July 31, 2021 • 27 mins
Having worked heavily behind the scenes and creating his own lighting company, Michael Blevins has started to create his own visions.
The L.A. based producer has used his former hometown of Kansas City for many of his movies, including the already released "Digging to Death" and the upcoming "The Devil Comes to Kansas City".
We talk to Blevins on his beginnings in the movie world, his filming style, and some stories behind the scenes of his movies.
The L.A. based producer has used his former hometown of Kansas City for many of his movies, including the already released "Digging to Death" and the upcoming "The Devil Comes to Kansas City".
We talk to Blevins on his beginnings in the movie world, his filming style, and some stories behind the scenes of his movies.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey, what's up. This isSeth Green and you are listening to Somewhere
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Vegas talking with Mark with it quThis is Courtney Cronin. You're listening to
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out Mark Pico's sexuality, but Iknow you're listening because somewhere live in Vegas.
Who did you go? Mark?I'm sorry, I thought you were
I'm sorry yet attend to get outof you. Hey, this is Lance
and Anna from Free Radio and Anna, and you're listening to somewhere in Vegas.
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Yeah, might say, you know, that's that's usually what happens with
me. I go to Vegas andI get lost, and so I end
up somewhere in Vegas. Somewhere inVegas. But I just don't know where
it is. I'm not quite sure. Yeah, we get ready. It's
gonna be hot. It's in Vegas. Check out part be there or be
square. My guest at this timeis a very very big busy man.
(02:17):
He's has a new movie called Diggingto Death. He's working on another one
called Devil Comes to Kansas City.Um. He's been working his tailoff,
pretty much, runs his own productioncompany, runs his own lighting company,
and really cool kind of a lotof things that's going on in his plate.
He's a producer, he's a director. We got Michael Levins on with
(02:39):
us right now. HWI doing Michaelpretty good? Good. Um. First
of all, I mean, youknow recently you've been doing music videos all
that. How has that been foryou to, you know, do these
smaller projects and kind of keep youare kind of keep yourself a little bit
sharper um. You know, honestly, it's it's great. Uh, It's
(03:00):
really is kind of a balance ofhaving, you know, paychecks that fill
the voids between the movies I'm directing. But also there's there's new problems,
there's new challenges. Every day,every day is different, so I can
really hone and sharpen my skills asa filmmaker as well as a director,
being on set constantly through and otherpeople's stuff. Yeah, and you know,
(03:23):
it's a little bit less stressed becauseusually music videos maybe take maybe two
or three days versus a long productionthat maybe taking weeks, if not months.
Yeah, I mean it, it'sit's kind of it's kind of interesting
because with a longer production, you'rethere is a lot of pre production and
then but your days are typically notas jam packed. You're shooting three or
(03:46):
four pages a day. Sometimes you'reshooting more. But for me, it's
it's limited Versus a music video,you're shooting what ideally you would want to
take three days to shoot in twelveor fourteen hours, plus about a week
of prep to make sure that thatall goes well. So it's it's more
like a gun to the head really, But it's uh, it's nice.
(04:10):
It's they're they're they're fun to pepperin. You know. Now, Now,
are you based out of out ofKansas City? Now? Uh?
No, I grew up. Iwas born and raised in Kansas City.
I've lived in Los Angeles for nineyears now. Yeah. Now, um,
it's been kind of interesting. Becauseyou mean obviously, uh, you
know, some of your stuff iskind of going back to to your Kansas
City roots as well. I mean, how's it been for production? I
(04:33):
mean, obviously its production has beenshut down in LA for for for for
the year. Um it might bestarting to reopen a little bit more now,
but how's it been for the productionside of things, especially considering you
have two movies that you're producing.Uh So, just to be honest with
you, when when COVID happened orwhen the official shutdown in LA happened,
(04:55):
uh in March or twenty twenty,there was about four and a half months
of nothing, like no one wasworking whatsoever, like no no indie kid,
student film, nothing. But thenaround mid July the smaller music videos
started to come up again. Andnow, honestly, the last four or
(05:18):
five months it's been kind of NonStop. SAG has implemented a lot of COVID
restrictions and rules that that make thingssafer but definitely more challenging. So when
we shot The Devil Comes in KansasCity, that was in like the principal
(05:38):
photography was in February of twenty twentyone, when COVID was still pretty rampant,
and it was it was very challengingshooting back in Casey and still having
to do all of the COVID protocolsand getting a whole cast and crew tested
twice a day and ohlsa, youknow, getting um getting everybody or not
(06:04):
twice a day, three times aweek, every other day. So it's
just it was it was nuts.But now it's starting to lighten up a
little bit. It's it's it's gettinga little easier. But you know,
you do we just roll with it. Yeah, you know, um,
you know that's how things are usually, you know, you have to kind
of roll with the punches as itwork. Um. I hadd fighter on
(06:27):
I think earlier last late last yearwhen she was um julming Big Skuy and
she's up in Vancouver, and yeah, she was questioned for you know,
quite a few days or she andwhen she had to go on set,
she you know, it was likethey rushed her on set, got her
scenes done in back to the hotelroom again. So yeah, you know,
things things are kind of crazy,but hopefully things kind of uh lots
of vaccinations can you know, startto kind of roll out. Maybe we'll
(06:51):
see a little bit more relaxing ofsome of the some of the things that
you have to go through in termsof a production. So you know,
figures crossed at um. You know, I mean just just as a filmmaker,
you know. I mean, firstof all, let me tell you,
let me ask you about, youknow, how you got started as
a filmmaker. UM, tell mea little bit, um, you know
about some of your you know,your history in terms of filmmaking. So
(07:13):
I took an interest in filmmaking actuallywhen I was a junior in high school,
UM, and started doing some smallthings with friends sua still in high
school, and completely abandoned this ideathat I was going to become a doctor
just to tell stories really, andI ended up. I went to Missouri
(07:35):
State and realized I wasn't ready reallyfor college and flunked out and uh because
I was playing guitar hero too muchand not really the beginning, you know,
great beginning of a of a herostory. But when I moved back
to KCY, I was like,I felt defeated, and I was like,
I'm not gonna let this defeat me. You know what can I do?
(07:59):
And I had a couple scripts thatI wanted you know, to shoot
eventually, and I had one thattook place in a mall, and I
was like, that took place ina shoot store. And I was like,
you know what, I'm gonna makethis movie. I'm gonna I don't
know how I'm gonna do it,but I'm gonna freaking do it. And
I was nineteen years old and Iended up shooting this feature that you'll never
It never got distributed. It wasjust kind of a practice thing, you
(08:22):
know, looking back on it,it's just got awful. But we got
it done right. And it actuallyshowed in a local movie theater and people
came to a premiere, and youknow, and I was all before I
was twenty. So I did twomore kind of like that. I did
a crime drama and then another comedy, like a music comedy, and then
(08:43):
I turned twenty four. At thatpoint I was like, all right,
I gotta move to La. SoI moved to La. I didn't have
any contacts out here. I didn'thave really any network or even a place
to live or a job. Ijust decided I was going to move,
came out here, handed out mybusiness card to everybody that would take it.
(09:05):
Eventually got on a set. Youknow, I said, I worked
for free. I'm a PA.I'll work for free. Just get me
on your damn set. Got ona set, got on a couple more
sets, learned how to grip justfrom being on set, and then kind
of actually paused the filmmaker, youknow, path just for about five years
(09:30):
where I would I built a lightingcompany because I learned how to light,
and I was a gaffer on somereally big, really big projects and big
movies, and like I used togaff like Steven Seagal movies and I've gaffed
for the Weekend and you know,basically being the guy that's coming up with
the lighting concepts and stuff. Butit was it was enough money that I
(09:50):
actually could raise money and use revenuefrom my lighting company to fund Digging to
Death or when I wrote it,it was called What's Buried in the Backyard,
and then the distributor you know,chose this new title, as you
know often happens. But uh,yeah, it uh it was cool.
(10:16):
You know, I was able tokind of take that money and I didn't
have to worry about owing other people. I have to worry about people telling
me, you know, things Ican and can't do, and I said
I was going to do it,and I got it done. So as
soon as I got that movie kindof done and distributed, I pumped the
brakes on the lighting side. Andnow I'm back full bore, you know
(10:37):
this last year so just been justcrazy knows the grindstone on production and directing.
Yeah, a lot of people don'trealize how important light is, especially
in terms of of of you know, of filmmaking. I mean you have
to you know, it sets themood obviously, um the idea of you
(10:58):
know, how how a person lit. I'm reminded of the Seinfeld episode where
there was a woman who looks greatin one light but looked terrible in the
other. So there's always that kindof situation. How has it been for
you to, you know, havegone through through the lighting aspect of filmmaking
and kind of transitioning that into whatyour vision was for this movie? H
(11:20):
honestly it just I mean, soboth movies had Justin Jones, who's a
very prolific DP out here in laI think his Instagram tag is at Justin
Jones DP. He uh me andhim have a very similar style. We
we like classic movie lighting you know, far side key kind of stuff and
(11:46):
soft, soft edges, not thatbright shiny edge shit, but just really
classic lighting. And so that's kindof how me and him have done a
lot of because I used to workfor him on these bigger music videos and
stuff, and we created this look. So when I was directing and I
was hiring him, we didn't reallyhave to talk about the look necessarily or
(12:11):
you know what, or even howto accomplish it because I knew he kind
of had that. And then Iput a gaffer in that was competent on
you know, both of these films, but it helped in the production side,
knowing like, okay, we're goingto take We literally drove a sprinter
van from LA to Kansas City justbecause it's all my lights and stuff.
(12:35):
But it's just a sprinter van.So I had to be very selective as
to what I was going to bring. And I wanted to bring some like
big, big units, you know, like big movie lights, but I
also needed some like smaller interior stuff, generators all that. So I had
to from a cost effective standpoint andfrom just a creative standpoint, how was
I going to be able to achievethe look that I needed with only a
(13:00):
sprinter van. How is that goingto make a move a million dollar movie
look like a million dollars with justa small sprinter van package. So,
um, I because of my lightingyou know, uh experience, I was
able to achieve that. Yeah,you know, and and sometimes less is
(13:20):
more, sometimes you ever think it. So it's it's really kind of easy
for you to to you know,take a smaller kit and just be able
to work with what you have aswell. And um, you know,
obviously a lot of a lot ofwhat goes on with you know, digging
to Death is the fact you havelike visual effects where you know, you
have your main uh you know antagonist, you know in certain certain certain situations
(13:45):
where you know you have to haveit lit kind of really interestingly enough to
kind of kind of get that shockand on on that as well. Obviously,
I mean this this is obviously yourfirst horror film, right, yes,
I mean how was it for youdo a horror film like this?
You know? Honestly, like Iwrote the I wrote this movie because the
(14:09):
house that I moved into is actuallythe house in the movie, and it's
just a big property. And soI was like, you know, I
have to shoot a movie here,and then I knew that horror movies were
easier to sell than, you know, traditionally than most any other movies.
So I was like, wow,that's kind of the whole point is just
to make this sell it show aprofit move the next movie, and just
(14:33):
from a business side, you know. So I was like, Okay,
So now from the creative side,how do I how do I make a
horror movie that I want to watch? Because I don't like horror movies.
I don't really think they're There's acouple that are good, I guess,
but most of them are just kindof like blood and tits and gore or
(14:54):
like I like story. So Iwas like, how can I write a
horror movie that kind of freaks meout, that that would compel me someone
who doesn't like horror movies? Andso that's what I Digging to Death is
essentially the best that I could dofor that with the with the budget that
I had. You know, yeah, I mean, how was it worked
(15:15):
with the actors on the set?And you know, was it because it
kind of fun to kind of workwork with them, um, you know,
on the set and especially considering youknow, kind of the genre you're
working in. Uh yeah, Iactually, uh so, I've I've actually
worked on some some bigger shows likeum I was. I did some acting
in um Hail Caesar with the CoenBrothers. I did a little bit of
(15:37):
acting with um A Marriage Story withNoah Bomboch and those sets. Yeah,
give me one second here, noproblem, Okay, we're back. Uh
yeah, So I was saying.I was just saying, um So,
I've been on some big sets withyou know, the Coen Brothers, with
(16:02):
Noah Bomboch, and those sets aresilent. It's very silent. It's not
like a traditional indie set where everyone'sjust sort of bumbling around. It's just
everyone's just quiet. So I madesure that, you know, I hate
to say this because like I don'twant to be one of those directors that
has these weird rules, but Ilike to keep it quiet and I like
(16:26):
to I like to be be veryintimate with my talent. With talent of
high caliber, you know, ifyou're doing a third take, you better
have a damn good reason. Youknow, like it's just I mean,
like that's like a third take ofthe same angle or the same shot.
You know, like once you gotit. If you got it, get
(16:48):
a safety just in case there's somethingyou didn't see. And if something happens
in the safety where you need thethird take, you got to literally communicate.
You have to say, hey,we got to do a third take
because I didn't like this, orwe need to fix this. But if
you're just like, oh, yeah, just let's just do one more,
it's it's disrespectful. You know,we got you gotta move on, you
(17:08):
gotta keep going, and if yougot it, you got it. So
it's just I like to I liketo be like that. I think the
actors that that I employed for thisthis movie, UM were grateful for that
and just like that, like thatintimacy. So it's cool. I liked
working with them. Yeah, thatwas kind of interesting because I I just
(17:29):
got I mean, my my filmvery I mean it just it's just just
premiered a couple of weeks ago,where I'm still working on some pros production
stuff to actually get it, youknow, get somewhat distributed to um,
you know, two different areas rightnow and find a figure out distribution.
I kind of network. But whenI was working with the actors, UM,
I mean, I you know,sometimes they would get it on the
(17:49):
first take, and I would doa second, second take, obviously for
safety, but um I would doone or two more takes just because I
wanted to see something a little bitdifferent, just in case I wanted to
see different performance. I mean,it's not anything against you know, their
performances at all, but I justwanted to make sure there's a you know,
sometimes when I got a good enoughactor, you know, it might
be nice to have a couple ofdifferent ways to kind of form a scene
(18:14):
so kind of interesting that your toyour take is is a hurry up and
get that, you know, Imean second, if not a third take,
and then just go shotgun. Yeah. And you know it's like I
if when you have the time,I think, yes, you should.
You should absolutely milk it, especiallyif you're paying one hundred thousand dollars for
somebody to be there. You know, you should absolutely milk it. But
(18:38):
you know, if you for me, like when I write scripts, I
write like shots and ship into myscripts sometimes so like people hate it.
I get a lot of criticism forit, but people, you know,
like I just want to describe.I want to communicate what I see in
my head and because I have sucha strong visual in my head. I
(19:00):
communicate that in the script as wellas verbally to my talent, so they
kind of know really what I whatI want to move to move on to
the next piece. So it's likeif they can give me what I want,
I do appreciate seeing you know whatelse they can do. But if
there's if you're doing like eight toten pages in a day, you know,
(19:23):
like sometimes it is boom boom boom. But you know, again,
if you're paying big money, you'redoing two page days, three page days
tops, so you can kind offinesse. Yeah, exactly. I mean,
it's it's it's them, it's them, you know. Um I call
it the rich band poor man ofproduction. You know, if you're on
(19:44):
a very huge streen budget like Iwas, I had the time to be
able to do it. But ifyou have you know, if you have
a large screen budget, you canhave more than one take. But if
you have a budget that's very limitedin terms of you know, it's good
enough that you know you're going tohave, um, you know you're gonna
have some any people on there,it's going to cost you money as much
as you possibly can to have peoplethere then Yeah, it's it's one of
(20:06):
those things where you kind of haveto almost running gun a little bit onto
that set. So absolutely understand thatas well. UM business on the on
the business end of things as well. So it's great. How long did
it take for you to UM toget Digging to Death done? I mean
how long it was the shoot?So the shoot ended up being all in
including pick up, uh, fifteendays, which was pretty again running running
(20:32):
gun UM. And then it waswe had some some demons in in post.
Honestly, the first editor that Ihired was just very lackadaisical. UM
didn't he like he had his UMassistant editor like organize all the footage.
(20:52):
But then that guy that organized allof the footage like didn't do anything with
b cam. So all of mygimbal stuff was left out of the original
cut of the like the first cut, and I was like, there's so
many shots that are missing, andit's like some of these shots are in
the script. So I had tofire that guy. Then it took me
(21:14):
a minute, took me another sixor seven months to find someone that I
really wanted to cut this thing.And I found Amir and he he hooked
it up, but it took hima minute just because of some issues with
some other things. And then yeah, so finally, like after two and
(21:34):
a half years, it sold andthen it you know, premiered damn like
ten months after after it sold domesticallyis when it ten months after it released.
So yeah, you know, II, yeah, fifteen days is
relatively short, and I mean,obviously having one location probably helped you a
(21:56):
little bit too. Considering that,well, i'd say one location. You
probably had several locations, but mainlocation was just one place, so that
I probably helped out a lot too. Yeah, what did you think?
What did you think of the flick? I did not get an opportunity to
watch it yet. I've watched thetrailer, so I was able to watch
some of the some of the shotsand some of the stuff that you did
there. So I need to catchup and watch watch the movie this weekend.
(22:18):
So I'll have to. I'll haveto, you know, get my
popcorn down and be able to watchit. Yeah, I think, uh,
I think you'll dig it, justknowing knowing what you know now and
that I'm very story driven. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean,
it's it's a really great premise.I mean, you know, to have
you know, this corpse that hadright next to a three million, three
(22:40):
million dollars and then the whole thewhole thing comes comes about as well.
The person that you cast for themain antagonist, though, I mean,
he did a really great job.I mean, how did you find him?
So? Uh yeah, So TomFitzpatrick was actually the um the Bride
and Black in the Insidious series.If you ever saw in Cidius two or
(23:02):
in Cidius three, he was inboth of those and as one of the
evil characters. And I randomly justworked with him on a shoot like back
in two thousand and seventeen, Ithink like a year prior, where he
(23:22):
played just like a creepy guy andI was a DP on it and it
was just a it was a greatlittle short film. But he just did
this great job. It was justthis creepy old man and it was like
a horror kind of thing and Iwas like, man, that would be
great. He's just he can He'slike this sweet old guy, but like
when he puts on the makeup,he just becomes this terrorizer. And yeah,
(23:48):
it was it was great that heagreed to do it. Honestly,
it was. It was cool.Yeah, A movement also has a lot
to do with that too, Justthe way that he moves it says a
lot, you know. So,yeah, he didn't have some fabulous job
with that. You know, there'sno question there's a reason why he's always
casting girls like that. But butit's great to be able to see that
as well. So Devil comes toCasey where I said, we're in a
(24:14):
kind of kind of post production thereand you gotta do some more shoots with
that. Um so are we expectingtwenty twenty two, maybe four for pro
release? Yeah, I'm hoping.I'm hoping twenty twenty two. We'll get
our pickup shots on hearing about aweek for our intro. And then I
ended up writing a new character inwhich I hate to do and I really
(24:37):
don't like when that's done like kindof after the fact. But I feel
like as I was watching and Iwas like, you know, this needs
there's a couple of little scenes thatI needed for exposition for one of the
characters. So we're going to dothose Hearing about a month with the celebrity
that I can't really name right now, but I can tell you Um,
(25:00):
it hasn't been announced yet officially officially, but Kirk Fox is playing our Devil,
which is super rad. Um,but we'll get it'll get a whole
announcement like a Hollywood Reporter deadline kindof thing eventually, I'm sure. But
yeah, so it'll be cool workingwith him next week and getting all that
(25:23):
done. So it's it's cool.Yeah, well, I mean that's that's
great. I mean it's great tokind of you and I'll get some some
some rub there a little bit interms of your marketing as well. Um,
anything else coming up for you?Um, other than other than that,
I've got a feature that I'm producingcalled High Desert. Um. I
(25:47):
got a kids TV show that I'mproducing right before High Desert called Homeschool History.
Uh. And then after that,I got to go to New York
for a short film in Buffalo.So it's I'm gonna be it's gonna be
kind of crazy until the end ofthe year. Yeah you know. Um
(26:10):
yeah, so yeah, really I'llaf forward to a bunch of the stuff
that's going on. Where can peoplecan't find you on social media? Yeah?
My I think my big my bigthing is Instagram. Um, I'm
at blev Film Underscore LA so bl e v F I l M Underscore
LA. Uh and yeah, giveme a follow there. I'm not on
(26:30):
Twitter or really anything, and Ikeep my Facebook pretty private, so uh
yeah, follow me on Instagram andor you know, google me, I
guess yeah. Yeah. Digging theDeath can be found pretty much wherever you
get your movies. UM, sodefinitely, just you know, get it
for a rental. Um. Iwill make sure to get a rental of
(26:51):
it this weekend as well. UmMy, Michael, what's been an absolute
pleasure and we'll hopefully get you backon when Devil Comes to AC comes out
next year. Awesome, Well,thank you so much for taking the time.
And yeah, I would love toI'd love to talk about it.
You guys can listen to Somewhere inVegas on all your podcasts catchers, including
iTunes, Speaker, Stotify, andour home here at speaker dot com.
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You guys can check us out onsocial media at swiv at swiv and Somewhere
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SWYV podcast. That's at SWYV podcast. Well. Hopefully have some more podcasts
coming up. Sorry for the delafor the past month. Things have been
kind of crazy, but we'll beback doing regular podcasts up shortly. We've
(27:38):
got a bunch of guests lined upfor you guys, so definitely subscribe to
us on all your podcast catchers,and thanks a lot for joining us,
and we'll see you next time hereon Somewhere in Vegas.
Hey, what's up. This isSeth Green and you are listening to Somewhere
in Vegas with Mark and I amso hot. I would desperately like a
glass of water. Please please giveme some water. This is Cindy Preston
and I'm with Mark. I'm somewherein Vegas. Hi. This is Melissa
Peterman from the MP's to Singing dand the television show for You Bak and
(00:22):
I have to tell you, Ijust have to give it off my chest.
I love Somewhere in Vegas with Mark. Hi. Here, this is
Save Glasgow and General Hospital. You'relistening in Mark. I'm Samarre in Vegas
and you better watch out. Youknow how to find you. I'stening.
Hi. This is Shannon Egan fromWhip It and I Love Somewhere in Vegas.
It's Mark. Hey, this isLee Allen Vegas. It's somewhere in
(00:45):
Vegas talking with Mark with it quThis is Courtney Cronin. You're listening to
Somewhere in Vegas with your host Mark, and I would make sure to listen
every week because he's a share Betais the money man, any money?
I got two tickets of Paradise thisyou know what it's somewhere in Vegas.
What happens in Vegas Space Vegas.Hi, this is Crystal Kale and I
love somewhere in Vegas with Mark.Hi. This is Cherry Nun from Berlin
(01:08):
and you're listening to Mark somewhere inVegas. Hi. This is Mirka Laurie
from Josh Veden Stallhouse. There arethree flowers in a vase and I'm listening
to somewhere in Vegas with Mark.Hi. This is Aaron Hill and you
are listening to Mark on blog talkradio and somewhere in Vegas. Mark is
a great guy. Hi, thisis Pulaski. I'm still trying to figure
(01:30):
out Mark Pico's sexuality, but Iknow you're listening because somewhere live in Vegas.
Who did you go? Mark?I'm sorry, I thought you were
I'm sorry yet attend to get outof you. Hey, this is Lance
and Anna from Free Radio and Anna, and you're listening to somewhere in Vegas.
(01:51):
Yeah, might say, you know, that's that's usually what happens with
me. I go to Vegas andI get lost, and so I end
up somewhere in Vegas. Somewhere inVegas. But I just don't know where
it is. I'm not quite sure. Yeah, we get ready. It's
gonna be hot. It's in Vegas. Check out part be there or be
square. My guest at this timeis a very very big busy man.
(02:17):
He's has a new movie called Diggingto Death. He's working on another one
called Devil Comes to Kansas City.Um. He's been working his tailoff,
pretty much, runs his own productioncompany, runs his own lighting company,
and really cool kind of a lotof things that's going on in his plate.
He's a producer, he's a director. We got Michael Levins on with
(02:39):
us right now. HWI doing Michaelpretty good? Good. Um. First
of all, I mean, youknow recently you've been doing music videos all
that. How has that been foryou to, you know, do these
smaller projects and kind of keep youare kind of keep yourself a little bit
sharper um. You know, honestly, it's it's great. Uh, It's
(03:00):
really is kind of a balance ofhaving, you know, paychecks that fill
the voids between the movies I'm directing. But also there's there's new problems,
there's new challenges. Every day,every day is different, so I can
really hone and sharpen my skills asa filmmaker as well as a director,
being on set constantly through and otherpeople's stuff. Yeah, and you know,
(03:23):
it's a little bit less stressed becauseusually music videos maybe take maybe two
or three days versus a long productionthat maybe taking weeks, if not months.
Yeah, I mean it, it'sit's kind of it's kind of interesting
because with a longer production, you'rethere is a lot of pre production and
then but your days are typically notas jam packed. You're shooting three or
(03:46):
four pages a day. Sometimes you'reshooting more. But for me, it's
it's limited Versus a music video,you're shooting what ideally you would want to
take three days to shoot in twelveor fourteen hours, plus about a week
of prep to make sure that thatall goes well. So it's it's more
like a gun to the head really, But it's uh, it's nice.
(04:10):
It's they're they're they're fun to pepperin. You know. Now, Now,
are you based out of out ofKansas City? Now? Uh?
No, I grew up. Iwas born and raised in Kansas City.
I've lived in Los Angeles for nineyears now. Yeah. Now, um,
it's been kind of interesting. Becauseyou mean obviously, uh, you
know, some of your stuff iskind of going back to to your Kansas
City roots as well. I mean, how's it been for production? I
(04:33):
mean, obviously its production has beenshut down in LA for for for for
the year. Um it might bestarting to reopen a little bit more now,
but how's it been for the productionside of things, especially considering you
have two movies that you're producing.Uh So, just to be honest with
you, when when COVID happened orwhen the official shutdown in LA happened,
(04:55):
uh in March or twenty twenty,there was about four and a half months
of nothing, like no one wasworking whatsoever, like no no indie kid,
student film, nothing. But thenaround mid July the smaller music videos
started to come up again. Andnow, honestly, the last four or
(05:18):
five months it's been kind of NonStop. SAG has implemented a lot of COVID
restrictions and rules that that make thingssafer but definitely more challenging. So when
we shot The Devil Comes in KansasCity, that was in like the principal
(05:38):
photography was in February of twenty twentyone, when COVID was still pretty rampant,
and it was it was very challengingshooting back in Casey and still having
to do all of the COVID protocolsand getting a whole cast and crew tested
twice a day and ohlsa, youknow, getting um getting everybody or not
(06:04):
twice a day, three times aweek, every other day. So it's
just it was it was nuts.But now it's starting to lighten up a
little bit. It's it's it's gettinga little easier. But you know,
you do we just roll with it. Yeah, you know, um,
you know that's how things are usually, you know, you have to kind
of roll with the punches as itwork. Um. I hadd fighter on
(06:27):
I think earlier last late last yearwhen she was um julming Big Skuy and
she's up in Vancouver, and yeah, she was questioned for you know,
quite a few days or she andwhen she had to go on set,
she you know, it was likethey rushed her on set, got her
scenes done in back to the hotelroom again. So yeah, you know,
things things are kind of crazy,but hopefully things kind of uh lots
of vaccinations can you know, startto kind of roll out. Maybe we'll
(06:51):
see a little bit more relaxing ofsome of the some of the things that
you have to go through in termsof a production. So you know,
figures crossed at um. You know, I mean just just as a filmmaker,
you know. I mean, firstof all, let me tell you,
let me ask you about, youknow, how you got started as
a filmmaker. UM, tell mea little bit, um, you know
about some of your you know,your history in terms of filmmaking. So
(07:13):
I took an interest in filmmaking actuallywhen I was a junior in high school,
UM, and started doing some smallthings with friends sua still in high
school, and completely abandoned this ideathat I was going to become a doctor
just to tell stories really, andI ended up. I went to Missouri
(07:35):
State and realized I wasn't ready reallyfor college and flunked out and uh because
I was playing guitar hero too muchand not really the beginning, you know,
great beginning of a of a herostory. But when I moved back
to KCY, I was like,I felt defeated, and I was like,
I'm not gonna let this defeat me. You know what can I do?
(07:59):
And I had a couple scripts thatI wanted you know, to shoot
eventually, and I had one thattook place in a mall, and I
was like, that took place ina shoot store. And I was like,
you know what, I'm gonna makethis movie. I'm gonna I don't
know how I'm gonna do it,but I'm gonna freaking do it. And
I was nineteen years old and Iended up shooting this feature that you'll never
It never got distributed. It wasjust kind of a practice thing, you
(08:22):
know, looking back on it,it's just got awful. But we got
it done right. And it actuallyshowed in a local movie theater and people
came to a premiere, and youknow, and I was all before I
was twenty. So I did twomore kind of like that. I did
a crime drama and then another comedy, like a music comedy, and then
(08:43):
I turned twenty four. At thatpoint I was like, all right,
I gotta move to La. SoI moved to La. I didn't have
any contacts out here. I didn'thave really any network or even a place
to live or a job. Ijust decided I was going to move,
came out here, handed out mybusiness card to everybody that would take it.
(09:05):
Eventually got on a set. Youknow, I said, I worked
for free. I'm a PA.I'll work for free. Just get me
on your damn set. Got ona set, got on a couple more
sets, learned how to grip justfrom being on set, and then kind
of actually paused the filmmaker, youknow, path just for about five years
(09:30):
where I would I built a lightingcompany because I learned how to light,
and I was a gaffer on somereally big, really big projects and big
movies, and like I used togaff like Steven Seagal movies and I've gaffed
for the Weekend and you know,basically being the guy that's coming up with
the lighting concepts and stuff. Butit was it was enough money that I
(09:50):
actually could raise money and use revenuefrom my lighting company to fund Digging to
Death or when I wrote it,it was called What's Buried in the Backyard,
and then the distributor you know,chose this new title, as you
know often happens. But uh,yeah, it uh it was cool.
(10:16):
You know, I was able tokind of take that money and I didn't
have to worry about owing other people. I have to worry about people telling
me, you know, things Ican and can't do, and I said
I was going to do it,and I got it done. So as
soon as I got that movie kindof done and distributed, I pumped the
brakes on the lighting side. Andnow I'm back full bore, you know
(10:37):
this last year so just been justcrazy knows the grindstone on production and directing.
Yeah, a lot of people don'trealize how important light is, especially
in terms of of of you know, of filmmaking. I mean you have
to you know, it sets themood obviously, um the idea of you
(10:58):
know, how how a person lit. I'm reminded of the Seinfeld episode where
there was a woman who looks greatin one light but looked terrible in the
other. So there's always that kindof situation. How has it been for
you to, you know, havegone through through the lighting aspect of filmmaking
and kind of transitioning that into whatyour vision was for this movie? H
(11:20):
honestly it just I mean, soboth movies had Justin Jones, who's a
very prolific DP out here in laI think his Instagram tag is at Justin
Jones DP. He uh me andhim have a very similar style. We
we like classic movie lighting you know, far side key kind of stuff and
(11:46):
soft, soft edges, not thatbright shiny edge shit, but just really
classic lighting. And so that's kindof how me and him have done a
lot of because I used to workfor him on these bigger music videos and
stuff, and we created this look. So when I was directing and I
was hiring him, we didn't reallyhave to talk about the look necessarily or
(12:11):
you know what, or even howto accomplish it because I knew he kind
of had that. And then Iput a gaffer in that was competent on
you know, both of these films, but it helped in the production side,
knowing like, okay, we're goingto take We literally drove a sprinter
van from LA to Kansas City justbecause it's all my lights and stuff.
(12:35):
But it's just a sprinter van.So I had to be very selective as
to what I was going to bring. And I wanted to bring some like
big, big units, you know, like big movie lights, but I
also needed some like smaller interior stuff, generators all that. So I had
to from a cost effective standpoint andfrom just a creative standpoint, how was
I going to be able to achievethe look that I needed with only a
(13:00):
sprinter van. How is that goingto make a move a million dollar movie
look like a million dollars with justa small sprinter van package. So,
um, I because of my lightingyou know, uh experience, I was
able to achieve that. Yeah,you know, and and sometimes less is
(13:20):
more, sometimes you ever think it. So it's it's really kind of easy
for you to to you know,take a smaller kit and just be able
to work with what you have aswell. And um, you know,
obviously a lot of a lot ofwhat goes on with you know, digging
to Death is the fact you havelike visual effects where you know, you
have your main uh you know antagonist, you know in certain certain certain situations
(13:45):
where you know you have to haveit lit kind of really interestingly enough to
kind of kind of get that shockand on on that as well. Obviously,
I mean this this is obviously yourfirst horror film, right, yes,
I mean how was it for youdo a horror film like this?
You know? Honestly, like Iwrote the I wrote this movie because the
(14:09):
house that I moved into is actuallythe house in the movie, and it's
just a big property. And soI was like, you know, I
have to shoot a movie here,and then I knew that horror movies were
easier to sell than, you know, traditionally than most any other movies.
So I was like, wow,that's kind of the whole point is just
to make this sell it show aprofit move the next movie, and just
(14:33):
from a business side, you know. So I was like, Okay,
So now from the creative side,how do I how do I make a
horror movie that I want to watch? Because I don't like horror movies.
I don't really think they're There's acouple that are good, I guess,
but most of them are just kindof like blood and tits and gore or
(14:54):
like I like story. So Iwas like, how can I write a
horror movie that kind of freaks meout, that that would compel me someone
who doesn't like horror movies? Andso that's what I Digging to Death is
essentially the best that I could dofor that with the with the budget that
I had. You know, yeah, I mean, how was it worked
(15:15):
with the actors on the set?And you know, was it because it
kind of fun to kind of workwork with them, um, you know,
on the set and especially considering youknow, kind of the genre you're
working in. Uh yeah, Iactually, uh so, I've I've actually
worked on some some bigger shows likeum I was. I did some acting
in um Hail Caesar with the CoenBrothers. I did a little bit of
(15:37):
acting with um A Marriage Story withNoah Bomboch and those sets. Yeah,
give me one second here, noproblem, Okay, we're back. Uh
yeah, So I was saying.I was just saying, um So,
I've been on some big sets withyou know, the Coen Brothers, with
(16:02):
Noah Bomboch, and those sets aresilent. It's very silent. It's not
like a traditional indie set where everyone'sjust sort of bumbling around. It's just
everyone's just quiet. So I madesure that, you know, I hate
to say this because like I don'twant to be one of those directors that
has these weird rules, but Ilike to keep it quiet and I like
(16:26):
to I like to be be veryintimate with my talent. With talent of
high caliber, you know, ifyou're doing a third take, you better
have a damn good reason. Youknow, like it's just I mean,
like that's like a third take ofthe same angle or the same shot.
You know, like once you gotit. If you got it, get
(16:48):
a safety just in case there's somethingyou didn't see. And if something happens
in the safety where you need thethird take, you got to literally communicate.
You have to say, hey,we got to do a third take
because I didn't like this, orwe need to fix this. But if
you're just like, oh, yeah, just let's just do one more,
it's it's disrespectful. You know,we got you gotta move on, you
(17:08):
gotta keep going, and if yougot it, you got it. So
it's just I like to I liketo be like that. I think the
actors that that I employed for thisthis movie, UM were grateful for that
and just like that, like thatintimacy. So it's cool. I liked
working with them. Yeah, thatwas kind of interesting because I I just
(17:29):
got I mean, my my filmvery I mean it just it's just just
premiered a couple of weeks ago,where I'm still working on some pros production
stuff to actually get it, youknow, get somewhat distributed to um,
you know, two different areas rightnow and find a figure out distribution.
I kind of network. But whenI was working with the actors, UM,
I mean, I you know,sometimes they would get it on the
(17:49):
first take, and I would doa second, second take, obviously for
safety, but um I would doone or two more takes just because I
wanted to see something a little bitdifferent, just in case I wanted to
see different performance. I mean,it's not anything against you know, their
performances at all, but I justwanted to make sure there's a you know,
sometimes when I got a good enoughactor, you know, it might
be nice to have a couple ofdifferent ways to kind of form a scene
(18:14):
so kind of interesting that your toyour take is is a hurry up and
get that, you know, Imean second, if not a third take,
and then just go shotgun. Yeah. And you know it's like I
if when you have the time,I think, yes, you should.
You should absolutely milk it, especiallyif you're paying one hundred thousand dollars for
somebody to be there. You know, you should absolutely milk it. But
(18:38):
you know, if you for me, like when I write scripts, I
write like shots and ship into myscripts sometimes so like people hate it.
I get a lot of criticism forit, but people, you know,
like I just want to describe.I want to communicate what I see in
my head and because I have sucha strong visual in my head. I
(19:00):
communicate that in the script as wellas verbally to my talent, so they
kind of know really what I whatI want to move to move on to
the next piece. So it's likeif they can give me what I want,
I do appreciate seeing you know whatelse they can do. But if
there's if you're doing like eight toten pages in a day, you know,
(19:23):
like sometimes it is boom boom boom. But you know, again,
if you're paying big money, you'redoing two page days, three page days
tops, so you can kind offinesse. Yeah, exactly. I mean,
it's it's it's them, it's them, you know. Um I call
it the rich band poor man ofproduction. You know, if you're on
(19:44):
a very huge streen budget like Iwas, I had the time to be
able to do it. But ifyou have you know, if you have
a large screen budget, you canhave more than one take. But if
you have a budget that's very limitedin terms of you know, it's good
enough that you know you're going tohave, um, you know you're gonna
have some any people on there,it's going to cost you money as much
as you possibly can to have peoplethere then Yeah, it's it's one of
(20:06):
those things where you kind of haveto almost running gun a little bit onto
that set. So absolutely understand thatas well. UM business on the on
the business end of things as well. So it's great. How long did
it take for you to UM toget Digging to Death done? I mean
how long it was the shoot?So the shoot ended up being all in
including pick up, uh, fifteendays, which was pretty again running running
(20:32):
gun UM. And then it waswe had some some demons in in post.
Honestly, the first editor that Ihired was just very lackadaisical. UM
didn't he like he had his UMassistant editor like organize all the footage.
(20:52):
But then that guy that organized allof the footage like didn't do anything with
b cam. So all of mygimbal stuff was left out of the original
cut of the like the first cut, and I was like, there's so
many shots that are missing, andit's like some of these shots are in
the script. So I had tofire that guy. Then it took me
(21:14):
a minute, took me another sixor seven months to find someone that I
really wanted to cut this thing.And I found Amir and he he hooked
it up, but it took hima minute just because of some issues with
some other things. And then yeah, so finally, like after two and
(21:34):
a half years, it sold andthen it you know, premiered damn like
ten months after after it sold domesticallyis when it ten months after it released.
So yeah, you know, II, yeah, fifteen days is
relatively short, and I mean,obviously having one location probably helped you a
(21:56):
little bit too. Considering that,well, i'd say one location. You
probably had several locations, but mainlocation was just one place, so that
I probably helped out a lot too. Yeah, what did you think?
What did you think of the flick? I did not get an opportunity to
watch it yet. I've watched thetrailer, so I was able to watch
some of the some of the shotsand some of the stuff that you did
there. So I need to catchup and watch watch the movie this weekend.
(22:18):
So I'll have to. I'll haveto, you know, get my
popcorn down and be able to watchit. Yeah, I think, uh,
I think you'll dig it, justknowing knowing what you know now and
that I'm very story driven. Yeah, yeah, exactly. I mean,
it's it's a really great premise.I mean, you know, to have
you know, this corpse that hadright next to a three million, three
(22:40):
million dollars and then the whole thewhole thing comes comes about as well.
The person that you cast for themain antagonist, though, I mean,
he did a really great job.I mean, how did you find him?
So? Uh yeah, So TomFitzpatrick was actually the um the Bride
and Black in the Insidious series.If you ever saw in Cidius two or
(23:02):
in Cidius three, he was inboth of those and as one of the
evil characters. And I randomly justworked with him on a shoot like back
in two thousand and seventeen, Ithink like a year prior, where he
(23:22):
played just like a creepy guy andI was a DP on it and it
was just a it was a greatlittle short film. But he just did
this great job. It was justthis creepy old man and it was like
a horror kind of thing and Iwas like, man, that would be
great. He's just he can He'slike this sweet old guy, but like
when he puts on the makeup,he just becomes this terrorizer. And yeah,
(23:48):
it was it was great that heagreed to do it. Honestly,
it was. It was cool.Yeah, A movement also has a lot
to do with that too, Justthe way that he moves it says a
lot, you know. So,yeah, he didn't have some fabulous job
with that. You know, there'sno question there's a reason why he's always
casting girls like that. But butit's great to be able to see that
as well. So Devil comes toCasey where I said, we're in a
(24:14):
kind of kind of post production thereand you gotta do some more shoots with
that. Um so are we expectingtwenty twenty two, maybe four for pro
release? Yeah, I'm hoping.I'm hoping twenty twenty two. We'll get
our pickup shots on hearing about aweek for our intro. And then I
ended up writing a new character inwhich I hate to do and I really
(24:37):
don't like when that's done like kindof after the fact. But I feel
like as I was watching and Iwas like, you know, this needs
there's a couple of little scenes thatI needed for exposition for one of the
characters. So we're going to dothose Hearing about a month with the celebrity
that I can't really name right now, but I can tell you Um,
(25:00):
it hasn't been announced yet officially officially, but Kirk Fox is playing our Devil,
which is super rad. Um,but we'll get it'll get a whole
announcement like a Hollywood Reporter deadline kindof thing eventually, I'm sure. But
yeah, so it'll be cool workingwith him next week and getting all that
(25:23):
done. So it's it's cool.Yeah, well, I mean that's that's
great. I mean it's great tokind of you and I'll get some some
some rub there a little bit interms of your marketing as well. Um,
anything else coming up for you?Um, other than other than that,
I've got a feature that I'm producingcalled High Desert. Um. I
(25:47):
got a kids TV show that I'mproducing right before High Desert called Homeschool History.
Uh. And then after that,I got to go to New York
for a short film in Buffalo.So it's I'm gonna be it's gonna be
kind of crazy until the end ofthe year. Yeah you know. Um
(26:10):
yeah, so yeah, really I'llaf forward to a bunch of the stuff
that's going on. Where can peoplecan't find you on social media? Yeah?
My I think my big my bigthing is Instagram. Um, I'm
at blev Film Underscore LA so bl e v F I l M Underscore
LA. Uh and yeah, giveme a follow there. I'm not on
(26:30):
Twitter or really anything, and Ikeep my Facebook pretty private, so uh
yeah, follow me on Instagram andor you know, google me, I
guess yeah. Yeah. Digging theDeath can be found pretty much wherever you
get your movies. UM, sodefinitely, just you know, get it
for a rental. Um. Iwill make sure to get a rental of
(26:51):
it this weekend as well. UmMy, Michael, what's been an absolute
pleasure and we'll hopefully get you backon when Devil Comes to AC comes out
next year. Awesome, Well,thank you so much for taking the time.
And yeah, I would love toI'd love to talk about it.
You guys can listen to Somewhere inVegas on all your podcasts catchers, including
iTunes, Speaker, Stotify, andour home here at speaker dot com.
(27:15):
You guys can check us out onsocial media at swiv at swiv and Somewhere
in Vegas on Facebook. You guyscan also check us out on Instagram at
SWYV podcast. That's at SWYV podcast. Well. Hopefully have some more podcasts
coming up. Sorry for the delafor the past month. Things have been
kind of crazy, but we'll beback doing regular podcasts up shortly. We've
(27:38):
got a bunch of guests lined upfor you guys, so definitely subscribe to
us on all your podcast catchers,and thanks a lot for joining us,
and we'll see you next time hereon Somewhere in Vegas.
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