IFH 827: Turning a Script into a Movie: The Indie Filmmaking Story of Jamie Buckner

Episode Transcript
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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 Indie Film Muscle Podcast, Episode number eight
twenty seven, Cinema Should Make You Forget You're sitting in
a theater, Roman Polanski.

Speaker 1 (00:22):
Broadcasting from the back alley in Hollywood. It's the Indie
Film Hustle Podcast, where we show you how to survive
and thrive as an indie filmmaker in the jungles of
the film biz.

Speaker 3 (00:32):
And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Indie Film Huscle Podcast.
I am your humble host, Alex Ferrari. Today's show is
sponsored by Rise of the Film Entrepreneur How to turn
your independent film into a profitable business. It's harder today
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Speaker 4 (01:50):
Enjoy today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.

Speaker 3 (01:54):
In this next episode that 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. As he as he's going to all these

(02:17):
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,

(02:38):
I 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 this
is the romantic bowling movie Split with guest Janie Buckner.

Speaker 5 (02:57):
Yeah, I would be 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,

(03:18):
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. I mean like learn the actual like
mathematics of music and like learned to read it and

(03:38):
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, I thought, and I
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

(04:00):
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

(04:21):
till 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 nerds stuff, and
it's sort of dawned on me at a certain point
that all of these things that I'd been dabbling in
and I was sort of interested in from a creative,
creative way of looking at things all sort of came

(04:41):
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 to hard commit to one or the
other all sort of came together in this one thing
that I already like. So I went to Northern Kentucky

(05:03):
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 it was when I was
going there was just a communications radio and television communications program.
Took all of the film ish movie ish classes that

(05:23):
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. So on. And one day, as I was
working in a Sunglass hut in downtown Cincinnati, I saw

(05:44):
in 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 on 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 Sea Biscuit in

(06:06):
freezing cold 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

(06:28):
some 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 louisll who's a good friend of mine now who
we've actually worked on several other projects together. So on

(06:49):
and so forth, 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 it was a
remake of The Honeymooners called of the Honeymooners with like
John Leguizamo 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

(07:10):
New York. That happened 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

(07:32):
have any pas that aren't awful? 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 Warnerbergers 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 you know, the resume kind

(07:55):
of speaks for itself from there. It just kind of
it just becomes this. You work with enough people and
they 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 projects. In all that time,

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

Speaker 3 (08:38):
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 Colsti, on the podcast before
how Is.

Speaker 5 (08:50):
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've 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,

(09:11):
Derek is the coolest guy too. He would just like,
you know, I'm just some random shmo working on the production.
He has no reason to be sitting there and shooting
the 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 loved for like two hours
one night. And he's just a what a red guy

(09:33):
that Derek is right. I'm sure I gotta go back
and listen to that episode. I didn't realize you had
him on. That's cool.

Speaker 3 (09:38):
Yeah, really really cool guy. And I got introduced to
him through another writer friend of ours, and I was like,
this guy's not gonna say yes to come down and
share them with me, and he was like, yeah, I
love toy.

Speaker 5 (09:49):
Yeah of course he will. Yeah, he's great.

Speaker 3 (09:51):
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.

Speaker 2 (10:01):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
and now back to the show.

Speaker 5 (10:10):
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 and again
on this in the spirit of positivity, will necessarily name
names with people who aren't such great salt of the earth,
people like you're Derek, Coolestad's of the world have success

(10:31):
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, and then the movies 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 good people make really good work and

(10:51):
it's really successful. It's that's that's what we're all hoping for,
of course.

Speaker 3 (10:55):
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, back

(11:15):
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 5 (11:27):
You know, you just kind of have to was 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

(11:48):
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 things and wine
producing smaller things and then I'm mind producing bigger things
and then I'm on to you know, I could do
that and next thing, you know, I'll blink. I'm sixty
years old and I'm doing really well, but not exactly

(12:10):
what I want to be doing. So if you really
want to, and it's just really 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

(12:31):
keep working or art 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 finding

(12:55):
in the time 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

(13:15):
talking about how like, you know, how do you raise
money for these things? How do you set up you know,
a small corporate, you know, because you end up being
a small business basically when you make a movie, done
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 just I just kind of made

(13:38):
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 going to
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 sort of
like you know, get a fresh eye on a different

(14:01):
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 joke
somewhere within, you know. So you really just sort of
have to always the creative muscle, I'd like to think,

(14:24):
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, it's
exactly like it's exactly what it is, like it will
atrophy if you don't exercise it regularly. So as far

(14:46):
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 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,

(15:08):
you know, and none of those things can happen. So
you just have to be very keenly aware of how
important rest is with all of this as well. But
whenever I had an opportunity, I'd be writing or talking
to people about raising money, or you know, talking to
actors or talking a little little bit of this, a
little bit of that. And then it finally came to

(15:30):
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
going to 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

(15:51):
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 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

(16:13):
know if people say that anymore, but it just drove
me crazy. I don't know, I don't know.

Speaker 3 (16:18):
It's called proof of concept.

Speaker 5 (16:19):
Now that's okay. See that's what I started calling it,
not even knowing anyone called that dat. So that's funny
because 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 have in mind,
so that you can put in front of like a
potential investor or an actor, this is what I have

(16:41):
in mind. So we shot that two days over a
weekend in queen 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 out in Queen's with It's so funny that were
just the cast that we got for that short is

(17:03):
now all super famous, which is hilarious. So but it
was so there was just this killer group of people
called in all these favors, like what were 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. He'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

(17:27):
it's oddly it's good, not hot 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 had a great group. But like as far as
like these people that are like living, eating, breathe in
the industry and doing it like on a sort of
like a more visible skit national and global scale. These

(17:49):
people live in New York and LA, and if 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, So 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,

(18:10):
my kids are in school or I got this other
thing going eh. 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 Powell who's on thirty Rock My

(18:31):
turnis who you know was Orange is the 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.

Speaker 3 (18:45):
Well, I was just about how you found time to
actually right in between jobs. Oh yeah, that's what.

Speaker 5 (18:50):
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 (19:02):
Well, and you know you touched on something too that
I a 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 actualphies if you don't use it. And so when
you were saying that, I'm like, that's exactly the way he
puts it as well.

Speaker 5 (19:23):
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.

Speaker 2 (19:47):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,

Speaker 5 (19:56):
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

(20:17):
a movie TV you know, new media like whatever, Like
I've I've lost, I have no other bankable skills. 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

(20:41):
like certain productions, if like some nightmare thing happens with
like an actor or producer's travel or like you know,
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 it's 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

(21:02):
could just work at a call center and go home
at five point thirty every day and like go to
happy hours and just like have a nice, happy little life,
still live in Kentucky, just live down the street from
my parents, go to like you know, like I kind
of like as part of me certainly at times that

(21:24):
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
I if I was not doing this and one is
not doing this exhaustive, sometimes insane, you know, often being

(21:45):
asked to pull off the impossible. If I wasn't doing
this production thing, if I wasn't doing the storytelling thing.
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 to go outside and walk
the dog at ten thirty pm because I'd been stuck

(22:07):
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. 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

(22:30):
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 I can't. My dad worked at like
a ge assembly line for thirty forty years in Kentucky,
like making washing machines.

Speaker 2 (22:43):
You know what.

Speaker 5 (22:44):
He's perfectly happy, you know, 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?
We're all like blessed with this opportunity to do this.
I'll probably do this until they like drag me lifeless

(23:05):
off of the set somewhere like we're doing. I don't
know why I wouldever 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,
you know hard. I stay away from the word hard people.

(23:26):
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 is 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. Uh, you know,
working in the coal mines is hard. Construction work is hard.

(23:48):
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 work and there's like a truck full
of catering that will make me whatever I want. I
stay away from the word hard with anything that we do.
But it's but the hours are tough and the sometimes

(24:12):
the conditions are not ideal. So if you can be
doing anything. And then I've it's sproken to some college basses,
you know, and I've told that, what would you recommend
if the you know, you know whatever, Like there's always
like the 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

(24:35):
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 and this sort of is spiritually the right word.
I don't it's if you're not going to be happy

(24:58):
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 the in the expectations of like when people
expect you to be available for them to certain degrees.

(25:19):
And again that's and sometimes when I'm working in production
that's just people that are creative types that 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,
I get it. I'm then I was that guy, you know,
And I was never like calling people at three o'clock

(25:40):
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,
the serving what goes on the screen. But anyway, again,

(26:04):
I'm all over the place.

Speaker 3 (26:06):
It's all good, Jamie. I tend to have that effect
on people.

Speaker 5 (26:11):
You're like a therapist. You're just giving me the opportunity
to ramble.

Speaker 3 (26:15):
Honestly, if you go back and listen to episodes, like
one out of every two guests will say, Dave, I
don't know why, but every time I come on your podcast,
I just start rambling or I go in those other
directions or you know, and I said, no, it's 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 it becomes a stream of consciousness,

(26:37):
you know, and it's good.

Speaker 5 (26:38):
Make sure you'd get out of your that is what
I think.

Speaker 3 (26:40):
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,

(27:03):
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 (27:15):
Oh?

Speaker 5 (27:15):
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

(27:36):
it makes sense and speaks to me. I meanwhile, go
back and look at my resume. They haven't all been
me being like 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

(27:58):
that don't 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

(28:23):
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 specifically really affected split as I had the opportunity
to work on Elizabethtown, which was Cameron Crowe, which is

(28:45):
one of my still is. Say what you will about
his recent the steps we might call them, but I uh,
I love the guy. I think he's a master. I
think he's great. This Showtime show wroteies that he did.
It was not perfect, but I enjoyed it. But so

(29:06):
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. He was super
cool and I have all these great stories from it.
But I got to read that script and I it

(29:29):
was just this revelation of just like, wow, this is
good right, 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, like was

(29:49):
talking to me about the movie he was going to make.
As I was reading the script.

Speaker 2 (29:56):
We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,

Speaker 5 (30:05):
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, because say what you will about that movie,
it did not quite turn out to be as good

(30:26):
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
to work on that movie, and I was laughing out

(30:46):
loud like a crazy person, and it was one of
the funniest things I'd 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.
And it was a great group of people working on it.

(31:08):
It was a great group of actors. I don't. It
was very strange. But that movie, you know, 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 was
very it was a very funny thing. Like I was like,

(31:28):
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 some kids, all right, dogs, birds,

(31:50):
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 what movie we were saying. So

(32:10):
my brother in law, we were walking out of something.
We started talking about the movie. Me and Elizabeth, my wife.
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 has affected my writing
immensely over time, just because I think a huge and

(32:35):
again I an't, 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 the most rewarding to me. But then
I'll get on a set or I'll see something that

(32:56):
I've done and I'm like, oh, maybe directing, but I
like directing stuff I wrote, so 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 be writing, but you also have to constantly be
reading the kind of work you want to be writing.

(33:17):
You know, it's kind of like making it. You know,
it's like directing as well. Like, if you want to
make movies or 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. You know what, who was who
are reattributing this quote to? Now I forget who exactly
said it, but what is the artists creating geniuses steel?

(33:40):
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 you're going to pull these
sort of universal 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.

(34:03):
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 of which by making
it the Bully movie. But you know, there are a
couple other little points where it was just kind of like,
I don't, I won't bor you with that right in

(34:24):
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 constantly over all of these years has
one hundred percent I think improved my screenwriting. And it also,
you know, it also makes it that much more like

(34:47):
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 is like just sitting on the shelf,
you know, like why is this happening versus all these
other things that I know exist in the world. But yeah, no,

(35:10):
I mean I don't know all let a'll let in
a very long way to say, yes, I read the script. Yes,
I feel like I get I'm very privileged to be
able to have access to that material from production and
production for sure.

Speaker 3 (35:22):
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? You know,
I've read screenplays that for unproduced you know movies. I've

(35:42):
read screenplays for produced movies, all sorts of that stuff.
Oh did you just hear that update? Well, I'm 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 5 (35:57):
She'd in start it and post youse, she'd make it
some big annoying thing. No, I didn't hear anything at all.

Speaker 3 (36:01):
It'll be like that bird crow from from a 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.

Speaker 5 (36:13):
Was one of the producers.

Speaker 3 (36:15):
Yeah, one of the producers was like, I feel this
is going on all along, so it or someone we'll
put that in there.

Speaker 5 (36:20):
That's so funny. I've often, uh, this is apropos nothing
I I I always have my phone on vibrate, but
I 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

(36:41):
Wars when the stormtrooper gets hit, that like the movie
trope that the sound is sound people always put in there.

Speaker 3 (36:45):
They're like, wow, there's actually a good Willhelm scream YouTube
cut and somebody yeah, all of them right, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 5 (36:54):
It's so good. Yeah, that's amazing.

Speaker 3 (36:56):
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 2 (37:03):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (37:03):
Dude, So I always thought like if you had a
ring back tone, what if you just had something like
the Wilhelm screen or something just completely ridiculous, just went
over and over again. Yeah, and the first is like, god, damn,
answer your phone.

Speaker 5 (37:15):
That 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 tree, Senator, Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Talking about old video stores is, yeah, we remember old
video stores. I'm like, there's an old video store in

(37:36):
my movie. Guys, the 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 of 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

(37:56):
purple cover here for twist twenty dollars, you know, and
you'd go 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
that 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

(38:18):
like there was all this security, all these different you know,
water marking and 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 these things
and just popping them up on the line, because it's
so easy for just like one person to be like, hey,

(38:39):
here's a script for 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 a copy and just throwing it up onto one
of those sites.

Speaker 3 (38:55):
Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. That's what happened
in Tarantio with Hateful Eight. 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 5 (39:08):
Yeah, yeah, it's it's it's it's a whole other operator.
I have a bunch of friend you know, because we're
hearing New York and like all these Marvel Netflix shows
come through here and uh, the amount of security, it's
it blows your mind how much security goes into just
every little Marvel production. It's the like they are probably

(39:32):
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
within the draft, will change one letter in a different

(39:53):
spot on that same page for every person that gets
a script.

Speaker 2 (39:57):
We'll be right back after a word from our spot
answer and now back to the show.

Speaker 5 (40:07):
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 are crazy about the security, man. I mean, but
that would you know? That would blow a movie honestly,
or certain TV shows too. It's like everybody. I also,
though part of me finds it to be a little

(40:28):
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 (40:46):
But yeah, I think what they're afraid of is the
sort of like you know, nerd sites, so to speak,
like me, but like if I've an't 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
reads screen plays, we'll 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

(41:07):
to read the screenplay, but he's watched this YouTube video
and they're just talking about.

Speaker 5 (41:10):
It and now he's, oh, sure, yeah, that's fair.

Speaker 3 (41:12):
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

(41:33):
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.

Speaker 2 (41:41):
At the end.

Speaker 3 (41:41):
Of the day, prostracting the Wi Fi all that good stuff.

Speaker 5 (41:44):
You know, 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 department
that didn't exist that exists now. Like we have an
entire green department. You know, we have a you know

(42:06):
green 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 footprint 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

(42:27):
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

(42:48):
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 covering. There's just gonna 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

(43:08):
means more work. So all good things.

Speaker 3 (43:12):
Yeah, And also I wanted to mention too when I
was talking to Mike about about the 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

(43:33):
that that you know, 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 five by whatever the
hell I'm looking for.

Speaker 5 (43:53):
I yeah, I'm you know, it's I go back and
forth because it's just so obviously it's 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 the

(44:16):
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 you know, interesting more highly curated, uh

(44:39):
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
tone and just like, why am I it's right there,

(45:01):
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 mortar stores. You want to talk
about a tangent, I could go off about how I'm
just convinced we're all going to be living the movie

(45:22):
Wally within the next like ten years. But you know,
we all just fight the good fight best we can.
But no, I'm totally on your on track with that
same as you.

Speaker 3 (45:35):
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

(45:57):
with an ar VR AI con like, I think 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 actually transition.

(46:20):
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 5 (46:28):
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,

(46:49):
oh yeah, I'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 this exponential rate that it's been going. And

(47:12):
I'm not saying it needs to slow down, but I think,
like I have a lot of thoughts about VR 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. I don't know. It's
hard to when you're speaking from your own personal position,

(47:32):
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
that that is specifically made for VR. I just I

(47:52):
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 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
at Sundance, not this year, but the past year, and

(48:13):
I got somehow another got looped in with like the
ILM people and they were doing 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 bbaight and that that great.
It's the coolest thing ever. So uh and they were like, well,
we do other movies too. And then all of a
sudden I was walking around with a velociraptor and I

(48:34):
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 showing

(48:54):
they flip it over to it was some production. I
don't know if it was for an actual production or
something that they had just sort of mocked up, but basically,
if you're gonna 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 gonna
build a mansion set or something like that, VR they

(49:16):
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

(49:37):
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.

Speaker 2 (50:00):

Speaker 5 (50:10):
And then just go out and 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
VR is going to be huge for. I don't think

(50:30):
VR is going to be a huge storytelling medium in
the way that people are sort of hitching their wagon too,
if that makes sense.

Speaker 3 (50:40):
Yeah, I concur I just I think that VR is
going to 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

(51:03):
actually bought something like that, and he 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 there'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 having my eyeballs burned out every

(51:25):
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, and 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 have to feel like

(51:45):
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
ex workers, 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

(52:05):
I think that he even knows he's overreaching, 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 pass.

Speaker 5 (52:16):
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. 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. It's where

(52:39):
it's the whole Louis c. Cabe. Actually, this is the
email signature in my uh when I send an email
to has 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 you yelling about
the Internet working on his on an airplane or something.
He's just like, give it a second, it is going
to space. Just give it half a second. So, like

(53:03):
I I'm always 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 ask 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 and

(53:24):
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

(53:45):
ever flying cars? Whatever? Guys? 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 ball being like, oh,
and what was that movie with the one guy and
the thing? Yeah, that you have that answer. Anyone can

(54:07):
pull the computer out of their pocket and have that
answer in ten seconds. You know. It's the future is now,
and I for one just love it. And these, 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 called her a computer. So every time, yep,

(54:28):
she just came on again. Sorry anyway, but man it,
you know, I try not 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 it's all happening

(54:54):
really fast. So it's like, maybe instead of moving on
to the next thing, let's 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 2 (55:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (55:15):
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 and you know, a guess,
I know we were talking about so many different topics.
I'm like, we actually should talk about split.

Speaker 5 (55:32):
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 the
very end. They're like, oh, right, in your album, let's
talk 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

(55:53):
think it was August second, twenty sixteen. It was about
four years of post which is what happens when you
you know, yeah, I'm sure it's 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 gonna
sacrifice good, 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 somebody

(56:16):
who's doing a 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

(56:37):
to get it out into the world, but 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 who just
sent me a text or something with the trailer of
like coming soon from Midnight shomp. No, you know what
it was. It was a news rooms like the announcement

(56:57):
of the fact that he was gonna make a movie
called Split. And I was like, oh boy, what's this
going to 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 twenty sixteen, and
it's uh, yeah, it's been a fun little ride. Man,

(57:19):
it's you know, still continuing. We are on. If you're
an Amazon Prime subscriber, we are one of the uh,
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 so much of it's new to me, but

(57:41):
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

(58:01):
think I want to say, like fifty different platforms. I
knew maybe three of them existed. So that's 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.
Everything that I said from the beginning, I was like, listen,
there's not enough bowling movies out there. I like rom coms.

(58:22):
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 the movie

(58:43):
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
it 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 only been

(59:06):
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.

Speaker 3 (59:18):
That's it.

Speaker 5 (59:21):
It's about where we are.

Speaker 3 (59:22):
Yeah, it's again, as we were talking about 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 them. He looked at me so odd. When
I said yeah, I'm actually talking to the director tomorrow.

Speaker 5 (59:42):
He goes, what, Yeah, are you screaed with me? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (59:45):
Yeah, it's like what I'm because like because one of
my friends was finally like, he goes, Dave, I'm just
going to ask you if you've heard of these guys.
He's like, you seem to know everybody. And I said, well,
thank you. I try.

Speaker 5 (59:55):
But turned out turns out that's so funny.

Speaker 2 (01:00:00):
Will be right back after a word from our sponsor,

Speaker 5 (01:00:09):
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've got some stupid bowling movie.

Speaker 3 (01:00:23):
Have you had?

Speaker 5 (01:00:26):
It's also that's been that's been interesting. You know, like
it is what it is, but you know, people who
were 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 the torrents Or streets something
somewhere out in the world in a very popular place.

(01:00:47):
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 pretty early on it said
split as if where the Shyamalan split. But then you
clicked on it and you got our movie. So we've
gotten eight ton of people that were not happy about

(01:01:10):
that happening. So that's that's been you know, it's been something.
But you know, in fairness, there have been there have
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.

Speaker 3 (01:01:28):
You know.

Speaker 5 (01:01:30):
But somewhere somewhere, somewhere along the line on some sort
of like back channel, Torrenty 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

(01:01:50):
our movie? It was our movie you it was where
you went to like fine hours, But then down at
the bottom all of the trailers were for the Shamalan 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

(01:02:11):
that I you know, that is just out apparently like
a completely out there sort of mind screw of a
movie that I also haven't you know that I that
I haven't seen, but I know exists. So hey, you
know what, it's a very popular little five letter word.
What can I say?

Speaker 3 (01:02:29):
Yeah, we should sit down together you myself, might 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 5 (01:02:39):
Oh what I wouldn't give What I wouldn't give to
just hear from anyone in the like Shamalan 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? And I'll

(01:03:01):
just go to my death bed. 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 (01:03:19):
Well, you know, you know what, you know what I
should tweet m Night after this, after this interview, I
should tweet her about 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 remind I
remind people, isn't this that weird guy from that thing?

Speaker 5 (01:03:43):
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 (01:03:49):
He well he actually does. Oh yeah, it's a it's
all him.

Speaker 5 (01:03:53):
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 make 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 (01:04:06):
Yeah, it's apparently the because uh, I mean obviously, you know,
just 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

(01:04:28):
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. It's like.

Speaker 5 (01:04:47):
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, yeah,
I can imagine that would bring that would that would
cause a person to burn out pretty quickly.

Speaker 3 (01:05:00):
Yeah, and he has a lot of other weird stories
which I which I won't go into right now. But
but uh, 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 to sort of put it PERI at the end

(01:05:21):
of this whole conversation, I.

Speaker 5 (01:05:23):
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 own,
like I'm actually I'm having a great time talking. But yeah,
I mean, anybody who's listening, if you're interested in seeing,

(01:05:45):
if you like romantic comedies, 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, like the Kentucky

(01:06:08):
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 button. 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

(01:06:28):
slash split the movie. Make sure you put the gun
in 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 have sort
of tagged split the move tagged us thinking they were
tagging the Shyamalan movie, which I just can't help but

(01:06:50):
have somebody from our side respond to every time it happens.
And it's also no, I mean, there have been some
pretty hilarious there's specific when it first when the uh
the other split came out. Uh, there was a guy
who did a whole Facebook status update that somebody had

(01:07:10):
sent me about how he you know, he enjoys a
little uh herbal refreshment from time to time this guy,
and he got a little bit, 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

(01:07:33):
gonna turn and start kidnapping girls? When is this when's
he gonna murder somebody? 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

(01:07:55):
says directed by not m Night Chamalan in very clear
print in the movie. Maybe he it just keeps happening.

Speaker 3 (01:08:03):
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 5 (01:08:12):
Yeah, yeah, that's my Yeah, that was my that was
my go to. Uh when this first started happening too,
I was like, what a twist, right, guys? It was
a bullying movie. The whole time, all m 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

(01:08:34):
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

(01:08:54):
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

(01:09:17):
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

(01:09:39):
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 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.

Speaker 2 (01:10:02):

Speaker 5 (01:10:11):
So get out there and do it. If if this
is the right space to just like throw that advice
at anybody, but it seems like your listenership would probably
appreciate that.

Speaker 3 (01:10:20):
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 know exactly where
you're coming from about people, you know, we get sort
of stuck. I mean I've been there, honestly, Jamie. But
that's a whole another three for another time. But Jamie Bucker,
thank you so much for coming on.

Speaker 5 (01:10:37):
Buddy, absolutely, man, thank you very much. Great talking with you.

Speaker 3 (01:10:40):
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 5 (01:10:50):
Oh great, Yeah, I'd love to come back on for sure. Man.

Speaker 2 (01:10:53):
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 at Indie film Huscle dot com.

Speaker 4 (01:11:02):
Forward Slash eight twenty seven.

Speaker 2 (01:11:03):
If you have it already, please head over to Filmmaking
podcast dot com.

Speaker 4 (01:11:08):
Subscribe and leave a good review for the show. It
really helps us out a lot. Guys. Thank you again
so much for listening to guys.

Speaker 2 (01:11:14):
As always, keep that hustle going, keep that dream alive,
Stay safe out there, and I'll talk to you soon.

Speaker 1 (01:11:21):
Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle podcast at
Indie film Hustle dot com. That's I N D I
E F I L M h U S T L
E dot com.

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