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Your new movie Follower
- in a few words, what is it about?
Follower
is simply about a cult survivor who is being interrogated by a determined
detective about the intricate dealings of the leader of the Nu Meta
Society and his true intentions.
What were your sources of inspiration when writing Follower?
There
were many different sources of inspiration that were taken in both a
positive and negative way in terms of writing Follower. Aside from being a
filmmaker, I work mainly in television on the technical side as a
programmer, which has included news channels and programs documenting
serialkillers and cults. I vividly remember the Branch Davidian Cult and
the United States government’s raid of their compound in 1993. I was a
teenager at the time and the story unnerved me. Fast forward several years
later and the story broke about the NXIVM cult and once the disturbing
details about its leader came about, it sickened me. The interesting thing
with me was that what bothered me more wasn’t the actual crimes done at
the hands of these leaders, but even after knowing how evil these men are,
there are still a small percentage of people who blindly follow them with
more than just a blind eye. Since the advent of social media, it has become
more available for people to spread messages of hate disguised as love and
easier to manipulate the vulnerable. I feel we are in a time where I’ve
never seen so many people desperate for any kind of connection that they
are willing to be accepted by the vilest methods in order to feel part of
something more.
Tonally
and visually, the first filmmaker and first film I looked at as a source
of inspiration was the late Jonathan Demme and his Oscar winning film The
Silence Of The Lambs. That film was a landmark in showing the ugliness of
man on film, and literally launched the realistic “true crime” style
horror-thriller in film. David Fincher’s Se7en, Bill Paxton’s Frailty,
and of course the seminal works of Alfred Hitchcock were visual and
cinematic inspirations for the film.
Do
talk about Follower's
approach to the thriller genre!
The
discussion of whether
Follower is a horror or thriller is an interesting
concept. In my mind, they fit into both categories. I think subject wise
this is my darkest film to date but there is an element of realism that I
never grasped. Even Once, When I Was
Dead, which was a dark drama, had
elements of the supernatural.
Since Follower
is basically just two people sitting in a room talking, what were your
techniques to keep things visually interesting throughout?
It’s
funny to me that you say it’s “basically just two people sitting in a
room talking,” which is what the initial reaction was when I talked
about the premise of the film to quite a few friends and colleagues,
followed with an eye roll and a look of boredom. Especially in New York,
where many police procedurals are filmed, it didn’t exactly scream at
first glance as something original. But… this is where it presented a
huge challenge. The cinematographer on the film, and also a producer,
Stolis Hadjicharalambous, is a director in his own right which definitely enhanced
the experience for the actors as he knows all about performance in
addition to technique. Once we secured our location, which was an office
in a television studio, we looked at the logistics of filming and had set
numerous plans to film. Our intention was to shoot this all on one camera,
but we had different plans set depending on situations that would come up
on a shoot day, because everyone knows something will happen. In this
case, we discovered we had less time than anticipated so we went to our
“Plan C” which was a two-camera set-up. However, we pretty much had the
film edited on paper before we shot a single frame. The last thing I
wanted was for this to feel like a filmed play, even though it was
technically filmed like one with the two-camera setup. In the end, it came
down to the cast and crew being fully prepared to get the shoot done, and
to make
Follower
different both in sound and vision.
A
few words about your overall directorial approach to your story at hand? The
dialogue had to be tight and active. The actors, Heather Drew [Heather
Drew interview - click here] and Patrick
Devaney, once cast and given the script, rehearsed for months before we
started filming. We even did a filmed rehearsal two months before the
scheduled shoot date to get an idea of flow and how we can shoot the film.
I don’t think the film would be as successful as it is without this
filmed rehearsal in play. Stolis and I were able to determine which shots
worked best, but we also figured out at what point to film certain angles
once we saw the back and forth between the actors.
What
can you tell us about Follower's
cast, and why exactly these people?
Follower
was specifically written with the two lead actors in mind. Heather Drew, as
you know, has been a terrific actress and a great collaborator that
whenever I have a new project in mind, she is the first I go to with the
idea. I knew Heather could evoke the range of Sarah needed for the film
and spotlight her in a way that had rarely been seen before. I remember
she initially liked the idea but when she read the first draft of the
screenplay, it affected her in a way that surprised me. She felt it was
the darkest story I had written to date, and with everything rooted in
reality it became a challenge.
Patrick
Devaney has been a good friend for a long time and I had been wanting to
work with him in some capacity as an actor. It was one of those instances
where timing never worked out. I had done a few screenplay readings on
Zoom when the Covid pandemic first hit in 2020, and hearing Patrick recite
his natural dialogue enhanced my interest in directing him. Patrick is an
extremely talented filmmaker too, and he had a very successful festival run
with his science fiction film Identity Check, which starred Heather in a
truly mesmerizing role. Although they had worked together in an
actor-director capacity, they had never worked together as actors on a
film before. Being that we all knew each other, and with Patrick’s own
experience as a writer and director, he understood the meaning of
Follower,
and upon reading the script agreed to do the role.
Do talk about the
shoot as such, and the on-set atmosphere? As
I stated before, we had a location set for the day and originally, we
thought we had 9 hours to shoot, however we discovered on set that we had
less time than anticipated with a 1 hour set-up. Our shoot time dwindled to
5 hours total, and we had 16 pages of dialogue to film. Once we got to our
set plan for the day (which was planned and set up beforehand), the shoot
ran like clockwork. We had to leave the studio by 5pm that day, and we
were able to get what we needed. The only sacrifice was that if we wanted
to improvise some shots, we couldn’t, but I am glad that we weren’t
able to do that. The result was the smoothest shoot I've ever had, due to the
time to prepare from the cast and small crew that we had (it was a total
of seven people). When we were done and packed everything up, we left the
studio at 4:59pm. I swear that is the truth. We made effective use of our
time, budget, and the cast and crew worked diligently to get everything we
needed.
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Another recent
film of yours is Upon
Arrival - so what's that one about? Well,
it’s not so recent as the film was shot and released in 2019. Upon
Arrival was more an exercise in horror where two EMTs are asked to babysit
a body while detectives are on their way to investigate the crime scene,
and things happen with the body that are rather unusual. It was meant
primarily as a short horror film to get back into the fold after a few
years away from filmmaking. What were
your sources of inspiration for writing Upon
Arrival? I
remember for Christmas in 2018 I went to a party with some filmmaking and
horror friends in New York City, and as I was waiting for my dinner I saw
an ambulance outside the restaurant we were at to tend to a situation in
the building across the street. The ambulance was there for a while with
the EMTs inside. After an hour, they left without carrying someone out. It
struck me as odd, and I wondered what exactly went on in that apartment
during that time. Also, whenever there is a crime and EMTs arrive at the
scene first, they have to wait for police to arrive, which means they
can’t touch anything and have to babysit the body. I thought that was a
fascinating premise that is perfect for a short film. I took the train to
go home, a two-hour commute, and during that ride home, I wrote the first
draft of Upon
Arrival. Once I finished the first draft, I sent it to
Heather to read, and an hour later I got a text from her saying “Oh yes,
we are so fucking doing this.” A few words about Upon
Arrival's approach to horror? The
element of horror here is a very basic one as the purpose of the film was
to scare you out of your wits even if nothing happened. Just the thought
of babysitting a body while waiting for the proper authorities to arrive
is chilling to me, but when the body moves when there’s nobody else
around, it’s rather unsettling. For me, it’s the unpredictable nature
of fright and when you know you are going to be scared… but you still
must keep the audience guessing at when the scare will come. To me,
that’s what Upon
Arrival is, a terrific exercise in fear. What can you tell
us about your directorial approach to your story at hand?
Upon
Arrival was a challenge personally because we came up with the concept in
January of 2019 and we were filming in March. Three weeks after filming I
was set for major weight loss hernia surgery that I had been preparing for
a year and I was unsure whether I should wait until afterwards. Heather
convinced me to do it beforehand because preparing the film kept me from
dreading the thought of surgery, and it worked. Plus, my rehab time of six
weeks was spent editing and mixing the film, so it all worked out.
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We
shot in New Milford, New Jersey at a place normally not given access, and
as a whole it worked tremendously. We had access to an ambulance for only
30 minutes so we had to make sure we filmed that scene on time, but for
the rest of the shoot, it was easy because we were having fun. I remember
on the set of Once, When I Was
Dead I think I sweated out buckets, but
when we filmed Upon
Arrival I wasn’t nervous at all. It was a weird
feeling, but at the end of the shoot it was very rewarding.
Do
talk about Upon Arrival's
cast, and why exactly them?
Heather
Drew [Heather Drew interview -
click here] is my muse, and the first person I go to with a new film idea. Also,
she is a fine actress, and we’re always looking to work on projects
together. Since she was so enthusiastic about the idea, she became a
producer and helped nab the location, the ambulance, the cast, and
introduced me to the fabulous make up artist Beatrice Sniper, who made our
body as dead and pale as she can be. I had written Glass with Heather in
mind. At the time it was my first film shot in 4 years so being on a set
was fantastic again. It was also great to be working with one of my best
friends.
Heather
suggested Jason Lopez to play Jose, the other EMT, and it was a great idea
from the start. I met Jason and knew immediately what a fine actor he was,
and this offered him a chance to play something he never got to play
before: a protagonist and EMT, so he spent a good amount of time learning
procedures on his own (with Heather) and at the end of the shoot, both
could be legit paramedics. Jason added such a touch of professionalism,
and it was great to work with him.
Saranna
Rotgard I had seen through cinematographer Steve Glassner’s Momentous,
and he sent me her info when I was looking for someone to play “The Body”. Although no dialogue, I felt the body had to look pure, innocent,
and in a way an old-style ghost that you’d see in classic horror films,
sort of a Celtic vibe. Her red hair and seriousness about acting made it a
challenging role for her and make no mistake… pretending to be dead for
an entire day is no easy feat. Plus, she had to get her facial expressions
right to be a corpse when she moved, and she was able to portray that
excellently.
A few words about the shoot
as such, and since Upon
Arrival was still shot before Covid, and I suspect Follower
during the pandemic, how did the two shoots compare?
Believe
it or not, there wasn’t much of a difference. Both films have a cast of
three with a small crew on set, so the way both sets were run were similar.
Where Follower
differed was that we were
following both Covid guidelines and the fact we rented a space that had a
time crunch. Upon
Arrival was filmed at a location we had more control
over, so we were able to have a little more time to prepare some shots and
improvise a little.
The
$64-question of course, where can Upon
Arrival and Follower
be seen?
Upon
Arrival just completed its festival run where it was very successful.
Recently we won Best Local Filmmaker at the Scared For Your LIIfe Film
Festival in Long Island. That was important to me because it played home.
With the run over, I will be releasing it online in 2023 at some point but
am debating opening a Patreon page for people to purchase the film for
viewing.
Follower
is freshly completed, so it hasn’t premiered at a festival yet, but
I’ve submitted the film to many festivals around the world. The first
notices will come in April, so I’ll just await the good news until then.
Anything you can tell us about audience and
critical reception of the two movies?
I’ve
been lucky to attend a few of the festivals Upon
Arrival had played at, and
each time I’ve loved the audience reaction to it. I’ve heard audible
gasps and even a few screams, particularly at one point late in the film I
won’t dare to mention, but it’s a moment I knew would grab people the
moment we shot it.
Follower
has only been met with critical praise amongst critics and peers, and
I’m very humbled and blown away by the amazing response to it so far.
It’s actually helped bring back old friends and colleagues I haven’t
worked with in a while to collaborate again. The film has accomplished a
lot and it hasn’t played at a festival yet, which makes me very happy.
From what I've
heard, you're planning a third season of In
Fear of - so anything you can tell us about that project yet? Well,
you’re half correct there. There will be more In
Fear of, but not in web
format. A feature film version has been in the works for a while and is
currently in the development stages. That’s all I can comment on that at
this time. Any
other current and future projects you'd like to share?
I
just recently worked as an assistant director on writer/director Dave
Campfield’s horror feature Awaken The Reaper [Dave
Campfield interview - click here], which stars Lance
Henriksen and Academy Award winner Louis Gossett jr. Filming is nearly
completed and will be in post-production. I worked closely with Lance for
three days and it was a truly amazing experience. To get to work with an
icon and to exceed all expectations was just astounding and I have Dave to
thank for that.
I’ve
also recently been commissioned to write an action/thriller script for an
acting-producing team that I have wanted to work with for a long time, and
am thrilled to get the opportunity to do
so. I have an April deadline to finish the first draft so I have to get
cracking on that. What I like about this script is that it’s different
than what I normally do, and the concept is based on a real-life
experience.
Finally,
a short script I have written called Eternally Yours is in pre-production
with Follower cinematographer Stolis Hadjicharalambous directing. This was
a script I first wrote in the previous century, so the adage “never say
never” certainly applies here.
Your/your
movies' website, social media, whatever else?
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My
Vimeo page with some of my older films, such as Insatiable and Something
Just, can be viewed here at https://vimeo.com/user4270315
Also,
my IMDb page is active at https://www.imdb.com/name/nm2187913/
Anything
else you're dying to mention and I have merely forgotten to ask? Nothing
I can think of. Thank you for the questions and the opportunity to talk
about film. Thanks
for the interview!
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