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Welcome to the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, Episode number three eighty one. The scariest moment is always just before you start. Steven King broadcasting from a dark, windowless.
Room in Hollywood when we really should be working on that next draft. It's the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, showing you the craft and business of screenwriting while teaching you how to make your screenplay bulletproof.
And here's your host, Alex Ferrari. Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast. I am your humble host, Alex Ferrari. Now, today's show is sponsored by Bulletproof script Coverage. Now. Unlike other script coverage services, Bulletproof Script Coverage actually focuses on the kind of project you are and the goals of the project you are, so we actually break it down by three categories, micro budget, indie film, market, and
studio film. There's no reason to get coverage from a reader that's used to reading tempole movies when your movie is going to be done for one hundred thousand dollars and we wanted to focus on that. At Bulletproof script coverage, our readers have worked with Marvel Studios, CIA, w MEE, NBC, HBO, Disney, Scott Free, Warner Brothers, The Blacklist, and many many more. So if you need your screenplay or TV script covered
by professional readers, head on over to covermiscreenplay dot Com. Well, guys, today on the show, we have returning champion Shane Stanley. Now, many of you know Shane as an instructor over at IFH Academy where he has some best selling webinars and courses about casting stars and working under COVID protocols and
many other things. But today we're going to talk about his new project called Double Threat, and Shane and I discuss how he was able to pull off a micro budget action film with some bankable names in the middle of COVID and how is he able to take that micro budget film and have worldwide distribution. It is a fascinating episode, guy, So without any further ado, please enjoy my conversation with Shane Stanley. I like to welcome back to the show returning champion Shane Stanley.
How you doing, Shae, I am doing great, Alex, thanks for having me mad It's great to see you.
Thanks for coming back on the show.
Brother.
I appreciate you coming back. And you and I have been working together for a little while. We've got a couple of courses up on IFH Academy. We got your book about what they don't teach you at film School up on IFH Books, and maybe in the next few weeks we're going to be releasing a few chapters of that book for free, so everyone can get to get a taste of your genius. But in what's inside that book that will hopefully save a lot of filmmakers' lives.
Today we're here to sit right here now one right there? What what el Mardo don't exactly so, but so today we're here to talk about your new film, Double Threat. But I just want to get into weeds a little bit about filmmaking and about where where how you can put this thing together, the realities of what's going on from financing to distribution and so on. So but first, man, can you tell a little bit about yourself. The people who did not listen to your first interview with me.
Well, absolutely, you know I grew up in the industry, I actually became a working actor at nine months old. My father was a working actor. We were at a barbecue and there was a guy kind of looking at me from across the backyard, and my dad's very protective, so you just walked right up to the guy goes, I don't like the way you're looking at my kid. What's your jam? And he said, oh, no, no, I'm a commercial director. I'm doing a new campaign for Century twenty one.
It's this real estate company and I need a baby, and your kid's been sitting there quiet and kirked up and well behaved, and we can't find a kid. It doesn't scream. So Luxury Shari became this working kid baby actor till I was, you know, in fourth, fifth, sixth grade. But during that time, my father got out of acting
and became a working documentary and educational filmmaker. So he had the flatbeds, the movieolas, the splicers, and sixteen millimeters cameras, and so through very young age, I started playing around on those cameras and splicers and movieolas, and he just started working and working and working, and he was doing everything at such a low budget. He was literally calling on me to work in the camera department, the editing department.
So I grew up in and around the business that way, and as I got older, around the time I was in high school, he finally got his big break and it was on a film that you know he did with Michael Landon that I was very very much a part of, and that changed our lives. And we started making these, you know, a television series of Movie of the Weeks for about nine years, which spawned into Retire Gang, which was the remake of one of our mow documentaries.
And I started going down the path of working in a television network and studio system, and I just I didn't like development. I didn't like meetings. I didn't like talking about movies getting made. I wanted to make movies. And when I probably about twelve thirteen years ago, after my fifteen hundred meeting at one of the networks, the head of the network called me into his office and said, let's talk, and we put our feet up on his coffee table. He poured us a glass of scotch, and
he said, it's obvious you're unhappy with this process. You're a filmmaker. Get out of here, go make movies and so I got five hundred dollars together and made a pilot for you know, a forty five minute pilot which did more for my career as a filmmaker than any of my resume previously. And I've been on that path ever since, and it's been it's been quite a right.
It has been served without question. You have made a bunch of independent films over the years, and I know that you know a couple of things that you should avoid in regards to making independent film, Like, what are a few things that make your independent film look cheap? Look low budget? Could you make high quality, high looking budget films at low budgets? But I've seen them too, man, I even worked on a few of them when I
was coming up as a colorist and an editor. Where you look at the stuff, You're like, dude, why did you just god, why did you shoot against the white wall?
Why did you get your aunt to play a big role in your movie?
Yeah?
Me, you know, look, let's put story aside. Every busher out and says, oh my god, it's all about the script. Yeah, the story is important, but let's talk about the look and production value of films. For me, there's five elements and no specific order your cinematograph. He's got to know his craft. You have to get actors that are that. I hate to keep using the term of know their craft. And and a lot of new filmmcacing well, I don't know any working actors. That's okay, go to local acting classes,
call colleges. There are a lot of actors amongst us that we don't think about. But most of the time they're calling their friends, their girlfriends, their aunt, their mom, their dad, their neighbor to star in their movies. And it just sinks the ship. And there's no reason you can't be working with talent. I think that another thing is so important is location. So many people just shoot
in their backyard, their garage, their house. People want to experience new things, and for me, everything is about location and making something look big. Another element is the editing. I think that's absolutely key. An editor can can sink or swim a film and a heartbeat. And the other
one is sound production sound. I've been fortunate on my last nine films to work with a guy I haven't add to d R one line, with the exception of we did a scene in a car and we had to we knew we weren't going to get it because of where we were driving in the organic nature. I wanted this shot in and we shot it with the camera trays, and the soundman said, just go get this as scratch. We'll we'll get them in the trailer doing
it later. And that's you have to have a great sound man, a good editor, good cinematographer, good actors, and good locations. I think if you have those five things, you have already stepped your game so far up that you're going to separate yourself, you know. I always it separates the sheet from the goats.
Yeah. And I think the other other thing I would add to that is to just when you frame things, just frame it with a little bit of scope, a little bit of a depth in a shot. So like so many times I see shots where, oh guy, look, they shot two people talking against a white wall. There's nothing interesting in that, and at all shoot at all window, at least.
Spout it out the window, go outside, you know, go go to a uh, you know, a set of tract houses on a day they're not doing the trash, you know, and you know, put a long lessons on that thing, and just get some depth and some open you know, and just that's just it is. Most of the student films were indie films that I look at and I
know you and I have talked about this. They shoot it up against the white wall, or they shoot it in a garage or a bedroom, and these things could just be taken outside or put into some new area. And our job as storytellers is to take an audience to either a place they've never been, a place they are afraid to go, a place that they want to go, or something they didn't exist. And I think every time we set something up, you need to think that way.
See, yeah, no question. And i'd love because in your new movie Double Threat, there's a scene that you know you're talking about. People want to be taken to a new place, things you haven't seen before. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor, and now back to the show. I haven't seen a woman on horseback with a bow and arrow chasing down a car ever that I.
Can remember without a spunk, Double exactly.
Then looked like a stud up. So we'll get into how you shot that in a little bit. But that was just like something You're just like, hey, something I don't see every day. That's that's interesting. So adding little elements like that of something you're just like, I've never seen that before adds a tremendous amount of value to your project.
It's gotten a lot of mileage. And also, you know, Danielle c Ryan is the actor you're referring to. Danielle had one mandate and and she produced the film with me as no stunt doubles. I can do anything that you need me to do. And you know there's a three and a half minute fight scene in that film that one double. She rehearsed it with doctor Haim and the other guys for one day on her day off. They showed up, we knocked it out, and you know that was the thing. You know, we shot that in
the heart of the pandemic. We filled it November December of twenty twenty, and we lost nine locations. Going back to locations, we had nine locations committed to the film. That one after another dropped out during production. And we had a friend with a film ranch who just said, dude, here are the keys, lock yourselves up on the hill and go do what you gotta do. And so we were very limited. I had that I had a warehouse, I had a hot dog stand, and we had my
cousin's cabin and Big Bear. Those were the only locations we had. And I would have loved to have shot that film all over the world, but we couldn't because of COVID. So taking what we were talking about a second ago is, yeah, is how do we make this interesting. Let's put a girl on horseback shooting a bow and arrow hitting a moving target, which he actually did. Let's get car chases, let's have fun with this, Let's do a Let's go to the airport and steal a plane
and have Matthew Lawrence started up and take off. I mean, we had no stunt doubles in this film, and that was kind of our That's awesome.
That's awesome. Now, in another interview, I heard you talk about the eleven minute rule that filmmakers and screenwriters should follow. What is the eleven minute rule?
I will I will tell you something funny. I got a lot of heats to that. I was doing an interview and before we started, you know, I just said, casually, I said, I think there's an eleven minute rule. And I learned this from sales agents that you know, when you make as storytellers and must we're Spielberg or you know, Christopher Nolan, whethery're gonna sit for two hours before you
get to the point. I've learned when you're making an indie film, especially in the climate of streaming and three hundred thousand channels at your fingertips, you better let your audience know what's going on with Then. I've heard from sales agents and distributors. They've been beating it in my head for the last six or seven years. You've got eleven minutes to get to the point where there were
out there they're gonna You're gonna lose them. And I mentioned this on another interview, and I got crucified for saying that, And of course it was all the people that have never made a movie before, who have never sold the film. And I learned it by having movies that were building and developing characters, with sales agent saying you've got to take three or four minutes out of your movie. You've got to get to it by ten eleven minutes. Dude, if you don't, we're not going to
get a sale. So you know, everybody likes to develop backstory character, and you know, all the you know all the officionados out there that have their rules that they believe they need to follow, and they crucified me, which is bind. Everybody's entitled to an opinion. But what was really funny is I am actually a work for hire as a director on a studio film right now that starts in August. I was hired by a studio to
direct a film. And what was so funny is we have our first meeting and they wanted me to read the script and they never saw the interview. They don't care about any of the stuff if I do outside of what they need me for. And one of the executives actually said to me, there is an eleven minute rule that we need to follow. This stript doesn't do it. It gets into about thirteen or fourteen minutes where we finally know what the hell's going on. We need you to as a director to do a director polish and
get us to this eleven minute point. And I said to him, and where did you hear about this rule? And they said, it's just a rule. Follow it. But I've never heard of the term eleven minute rule a time. I'm not saying I coined the phrase like Richard you know, like that wonderful comedian that said he coined the lunch from help or the something from help. I had never heard the term. It was brought up in the interview.
But I have found, especially in the independent world, when you're hustling and you're trying to sell your stuff, if your audience doesn't know what the hell's going on and what the journey is going to be. Of course, surprises down on the road are good, but they don't know what the whole setup is and who the players are. By ten eleven minutes, man, good luck, good luck.
No.
And that's the thing. And this is the difference with a lot of filmmakers don't understand that in the eighties, nineties, even the early two thousands, people would go to a theater, they sit down, or in the eighties and nineties, they would rent a movie, they've paid for it, they're gonna
watch it hooked, you're hooked. But in today's world, you're flipping and flip and flip and flipping, flipping, and there is tens of millions of pieces of content for you to consume, and movies and television and entertainment for you to watch. That I'd argue it's like much faster than eleven minutes, because it is for me. I'll sit there and I'll start watching something and man, like, we were
watching the show. What was it? I forgot the name of the show, but it was supposedly a really good show. Oh no, it's like a new HBO show. I'm not going to name the show. But we're watching this new HBO show and it was like a drama and we're just sitting there going, I'm like, what this is so slow? My wife and I just like eight minutes in, We're like, I can't great cast, scene, cast, great writers. I just it just took too long for me to get into it.
I was just like, if this is the pace of the show, then I'm not going to be able to keep going with it. So I just started watching Mayor of Kingston.
How do you like You?
I'm in the middle of.
It right now.
Some of the I saw the whole I saw it. Talk about Jeremy Renner's show.
Yeah, yeah, Taylor Taylor Sheridan show. Taylor's absolutely loved it.
It's got you know, look, you could pick apart any series, wouldn't we all love to be done. Sure, Taylor's got it going on right now. I'll tell you something that the last two episodes, it's a two part episode. I'm I'm a cutter at heart. I'm an editor at Hart. Is the best cutting. There's a scene in the prison yard. I'm not going to ruin it for you. It's the best editing I've ever seen on television. And it's terrible.
I thought I always thought Braveheart's battle scenes were the best cut I had every It's comparable to the Brave Heart stuff. I was just I rewatched the episodes just for the cutting it was. I love the show and I hope.
So so yeah. I think they're definitely bringing it back. But Mayor of Kingston is for everybody not listening is a show by Taylor Sheridan, who is right now the most the busiest human being in Hollywood, has I think.
Eleven shows in the pipeline, every Yellowstone, He's got.
Nineteen thirty two, and then there's like four or five other ones that I just the one with Celester Stallan's coming out like everybody in the in the country, in the world wants to work with him. So he's got like I think, literally, I'm not exaggerated about e loved shows running.
What's really cool, if I can interject, is donal Odlivieri, who co starts and co stars in Double Threat that failed. What we're talking about. She was in eighteen eighty three and they loved her so much. She is going to be in Yellowstone this year. She's I mean the whole season. I mean, how cool is that. I'm so proud of her. Well, I'm allowed to say that because that news broke two days ago.
All the w that's awesome music. But the reason why I bring that show up is because the first pilot. I'm sitting there watching the pilot of that, the first episode, I'm just going, it's so tight, Yep, it's so in. I'm so I'm so in. And then there's a twist in this in the pilot which we won't tell you about, and you're just like, what that done? You're hooked for the series because of what they did in the pot one of the best pilots I've seen in a while in.
A while, and Taylor is so good at those fights. I'll tell you, going back to what you said a second ago, that is so key. When we were making movies up until probably ten years ago, you got them in the theater. They were hooked. They weren't going anywhere. They paid for the DVD or the VHS, they weren't going anywhere. Now the problem is is the distractions the phone. So even if they're streaming your show, this is going off.
They've got a tablet, they got a kid crying. There's so you have to make your show look like they can't blink. And that was the point of the whole eleven minute rule is. And I'd learned it the hard way because when we did Break Even Look love it or hate it, that film had more potholes in it than a poorly paved road. But the problem was we took twenty minutes out, which left those holes so we could make our deals. That was the problem, and that
eleven minute rule. That was what everybody said, is it takes you twenty one minutes to get to the damn point. We don't know what the kids are doing until seventeen minutes in. Once we hit that eleven minute point, everything changed. I thought the movie suffered greatly for it in plots and story, and that's unfortunate, but it made the deals when you talk about business, and and that was where that was coming from you.
Know what, and and and then we'll get off the tailor train for a second because it's just like just such a fan of Tailor's. Oh he's so he so must see TV for my wife and I that when a new season of Yellowstone is up, my kids, no are you guys, it's Yellowstone night. Okay, we won't we won't knock on the door because if they knock on the door while Yellowstone's on, they know they're gonna get it. So anytime they walk it but like, so yellow and
now we're like, it's Mayor of Kingstoon. No, no, no, no, not don't want to hear anything for an hour. Go away, go away?
Ye have the houses on fire? I don't care.
There's a fire extinguisher under the under the saying just deal with it. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor. And now back to the show. But that's Taylor. That's the kind of writing that that Taylor does, the kind of filmmaking he does with his shows, and that is he is. He is a writer and a creator for this moment in time, and probably the best he is probably arguably one of the best writers in
television right now arguably also I mean Zacario, Jesus Christ. Oh, I mean Jimmy, I mean all his movies where I mean Hella high Water.
You're just like, oh, you know.
And I was watching an interview about him the other day, I think it was a CBS or something like that, and then where he's like, yeah, after twenty years of you know, being number eleven on the call sheet, someone said you should write. And the first thing he wrote was the pilot of Mayor of Kingstyle. And then after he wrote it, he goes, damn, man, I wish I
would have been doing this fifteen years ago. He was just never wrote before that, and he never he just and then he just kept going and he said, which is the best. He's like, I do movies because to report my horse habit.
Yep, that's what I think. Why he even dons hit it off still, Well, it is because you know she she lives on like this huge ranch and she is she is all about the horses. And I remember when we were working together on Double Threat, she was like, I really want to do a film with you with horses, maybe a Western we should do that. It's like okay, And then we wrapped Double dreatch. She got eighteen eighty three and she goes, ah, I found my Phil Baker, who's got the horses. Shane thinks.
Anyway, Shane, I'm gonna compete with this.
I can't complete like Whatie Harrelson an uh in decent proposal. It's like he's got the big yacht. That is, I can't compete.
I can't convey with the just us gout make it.
Offering me some old vintage guitars. That's it.
And you know that he's doing so Taylor's doing so well that he bought he's a co owner now of the four sixes ranch.
I didn't know that.
Oh yeah, he bought. He bought for everyone know the four Six's ranch is the largest ranch in America. I think it's it's two hundred and seventy five miles. Yeah, it's it's seventy five square miles or some something insane. It's he he owns, and he owns he's a part owner of it. Now that'll be I think two hundred million or something like that is something crazy.
Must be nice publish. I'm just trying to put gas in the car.
Hence why I move Why I moved to Austin, Sir.
War Man, smart man.
Now, another thing I wanted to ask you about Man, is titles, the title of your movie, and how important the title of your movie is. And a lot of filmmakers think about it as a creative choice, and it is. But a movie like one of the greatest movies ever made, worst title ever for a film? What movie is it? Greatest movie you ever remember? One of the greatest movie ever made in the nineties, worst title in the history of cinema.
Well, I know, I know. It was a well for me. It was the best selling book with Shashank Redemption.
It's a horrible, horrible thing.
I think will tell you a funny story about that movie, not leting people know, but.
Go for it.
I's such a good story.
When we first started doing redire Gang, we got that film got acquired by Sony in ninety two ninety three, so we spent a lot of years at the studio and without naming names. Uh, you know, when you're in the studio system, they'll they'll invite you to screenings, premieres and little private showings. And I'll never forget being invited to a private showing of a film that the head of production at Sony Calton said we want you guys, you and your dad and mom to come to see
this film. So we went and it was it was Shawshank Redemption, and it was brilliant. It was like I did the lights came up. I turned to the gentleman who invited us and I say, is one of the best films I've ever seen. He said, we're not that excited about it. We don't know, he said, we're kind of nervous about it. It's a little picture. We may yeah, And I just I didn't know it was based on a Stephen King movie because I actually saw it without credit.
That's what really I saw it, and I just said to him, I said, my only suggestion is changed the title. And everybody looked at me like I just took a turn on this in the corner of the ring and they were like, you realize that's a Stephen King novel And I was like, oh, I just don't think.
It's not a novel. It was a short It was a novela it's a short story inside it's a novella. So it wasn't like it you could change the damn title And it wasn't actually the name of the title of them.
They first saw the title, and now I think everybody's it's ingrained in our head.
But yeah, but now it's in shosh It was horrible, horrible. So can you talk about the importance of titles in the marketing and selling of your film? I can.
I the first time I ever got introduced to the importance of the title. I was fortunate enough when I was. I was running Charlie Sheen's production company from ninety I think it was ninety six to ninety nine, and we were doing a lot of projects back then, and we got involved with Abbie Lerner, who's you know, Abby's become one of the most prolific independent filmmakers of you know, content in the world. And we were doing a film
and the title was The Pharaoh Prophecies. It was kind of this really cool psychological thriller, and they greenlit the film and it changed. But Abby said to me in a meeting, I'll never forget it. We didn't have He called and said we need to have a meeting. We didn't have Skype, we didn't email. We drove to Abby's office. He said, we're having a round table meeting about Tiden and he said the title stops. I don't understand it.
But most importantly, it does not translate foreign. He said, on a good day, eighteen percent of our money will come from domestic. It's all about foreign. And I never forgot that. So I was literally in the bathroom. I grabbed an old I was getting ready to go to the meeting, and I was looking at an old issue of Metal Edge magazine and the drummer for Poison. They're friends of mine. Yes, Ricky Rockett was wearing a shirt
that said no Code of Conduct. So I went to the meeting about two hours later, sitting there at obvious streaming about how horrible the title is, and I finally said, what about no code of conduct? And everybody stopped. He wrote it down. He made a phone call. He said, that is brilliant. He said, you're good at titles. You're a crappy writer, but you're good at titles. So I said to him later as we became friendly, he said, you know, and this was in our video days, but
I tell people this now. He said, when people go to Blockbuster or Hollywood Video, they start at new releases. They're at alphabetical order. You have to think about by the time they get to m they've made their selection, he said, So always try to think of titles before m but good two word titles that have translation globally. So for me, I realized in making movies, especially in
the last few years. You know, we have we have titles like break even, we have titles like night Trade, we have titles like double threat, you know, things like that. And for me, it's about let's get a catchy title that we say on a daily basis or a regular like, well, we hear it, it's a familiar term. And for me it's it's it's really important to catch people's eye that
know nothing about you as a filmmaker. They may not know your actors or what your film's about, or you don't have the publicity money to make it a household name. How can you do that? And that's all the studio system was doing and repeat sequels, prequels and remakes was let's get rebrand what people know. So as an indie filmmaker, I think it's important to come up with really cool titles that people are familiar with subconsciously that will help just do a little bit of a built in branding
for your film. And that's that's where that comes from. But as a I can't work on a film until I have a cool title. I just I never could.
It's so I actually when I was working in coming up doing deliveries for a film for films, I was working with the distributor and there was a tidal little movie and let's say it's called by Train. All right, let's for lack of it's called by Trains for it. He goes, yeah, it's too they can't he can't make that work. Yeah, we need to be in the top of the catalog.
Yep.
So for him, he was looking at it from AFM standpoint, from the American film market standpoint where distributors and buyers are looking at the catalog, and it starts at A. So he renamed the movie a night train.
Smart because they're not going to make it night train. Comma a in the catalogs to the A night train a night train.
So, and I'm using that as a really horrible example, but it's exactly what he did. He just took it and just made a just threw an a in front of it, and you're just like, but that doesn't sound that great, And he's like it's going to sell. So there's and this is the thing man, and I know, I know you and I both kind of fall in the same in the same boat in this in regards to art versus commerce, where filmmakers where creatives. We want to tell a cool story, we want to be doing
what we'd love to do. But then you've got to make money in order to keep this train going, no pun intended. They keep this. You got to keep this thing going. So there are going to be sacrifices at this level when you're at the studio level where the whole other or if you're in the art world, our art art film level where you don't care. Like I made a movie called On the Corner of Ego and Desire. It's not something I was afm was not my strength, not my point. It wasn't like buyers are going to
buy this. I made the movie for three grand and it's fun. It was just for fun and I was going to sell it to my audience and I made money with it all and we're all said and done. But it was an art piece. It was an art piece. So there's art films and then there is a studio world where rules are completely different. They're completely skeared whatever they want. But in the indie you know, the grinding indie world and the trenches if you will, you've got
to balance art and commerce. And you just said that you could have cut out twenty minutes of your movie or else you wouldn't have gotten deals. Now you could have stuck to your guns as an artist and said, you know what, this is my vision. I'm not moving forward. And that movie wouldn't have made money, you wouldn't have been able to make the next one. Is that a fair statement?
And that's and that's just said. I say in my book, I remind people, you know, I look at every film we make is a gift.
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Every opportunity we have. I look, I compared to a trip to the moon, and how many people have been to the moon twice? I don't think many. And I just say, look, if you just want to make a movie, go make the movie you want to make. But if you want to have a career as a filmmaker, there are sacrifices and things that you have to change to get there. I mean, I've had films that people said
are brilliant. They've won, you know, one hundred awards at really prestigious festivals, premiered it can, and then the buyer buys it it can, says great, we need to take out five minutes, we need to do this, we need to switch this. We don't like this actor, we want you to reshoot that. But that's what got me here. I am at fifty plus years old now and I'm making a couple of films a year, and I'm very pleased to say pretty much my way because I've learned
how to play the game and it is commised. You're going back to what you said about title real quick. The original title to Night Train was actual blow and smoke, because it's a film about speed. It's about you know, car racing and all motorcycles and all this smoke.
Right away I thought of I thought it was a weed movie.
Yeah, okay, so at first was a weed, then there was blowing smoke up your ass. And then I literally said, as a joke, I said, well, the the treatment title was night Train, and everybody's like, well, that's your title, night train. The truck is actually your third star in the movie. That's the brand. That's plus you got the Guns Roses song that was real familiar, uh popular, So
it's again it goes back to that subtle branding. So yeah, we scrapped Blow and Smoke even though that was the working title, but it was always meant to be Night Training.
Yeah, exactly. Now I want to ask you how did you get double Thread off the ground? You know? And especially how did you get that? You know? How did you just I mean, obviously you came up with the idea, you wrote it correct, No, no, no, C J.
Waller, It didn't easiest story. So we were in September of twenty twenty. We had all been on lockdown for six seven months. I was sitting in my home office and I literally said, Okay, it's September, coming into the fourth quarter. We can look in a rearview mirror and say twenty twenty kicked our ass and lock this down, or we can we can turn around and make it our bitch. I said, I am not going down without a fight. A friend of mine called me. It was
one of my dearest friends in the world. He said, hey, I got fifty grand burning a hole in my pocket. Can you do something with it? And I said sure, So I called up CJ and I said, I got a Fred who just shimmidted fifty grand. I know it's nothing. I got the cameras for free. I know I can get the locations for free. The actors will just put it under an experimental be able to get decent actor. Somebody will come out and playlist. We'll get a crew
of eight. Let's just go do it. So we talked to Danielle and her manager at the time, Kurt, and we all agreed to go make this movie. CJ had a subscript in six days, and on the sixth day of Christmas, I Truelove called me and said, yeah, my wife said no, you're not in a fifty grade. So
it was like, oh, okay. So I actually was having lunch the next day with one of my dearest friends in the world, and it was when they were starting to let people in restaurants if they were outside on streets, and we sat down and he just said, you know, I told you I'd never get involved in your industry. Is a very successful man in his own business. He said, I'm concerned about you and your friends. You haven't been
out of the house in seven months. He said, what is the cheapest you can make a movie for, like Bare Bones with the COVID protocols. I don't want you to get shut down. So I teamed back to him later that day and said, I'd broken down what we were going to do. Here's what COVID's going to cost. Let's put a little pat in there, let's do it right, let's do it through SAG, let's do it pay everybody. Here's the number. And he said, I want you to get out of the house and go make a movie.
And within two months from concept too, that's a wrap.
Wow. Yeah, that's an insane turn around for a movie at endsize.
And now the best part of the story is not I had two assisted editors on the film who sadly lost parents, grandparents, and brothers and sisters to COVID. Though I had all the four K or five K footage sitting, I couldn't find anybody because Hollywood had started to open and we had no money going in. It took me six months to get the pictures trans coded, saw Daily's proxies and cut because everybody was back to work and making good money and we didn't have post money going in.
And I literally had to ship a hard drive, a twenty four terabyte hard drive to Cairo, Egypt. There was a gentleman, God love him. He heard we were in need. He reached out and said, I am stuck in Egypt. I flew here before the pandemic with my wife. We cannot leave. We're on lockdown. If you trust me, I will deliver you need. And I literally FedEx to Cairo a twenty four terribinted high drive in a month later. He set it back with everything done and we were.
Able to affordably. I'm assuming.
He did it for like lunch, a screen credit, and a new friend, I mean the guy. I couldn't have done it without him, and he had no post money. We put it all into the shoot and COVID forty grand went to COVID on that film. We detested over four hundred times, not one positive. We had a couple of COVID officers at all the pp E stuff you needed. I mean it was. It was unbelievable. What went to COVID like a huge choke movie went to COVID.
Wow, that's it.
So we posted it for nothing. I mean my DP Joel Laogan colored it because he wanted to color a film. He said, I'd like to try coloring a film, and I said, well, I have no money here, and these are the things.
And when you're when you're working at this budget level, you gotta do what you gotta do to make it happen.
Is not just, and it was just. It was it was a fraction of what we had been used to. And then you add COVID on top of it, and then the fact that when we weren't posts, everybody was back to work. I was calling people that were friends of friends that were looking for work the week before in destitute, living in a box. And as we all know,
Hollywood went crazy. And I would call people in like colorists that would say yeah, I'll do it for like five that they were like, dude, you can't even afford me. I'm backed up for six months. Don't even bother me. I couldn't get anybody to do it.
Yeah, exactly exactly. And I was getting calls left and right to do color, and I just like, I'm retired. I'm retired. I'm a podcaster, sir, I don't color. I'm choke.
I Actually they had a friend and Chris Rossiter, he's one of my dearest friends. I love Chris. He's an incredible cinematography teacher at LACC. Chris is a very good colorist, and he had been on lockdown, so he had actually offered when we went into this. He goes, if you ever forget in a jam, and he had colored let me know, I'll color it for you for lunch and you know a couple of favors. And I said great. But the problem was it took us four and a
half months to get it transcoded sinct. So by the time I got the film back and Frank Reynolds and I started cutting the film, Chris was already back teaching, working full time again, so I lost that window and it was like starting and thank god, it's like he said, he'd color it.
It's it's pretty, it's it's it's insane thing we do. I don't even know why we do it. Honestly, it's it's insanity.
I quite now.
You've obviously been able to raise money from investors over the years to get your movies and projects off the ground. What are a few reasons why investors want to invest in our in our industry, in your project specifically, what are a few things that we can kind of know on how to you know, angle our pitches or you know, just angle what we're trying to do with them.
You know, that's a great question and I have found, you know, I think for filmmakers for many years it was getting rich people that wanted to rub albums with celebrities. Those days are over. It's it's about relationships. And people don't like here this, especially the young ones coming up who are of that instant satisfaction get it when you want it age of picking up the phone and ordering something from Amazon and having it or being able to text somebody you can't reach. And I talk about it
in my book, Alex. The key thing is relationships. The people that have invested in me over the years, with the exception of one maybe two times in thirty years, were people that I had known for decades, most in which said never never talk to me about investing in film. I will never do it. It's and everybody wants to hear. It's going to a cocktail party and meeting a rich guy who wants to rebelbows with, as they say, and the player, which will be Goldberg and make, you know,
write a check. And that's not how it works. It's about building trust. They want to know that they can trust you. You have to treat their money like it's your own. For me, many times it was working for these people in side hustle jobs, or they had a need and they needed something handled professionally that they didn't know who to call on. So they called on me
and said I need something done for my business. Nobody's available, So it would turn into me doing a three month job for them that they look back and said, this guy didn't fail me. He did what nobody else could do and he delivered, and this is how he's conducting them self. It was business I want in and that's what he came for me. And with the exception of running into two or three people in the course of thirty years that said, hey, I want to be in
the business. I like what you do. Here's a check. It's been about deep seated, long lasting friendships that were never built on maybe one day they'll write at check for a movie, and that I think is the hardest thing to translate to people. You'll always meet people that say I know somebody that may be interested, or I'm a hedge fund manager, I know people, or my favorite is is. You know, I have clients that are deep, deep pockets and they're interested in getting in the industry,
and you know, put a proposal together. I think pitch decks, and I talk about this a lot. I think pitch decks have to be reality checks for a lot of people.
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Pitch decks, especially for filmmakers who haven't done it. They they they put these figures together that are so methodic. I mean, it's like great mythology how they put you know, maybe back in the old date blockbuster in Hollywood video of these things they have worked, but it's a new day and age. The MG's are tiny if you get them at all. I always remind the filmmakers you've got fifty four territories in over one hundred and seventy countries
that potentially could buy your film. Quit making movies for instagrammer and carpet moments, and think globally, not locally when it comes to building. Amen, they stop putting dead affleck and you know, gal Gado and your pitch check, it's not going to happen. And you know all you're doing as I talk about is all you're doing is disappointing your potential investor. Why would you go in with these
names to try to lure them? And then before you've even started shooting the movie, Hey you got some b rate actor that nobody knows. No disrespect to them, but it sure doesn't add up to Galcado and Ben Affleck. So your investor's going to look at that go well, why did you present this? And you're ending up with that.
And let's not even talk about projections and you know, busting out Blair Witch Project and paranormal activity.
If it's sling Mad and Napole and Diner Behind and El Mariachi, Oh my god. I always tell people, look at Luve Me and Amazing Once, these little films that were made for a half a million dollars a feat back Once.
Yeah Once is a great one. Yeah Once is a great example.
And I told me it's like, look if I'd like to think that US filmmakers are smart enough to be creative beings and should have some business sense, And what frustrates me is I see them. Look if if you're a potential investor and somebody came to you and said, dude, I need one hundred grand. We can build by this house and flip it in six months and make it thirty million bucks. Are you going to get that guy
one hundred grand? Probably not. But if the guy came to and said I need a undergrand, it's going to take us ten months to to remodel, and probably in the next two to three years we can sell that house for two hundred and fifty to three hundred grand. Is that something you'd be interested in? You may actually
listen to them. And that's what filmmakers forget. And remember when you're going to somebody with a lot of money or the potential to finance your dream, chances are they smarter than you are, and they have people in their camp that earn a living protecting them from people like us. And you have to lay it out. It's like you know, I learned at a very young age, don't don't bs
and build this picture of total fantasy. Go in with the mindset as you're going to get a base hit, an occasion old double if you ever get a grand slam Hallelijah. But that can't be what you're selling because it's lightning in a bottle.
Oh yeah, I mean, if you're always if you're if you only look at the home runs and not the not the bunts and the singles. And that's when most and that's what most filmmakers do. They look at the best case scenario. They never look at the worst case scenario or the general like it's one out of a a thousand one or out of ten thousand, you know, do that kind of big kind of money that blows out the once is and the and the I mean paranormal activities once in it once a decade, you know?
Yeah, but how many millions did Paramount put into that movie? Seven?
Yeah? And I and I know, and I know the guys who I mean who worked on that.
You know, and people at Paramount who acquired.
It, right exactly, so we know I knew the stories behind it, Like oh yeah, they pumped a ton of cash into this. It wasn't like it's like Mariachi, Like, oh yeah, it was a seven thousand dollars movie that made three million of the box office. Like yeah, well, you know, they did spend a little bit of money remastering it. They put a little money into marketing, you know, but that's that that's not that doesn't serve the narrative. It doesn't serve.
Wow, it doesn't. And I think the these of those sling blades and Napoleon Dynamites, because there were the Merrimaxes and the Hollywood videos and blockbuster outlets that these little gems found found life and they flourished, you know.
I mean, man, I can't even think we haven't had anything like that happened, Like a movie out of nowhere with no stars.
Well nowhere not not. The deal was already done. Let's send it to Sundance, will announce it like.
Literally nowhere, no no talent in the in the movie or like barely any no bankable stars, no, nothing like a Napoleon Dynamite style like that goes off and makes fifty million dollars or Brothers McMullen. Yeah, that went on to thirty million dollars with nobody, like literally nobody, nobody.
It was a sting project practically.
Yeah, yeah, I just put that thing together those I don't know if that's even possible today, And that in the way it was then because the marketplace was different. There was a marketplace for indie films, and that's the big thing that a lot of people don't understand is there was in the nineties an infrastructure being built for independent films. The DVD market was huge. There were still
hollyw with videos and blockbusters are running around. You know, Rick when he was on the show Rick link Letter, when he was talking about Slacker, He's like, the reason why Slacker found the bomb made money is because there was an infrastructure starting to be built in the early nineties. There were indie movies in the eighties. There was really you know, great art you know, independent filmmakers that make great films in the eighties and in the seventies, but
there wasn't the infrastructure to make money with him. The easy writer was like the you know, and it's still Jack frickin Nicholson and Dennis Hopper in it. Yeah, yeah, back then and that was considered indie. But there were still independent filmmakers making movies back then, but there wasn't the infrastructure. So in the nineties there was this groundswell of of of places you could put movies and actually
make money. Art house theaters, every studio had an indie armed araboun advantage, you know, Fox two thousands, all of those, all of those things were around for that and that's where that's all kind of gone away. There's only a handful of those left Fox search Light or it's just just search Light Films now and Sony Picture Classics. And now they're not doing indies, they're doing big budget you know, with big stars. Yeah, like under ten million, Yeah, stars
under ten millions. That's that's the.
Globally different animal. And we don't have You know, It's funny is because I have a lot of friends in the music industry, and when Napster and file sharing became really big, I remember I went to a friend's house who had had a record release party, and he played some of the songs that he had on his record and I and he had a lot of success, and I remember saying, dude, this is this is huge. And he said to me, he said, let me tell you something.
He said, music is free. He said, now, music is free. We don't make our money on music. We make money on touring. And he said, I'm worried about your industry because you guys don't tour. And I thought, oh, that was interesting. And as I look now, we're kind of so many of us are giving our these two streaming platforms for nothing, and we don't have an after party to keep people excited. Like an artist can go out.
They can do an album in their home studio, may cost them a few grand, and they put it out and they get a few singles on it that circulate on iTunes or YouTube. But they're giving that out and we're all sharing the links to it to friends, so they're really not getting a lot of money on it. But they can go out and tour and make fifty sixty eighty one hundred grand at night for three or
four months. That's their follow What do we have and don't I don't know the answer to that, but it's something I think about.
Well. I do have the answers in that book Rise of the Film to Producer, where you create multiple revenue streams and product lines based on your movie. Now, it doesn't work for every kind of movie, every kind of story, but if you design it around that, it is a possibility. And there are examples of filmmakers giving the movie away as a loss leader to bring them into their funnels to make money other ways. And I feel that on the I feel that that's really the future of independent filmmaking.
I do truly believe.
And you are a Trailblazer with that and have always been really good at marketing and building a brand when you're when you're you don't have the brands such as you know, I F H, Academy or whatever you can build. It's in you're just you're going from film to film to film film.
It's often it's just it's a it's a different way of looking at films. So like, I can't I don't think that you know, you're not going to be selling double threat T shirts generally speaking, it's not that kind of hold on, wait a minute, wait a minute, I'm sorry you are going to be selling double making covid art pitch.
Again, I'm not selling them. It was already I know designed it and kerk.
Had, which is that's amazing, that's amazing. But generally, but generally speaking, like not every movie is set up for a film entrepreneur model, But as a filmmaker you and go, Okay, how can I build a sustainable business if I like a certain genre? Can I build a brand around horror movies like Bloom, like Blumhouse? Can you build a brand around action movies and like really branded so people know that? Is it possible? Yeah, it's I'm not saying it's easy, but it's pure.
I mean, for us, it's it's kind of taking the hell Needham approach of the seventies and early eighties, if that's Canniball run and flipping it where we're putting the women in the driver's seat and the guys are writing Shotgun. And that's kind of what we've been doing these last three or four years, and it's been really exciting. It's like, but you're right, it's like we had break even during
the pandemic. Shot Double Threat. I've already shot Night Train prepping another film, but here I am promoting Double Threat, but I'm already thinking about Night Train and how we're gonna market that. I mean, it's it's it's constant and you work together a little bit.
But yeah, I know, I don't. Now I have to ask you. On the casting side, yeap. Double Threat I mean has a great cast. You know Matt Lawrence and you know I worked with them before. You love all the Lawrence boys are great. I love it. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor and now back to the show.
I'm gonna be with him Friday. I love that.
Now tell him please tell mat I said hi, Austin. Austin and Austin and I say hi. I did a little work with him a little while ago. But but generally speaking, nobody in your movie is this giant, bankable star. So yeah, so they didn't have like, you know that bringing huge money in, but they're good actors and that's great. So how did you get this is the movie itself, the genre and the trailer and what you've put together is that the star that helps sell the film?
You know what it was? It It basically was the fact that we've got this lovely girl, Daniels Ryan, who's five foot two, soaking wet with a full moon, and he does all our own stunts and she's actually a really good actress. She's actually the star of Night Train, and we you know, that film was so different. We got really blessed with DONALDA. Biery and Matthew Lawrence and Kevin Joy. You know, it was somebody that one of the producers found and had known and he was great.
But yeah, it was it was like, look, we know what we're dealing with. I mean, before we had cast some of the people that we did, we were making calls to so really respectable, bankable quote unquote names, and we didn't even get past the hi, how you doing, we're doing a film, and they said, dude, call us back when COVID's over. Because if they were bankable and they had that kind of scratch, they didn't need to work.
They weren't coming out of the house. And no disrespect to who we did get, because they've all had tremendous careers and to do it very well. But what was really cool is Donald le Biery had called her agent three days before we called her, and she said, I know there are some crazy sum bitches out there that are mavericks that are thumb in her nose to locking themselves in the house anymore. Find me somebody respectable who's
making a movie. So when we called Don's age, then she said, oh my god, Don just called me two days ago saying find something. And the problem is that there aren't many people out there making movies. So we got really lucky. Similar with Matthew Lawrence. Matthew had been tired of being locked up for six seven months, and as a filmmaker and producer at heart, and he was all about getting out and making art, and so we got really fortunate. I wouldn't trade one actor in that
film for anybody in the world. I couldn't be more proud of that cast. But for us, you know, for me and I it's it's Look, when you're working an indie film, you're not going to go get the A listers.
You know.
I'll never forget when I was doing my film at Sony, when we when we were simmering down, they said, hey, anything you get attached with Vince Vaughn, you have a go picture. And that tells you the power that an actor may have.
It is tours.
Well, when you're making films for half a million dollars, you don't get those kind of actors. So what I always try to do, when I talk about it in the book extensively, is get actors that people are familiar with. They may not be writing the biggest wave today, but at one point in your career they were. Or think globally again, it's like, I know Matthew Lawrence has done this,
as Doubtfire has done Boynet's World. I look at somebody like don Oliverery, who was in you know, A House of Cards and all her House of lives forgive me and heroes. These shows are being syndicated in the one hundred countries right now. So just because we may not recognize the name or face immediately, does it mean globally as Lauren on TV three or four times a day and they're still stars And that's how I cast my ess.
Yeah, and that's that's a really smart way of going about it, because they might not look like, oh, well, it doesn't look like somebody I know, or does isn't that well what has she done? Was she a big star in a show for eight seasons or did they do some other big studio movies at one point? And their name is still people recognize or see their face and they recognize it. If the budget level, it depends
on the budget level. So you know, if your budget level is starting to go to three, four, five, six million, and you have to get bankable names to be responsible to the investors.
If you're making a five million dollar film, you better allocate two million dollars large to one or two stars to justify what you're spending. You have to wait and trust me, I have this discussion with buyers, distributors and other filmmakers. I got a lot of friends with a lot of five million dollar movies. They can't even get looked at because they this cast it. And that's Scarrett.
I'll tell you there was a movie I worked on years ago. I did, I did all the post on it, finished it up, had no stars in it. They went out to the marketplace. Everyone said, sorry, you had nobody in it. If I know it's a sci fi action thing, don't care. Went back. He raised another fifty sixty grand,
one hundred grand something like that, got two stars. I think he got like one of the guys from Stargate, the show Stargate and it's a sci fi thing, And he got Michael Madson for a day each shot him out, re edited the movie, reasserted the new scenes. He came back to me like eight months later he's like, hey, can we redo the movie? Like what do you what do you to do? I think, oh, okay, we did that. He packaged it, put him on the cover, went back to the marketplace and they said we'll take it.
I will tell you I had a friend of years ago who did a film. He spent five hundred thousand of his own money on it, shot it in thirty five millimeter and couldn't get it looked at. It was just it was his friends and locals in another state, and he brought it to California and it wasn't a bad film. It just didn't have anybody in it. And it was the exact same story. Somebody said, if you can put a star or two in a scene and
reshoot a scene or two, you may get somewhere. I know, to date this film is generated over four million dollars for him because he just went out and got he We literally went into a studio and shot one actor, replaced an actor from another scene when a known actor paid him, you know, probably fifteen twenty grand for the day. Did anyone about another cameo for a guy to play an arresting officer. To date, that film has made over four million dollars for him. And this was a film
that nobody looked at for eighteen months. They were just like, dude, I don't even see it. Nobody wanted it.
And that's the importance of a bankable a bankable name. So and again, it's not and I've said this so many times on the show, and I think I have to say it again for people to understand it's not out of reach for to shoot somebody out in a day fifteen ten five grand a day, ten grand a day, twenty grand a day for an eight or ten hour day. Is you're going to get that money back tenfold if you're smart. And it's so important, and filmmakers just don't
think they can one. They don't have the confidence to think that they can get it done. But I've just seen it. I'm working with people right now, some clients that are doing it currently, and they're going out to the talent. They're like, here's how much I have. Okay, let's do this. Let's do that. Great. I need you for five hours words five hours to shoot out scenes for this movie. Can you do it? And I worked on a movie that had Sean Patrick Finnery from Boondogs
and then the young Indiana Jones and a million other things. Right, so they do so brilliant They shot him out one day because that's the whole movie. He's in the entire movie. He's not just in one scene.
They peppered him.
Yeah, they they peppered him throughout the movie. She's in like six or seven scenes, but they're all in the same place. In other words, he's the cop that they come back to like to meet with and they always meet it at the parking garage. So they just shot the parking garage shirt, changed your shirt, spread to the hitter and and and he dropped him in and he was the sun and he's on the cover. So and they shout him out for a day and then and
then you've got him. Now you've got them marketable movie. And that's the that's the way filmmakers need to think, especially in a commerce based film art house. Different conversation.
And you know what, let me let me cap that by saying, I have somebody that was brought to my life a couple of years ago who shot a film with three a list well known stars and couldn't get anybody to look at the film. And it was content. It was content and that was heartbreaking because this guy actually spent a million and a half dollars.
Well what was the content? What was the wrong with the content?
Well, there's you know, there's two rules in a movie. Don't kill a kid and don't kick a dog anymore, right, and he.
Killed the kid and killed the dog.
Well, they killed the kid and kicked the dog, and and that was it's like, dude, But it was also involving such assault to a child.
That's like no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, well you not, I mean no not these actors who have, like two of the actors generated over three billion in the box office on their work, and they agreed to do this and you wasted this bullet and they can't even get it looked at because it's it's based on a true story everybody knows.
And they're like, yeah, no, we touched a knotty.
Might as well throw some religion and politics and there, if you will, at detective the might as well love that. Oh let's talk about religion and politics. Well we're ont it. I mean, it's oh my god, that's so heartbreaking, but that one. But that's the kind of stuff that happens all the time.
Yeah, hey we got the cast. We missed we missed the content. Hey we got the content, we didn't get cast. I just think, is indie rats, we have to we have to think again. And you say it so rightly. Is commerce business and and and art? And and how do you find that? And it's it's it's about you know. I remember I had a film that that had the green light before the E seven crash, which Thank god it didn't happen, because it was, it would have been miscast.
We had a lot of angless actors getting at one of the big agencies packaging it, and they had some serious cats wanting to get on board. And I was adamant about the lead being an unknown. I was adamant about it.
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Because of her meager world in the script, I didn't want somebody looking at like Jennifer Anderson and a good girl. Oh yeah, she makes a million dollars an episode to think I'm about skinning knocked on the door. Oh no, kids, is you know when you're watching this girl who works in a mini mart who supposedly broke but it's it's headline news everywhere that the stars of Friends are making a million dollars to the episode. I didn't want that.
I didn't want that to taint it. So I was adamant about in a note and I remember ahead of a studio brought me into his office and he said, you're you're dating a grave. You have a film that you have everybody clamoring to do. That is bakable and respectable. Yet you want to hang it out on a note you're never going to get this movie pass go And he was right. He was right.
So let me ask you, then, how did you get distribution for this? How? What is the distribution? How are you all for? Bratt?
Yeah, it was really you know, look, it was really simple. Knew we knew domestically that we would be looking at a VOD situation. We didn't we didn't have our own farts on this one. We didn't, you know, have any delusions of grandeur. It was this fun, little dirt movie we made with our friends and kicked ass and took no prisoners and it is what it is. And so it was one of those things where it was about
partnering with somebody who captured the vision. We wanted a woman run company to be behind the film, because we are women driven in our storytelling. And VMI has got a wonderful group that runs that company, and they happen to be some wonderful, lovely ladies, and they saw it
and they just fell in love with it. They just loved the idea of a woman out there kicking ass, riding a horse bear back and shooting somebody with a bow and arrow, you know, having the fight scenes that she does, and it just was one of those things, Alex where for us a lot of times, it's not about the dollars up front, it's about what is the passion and commitment someone who's going to have to put product out That was most important and fortunately for us,
you know, the film is new, so it went to can piggybacking with Night Train and we're starting to sell up the globe now, which is really exciting because it is a fun action comedy without slapstick comedy that sometimes doesn't translate for in it's physical comedy and you can always do well with that. So it's it's got the combination of some fun action sex, horses, fights, airplanes and pins,
some love and you know road type movies. So we're starting to see that it's translating very well across the globe here.
You've already started selling out different territories.
Oh, I think we got twelve thirteen territories since Canna.
That's amazing.
And yeah, it's really it's a really good I mean, you know, talking about Germany, China or not. I'm sorry not eat service, no no, no, Japan, South Korea, Germany, you know, South America. I mean it's like I looked at something that came about yesterday I was like, God, dang, it seems like starting to lose. This is exciting. So the UK. Yeah, and that's just based on us just going out there with a cool trailer and some fun art. Unfortunately,
I'll address it. You know, we came out a week after, two weeks after the tragedy in Olbie, and that was a big problem because we had already started putting out the artwork and that was something that we all, you know, realized that that's something that in hindsight, we wish you would have not you know, you don't know what you don't know going in, but you know, having your star with an AAR fifteen on the poster a week after
that tragedy is not the best marketing tool. But the horse was already out of the barnet.
Yeah. And that's the thing too, Like there's just elements and there's variables in filmmaking that you just don't know. It could be good or bad, something like what you just said. Obviously it's an egg of light. But then all of a sudden your star gets picked up and is like going to be the New World movie. And then all of a sudden you're like, oh wait a minute, now this property is worth a lot more because our star is going to be on a big show where a big so you just these are variables you just
can't plan for. So you kind of got out the roll with it and see unfortunately and what happens.
And unfortunately there's the gunplay in the movie is minimal and it's all justified. Good guys versus bad guys. It's not anything like.
No, no, norexsit.
But you can't for some did it well?
The Stranger Things I'm sorry, sorry, sorry, Remember Stranger Things right? Remember Stranger Things right? The New Stranger Things eries, the play opening, the opening sequence, they like literally put a thing on, like hey, this might be a problem. The opening of of Obi wan Kenobi, same thing, they're like, this might you know they made those They made those shows years, like a year ago.
Okayprett in November December twenty the kyart was done seven months ago.
Yeah, it looks exactly.
We knew it was coming out in June of twenty twenty two. I made two movies since that. It was like out of side, out of mind.
Yeah, it is what it is. So you just have to kind of, you know, roll with the roll with the punches in that set. I want you to discuss something for me. Can you please debunk the myth of streamers and the that there's so much money to be made by in the bed they're buying. Netflix is buying movies from independent filmmakers left and right. They're writing checks like.
They are writing See they are writing checks.
Not to us, but not to us.
Let me playing something. I will give you two examples. I have a friend who is a very very respected filmmaker that made an independent film for eight hundred thousand dollars they made back when Netflix and spending. They made a deal with Netflix for two hundred and fifty grand. Once it went on Netflix, nobody will, nobody else would look at it because oh you're on Netflix. By so it made an eight hundred and fifty thousand dollars movie made back to fifty but Netflix haste. I think over
the course of two years. They pay it in quarterly installments. Plus you've got your twenty percent sales commission fee. So and they're deliverables, which A're gonna cost you more because they're not in a standard deliverable, so you may see out of that two fifty, they may see it one hundred and seventy five thousand dollars over the course of two years. And then I have a friend, I got to be careful how we talk about this. He had
a number one show on Netflix during the pandemic. He's made nothing and is pitching on a regular basis to them and other streamers to hopefully get another movie made. And he had a number one hit on Netflix during the pandemic, and he's like, dude, it barely covered the cost of deliverables.
And that's that's the and that's the thing, and that's the thing. I want people to hear it because everyone's like, oh, you gotta get a Netflix again.
Definitely waited.
Look I got on my first one got on Hulu, which is an insanity. How my five thousand dollars movie got picked up by Hulu. That's great, it was, but it was a different time. It was.
It was probably six seven years ago when Hulu.
Was it was it was twenty twenty seventeen. Okay, it was twenty seventeen, so it was twenty seventeen, and you know, and I also sold it to China. So there, that's how old that is. So because Johanna was bying at that.
Point, Yeah, that door was closed.
That door was closed right now, but that door was open. And I made good money on both of those. It was both of those sales. It was great, but it's not what And by the way, if I didn't make a five thousand dollar movie, that Hulu deal wouldn't have really been made a whole lot of sense. But because I made a five thousand dollars movie, it was like, of course, it wasn't.
A lot in the process, which is what we talked about earlier in my backright of doing that five hundred dollars forty five minute pilot that did more for my career than anything, than anything than I don't And you're right. And that's the thing is I always it's like so funny when I talk to people, whether they are people not in the business or people coming. I mentioned to deal with Netflix. You deal with Netflix. It's like, no, no.
But that's it. But that's it. But that's a little secret for everybody who's not in the know. Everyone thinks that like, oh, you've got to be on the major streams. Amazon's not buying anything, and if you get on HBO Max, you've got to have some major star power. And I've spoken to filmmakers who have their films bought, but then I'm like, oh, but you have this guy who's in a Marvel movie, who's the lead in a Marvel movie, who's about to explode in the movie. That's probably one
of the reasons. And it also covered a bunch of other boxes that they wanted to chick off.
Yeah, yeah, I get that, And again it goes back to how you package market and cast and content in what you're putting together. As we talked about before, but the streaming world, especially in North America, is very tough.
That's why I always tell filmmakers think about your cast and think global and realize you're making a movie for fifty four territories at one hundred and something countries that potentially can buy because you know, I think the average is what eighteen to twenty two percent of a film's revenue comes from North America, but when you're an indie rad it could be as little as four to six percent.
And that's something to remember, and that means that there still are parts of the world that are buying brick and mortar video, DVD, Blu ray. It's still out there and there are small theaters around the country or I'm forgiving not the country around the world that'll badly put your movies in there. It does, it does exist. It's just it's not here and it's not sexy. You know, wegain. It's why I was saying earlier is stop making your
movies for Instagram likes. That's not It's not all about the bullshit red carpet that you've put up on the side to proceed a boulevard that's duct taped by your buddy to try to get people. That's not why we're making movies. It's a business. Think global. Get your head out of the San Fernando Valley in West LA and start thinking about the world. And that's what I try to impress upon your filmmakers.
Yeah, and I understand exactly what you're talking because I lived in for thirteen years, so I know exactly what you're talking about. But a lot of filmmakers who even if they're not in LA, they think that that's making it and they're turning to like, you gotta look at it. God, I mean, walk around afm man. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor, and now back to the show, and you can see who are the real filmmakers who are making money. Yeah, I don't care if
the movies are good or not. That's not that's not the question. Here's that's all making money.
Are you making money?
Are you making money? And then you, as a filmmaker, whoever's listening out there, you have to ask yourself the question, what kind of films do you want to make? Do you want to make films that is a personal piece, a backyard a backyard film if you will, that's personal to you. Do that and make it for as cheap as possible and understand its art and hopefully you can make maybe some money back maybe somewhere. Go on the festival, church, see what happens. You rolling the dice of that. But
that's not a business. That's our, that's our And as.
My brother, as my brother reminds, you want to be an artist, go paint in the park on Saturday. That's his motto.
Exactly exactly, go exactly. But if you want to make a business, and you want to do what you love to do and do it consistently, for a decade or two. You have to think of commerce. You have to think of the business. If you don't, you're not It's not gonna make it. Man. And you know, that's one of the reasons why most people don't even build careers in this business, because they have delusions of grandeur, delusions of
what they think is supposed to happen. But they don't look at the reality of what is as opposed to what they want it to be.
And here's another thing that I really try to remind a lot of up and covers about. Is this world we're living in now. You know, everybody talks about how why is time going so fast? Well, it's simple. It's because we can't keep up with the news. By the time something it's like tragic. You look at this shooting in Buffalo, by the time it dust settled on not there was another one at a church here in Anaheim. Then there was the big school shooting. There was five
that following week. My point is, think about how fast the news we move from from thing to thing to thing. It's worse in film. When your buddy is putting up a trailer of their movie, their buddies are already looking at five other trailers and by the time you've set it out once, it's already buried and it's really hard to get the traction. You you, really, the traction is not something that we have anymore. It uhould be. You know, back up until five years ago, you put a trailer
on Facebook or YouTube. Man, that thing got tons of hits. People were emailing you about it for weeks or months. You get, you get you know, two or three hundred, maybe a thousand likes in a couple of days. They can't see the movie. They're just buried with everything else. They come home and it's like, oh, honey, The Boys is back on, or Stranger Things is back on, or you know, you guys found a new tailor shared in
film or something. It's like you is indie filmmakers. You can't keep up with the machine that is spoon feeding the world with tens of millions of dollars on P and A. So you have to think globally and where is your phone going to stick?
Right exactly and then again back to the film. Entrepreneur method is focusing on a niche hellers. It helps with cutting through the noise if you can, if you can attach to an emotional niche that you're into, then you have a much better fighting chance because there's you know, I don't know how many surf movies they are made every day, but or how many skateboarding movies are made every day. It's not a huge genre, but it's a huge market and there's a lot of people who are
looking for those, you know. I remember when Gleaning the Cube came out, Remember Gleaning the Cube back of the eighties, like late eighties, I think it was eighty nine. Was Christian Slater or rad with the BMX bike movie. This guy re released.
Sower Takes All for Motocross in the eighties. That's a hubid film that's unwatchable.
Right exactly. But those movies focused on a niche audience, and everybody was like, oh my god, did you see Gleaning the Cube? It's a skateboarding movie? Or that you can you can make noise with an independent film with no bud and even no marketing money. In a niche, you have a chance, you have a fighting chance to cut through the noise.
Well, especially in a niche like you're talking about, like you imagine getting on all the Facebook skateboarding BMX Facebook groups yeah. I mean, like, I'm a big motocross guy. You know, it was my life for thirty forty years. And that's like I belong to these these little pages on Facebook and there's like three hundred thousand members and that's one of twelve that I'm a member of. And then you go there's twenty thousand, ere one hundred thousand era.
Can you imagine if you did a little niche movie for skateboarder BMX and that group got behind it, what damage you can do? You gotta think that's Burke. I mean, that's how you have this thing.
But that's how then I've used multiple examples of that in my book because it's exactly how you do it. It's the only it's the only weapon we have as independent filmmakers to really compete against the big boys, because I use the example all the time. There was a documentary about vegan athletes that I saw, the one with Schwartzenegger's and yeah, it was a game, Game changes right,
and I was dying to see it. And no matter what was around any big Hollywood movie, any billions of dollars that they spend in advertising, I'm like, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's nice. I want to see this. It cut through all marketing. I'll get to your billions, I'll get to the next of the Bond film.
I need to see this film.
This is the first on my list because I had an emotional attachment to see that. I wanted to see that. So if you could do that as a filmmakers, it's a lot easier.
Yeah, it's smart.
Now I'm gonna ask you a few questions, sir, I asked all of my guests, Oh, what advice would you give a filmmaker trying to break into the business today.
My advice to filmmakers trying to break into the business today is first, make, nurture, harvest relationships, whether you're meeting a sound guy on a shoot or you're meeting a hair and makeup girl on a shoot. My film family runs longer than twenty five thirty years with a lot of us, and those are because of relationships that were made. And I say that, are my hair and makeup team or my sound guy writing the checks to finance my movies? No, but they'd got my back and I couldn't do it
without them. So I think the most important thing is besides shooting and screwing a lot of the things up and making yourself better. Relationships for me are almost number one.
What did you learn from your biggest failure?
What I learned from my biggest failure was you have to keep up with the times. I think our biggest financial failure was a film that never got out of the gate when everybody was going to high depth in video listening to certain decision makers that were adamant about
shooting on film. It raised the price of the film for hundred thousand dollars more than it should have been, which put us more in the whole and it was That's what I learned is that you were never going to crawl away out and that was kind of a thing in Boogie Nights, if you remember, with p videotape Man videotape. And I've known a lot of distributors over the years that were always behind the ball when it went from going from film to video video to dv
DVD to Blu ray. And that was the one thing I learned is this really good FELM never saw the light of a day because it was just buried in financial woe because they just they made and I was part of the above the line decisions on that, and I should have fought harder.
What is the lesson that to keep the longest to learn, whether in the film industry or in life.
If you want loyalty, you get a dog. I mean it's true when you're when you're when you're hot, you're hot when you're not. You know, know, your phone does spring. And the people that you would consider, you know, your brothers at arms or your your you know, the people are the foxhole. It's it's loyalty in this industry. I don't think it's very very, very rare.
And it's it's tough. It's tough.
Yeah, So I mean that's that's just it.
Instance.
You know, I get attached to people a little more than I should emotionally because I believe I find somebody of like mind. And and then again I go back to you want loyalty, you get a dog.
You, sir, are a nice guy who has been beaten up by the business that had shrapnel along the way. I'm assuming, I'm assuming thirty years ago you were much nicer and less cynical than you are now.
I don't know. I mean I was definitely less cynical. Sure at the stars, the.
Stars were still in the eye. The sparkle was still in the eye.
I still had I was still youthful exuberance and excitement. And like the late great Dicky Fox, I clap my hands and I say, it's gonna be a great day day. Ok, here we go again.
And three of your favorite films of all time, the films that impacted my life the most Sideways.
I love that film. But but growing up in Jerry Maguire. But growing up it was the Black Stallion, it was Cherry's and it was on Golden Pond. Those are films that my father showed me when I was about eight or nine years old that made me fall in love with the idea of filmmaking.
And there you go?
And where is why they still play it today?
And where can people find a double threat and find out more about you and what you're doing?
Sir, oh bless you well? Double Threat is available on Amazon Prime. But news is like fifteen or twenty different platforms, and I'm sorry to say, I don't know off the top of my tongue. They're easy to find. It's on Xbox, It's on you know, Google.
Play double just at double threatned Google and double for.
Storry, Daniel c Ryan, Donald of Vieri, Matthew Lawrence directed by yours truly you'll find it. Yeah, you could go to what you Don't Learn in fell School dot com. That's the website for my book, which has a lot of information if you if you care and you want to go to my website, it's Shane'sfamily dot Net. It'll take you wherever you need to go. And that's it. That's how you find me, and that's what I'm up to.
And if you guys want to check out his book on audiobook, yes, always. You could always head over to Indie film Hustle dot com and and do a search there for it, or go to audible and it's it's on audible right and it's and it's it's a bestseller. People love it and it's it's good. And of course if you want to check out Rise of the Film Entrepreneur, it's not too far either. You can check those out. It's a good double book. If you get both those books, you're going to be in good shape. Sir.
I'm just giving great shit. You were gonna be in great shape.
You get both those books, those are going to be that's a film school right in itself, sir uh say, man, I think so much for coming on the show, but it's always a good talking to you man, and continue success and keep keep that hustle going.
Brother, Hey Alex, thanks for having me, Thanks everybody for check it out, and just just keep filming. Just keep filming, guys, it'll it'll. Eventually, you'll find your way, you'll find your voice. Just keep doing what you do. You'll get there.
I want to thank Shane so much for coming on the show and dropping his knowledge bombs on the Tribe today. Thank you so much, Shane. If you want to get links to anything we spoke about in this episode, including how to access his amazing webinars on ifh Academy, all you need to do is head over to Bulletproof Screenwriting dot tv Forward slash three eighty one. Thank you so much for listening to guys as always, keep on writing no matter what. I'll talk to you soon.
Thanks for listening to the Bulletproof Screenwriting podcast at Bulletproofscreenwriting dot tv.