that was
from Kentucky, and he bought us a bottle of Woodford
Reserve bourbon that I had somehow never seen. I'd never
seen this size available, this size of bottle, and we
somehow managed to go through almost all of it over
the course of late nights in met office. But no,

(08:56):
Derek is the coolest guy too. He would just like,
he know, I'm just some random schmo working on the production.
He has no reason to be sitting there and shooting
and you know, shooting the breeze with us until the
wee hours of the night. But we would just talk
about movies and I think we talked about The Twilight
Zone in particular episodes we love for like two hours
one night, and he's just a what a red guy

(09:18):
that Derek is, right. I'm sure I gotta go back
and listen to that episode. I didn't realize you had
him on.

Speaker 3 (09:22):
That's cool, yeah, really really cool guy. And I got
introduced to him to another writer friend of ours, and
I was like, this guy's not gonna say yes to
come down and show them with me and he was like, yeah,
I'd love to.

Speaker 4 (09:34):
Yeah, of course he will. Yeah, he's great.

Speaker 3 (09:35):
Yeah, fantastic guy. And I'm actually really glad too that
John Wick both one and two were box office hits
as well as critical hits, because I love to see
when good things happen to good people.

Speaker 4 (09:45):
Oh yeah, absolutely, Oh yeah. You always you always, you know,
you always want that to be the case. Like, and
it's funny. I've seen I've seen it go all different
sorts of directions where the people you know again on
this in the spirit of positivity will necessarily named names,
and people who aren't such great salt of the earth people.

Speaker 2 (10:03):
Will be right back after a word from our sponsor
and now back to the show.

Speaker 4 (10:12):
Like you're Derek, Coolestad's of the world have success and
you're kind of like, yeah, all right, that's going to
perpetuate some bad behavior. Or I've also seen some people
that are really really terrific, like just really great, really fun,
really talented people in a movie's tank and it's that's
a bummer to see too. But so yeah, when the when,
the when the optimum scenario happens and it's just really

(10:33):
good people make really good work and it's really successful.
It's that's that's what we're all hoping for.

Speaker 3 (10:39):
Of course, yeah, absolutely, And you know, I just going
back to your career, you know, as you as you
know you worked on as crew for all these films. Again,
I'm looking at your IMDb and you know, how did
you find the time to actually sit down and write Splits?
I mean, I know it started off as a short
film before you made it into a feature, so you know,

(11:00):
back in twenty ten, you know, when you made this short.
You know, how did you find the time between these jobs?
You know, because it seems like you're going from job
to job, you know, production and production, So how did
you find the time to actually sit down and write
write this out?

Speaker 4 (11:12):
You know, you just kind of have to if the
original script I've had sort of with me for a while,
like from when I first started working in production basically,
and it's really just been a matter of, like you
just have to if what you want to do is
be creative and you don't want it, because it's really

(11:32):
easy to get stuck. I could just completely just rest
on my laurels, keep working and keep doing what I
do well and just you know, and I'll eventually you know,
you know, just keep correction, managing, supervising and things and
wine producing smaller things and then mind producing bigger things.
And then I'm on said, you know, I could do that,
and next thing, you know, I'll blink. I'm six years
old and I'm doing really well, but not exactly what

(11:55):
I want to be doing. So if you really want to,
and it's just easy to get stuck in any particular discipline,
you know, like there's people who get stuck in the
camera department who would rather be you know, writing or
directing or whatever, and that's not a terrible transition, but
like there are people you know that end up being
key grips or gaffers that feel like they can't make
the transition because the money gets good at a certain
point and they just kind of keep working or art

(12:17):
department locations, you know, you can, you kind of There's
so many different little specific disciplines that are super important
to various productions, and you don't want to make light
of any of those at all. But if it's not
where your heart is one hundred percent, you just kind
of always have to find the time when you can
without compromising your you know, your day to day work.
I just I just always prioritize fining in the time

(12:40):
whenever I could to go back and do a little
rewriting or go back and do a little uh, you know,
prep work of like you know, trying to figure out
where locations would be. And we're talking about over the
course of years and years, you know, like in talking
to different actors and talking to different writers helping give
me notes, and you know, the producers talking about how like,

(13:01):
you know, how do you raise money for these things?
How do you set up a you know, a small corporate,
you know, because you end up being a small business
basically when you make a movie, it not even basically
you are a small business. You have to you have
to basically teach yourself how to be an entrepreneur in
a very sort of tweaked way. But you really, I

(13:22):
just I just kind of made the time. You know,
Like if I if we got done shooting early on
a production and like I had a few hours left
in the office and everybody who was like, oh, quitting time,
I'm going a happy hour, I would you know, be like,
all right, guys, great, just you know, leave one light on.
I'm gonna stay here for five or six hours. And
you know, like pound away on my script or like
you know, I also would work on other scripts to

(13:42):
sort of like you know, get a fresh eye on
a different story and sort of think outside of the
the like Bowling rom com Box and like go and
like do a script contest and like write a horror
movie in ten pages and then that would somehow inform
a oak somewhere within, you know. So you really just

(14:02):
sort of have to always the creative muscle, I'd like
to think, and you know, there's much wiser people that
can probably say it much better than me, But I
think the creative muscle and like the energy that you
that you put into it are just very important. It
has to be constant because it's like a muscle, you know,

(14:22):
it's exactly like it's exactly what it is, like, it
will atrophy if you don't exercise it regularly. So as
far as how I did it, I don't. I don't.
Just basically every moment that I can find free that
you know, you also have to fund time for rest too,
like I'm not just completely twenty four to seven, like
you get You've got to be wise enough to know

(14:43):
when to take a break when you're actually burning a
candle at both ends, and you're compromising other parts of
your life, or you're compromising the creativity, or you're compromising
the paycheck job, you know, and none of those things
can happen. So you just have to be very keenly
aware of how important with all of this as well.
But whenever I had an opportunity, I'd be writing or

(15:07):
talking to people about raising money, or you know, talking
actors or talking a little little bit of this, a
little bit of that. And then it finally came to
a point where I thought, Okay, if we're going to
do this, let's take the first like seven or eight pages.
I forget what it was of the script. Let's do
what I think I'd heard other people do before. At
that point, and I was like, I think we're gonna

(15:27):
have to do a kickstarter to raise enough money to
start raising money, because I knew it would cost a
little money to get a lawyer to start a company
to you know, get a couple of wheels rolling to
then like then be able to go out and like
actually raise private equity. So I was like, I think
I want to do a kickstarter to raise money in
order to start raising real money. In order to do that,
I would like to do what I started referring. People

(15:49):
called it a sizzle reel. I hate the term sizzle
reel because it's just not what this was. And people
kept referring to it as that, and I get the
place of a sizzle reel. I don't even know if
people say that anymore, but it just drove me crazy.
I don't think. I don't know it's called proof of concept. Now,
that's okay. See that's what I started calling it, not
even knowing anyone called that that. So that's funny because

(16:10):
I was just like, this is my this, This will
be like my my like proof of concept piece. This
will be my Hey, we're gonna make a bowling rom com.
Oh does that sound silly? Well, I don't think it's
completely silly. Here's exactly what I had in mind, so
that you can put in front of like a potential
investor or an actor. This is what I have in mind.
So we shot that two days over a weekend in Queen.

(16:32):
I still stand that. I think I'm the only person
ever to shoot Queens for Kentucky. So we shot this
in like a double decker bowling alley way on in
Queen's with It's so funny that short. Just the cast
that we got for that short is now all super famous,
which is hilarious. So but it was so there was

(16:53):
just this killer group of people called in all these favors,
like we are the top eighties in New York. I
was is just a buddy of mine. I was like, hey,
you wouldn't come do this on a weekend, would you?
It's like, yeah, I'm free whatever, that's fine. And it's
like when it's like when you shoot something, you shoot
something in New York or you shoot something in LA.
People you know, it's it's oddly it's good, not hot

(17:14):
at all, actually, come to think of it, it's just
it's easier to get top crew, top cast. Not that
not that there's not amazing people all over the country,
and specifically in Kentucky we have a great group. But
like as far as like these people that are like living, eating,
breathing in the industry and doing it like on a
sort of like a more visible skit national and global scale.
These people live in New York and LA. And if

(17:36):
you're shooting in New York or LA, they're much more
ready to just be like, yeah, cool, can I just
hop on the subway and get there. Fine, yeah, I'll
be there whatever, some big deal. You can pay me
whatever you can. It's fine if you know it's It
gets a little trickier when you're like, hey, can you
come to three weeks for Kentucky and I'll put you
in a hotel and whatever. They're like, oh, I don't know,
my kids are in school or I got this other

(17:57):
thing going. Whereas if it's just down the street, you know,
they're much more they're much more game for it. So yeah,
so in that short, we've got like Tommy Sadowski who's
now on Wife and Pieces and like, you know, he's
just got his feet kicked up in CBS heaven. Uh,
and you know Keith Talell who was on thirty Rock,
My turnis who you know was on Orange is the

(18:18):
New Black? Just amazing. But so yeah, we did the
short and then oh my god, I totally forgot the question.
Listen to me rambling. What was your Well?

Speaker 3 (18:30):
I was just about how you found time to actually
write in between jobs.

Speaker 4 (18:33):
Oh yeah, that's do you see how half topic I
got on that? I I don't know, man, I don't
really have a great answer for it. You just kind
of have to find it. You just have to make
the time. You know.

Speaker 3 (18:47):
Well, and you know you touched on something too that
I previous guest, James Altacher, he touched on this as well.
And creativity is he calls it a muscle. He calls
it his idea muscle of coming up with these ideas.
And you know, he's like, that's what happens it actuphies
if you don't use it. And so when you were
saying that, I'm like, that's exactly why he puts it
as well.

Speaker 4 (19:07):
Yeah, I mean, it's just one of those things and
I feel it sometimes. Well, it's also one of those
things where if you're gonna be in this industry, how
do I say this in like a positive way, because
it's it's it is a positive thing, but saying it
and when I've said it previously, it kind of doesn't
sound terribly positive. You sort of have to be crazy,

(19:30):
You sort of have to be a little bit obsessed
and stubborn and just in order to do this business
in order to live and eat and breathe it and
just have it be what you do. And it took
me a few years to get to the points where finally,
like I was just like, this is what I do.
I am a filmmaker, I am a storyteller, I am

(19:51):
a movie TV you know, a new media like whatever,
Like I've I've lost, I have no other bankable skills.

Speaker 2 (20:02):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
and now back to the show.

Speaker 4 (20:11):
I'm literally this is just what I do. And in
order to sort of be in it to that level,
you kind of have to have no other options. Because
there are certainly days when I have, say like specifically
on like certain productions, if like some nightmare thing happens
with like an actor or producer's travel, or like you know,

(20:32):
something bad happens on set with a piece of equipment.
It's any number of things that I could tell you
probably one hundred stories. Like you know, I'm living the dream.
I do what I love for a living. But there's
just like anything else, Like there's you know, there's crappy
days where I'm like, man, I wish I could just
work at a call center and go home at five
point thirty every day and like go to happy hours

(20:55):
and it just like have a nice, happy little light
still living. Can Ducky just live down the street from
my parents go to like, you know, like I kind
of like this part of me certainly at times that
are just like, wouldn't life just be easier if I
would be okay doing not all of this? And the
answer is yeah, maybe, but I just I internally don't

(21:19):
I if I was not doing this and one is
not doing this exhaustive, sometimes insane, you know, often being
asked to pull off the impossible. If I wasn't doing
this production thing, if I wasn't doing the storytelling thing.

(21:39):
And this is including you know, my like day job,
production work on like other bigger productions, and my own work,
you know, Like I barely left my apartment yesterday. I
finally had to leave and go outside and walk the
dog at ten thirty pm because I'd been stuck in
here writing my next writing this next script all day yesterday.
I woke up at eight o'clock in the morning and
I was just here like a shut in, just all day.

(22:01):
And it's you just kind of have to have a
little bit. You just got to be a little bit off,
but in all the right ways, you know, And it's
and it's and I wouldn't trade it for the world,
but there's certainly times where I'm just like, oh, I
can't I just go and work at Like why can't

(22:22):
My dad worked at like a ge assembly line for
thirty forty years in Kentucky, like making washing machines. You
know what. He's perfectly happy now he's retired. He watches
westerns all day, goes on long walks. I just, you know,
I just you know, I can't even picture myself ever retired.
People like, what are you gonna do? You know, you know,
when you retire, And I'm like, who retires from making movies?

(22:43):
We're all like, blessed with this opportunity to do this.
I'll probably do this until they like drag me lifeless
off of the set somewhere, like, I don't know why
I would ever retire from it. I just like, it's
I'm doing it. But if you're not doing it because
you love it, then then you're legitimately a crazy person
because go do something else. It is it is hard, yeah,

(23:06):
you know hard. I stay away from the word hard people.
This always comes up when people are talking about, oh,
how do you raise money for the movie, and you know, people, oh,
raising money is the hardest part. Raising Money's hard. I
don't like to call anything that we do and I
just slipped up on my own on my own advice there.
I hate calling anything that we do hard because you know,
digging ditches is hard. You know, working in the coal

(23:29):
mines is hard. Construction work is hard. You know, working
in the heat and not having a job and living
in a third world country. You know that that that
stuff is all hard. What we do is we're blessed
to be able to like, you know, to do what
we do for a little you know, I show up
to work and there's like a truck full of catering
that will make me whatever I want. I stay away

(23:50):
from the word hard with anything that we do. But
it's but the hours are tough and the sometimes the
conditions are not ideal. So if you can be doing anything,
and then I've it's broken to some college classes, you know,
and I've told you, what would you recommend if the
you know, you know whatever, Like there's always like the

(24:10):
basic questions. I'm like, if you think you can do
anything else, if there is a world in which you
do not have the internal drive where you absolutely have
to be doing this for like, with all of who
you are, you should one hundred percent. Just go do
that because it's going to be easier again, easier whatever.
You know what I'm saying, it's it's it's going to
be it's going to lead to sort of a emotionally

(24:36):
and this sort of is spiritually the right word. I
don't it's if you're not going to be happy putting
in what has to be put in to work in
this industry, then just don't do it. Don't put yourself
through it, because it can be. It can be, it
can be pretty, it can be pretty brutal to a degree.
Just you know, it's mostly just about the hours and

(24:56):
the and the expectations of like when people expect you
to be available for them to certain degrees. And again
that's and sometimes when I'm working in production, that's just
people that are creative types. And I'm just like, now
I get it. Listen. Especially the since I left doing
regular production, you know, regular like sort of like my
normal production stuff and went and made the feature. I'm like, well, listen,

(25:20):
I get it. I'm then I was that guy, you know,
and I was never like calling people at three o'clock
in the morning and being like, you know, we need
to change everything, but you know, I got it. I
was like, listen, the creative end of it and the
production end of it feed into each other and definitely
overlap in a lot of ways. But they also are
you're sort of serving different masters to a degree, but
ultimately not You're also serving the story, you're serving the product,

(25:44):
you're serving what goes on the screen. But anyway, again,
I'm all over the place, but it's.

Speaker 3 (25:51):
All good, Jamie. I tend to have that effect on people.

Speaker 4 (25:56):
You're like a therapist. You're just giving me the opportunity
to ramble.

Speaker 3 (26:00):
Honestly, if you go back and listen to episodes, like
one out of every two guests, we'll say, Dave, I
don't know why, but every time I come on you podcast,
I just start rambling or I go in those other
directions or you know. And I said, no, it's a
I have that effect on people, you know, longer answers
and stuff like that. I think it's a great thing. Actually,
So I mean it's it becomes a stream of consciousness,

(26:21):
you know, and it's good.

Speaker 4 (26:22):
And make sure you'd get out of here. That's what
I think.

Speaker 3 (26:25):
Oh, thank you very much. You may appreciate that. And
then you know, we as we talk about screenwriting. You know,
I wanted to ask you when you were working all
these other different productions. You know, I'm sure at one
point or another you got to read the screenplay. Did
that have like a lot of effect on you? How
of how to actually, you know, write screenplays? Because because
you know you're actually seeing movies, I mean, you're you're
beyond a reader at that point, because now you're actually

(26:48):
you know, any of these movies are actually in production
right now, so there has to be something valid about
this screenplay. Did you ever get a chance to read
the screenplays? And if so, you know, what did you
take away from?

Speaker 4 (26:59):
Oh? I mean, I it's funny. I've worked with some
people on productions that you know, I'll be like, oh,
and then did you read this in the script? And this?
I read them immediately, sometimes before I even start. I
It's one of the first things I asked, when asked
for when I'm even considering doing a project, be like, well,
let me see the script and if you know, if

(27:20):
it makes sense it speaks to me. I meanwhile, go
back and look at my resume. They haven't all been
me being really choosy about the content. But but I
try to be. I do try to. I do try
to make sure that I it's something that I enjoy
working I would enjoy working on. So yeah, I read
the screenplays every time I have worked with people that

(27:43):
don't know because there's certain disciplines within the making of
like a movie or TV show where you don't necessarily
have to read. Like every screen show, up to set,
people tell you what to do, it gets done, you
go home whatever, which is certain certain crew positions. But
with mine, as I've as I've progressed sort of up
the proverbial ladder there. I yeah, I find it crucial

(28:08):
to read the screenplay and I mean it's funny to me.
It has definitely affected my writing. I one of the
one of the first scripts I read really affected me,
and it was as specifically really affected split as I
had the opportunity to work on Elizabethtown, which was Cameron Crowe,

(28:29):
which is one of my still is. Say what you
will about his recent the steps we might call him,
but I uh, I love the guy. I think he's
a master. I think he's great. This showtime show rodies
that he did. It was not perfect, but I enjoyed it.

(28:51):
But so I got to work on Elizabethtown. I was
so I was so young at that point too. I
was so just over the moon that one of my favorites,
probably at the time, my favorite writer director was coming
to my town to make a movie and it was
amazing and I got to work on it and he
was super cool and I have all these great stories
from it. But I got to read that script and

(29:12):
I it was just this revelation of just like, Wow,
this is good writing. And I can't explain what it
was about it. It was just the way it flowed
the way it felt like. It felt like Cameron Crowe
is a director that I knew him to be just
because I had seen his movies, was speaking directly to me,

(29:33):
like was talking to me about the movie he was
gonna make. As I was reading the script, and I
could hear the characters and they were right in front
of me, and it was just like this incredible experience
where I was like, Oh, this is good writing. It's terrific.
And then that was also a very interesting learning experience

(29:55):
because say what you will about that movie.

Speaker 2 (29:58):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
and now back to the show.

Speaker 4 (30:07):
It did not quite turn out to be as good
of as a movie as I thought the screenplay was.
I worked on a movie called It was The Business
Trip at a certain point, and I guess it ended
up being this Vinces Fawn movie Unfinished Business. I think
they changed the title too. That script. I read it
on the train up to Boston as I was going

(30:29):
to work on that movie, and I was laughing out
loud like a crazy person, and it was one of
the funniest things I had ever read. Somehow the movie
came out and it's like they had tried to take
all the funny out of it. I don't know what
happened in between and I was there. I don't know
if that's editorial, I don't know if that's I don't know.

(30:49):
And it was a great group of people working on it.
It was a great group of actors. I don't It
was very strange, but that movie, you know, and I
think I think that's the opinion held roundly about it,
is that it just was not exactly an A plus
effort from most of the people involved, which is very
funny because the script, the jokes were very tight, it

(31:10):
was very it was a very funny thing. Like I
was like, this could be the next hangover. This is
gonna be really funny, and then there it went. But yeah,
I always, you know, and I read them a little
differently now, Like, especially from a production standpoint, I'll be
like reading through it and I'll just start clocking annoying
production things like oh, house on fire, okay, Oh there's

(31:32):
some kids all right, dogs, birds, that's annoying okay, and
oh glass breaking. You know, just like little things, you
sort of read them differently. It's like when you make
you know this experience too, when you make them, or
when you work in this for a living, you're an
annoying person. To watch a movie with my wife, my
wife's brother. Actually, at one point we left, I forget

(31:53):
what movie we were saying. So my brother in law,
we were walking out of something. We started talking about
the movie me and Elizabeth my life. He said to me,
I always think I like a movie until I hear
you guys talk about so But yeah, no, I it
affected my writing, and it has affected my writing immensely

(32:15):
over time, just because I think a huge and again,
i'm you know, and I want to write and I
want to be you know. All I'm saying is like
I'm not this like hugely accomplished screenwriter. At this point,
I have written a lot, and I do really enjoy writing,
and I actually that's probably my favorite. I don't know.
I say that's my favorite of the disciplines and it's

(32:36):
the most rewarding to me. But then I'll get on
a set or I'll see something that I've done and
I'm like, oh, maybe directing, But I like directing stuff
I wrote to one feats to the other, whatever. But
it's it's I think that in order to I think
it's about fifty to fifty, honestly, Like, in order for
you to be a good writer, you have to constantly

(32:57):
be writing, but you also have to constantly be reading
the kind of work you want to be writing. You know,
it's kind of like making. It's a you know, it's
like directing as well, Like if you want to make movies,
you want to make TV. You can't just create in
a vacuum. You know, you should be watching quality work
as well and not necessarily mimicking that, but learning from that.

(33:17):
You know, what, who was who? Who are reattributing this
quote to? Now I forget who exactly said it, but
what is the artists creating geniuses steel. You know, yeah,
there you go. So it's you're not necessarily you're not
necessarily reading or watching things to be able to imitate them,
but but you're going to pull these sort of universal

(33:39):
ideas and truths out of them and sort of recreate
them in your own way, you know, Like I mean,
take you know, Split the Bully movie. We did, like
it is a very by the numbers romantic comedy, but
it was very important to me to you know, spin
the genre a little bit, not the least, you know,
not the least, which by making it the Bully Movie.

(34:02):
But you know, there are a couple other little points
where it was just kind of like, I don't I
won't borre you with that write in this particular instance,
but it's like, but yeah, the screenwriting. Being able to
read the work, especially like you're saying at the point
where it's like this is production ready, this is the
script you're going to go actually make. Reading that work

(34:23):
constantly over all of these years has one d I
think improved my screenwriting, and it also, you know, it
also makes it that much more like frustrating or interesting whatever.
When you're working on something you're just kind of like
this isn't that good? Like I don't understand why this
got picked to be made versus X, Y or Z
Blacklist script or like so and so other script that

(34:46):
is like just sitting on the shelf, you know, like
why is this happening versus all of these other things
that I know exist in the world. But yeah, no,
I mean I don't know all. Let in a very
long way to say, yes, I read the script. Yes,
I feel like I get and I'm very privileged to
be able to have access to that material from production
and production for sure.

Speaker 3 (35:07):
Yeah, it's you know true when you're when you're ever,
you're making something you know, and you're you're you want
to see what else is out there and you and
now because of the of the of the environment we
live in, you know, you can go online. There's there's
screenplay resources all over the place. You know, you want
to read the screenplay for whatever, you know, there's a
good chance it's out there. And so what happened?

Speaker 2 (35:23):
You know?

Speaker 3 (35:23):
I've read screenplays that for unproduced you know movies. I've
read screenplays for produced movies all sorts that stuff. Oh
did you just hear that update? Well, okay, cool, I
I just I had a chime just a couple of
my screen on my desktop. It was like, oh, you
have a Java update. Sorry about that. I sort of.

Speaker 4 (35:42):
Shed insert it in post because she'd make it some
big annoying thing. No, I didn't hear anything at all.

Speaker 3 (35:46):
It'll be like that bird crow from from Citizen Kane
where all of a sudden, you know, like it was
just going all of them. Wow, you know they and
they put that in there to wake up the audiences.
That was like their shock because it was Yeah. One
of producers was like, I feel this is going all along,
so or someone we'll put that in there.

Speaker 4 (36:04):
That's so funny. I've often h this is apropos nothing.
I always have my phone on vibrate. But I just
because you know whatever, being on sets and everything, I
just am afraid. But if I ever were to actually
have a ringtone, I really want to find the Wilhelm
scream and just have that be my ring tone, just
that like you know, like the Star Wars when the

(36:26):
Stormtrooper gets hit that like the movie trope that the
sound is sound people always put in there.

Speaker 3 (36:30):
They're like, wow, there's actually a good Willhelm scream YouTube
cut and somebody yeah, all.

Speaker 4 (36:37):
Of them, right, Yeah, yeah, it's so good. Yeah, that's amazing.

Speaker 3 (36:40):
You know it's funny. I do you remember ring back tones?
I know there's now we're going in a weird direction,
but do you remember ring back tones?

Speaker 4 (36:47):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (36:48):
I do.

Speaker 3 (36:48):
I always thought like, if you had a ring back tone,
what if you just had something like the Wilhelm scream
or something just completely ridiculous, just went over and over again. Yeah,
and the first is like, god, damn, answer your phone.

Speaker 4 (37:00):
Would be great. Yeah, I guess those went away. I
love it. Yeah, that's so funny. That's you're taking me.
I just listened to the last episode too, and it
was it was very funny you and oh my god,
I forgot the guy's name. It was on your old
tree centaer. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Talking about old video stores
is like, yeah, we remember old video stores. I'm like,
there's an old video store in my movie. Guys, the

(37:21):
old video stores are still around like that. The video
store we shot in is still in Louisville, Kentucky. But
you talking about all the screenplay sources online too, makes
me think when I first moved to New York and
there was still like the tables of like people in
Times Square would just like set up with like a
folding table and it would just be like printed copies
of like, hey, do you want to read Citizen Kane,
I've got it with a purple cover here for twist

(37:42):
twenty dollars, you know, and you'd go in like peruse
the like pile of printed out scripts. And that was
two like the Internet existed. It's just you know whatever,
you're right, it's totally funny. Any script if you want
to read produced unproduced. Yeah, And we go through on
you know, like on John Wick. On john Wick two,
we had like a code name, and like there was

(38:03):
all this security, all these different you know, watermarking, and
they like the intense amount of technology and security that
has to go into just keeping these things from keeping
the wrong people from getting a hold of these things
and just popping them up on the line, because it's
so easy for just like one person to just be like, hey,

(38:24):
there's a script of the new John Wick movie and
just zip it up online really quick. So there's so
much from a production standpoint, we have to like so
many hoops we have to jump through just to keep
you know, from random ye who's like getting a hold
of the copy and just throwing it up onto one
of those sites.

Speaker 3 (38:39):
Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. That's what happened
in Tarantino with with the Hateful Light. Was that something?
You know, somebody he gave the script out to somebody
and then somebody else was like, hey, look at this
Tarantino script and they photocopy, didn't put it up online.

Speaker 4 (38:52):
Yeah. Yeah, it's uh, it's it's it's a whole other operator.
I have a bunch of friend you know, because we're
carring New York and like all these Marvel Netflix shows
come through here and the amount of security, it's it
blows your mind how much security goes into just every

(39:12):
little Marvel production. It's the like they are probably the
most intense about it for good reason obviously, but they are.
Yeah there, it's you know, it's a whole new world.
You just have to and even like somebody's I feel
like I had a friend work on one of the
Transformers movies and they were down to just like, yeah,
we watermark and we also on like a certain page

(39:34):
within the draft will change one letter in a different
spot on that same page for every person that gets
a script. I'm like, seriously, is that a real I
still don't know if that's a real thing. I don't
even know how you would do that from a logistical standpoint,
but yeah, people were crazy about the security man. I mean,
but that would yeah, that would blow a movie. Honestly.

(39:55):
There are certain TV shows too, it's like everybody.

Speaker 2 (39:59):
Will be right back after a word from our sponsor,
and now back to the show.

Speaker 4 (40:08):
I also, though part of me finds it to be
a little bit too much sometimes because it's kind of like, listen,
how many how what percentage of your audience is for
like a TV show or a movie or whatever, what
percentage of that audience is going to be like, oh
my goodness, the script is online. I'm going to go
read that script. I don't know how much of the
general public is actually reading screenplays.

Speaker 3 (40:30):
But yeah, I don't. I think what they're afraid of
is the sort of like you know, nerd sites so
to speak, like me, but like I if I've got
a screenplay, I wouldn't be like, hey, here's all the things.
I think a lot of these sites that they're afraid
of that read screenplays will talk about them and then
all of a sudden, you know, someone's watching a YouTube video,
like you know, you know John Smith, who's not going

(40:51):
to read the screenplay, but he's watched this YouTube video
and they're just talking about it and now he's.

Speaker 4 (40:55):
Oh, sure, yeah, that's fair.

Speaker 3 (40:56):
That's why I think that they've sort of become locked
down the the A friend of mine and I were joking,
I think it was actual Mike actually Michael K. Snyder,
and we were joking around that the next big thing
in film is going to be a department created call
just called film security, where there's gonna be like literally
literally like somebody who's in charge or our team in

(41:17):
charge of scripts everything else, and be like everybody else
does their own thing now and we'll hand We'll be
the ones in charge of handing out the scripts, getting
them back at the end of the day, prostricting the
Wi fi, all that good stuff.

Speaker 1 (41:28):
You know.

Speaker 4 (41:29):
Oh that's listen, there's there's there are things. There are
productions that have that. There are productions that have that.
We I work on a show called Billions and several
other shows around New York that I know of, like
we have there's all kinds of little sub departments that
didn't exist that exists now, Like we have an entire
green department. You know, we have a you know green

(41:50):
quote unquote, but like an eco minded department that goes
from set to set and like make sure that all
of our trash is separated into like recyclables and composts
and all of those things. And you know, they're tracking
the carbon flip print of the entire production, like how
many people stayed in hotel rooms that are how many
square feet for how many nights? And who traveled on
what planes. It's intense. And then you know, down to

(42:11):
what I'm surprised hasn't started happening is that you have
to hire like a social media person on every production,
you know, someone who is specifically in charge of you know,
like hey, keep our Instagram, Twitter and you know, snapchat
whatever up like during production so that anybody who cares
to follow it can go follow it. You know that
there's so many just the technology and the way that

(42:32):
people are consuming things, the pace at which people are
consuming and the volume at which they're consuming is it's
just changing everything. So yeah, there's departments are just going
to keep popping up up until like we just have
everything covered. There's just going to be thousands of people
working on every little TV show, which is only going
to be good for people in my position because it
just means more work. So all good things.

Speaker 3 (42:56):
Yeah, and also I wanted to mention too, when I
was talking to Mike about the video stores that were gone.
I was just meeting like stuff like Blockbuster, Highwood Video,
those guys. I mean, there's small mom and pop places.
I actually there's one right up the street from me.
It's about thirty minutes away. But yeah, i know there's
still places here and there, and I'm glad they're still open, honestly,
because honestly, those are the places that that you know,

(43:18):
I'm you know, like Quentin Tarantino, he worked at a
local video store and stuff like that, and I love
just you know, you know, honestly, I'm actually starting to
go the other way, Jamie with a lot of things,
Like I used to be in love with Amazon and
how easy it was. Now now I'm just like, I'd
rather just go out now to a little mom and
pop place and buy, buy whatever the hell I'm looking for.

Speaker 4 (43:37):
I yeah, I'm you know, it's I go back and
forth because it's just so obviously it's easy. It's amazing
to do Amazon to order things online and you know,
and listen again, I'm in New York City. We like,
I barely even leave the apartment sometimes because the food
will come to me at three in the morning if
I want it to and whatever cuisine I like. So

(44:00):
the ease is terrific. But I know exactly what you're saying,
and I think I've reached a little bit of fatigue
with it as well. I recently started really buckling down
on ordering comics online because I have a great little
spot right down the street from me that's like a
little indie comic shop that sells a lot of zines
and sort of the you know, interesting more highly curated,

(44:22):
uh sort of titles. But then, you know, I hop
on the train and I get into Union Square and
I've got my little local comic shop here that has
just everything under the sun. And I spent a good
few years just ordering like you know, like, oh, the
new Saga's out, or oh the new Walking Dad or right,
and I would just order it on Amazon. And now
you know, I've really I've really kind of changed my

(44:42):
tone and just like, why am I it's right there.
I should just go down the street support these local businesses.
So yeah, No, I totally get that, and I think
and I think that's a thing that we're all probably
going to start experiencing, and it's only going to be
good for those little mom and pop businesses. I just
you know, brick and order stores. You want to talk

(45:03):
about a tangent, I could go off about how I'm
just convinced we're all going to be living the movie
Wally within the next like ten years. But you know,
we all just fight the goods, fight best we can.
But no, I'm totally on your on track with that
same as you.

Speaker 3 (45:19):
Yeah, I know, Mark Zuckerberg he announced his plan to
do away with the smartphone and it's all about AR
mixed with a little bit of VR mixed with a
little bit of AI. And it's just like I honestly,
I don't think that maybe if you if we baby
step this out, but I think like if you were
to try to radically just change things overnight, like with

(45:41):
with an AR VR AI combo, Like I think, what
he what he's trying to do where it's like, you know,
because there's also a company that's trying to get rid
of computers as we know them, and it's just going
to become that an augmented reality system where you're just
kind of like moving parts around. I'm just like, yeah,
that that might be good, but you know, I don't
know if how long that's gonna take for everyone to

(46:03):
actually transition. I mean, my god, they just killed fifty
six k modems in this country a while ago, right,
I mean, or an analog and analog cable signals.

Speaker 4 (46:13):
Though, man, there's still listen, there's still people all over,
you know, not necessarily a ton of people on the coast,
but there's people all over, you know, the middle of
this country that still have dial up internet, you know,
like it's it's I don't know, man, I don't think
that I even have I have guys on set. I
have guys that work on sets still that I'll be like, oh,

(46:33):
yeah'll email you a call sheet. No, no, I don't email.
You're gonna have to print me one, Like who are you?
How do you not have the email? But these people
still exist. So I think that you know, the Zuckerbergs
of the world, and you know Elon Musk and like
everybody's technology, everyone is just sort of stuck in this
loop of like it always has to keep going at

(46:54):
this exponential rate that it's been going. I'm not saying
it needs to slow down, but I think, like I
have a lot of thoughts about V that I just
am convinced VR. A lot of people are really hitching
their wagons to the VR thing, and I don't necessarily
I'm personally in this.

Speaker 3 (47:13):
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (47:13):
It's hard to when you're speaking from your own personal position,
like you know, it's hard to say, like, you know,
maybe the kids will be really into VR. I don't think.
I don't know. But I as a person sitting at
my age and what I do for a living, I
do not ever think I am going to watch a
movie specifically made or a television show or anything like

(47:33):
that that is specifically made for VR. I just I
just don't know that that content is ever going to
catch on for me or people like me. I just
don't think about it. I don't think, but I was.
But that being said, I do think that there are
very incredible and there's a lot of potential for VR
in a lot of ways. Because so I was out

(47:54):
at Sundance, not this year, but the past year, and
I got somehow another got looped in with like the
ILM people, and they were doing, uh a VR like demonstration.
I was like, all right, well let me see what
this is all about. It's im I'll see. So I
put on a helmet and whatever, and all of a sudden,
I'm on tattooed and there's bdaight and that great, the
coolest thing ever. So uh and they were like, well,

(48:14):
we do other movies too, And then all of a
sudden I was walking around with a velociraptor and I
was like, all right, this is actually too nope, too real. Stop,
I'm actually scared. Quit it. There's a velociraptor in my face.
So but they you know, and I was just like, okay, cool,
that was a fun trick. Guy. Thanks. And they were like,
well you work in movies, right, yeah, I mean that's
sort of my thing. They were like, all right, well
let's talk about some practical implications. So then they start

(48:37):
showing they flip it over to it was some production.
I don't know if it was for an actual production
or something that they just sort of mocked up. But basically,
if you're going to go, if you're working on a
movie and you're gonna build, say like in a however
many hundred thousand foot warehouse, a huge spaceship, or you're
going to build a mansion set or something like that.

(48:59):
There they started showing me these like schematics for these sets,
but they actually had built the sets out entirely in VR,
so that you could put a camera in a certain
camera position, see exactly what your shot was going to
be on your fake set that hadn't been built yet,
so that you could have every idea about every potential
shot in your movie on this set that was completely

(49:21):
not even existent yet, just through VR, so that you
wouldn't spend any money at all, being like, oh, no,
actually that doesn't quite work. We're gonna have to rebuild her.
Oh the measurements aren't quite You do all of your
pre planning in VR, and then you you know, it's
the whole like measure twice, cut once thing you've measured
a million times digitally, and then just go out and

(49:44):
build the thing, and everything's going to go exactly as planned,
you know. And I'm sure that's not exactly how it works,
but like that kind of thing is a practical application
that I think and you think about that, like you
can do that before you build a hospital. You can
do that before you like that's the real world stuff
that I think.

Speaker 2 (50:01):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
and now back to the show.

Speaker 4 (50:10):
VR is gonna be huge for I don't think VR
is gonna be a huge storytelling medium in the way
that people are sort of hitching their wagon too, If
that makes sense.

Speaker 3 (50:24):
Yeah, I concur I I just I think that VR
is gonna be a lot like what three D was,
where you know, the glasses and then they had to
watch you had to get the three D TV and
had a three D you know, Blu ray and And honestly,
of all the friends that I have who are huge
in the movies, the movie going experience, or the movies
every weekend, only one of them actually went out and

(50:46):
actually bought something like that. And he has a ton
of disposable income where he can actually buy stuff like that,
because like, honestly, even if I had like a ton
of extra money, I don't even think I'd buy that.
And it's and you know, I I just that same
way I feel about VR. I just would rather, you know,
have a better story. And plus I don't feel like

(51:06):
having my eyeballs burned out every which way I keep
turning because like smartphone screens are bad enough, and it's
just like I don't need to be staring at another
screen for twelve hours, fourteen hours a day. And but yeah,
so I mean, I yeah, I definitely concur about that.
I mean honestly that So that's why I think that,
you know, it's a lot of the trial and error
too with technology. I know you mentioned technology they always

(51:28):
have to feel like has always has to be pushed forward.
But even if we just you know, but I think
it's more of it there are trying to push it forward.
I agree with you on Matt, and I think I
think they realize too, like the Elon Musk's and the
and the exerc works, it's gonna be a lot of
trial and error because I mean, Elon Musk is the
CEO of three different companies, and I guarantee you I
honestly sometimes I think that he even knows he's overreaching,

(51:51):
and I think he just keeps doing it for for
you know, just because he either because he can or
maybe he just thinks, you know, if he throws up
enough hail Mary's, one of them has to pay.

Speaker 4 (52:00):
Right right right? Oh? Absolutely? Yeah? And hey, you know
what these are the people. These are the people in
large part giving us a lot of this great stuffs
that you know, Listen, I am look at what we're
doing right now. I am sitting in New York City,
You're sitting in Philadelphia. We I am speaking into the
air in my apartment and we are going to digitally
project this to the world at some point. You know,

(52:20):
it's where it's the whole Louis c. Cabe. Actually this
is the email signature in my uh when I send
an email just as sent from space because of this
whole Louis c. K bit where he's talking about some
guy yelling into his phone on the or is it
yea yelling about the Internet working on his on an
airplane or something. If it's just like give it a second.
It is going to space. Just give it half a second.

(52:46):
So like I I'm I'm always the first person to
just be like, guys, we are living in the future.
I talk to my I talked to one of the
three robots I have in my house, and I asked
that robot to turn the lights off when I go
to sleep at night. You know, I talk to my
Amazon Echo thing and I say Echo bedroom light off,

(53:07):
and it goes off, and I genuinely that has not
stopped being cool. You know, I gotta, I gotta, I gotta,
I gotta room to the vacuums my floor. I got
you know, it's you know, like whatever, like we were
living in the Jetsons guys, it officially happened, you know,
and it's it's funny, you know, growing up around the
same time. I think as I think we did you

(53:29):
ever off flying cars? Whatever? Guy's flying? Who needs flying cars?
That just sounds dangerous and terrible to me. We're talking
to robots in our house telling them to do things,
and we have all of the world's information at our fingertips.
No longer will you beat a bar being like, oh
and what was that movie with the one guy and
the thing? Yeah, that you have that answer. Anyone can

(53:50):
pull the computer out of their pocket and have that
answer in ten seconds.

Speaker 3 (53:54):
You know.

Speaker 4 (53:55):
It's the future is now, and I for one, just
love it. And you know, in large part, these are
the guys who are making this happen. This is so funny,
my echo, because like Star Trek, we've we've called her
a computer. So every time yep, she just came on again.
Sorry anyway, but man it, you know, I try not

(54:20):
to be like, all right, let's all slow down. It's
all moving too quickly, because I love it. I love
all the cool technology that we're able to play with,
especially within the especially within the storytelling space. Yeah, you know,
it's uh, it's all happening really fast. So it's like,
maybe instead of moving on to the next thing, let's

(54:41):
try to perfect some of the things that we have. Yeah. Yeah,
I don't know, but that's that's that's I feel like,
I feel like we've covered about twenty different conversations for
another time, but we'll just dive. We'll just diving into
them all here. And I love that.

Speaker 3 (54:57):
Yeah, I do want to talk about Split. I mean,
you know, just sort of going back to Split. I
do want to say, you know, you shot your short
film in twenty ten and then in twenty fifteen you
actually made it into a feature film, and you know,
I guess I know, we were talking about so many
different topics. I'm like, we actually should talk about Split.

Speaker 4 (55:16):
Well, that's what I'm telling you. That's what a great
interview you see somebody on like like a Stephen Colbert
or like an Old Letterman episode, and I just did.
At the very end, they're like, oh, right in your album,
let's talking, is your album come out? But yeah, I
mean we did. Yeah, we did the short in twenty ten.
We actually shot the movie in twenty twelve, came out
in August I think it was August second, twenty sixteen.

(55:38):
It was about four years of post which is what
happens when you you know, yeah, I'm sure it's been
said on this podcast probably a hundred times. Good, fast
and cheap. You know, I wasn't going to sacrifice good,
so I wasn't going to sacrifice good and I and
I couldn't sacrifice cheap, so fast went out the windows.
So I've had a lot of people working on favors,
and you know, if you have some who's doing a

(56:00):
lot of really great post production work for you, and
then they're just like, hey, I have to go to
Montreal to work on a movie that's gonna pay me
a lot of money and you're paying me none money.
Then I'm like, all right, cool, Well we'll just uh,
I'll do maybe some sound work over here with this
other part. You know, you just kind of have to.
So it took us a little while to get it

(56:21):
out into the world, but uh so yeah, we were
like in post production movie ready to go, you know,
for the most part, and just sort of like having
to get some other little pieces out. And then I
saw I think it was somebody just sent me a
text or something with the trailer of like coming to
Sodent from Nimnight Shump. No, you know what it was.
It was a news rooms like the announcement of the

(56:41):
fact that he was gonna make a movie called Split.
And I was like, oh boy, what's this gonna be,
you know, and people should we change the title, and
I'm like, no, it's our title. We were here first,
what are you talking about? But yeah, so yeah, So
we came out in two thousand and six, and it's
uh yeah, it's been a fun little ride, man, it's

(57:03):
you know, still continuing. We are on If you're an
Amazon Prime subscriber, we are one of the one of
the movies you can watch for free as part of
your Amazon Prime subscription. We are also available to rent
or purchase on iTunes. We're on. This is actually something
that's been amazing through the distribution process that I just

(57:23):
so much of it's new to me, but this particular
part they're like, okay, we're gonna put you. So you're
on iTunes. I'm like, okay, got it, Xbox Oh you can, okay,
that didn't know you could do that great PlayStation that
one too great? Also Voodoo so okay, what's that. It's
Walmart streaming service. Oh well, okay, cool, there's that I
just learned about. We're on probably I think I want

(57:45):
to say, like fifty different platforms. I knew maybe three
of them existed. So that's uh, that's been a fun
little ride. But yeah, man, it's it's it's just good.
You know, we just made a cute little movie and
everything that I said from the beginning, I was like, listen,
there's not enough bowling movies out there. I like rom comms.

(58:06):
Let's make a bowling rom com so that we're not
doing the exact same movie people have seen a hundred
times and we're having a little fun with it, and
I you know, I want people to go on like
a date night, or I'll want people's like folks to
go or somebody to be able to take their kids,
you know, probably around the age of twelve or thirteen
year older kids and just you know, walk out of

(58:27):
the movie and just say, huh, that was cute. All
I was going for. We're not changing the world here.
I'm not trying to make some sort of like huge,
amazing message. I just want people to leave say that
was cute, and then be like, you know what we
haven't done in a while, Let's go bowling. So then
then people are going bowling. And that's really just what
we set out to do, and that's what I think
we accomplish. It's been a lot of fun and it's

(58:49):
only been only been made a little bit more interesting
by the fact that one of the most polarizing directors
of a generation decided to make a multiple personality serial
killer movie. I'm the same name. That's it. It's about
where we are.

Speaker 3 (59:05):
Yeah, it's uh. As gain as we were talking about
me in the pre interview, I actually, you know, it's
just funny because about my friend who actually found Split.
I was like, oh, there's another movie out called Split.
Did you hear about this? And I said, I said yeah,
I said, actually I'm talking to the He looked at
me so odd. When I said yeah, I'm actually talking
to the director tomorrow. He goes, what, Yeah, are you

(59:27):
screwed with me?

Speaker 4 (59:27):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (59:28):
Here yeah, it's like what I'm because like because one
of my friends was finally like, he goes, Dave, I'm
just gonna ask you if you've heard of these guys.
He's like, you see to know everybody, And I said, well,
thank you. I try.

Speaker 4 (59:38):
But turned out turns out that's so funny. I had
a coworker who I guess it was back in like
February or March, had had went to go see The
Shaman Split and as they were walking out, somebody was like,
you know, I tried to find a stream of this online,
but I got some stupid bowling movie. Have you had?

Speaker 2 (01:00:00):
Be right back after a word from our sponsor and
now back to the show.

Speaker 4 (01:00:08):
It's also that's that's been that's been interesting, you know,
like it is is what it is. But you know,
people who are going out to watch a horror movie
that I guess on some sort of excites again things
I'm not familiar with, but I think like Torrents or streets,
something somewhere out in the world in a very popular place.

(01:00:30):
It seems that our movie has been basically it's all
of the artwork, all of the synopsis, everything completely out
there in the world for it pretty early on it
said split as if it were the Shamalan split. But
then you clicked on it and you got our movie.
So we've gotten a ton of people that were not

(01:00:51):
happy about that happening. So that's that's been you know,
it's been something. But you know, in fairness, there have
been there been you know, here and there, there have
been plenty, They've been plenty enough people, you know that
have just been like, hey, I found this totally wasn't
the horror movie, but it's pretty good. Great, thanks guys.
You know. But somewhere, somewhere, somewhere along the line on

(01:01:16):
some sort of like back channel torrent the put movies
up for free place, those wires got crossed. Actually iTunes
at one point, big you know, awesome apples. I'm all
on the Apple train. I love them all, I have
all their products. The hate at one point had what
was it it was our movie, it was our movie.

(01:01:36):
You it was where you went to like find hours.
But then down at the bottom all of the trailers
were for the Shyamalan movie. So it was like even
iTunes had some of their wires crossed, which is and
again and then apparently there's a third split movie that
came out in twenty sixteen that I you know that
is just out apparently like a completely out there sort

(01:01:58):
of my screw of a movie that I also haven't
you know that I that I haven't seen that I
know exists. So hey, you know what, it's a very
popular little five letter word. What can I say?

Speaker 3 (01:02:11):
We should sit down together, you myself, m Night Shyamalan,
and the other and another guy from that third split,
and we should the four of us can compare all
of them back and forth.

Speaker 4 (01:02:21):
Oh I what I wouldn't get? What I wouldn't give
to just hear from anyone in the like Shyamalan camped
to just say, hey, guys, yes, we know there's a
bowling movie. Isn't that funny? Like just something like how
many people? How many people have taught? How many people?

(01:02:43):
And I'll just go to my deathbed, I'm sure wondering this.
How many people have gone up to m Night Shyamalan
have been like, hey, do you know there's a bully
movie called h If It's happened once, it's enough to
make my lifetime. That's that's really truly the case.

Speaker 3 (01:03:02):
You know you know what, you know I should tweet
m night after this, after this interview, I should tweet
him about it and do it. And see, I mean,
let's let's be honest, there's a ninety nine nine percent
chance he's not gonna respond to me because he's gonna
be like, wait a minute, isn't this that weird guy?
And that's how the best how most people usually say
from my I remind people, isn't this that weird guy?

(01:03:22):
From that thing?

Speaker 4 (01:03:25):
But I'd say there's also a ninety nine point nine
percent chance he doesn't run his own Twitter, So there's
also that.

Speaker 3 (01:03:31):
He well he actually does. Oh yeah, it's all it's
all him.

Speaker 4 (01:03:35):
Oh wow, Well that's cool. That's after that. That's like
mad respect for him because like I'm there's so many
people that like spend so much time making it seem
like it's them, but it's not actually that, you know
what I'm saying. Oh yeah, so that's actually really cool.
If that's legit him, that's great.

Speaker 3 (01:03:49):
Yeah, it's apparently the because uh, I mean obviously you know,
just from other people they've said, yeah, that's actually him
doing it all. And then like Kevin Smith, he does
all his own apparently, and uh, because I had a
friend of mine whose job when he went out to LA,
his first job was actually running celebrity Twitter accounts, and

(01:04:10):
that like he would actually just to make sure it
looks like them. So then he ended up doing stuff
for like a couple of adult film stars, like doing
their social media. And he said he got so burned
out because you can imagine, like it was just a
constant bunch of like weird, creepy guys going like, hey, well,
I can't yeah, we have sex with me.

Speaker 4 (01:04:27):
It's like, I can't even imagine. I can't. I can't
even imagine how tough it is to just be a
woman on the internet in general. But just oh my goodness,
oh hoof Yeah, I can imagine that would burn that
would that would cause a person to burn out pretty quickly.

Speaker 3 (01:04:42):
Yeah, and he has a lot of other weird stories
which I which I won't go into right now. But
but but but Jamie, you know, I mean we've been
talking for about an hour and five minutes now, you know,
I know, we you know, just to talking about split.
You know, is there anything you know we didn't get
a chance to talk about that you wanted to sort
of talk about, or anything you wanted to say sort

(01:05:02):
of put u PERI at the end of this whole conversation.

Speaker 4 (01:05:05):
I mean not necessarily, I would, you know. I I
think I got in all of my all of my
little plugs for the movie. I mean, that's that's really,
that's really the the important thing as far as I
kind of you know, and I think just as a
person that comes and does any sort of podcasts like
you're on, like I'm actually I'm having a great time talking.
But yeah, I mean anybody who's listening. If you're interested

(01:05:27):
in seeing, if you like romantic comedy, if you like
bowling one or the other, especially both, please go see
Split Not the m Night Shyamalan movie, the world's first
romantic bowling comedy. We are the easiest place to find
all the play all the ways we're available, is just
to go to Derby Cityproductions dot com like Louisville, Kentucky,

(01:05:49):
the like the Kentucky Derby so Derby City Productions Plural
dot com. And that's uh, you know our trailers there,
and there's an Amazon button if you want to watch
it on Amazon. There's a you know, Google play by
and how I pick your poison. It's all right there.
You can also follow us on Facebook and Twitter. Around
both of those, it's just Facebook dot com slash Split
the movie and Twitter dot com slash Split the movie.

(01:06:12):
Make sure you put the dun there because if you
just do split movie, you go right to Shyamalan, which
is which has probably led to the most hilarious Twitter
conversations where people had sort of tagged Split the move
tagged us thinking they were tagging the Shyamalan movie, which
I just can't help but have somebody from outside respond

(01:06:34):
to every time it happens. And it's also no, I mean,
there have been some pretty hilarious there's specifically when it
first when the other Split came out. Uh, there was
a guy who did a whole Facebook status update that
somebody had sent me about how he, you know, he

(01:06:56):
enjoys a little herbal refreshment from time to time. This
guy and he got a little bit, uh, got a
little bit greened out, a little bit blazed out, sat
down and thought he was watching a horror movie. And
he just does this whole account of how he got
point for point through our movie, thinking like, when is
this guy gonna turn and start kidnapping girls? When is

(01:07:17):
this When's he gonna murder somebody. Like he gets through
pretty much the whole movie, and then eventually it's like,
wait a second, James McAvoy's not in the Like, what's
amazing to me about that? Is my name as the
director is. I don't think you make it two three
minutes into the movie before you see that, and you know,
like it says directed by not m Night Shyamalan in

(01:07:41):
very clear print in the movie. Maybe he just keeps
happening it.

Speaker 3 (01:07:45):
Maybe he thought that was another alter ego of the song.
Maybe and he goes, oh, it's not. It's not Emma's
Shyamalan directed this. It's his alter ego Jamie Duckner.

Speaker 4 (01:07:55):
Yeah, yeah, that's my Yeah, that was my that was
my go to. Uh. When this first started happening, too,
was like what a twist, right, guys? It was a
bullying movie the whole time. Alam Night, It's always got
some sort of twist in store for you. No, man,
I think I think you know, we we've covered, we've covered,
We've covered quite a bit. I don't think that there's uh,
I don't think. I mean, here's the thing, like with

(01:08:16):
your podcast, Uh, the episodes I've listened to it seems
like a lot of your audience is going to be
people wanting to get out there and sort of do
it on their own, or are doing it on their own,
or just you know, I all I if I have
maybe two cents worth of advice to offer, it's just,
you know, there's all the reason in the world to

(01:08:37):
get swayed away from doing it. But if you have
what I was talking about earlier, and you have that
that inability to do anything else and you just have
to be telling stories and you have to be doing this,
then don't let anyone stop you from doing it. It
took us years and years to get this movie made,
and so much got in the way, and so much

(01:09:00):
you know, tried to whatever. Like there's there's always hurdles.
Just get out there, start making something, and by all means,
finish it because there are so many The most amazing
stories to me are when people are like, oh, yeah,
I got on this movie and then we shot it,
and then this happened, and then I got into posts
and then it just kind of never went anywhere, and
I'm like, I do not know how anyone could ever

(01:09:22):
get into that position, like just put it out on YouTube.
Or something like you just get out there, have your
story told. There's too many ways for you to just
get your get your story out into the world these days,
and it's just it's too everything is too readily available
for you to have any excuse to not just be
out there telling your story. So get out there and

(01:09:44):
do it. If if this is the right space to
just like throw that advice at anybody, but it seems
like your your listenership would probably appreciate that.

Speaker 3 (01:09:52):
Yeah, yeah, I completely uh, I think this is the
best best spot to put that in that Yeah, and
thank you for saying that. And I I know exactly
where you're coming from. You know, we get sort of stuck.
I mean I've been there, honestly, Jamie. But that's a
whole nother story for other time. But uh, Jamie Bucker,
thank you so much.

Speaker 4 (01:10:08):
For coming on, buddy, absolutely, man, thank you very much.
Great talking with you.

Speaker 3 (01:10:11):
Great talk you to Jamie and listen. Whatever you could
do next, you know, let me know, and you know
I want to bring you back on. We'll talk about
whatever you have coming out next. And because I'd love
to have you back.

Speaker 4 (01:10:21):
Oh great, Yeah, I'd love to come back on for sure.

Speaker 2 (01:10:23):
Man, I want to thank Dave so much for doing
such a great job on this episode. If you want
to get links to anything we spoke about in this episode,
head over to the show notes at Bulletproof Screenwriting dot tv.
Forward slash for forty seven. Thank you so much for listening, guys,
As always, keep on writing no matter what. I'll talk
to you soon.

Speaker 1 (01:10:40):
Thanks for listening to the Bulletproof Screenwriting podcast at Bulletproof
Screenwriting dot tv.