Filmmaker Stimson Snead

WEBVTT

1
00:00:00.120 --> 00:00:06.000
Brad, We're gonna jump right into
it. We have the privilege of speaking

2
00:00:06.200 --> 00:00:13.839
with a filmmaker today. We are
going to be talking with filmmaker Stempson Snead.

3
00:00:43.079 --> 00:00:46.960
Hello everybody, and welcome back to
a Film by podcast. I'm Jeff

4
00:00:47.000 --> 00:00:53.240
Johnson. I am Brad Kozo,
and we are very happy and very fortunate

5
00:00:53.439 --> 00:01:00.159
to introduce filmmaker Stempson Sneed to the
show. Stempson, welcome and how are

6
00:01:00.240 --> 00:01:03.159
you. I'm doing well. Good
to see you, guys, Brad,

7
00:01:03.240 --> 00:01:07.319
Jeff, thanks for being here.
Absolutely, yeah, absolutely, it is

8
00:01:07.359 --> 00:01:14.159
a pleasure, sir. Let's let's
jump into it. Stempson. My first

9
00:01:14.200 --> 00:01:17.280
question for you would be, you
know, how did you get your start

10
00:01:17.280 --> 00:01:21.239
in the business. I was quite
literally born into it, but I was

11
00:01:21.280 --> 00:01:23.840
not born into the NEPO side,
although I really wish I had, like

12
00:01:23.920 --> 00:01:29.159
that would have made things so much
easier. My parents were both actors in

13
00:01:29.200 --> 00:01:34.640
the Seattle area stage actors. They
met in shows. I grew up in

14
00:01:34.799 --> 00:01:38.599
green rooms and backstage at stuff all
around the Seattle area, and it was

15
00:01:38.680 --> 00:01:42.159
I got As I got older,
my parents retired from acting. My dad

16
00:01:42.239 --> 00:01:46.959
moved into radio, so I'd be
hanging out of radio stations. He eventually

17
00:01:47.000 --> 00:01:49.799
would be working in weather and news, so I'd be hanging around in TV

18
00:01:51.000 --> 00:01:55.079
stations, usually playing with my Ninja
turtles. Meanwhile, my mom was a

19
00:01:55.079 --> 00:01:59.680
composer and songwriter, so she always
kept one foot in that world. So

20
00:02:00.439 --> 00:02:02.920
I was born into the theater side
of things with long, deep roots in

21
00:02:02.959 --> 00:02:07.159
Seattle. So naturally I decided to, you know, take it to La

22
00:02:07.200 --> 00:02:10.199
where I would have zero family connections
or any leg up whatsoever. Because that's

23
00:02:10.199 --> 00:02:15.599
what we call smart business moves.
That's a kin to you, Brad,

24
00:02:16.639 --> 00:02:22.319
and it gave you though by doing
it, it's such a young age,

25
00:02:22.520 --> 00:02:28.199
you already knew so many things that
were already ready to go as you came

26
00:02:28.199 --> 00:02:32.000
out here had been some kind of
benefit, though I would say it was

27
00:02:32.080 --> 00:02:37.000
a lot of benefit in knowing how
to speak the language of the art form

28
00:02:37.039 --> 00:02:40.560
being raised on films. It was
a zero benefit in terms of the business

29
00:02:40.599 --> 00:02:46.840
side. The actual corporate world of
film is so far removed from the world

30
00:02:46.919 --> 00:02:52.560
of theater, certainly the world of
theater in Seattle and local small community theaters.

31
00:02:52.960 --> 00:02:58.000
They are too fundamentally different businesses and
business models, right down to how

32
00:02:58.039 --> 00:03:00.680
they pay for things, how they
sell things, even the way they try

33
00:03:00.719 --> 00:03:05.719
to engage with the audience beyond the
obvious difference of live versus a screen.

34
00:03:06.400 --> 00:03:10.159
Yeah, So in that regard it
was useless, But in terms of understanding

35
00:03:10.199 --> 00:03:16.039
the language of the art that that
came very easily. Yeah. Able to

36
00:03:16.080 --> 00:03:21.159
snuff out a lot of bs right
away, also able to fake a lot

37
00:03:21.159 --> 00:03:23.960
of bs right away. Yeah,
yeah, absolutely. Now, when it

38
00:03:24.000 --> 00:03:29.960
comes to filmmakers, you know which
filmmakers inspired you? I think that's one

39
00:03:29.960 --> 00:03:34.639
of those questions where anybody who's immersed
in the arts, that's that's a question

40
00:03:34.639 --> 00:03:38.759
that's going to change constantly, because
the people that you were impressed by changes

41
00:03:38.800 --> 00:03:44.120
as stuff comes and goes. As
a kid, surprising no one for being

42
00:03:44.199 --> 00:03:46.919
raised in theater, the stuff I
was most drawn to was the most for

43
00:03:47.039 --> 00:03:52.400
lack of a better word, theatrical
of the storytelling techniques. And this was

44
00:03:52.439 --> 00:03:54.479
of course at the ages where I
didn't even know who these filmmakers were.

45
00:03:54.520 --> 00:03:59.520
I just like their stuff. Like
most young kids, I was really into

46
00:03:59.560 --> 00:04:03.319
timber work because of the performative nature
of it, the abstract nature of it.

47
00:04:04.159 --> 00:04:10.599
Sonenberg for the exact same reason as
Tim Burton Julie Taymor. Although I

48
00:04:10.719 --> 00:04:15.039
was far too young to have even
the slightest comprehension of the sheer depth of

49
00:04:15.039 --> 00:04:17.360
her work. Although as I got
older that was something I came to enjoy.

50
00:04:17.879 --> 00:04:20.680
And then as you get older and
in the film you start understanding the

51
00:04:20.680 --> 00:04:25.639
writing side, You get into your
Finchers and your Tarantinos, and you start

52
00:04:25.639 --> 00:04:30.199
to find a style of things.
Yeah, you start. That's what's interesting

53
00:04:30.240 --> 00:04:33.920
there. If I were to pick
any filmmaker who I feel particularly just obsessed

54
00:04:33.959 --> 00:04:40.279
with right now, ah, yes, to be Robert Eckers. Just everything

55
00:04:40.360 --> 00:04:45.680
he does seems to have a combination
of being wildly different and wildly entertaining.

56
00:04:45.759 --> 00:04:49.160
My favorite of his work so far
by far being The Lighthouse, if only

57
00:04:49.199 --> 00:04:55.519
because it seems like it's actually playing
against the trope of the artsy indie movie.

58
00:04:55.959 --> 00:04:59.399
The trailers for that film are so
serious, and it's not until you

59
00:04:59.480 --> 00:05:01.680
watch it is a serious movie.
But it's not until you watch it that

60
00:05:01.720 --> 00:05:05.480
you realize it's one of the funniest
damn things you've ever seen. Yeah,

61
00:05:05.519 --> 00:05:11.600
and you can't take your eyes off
of it exactly. Yeah. Yeah,

62
00:05:11.600 --> 00:05:14.600
Like, even if you're at a
point where you're like, I don't know

63
00:05:14.639 --> 00:05:18.360
where this film is going, I
cannot stop watching these two men. I

64
00:05:18.480 --> 00:05:23.360
have to know if they're going to
kill each other or what you know.

65
00:05:23.439 --> 00:05:27.240
But it's that's why I say it's
so enticing. And even The Northman,

66
00:05:27.360 --> 00:05:31.680
I feel, being a kind of
a simple, straightforward story makes it so

67
00:05:31.879 --> 00:05:38.920
different because of that kind of look. I'm go ahead, Well, he

68
00:05:39.040 --> 00:05:42.959
uses the look to lean into the
classical nature of it. The thing about

69
00:05:42.959 --> 00:05:47.519
The Northman is how surprisingly classical the
story is. It's the delivery of it

70
00:05:47.800 --> 00:05:51.519
that is so fascinating. And I
think one of the reasons I'm just so

71
00:05:51.600 --> 00:05:57.560
drawn to this particular director right now
is because of how different their work is.

72
00:05:58.439 --> 00:06:02.000
As far as the other way to
phrase the question what filmmakers influence you?

73
00:06:02.079 --> 00:06:04.680
At least when I hear it,
it's often who do you most wish

74
00:06:04.759 --> 00:06:10.879
to imitate? And the answer to
that is absolutely nobody, right to me,

75
00:06:11.000 --> 00:06:14.439
the goal should always be to try
to find a voice that's new and

76
00:06:14.560 --> 00:06:16.959
distinct in your own. Now,
naturally, you're always going to be taking

77
00:06:17.000 --> 00:06:21.160
bits and pieces of other things you
like. Tarantino is the perfect example of

78
00:06:21.160 --> 00:06:28.240
someone who has a distinct voice but
borrows relentlessly from his jeans. Yeah,

79
00:06:28.240 --> 00:06:31.000
but he still turned that into something
distinctly his own. Paymore is among the

80
00:06:31.040 --> 00:06:38.319
few people where I really can't cite
something that feels like she was drawing influence

81
00:06:38.360 --> 00:06:43.160
of it. It just seems so
fundamentally her own in its very nature.

82
00:06:44.279 --> 00:06:48.360
And because of the grand scale of
the look of these films, I'm gonna

83
00:06:48.480 --> 00:06:56.000
guess that you are a big supporter
of seeing these films on a theater screen

84
00:06:56.519 --> 00:07:00.720
because of being able to take in
every little piece. Yeah, I mean,

85
00:07:00.759 --> 00:07:04.399
like Julie Tamar's, I think our
films are like paintings almost, you

86
00:07:04.439 --> 00:07:08.279
know, And then the other ones
that you said, like Burton and obviously

87
00:07:08.360 --> 00:07:13.360
Robert Eggers, that these are films
you need to experience on the big screen.

88
00:07:14.000 --> 00:07:16.560
I have nothing against the small screen, but what I think a lot

89
00:07:16.600 --> 00:07:21.639
of times gets lost in the conversation
is filming for a small screen versus filming

90
00:07:21.639 --> 00:07:29.519
for a large screen is who entirely
different creative choices. I value the large

91
00:07:29.519 --> 00:07:32.800
screen because of that detail work.
Because sometimes there is a joke that you

92
00:07:32.839 --> 00:07:36.560
can put into the margins in the
feature I just came off of right now,

93
00:07:36.759 --> 00:07:41.519
there's a whole scene where the joke
is that you shouldn't actually be paying

94
00:07:41.560 --> 00:07:45.720
attention to what's going on in the
foreground. You need to be paying attention

95
00:07:45.759 --> 00:07:49.120
at a small get that's happening at
the background. That's quite funny and silly

96
00:07:49.160 --> 00:07:53.720
and setting up something for later.
But if you were watching that scene on

97
00:07:53.759 --> 00:07:57.959
an iPhone or even a computer screen, I don't think the joke would read

98
00:07:58.000 --> 00:08:01.800
at all. Right, and so
well, I have nothing against the small

99
00:08:01.839 --> 00:08:07.399
screen. I think the large screen. It is an experiential difference. Yeah,

100
00:08:07.639 --> 00:08:11.240
and that's why it needs to be
protected. Yeah, you guys have

101
00:08:11.319 --> 00:08:16.120
talked about some you guys have just
talked about some great directors. I want

102
00:08:16.120 --> 00:08:20.399
to talk about the director now.
So let's let's get into Spirit a Martian

103
00:08:20.480 --> 00:08:24.360
story. This is. This is
distributed by the the Aldrin Family Foundation.

104
00:08:24.920 --> 00:08:28.480
Who I know, our NASA friends, they're they're gonna know, Hey,

105
00:08:28.480 --> 00:08:33.720
that's Buzz Aldrin. That's a polyto
eleven. So Stimpson, let's let's let's

106
00:08:33.720 --> 00:08:39.440
talk a little bit about this this
project. This started so long ago.

107
00:08:39.600 --> 00:08:43.200
I'm assuming you guys are big fans
of the magnificent web comic XKCT. I

108
00:08:43.240 --> 00:08:46.360
am familiar with that one. Yes, it is fantastic. Years ago,

109
00:08:46.480 --> 00:08:52.639
when the Spirit Rover died, he
put out a one page comic that personified

110
00:08:52.679 --> 00:08:56.799
the Rover as feeling bad and wanting
to go home. It absolutely cut me

111
00:08:56.879 --> 00:09:01.960
to my gut. And because Random
Maholland releases his work into the public domain

112
00:09:03.039 --> 00:09:07.240
under the Creative Commons ACT, I
decided to adapt a short film. And

113
00:09:07.559 --> 00:09:09.480
this was back in my mid twenties. I got a bunch of friends together,

114
00:09:09.600 --> 00:09:13.279
we pitched a bunch of ideas,
we planned how we would do this,

115
00:09:13.559 --> 00:09:16.679
and then we failed miserably and never
made it. It was sort of

116
00:09:16.720 --> 00:09:22.480
a wound in my side. So
many years later, when my career is

117
00:09:22.480 --> 00:09:26.240
starting to do better, I'm starting
to get access to much more funding.

118
00:09:26.240 --> 00:09:28.639
I'm starting to get ACT. I've
now established a team of people who aren't

119
00:09:28.679 --> 00:09:33.879
simply my friends, but are collaborators
and true coworkers with whom you can have

120
00:09:33.960 --> 00:09:39.320
great creative work. I decided I
wanted to revisit this project, but taking

121
00:09:39.320 --> 00:09:43.720
it leaps and bounce further than I
had ever intended to. Originally, in

122
00:09:43.759 --> 00:09:46.200
the original version, it would bid
him like a stick figure drawing of the

123
00:09:46.279 --> 00:09:50.399
rover or like a bad two D
animation. This time, I decided to

124
00:09:50.440 --> 00:09:56.120
go back and make it a full
CG creation shot in real life settings.

125
00:09:54.480 --> 00:10:01.120
As a replacement for Mars and Loaded
with actual history about the real Rover,

126
00:10:01.320 --> 00:10:05.399
expanded into about a fifteen minute film
so that it could be an educational piece

127
00:10:05.399 --> 00:10:09.519
for kids, and if possible,
see if I could even get one of

128
00:10:09.559 --> 00:10:13.519
the folks involved at the original mission
to put some context in it for more

129
00:10:13.639 --> 00:10:18.240
educational purposes. And as I was
putting this new version of it together,

130
00:10:18.759 --> 00:10:24.039
that's when I heard about their NPR
about the Oldron Foundation, which immediately made

131
00:10:24.039 --> 00:10:28.000
my ears go ooh, because I
don't like putting my stuff on YouTube.

132
00:10:28.399 --> 00:10:31.639
Nothing against it. It is really
undervalued how much of a business it is

133
00:10:31.679 --> 00:10:35.679
the folks on YouTube, and I
respect it, but it's not my business,

134
00:10:35.720 --> 00:10:39.720
and I don't want to create a
film in which I'm basically hoping to

135
00:10:39.840 --> 00:10:43.600
get lucky and someone would notice it. So the moment I heard about the

136
00:10:43.600 --> 00:10:46.919
Oldron Foundation, which goes to schools
across America, they show videos, they

137
00:10:46.960 --> 00:10:52.039
do these huge maps of Mars that
kids can walk through in the class,

138
00:10:52.559 --> 00:10:54.279
this was like, that's the way
to get this in front of my target

139
00:10:54.320 --> 00:10:58.799
audience kids and get them excited about
it. Reached out, got them on

140
00:10:58.840 --> 00:11:03.360
the phone in relatively short order,
and before we'd even filmed the thing,

141
00:11:03.399 --> 00:11:05.960
we had already had a soft committal
for how we were going to distribute it.

142
00:11:05.960 --> 00:11:09.679
It would have to It was always
going to have to remain nonprofit because

143
00:11:09.679 --> 00:11:13.960
I was adapting from the Creative Commons
comic. So this to me was a

144
00:11:13.960 --> 00:11:18.159
win win because I always assumed it
would be just kind of a financial wash.

145
00:11:18.200 --> 00:11:20.759
And then got the team together,
went out, filmed it, got

146
00:11:20.799 --> 00:11:24.519
Gabe con got a guy named Jay
Ricatinue to film it with me. Did

147
00:11:24.559 --> 00:11:30.360
a pretty much shot for shot recreation
of the original comic, expanded over fifteen

148
00:11:30.399 --> 00:11:33.759
minutes worth of additional shots. Got
Gabe Conroy, who used to work for

149
00:11:33.799 --> 00:11:37.840
Sin Sours and does a lot of
the effects for all the commercials you'll see

150
00:11:37.879 --> 00:11:41.759
for a SpaceX. Anytime you see
like the CG stuff from SpaceX, that's

151
00:11:41.799 --> 00:11:46.480
Gabe. He came in, built
the fully rendered version of our new Rover,

152
00:11:46.720 --> 00:11:50.080
rebuilt its face to have a little
bit more of a human of motion

153
00:11:50.159 --> 00:11:52.919
to it, and then as the
final step to make sure this would land

154
00:11:54.000 --> 00:11:58.039
as hard as possible emotionally we need. We decided we needed a world class

155
00:11:58.039 --> 00:12:01.120
actor, and rather than reaching out
to one of my friends, all of

156
00:12:01.159 --> 00:12:05.399
whom are very talented people, by
the way, I decided we should take

157
00:12:05.440 --> 00:12:09.279
this that extra step and get the
best voice over actor in the world,

158
00:12:09.519 --> 00:12:13.840
Terror Strong, who came in knocked
it out without barely breaking a sweat,

159
00:12:13.399 --> 00:12:18.639
and it all turned out wonderfully,
like Sperrit. Aside from taking too long

160
00:12:18.720 --> 00:12:20.879
to do, you know, a
good decade from the time I originally thought

161
00:12:20.879 --> 00:12:26.159
about doing it kind of just went
way too easy. I can't complain.

162
00:12:26.399 --> 00:12:31.759
Well, I'm so happy that you
did revisit this project because when I watched

163
00:12:31.799 --> 00:12:37.600
it, it gave off like a
Sunday night, wonderful World of Disney vibe

164
00:12:37.600 --> 00:12:41.840
to me, especially with Steve how
you have him introducing it. Let's talk

165
00:12:41.840 --> 00:12:46.360
a little bit about Steve Squires and
Tara. How was it working with Steve

166
00:12:46.399 --> 00:12:52.639
Squires? It was a dream,
but it was very last minute. We

167
00:12:52.679 --> 00:12:56.200
had already finished the film. At
that point I had kind of just I

168
00:12:56.200 --> 00:13:00.240
had always knew I'd wanted to work
with someone involved with the project. The

169
00:13:00.279 --> 00:13:05.799
actual commander of the entire scientific side
of it was not the person I expected

170
00:13:05.799 --> 00:13:11.039
to get by any stretch of measure. And as we were getting ready to

171
00:13:11.080 --> 00:13:15.559
give it to the altern Foundation,
they pointed out that because it was very

172
00:13:15.600 --> 00:13:18.559
abstracted, in spite of the educational
elements, it would be useful to get

173
00:13:18.600 --> 00:13:24.600
somebody involved from the original project,
from the original mission to help put that

174
00:13:24.639 --> 00:13:28.639
in context. So when I reached
out to Steve, the film was basically

175
00:13:28.720 --> 00:13:33.120
done and he was very on the
fence about doing it. According to him,

176
00:13:33.200 --> 00:13:37.120
what made the decision for him was
when he showed it to his young

177
00:13:37.240 --> 00:13:43.080
daughter and she loved it. So
she is the one who got Steve Squires

178
00:13:43.120 --> 00:13:46.679
involved. He came out, We
recorded his stuff at about a day.

179
00:13:46.840 --> 00:13:52.039
You could tell he's done fifty million
interviews as I don't think I've ever done

180
00:13:52.120 --> 00:13:58.320
less directly in my life. It
was Steve Squires and I was also there

181
00:14:00.720 --> 00:14:05.000
that day. Well, okay,
now Tara Strong, we're talking she's got

182
00:14:05.039 --> 00:14:11.759
over six hundred acting credits, and
we're talking iconic Marvel going Strong. Yeah,

183
00:14:11.840 --> 00:14:18.600
I iconic Marvel characters, DC characters, Disney characters. Was she always

184
00:14:18.639 --> 00:14:22.240
the goal? Like we gotta get
Tara or were you just were you just

185
00:14:22.279 --> 00:14:24.480
blown away when they said, hey, Tara Strong's coming in. At this

186
00:14:24.600 --> 00:14:28.720
level of filmmaking, when you're this
deep into the indie scene, you don't

187
00:14:28.720 --> 00:14:33.120
get to die on any hills casting
wise, so very rarely do you get

188
00:14:33.159 --> 00:14:35.879
a first or second, third,
or fourth choice. You have a short

189
00:14:35.919 --> 00:14:39.519
list and you approach the folks.
Tara was on that short list of about

190
00:14:39.559 --> 00:14:45.440
five people, and it was a
kind of easy negotiating process. It was

191
00:14:45.559 --> 00:14:48.120
very straightforward with through the casting director's
agents. Once she took a look at

192
00:14:48.120 --> 00:14:52.879
the project, she was all in
and she came in and was just incredibly

193
00:14:52.919 --> 00:14:56.679
fun to work with. Now,
the fun thing when you mentioned all the

194
00:14:56.720 --> 00:15:00.519
stuff from her career is she has
been doing this so long that when you

195
00:15:00.559 --> 00:15:05.039
meet her in person, without even
thinking about it, she will be randomly

196
00:15:05.159 --> 00:15:09.399
slipping into various characters from the course
of your career as you're talking to her.

197
00:15:09.639 --> 00:15:13.759
If you say something that that mildly
annoys her, you'll hear a little

198
00:15:13.759 --> 00:15:16.759
bit of Raven coming out. You
mentioned something that makes her laugh, and

199
00:15:16.840 --> 00:15:20.200
you'll hear the bubbles laugh. It
is actually surreal when you've grown up of

200
00:15:20.240 --> 00:15:24.039
these characters, because it's like,
in the course of a five minute conversation,

201
00:15:24.080 --> 00:15:28.919
I'm just sort of pinpointing folks as
I go Wow. And the thing

202
00:15:28.919 --> 00:15:35.279
with her performance in this she gives
She gives spirit, a little bit of

203
00:15:35.320 --> 00:15:39.799
sash, she gives it definitely the
emotional depth as you said, this is

204
00:15:41.360 --> 00:15:46.039
this is educational, it's very entertaining. Was it always your intention to make

205
00:15:46.039 --> 00:15:50.639
it have such a to elicit an
emotional response? Because that's what I got

206
00:15:50.639 --> 00:15:54.559
out of it. I mean,
I started, I was heartbroken for a

207
00:15:54.600 --> 00:16:00.360
minute. You know, one hundred
percent. One of those filmmakers I should

208
00:16:00.360 --> 00:16:04.440
have mentioned earlier for having a big
influence on me is probably the biggest influence

209
00:16:04.440 --> 00:16:11.159
of my childhood is Gone Bluth.
I am a firm believer that a kids

210
00:16:11.240 --> 00:16:17.440
film needs to traumatize kids along the
way. But I'm not trying to do

211
00:16:17.480 --> 00:16:19.799
a ha ha ha, let's traumatize
kids. No. I mean, seriously,

212
00:16:21.039 --> 00:16:25.840
kids have a much greater threshold than
film than most people these days.

213
00:16:25.879 --> 00:16:29.480
Give them credit for now. You
shouldn't be out to horrify them with violence

214
00:16:29.480 --> 00:16:33.759
and gore. But they can handle
real, significant ideas and real grief,

215
00:16:33.080 --> 00:16:36.600
and that's part of the balancing act. I think that it's something we have

216
00:16:36.639 --> 00:16:41.399
gotten much worse apped in film.
Paradoxically, we've gotten much better at it

217
00:16:41.480 --> 00:16:47.360
in kids television. Hid's television these
days has so much more teeth than your

218
00:16:47.360 --> 00:16:52.279
average kids film, and I think
that's impressive and wonderful. So no,

219
00:16:52.320 --> 00:16:55.799
with spirit. Part of what drew
me to this comic in the first place

220
00:16:56.039 --> 00:16:57.960
was the fact that it broke my
heart at the end, I changed the

221
00:16:59.080 --> 00:17:02.720
ending from the comic. You'll notice
I do actually give the film a happy

222
00:17:02.840 --> 00:17:08.039
ending, but only after we still
kill her. Yeah, it's like I

223
00:17:08.079 --> 00:17:11.880
still want the depressive edding, but
then we get a little bit of happy

224
00:17:11.000 --> 00:17:14.759
at the end. But so it
was always a part of that, and

225
00:17:14.799 --> 00:17:18.079
I think that's something we should all
aspire to. Kids need to cry more.

226
00:17:18.200 --> 00:17:22.279
It's help yeah grow, It helps
him grow, right, Yeah,

227
00:17:22.319 --> 00:17:23.920
I just I love it because she's
spunky. You know, she's like,

228
00:17:23.960 --> 00:17:29.119
hey, I'm still here feeling a
little ignored. And then you know when

229
00:17:29.119 --> 00:17:30.640
she that that that moment where at
the end where she's like, I did

230
00:17:30.680 --> 00:17:34.680
a good job for Earth, no
for Mars, and she it's like the

231
00:17:34.720 --> 00:17:37.640
acceptance of spirit, like this is
where I'm at and this is what's going

232
00:17:37.680 --> 00:17:41.640
to be. And then yeah,
like you said, I I knew it

233
00:17:41.680 --> 00:17:44.720
was coming. You know, I
still wasn't emotionally ready for it, but

234
00:17:44.720 --> 00:17:47.079
I knew it was coming. And
then and then you give us that little

235
00:17:47.160 --> 00:17:48.799
uplifting in where you know, like
with the home line, Oh, it

236
00:17:48.920 --> 00:17:53.519
was perfect man, it's just it's
a fantastic It's an absolutely fantastic short.

237
00:17:55.319 --> 00:18:00.279
This win's best Science Fiction Short,
correct, it did for a couple different

238
00:18:00.319 --> 00:18:04.000
vessels. Raw Science Festival is the
one that stood out most in my mind

239
00:18:04.079 --> 00:18:08.960
for that because it's the only festival
out there that I'm aware of that's judged

240
00:18:10.000 --> 00:18:14.799
all by sciences. And this was
right at This was right before the pandemic,

241
00:18:14.960 --> 00:18:17.880
I think, when that hits.
So I did not get to go

242
00:18:17.960 --> 00:18:21.319
to that festival in person, but
I think for Spirit that was among my

243
00:18:21.359 --> 00:18:26.559
personal favorite the awards or award nominations
we got it. Also, while it

244
00:18:26.599 --> 00:18:30.440
did not win awards at Boston Sci
Fi, it ended up taking me to

245
00:18:30.680 --> 00:18:33.559
Boston Sci Fi where it got screened
in front of an Ava Green film,

246
00:18:33.559 --> 00:18:38.279
which I'm spacing on now, the
one about her is an astronaut and that

247
00:18:40.359 --> 00:18:44.799
well, that might be worth revisiting
this conversation later on because Spirit was directly

248
00:18:45.319 --> 00:18:48.759
this festival, Boston Sci Fi was
directly responsible for the creation of the film

249
00:18:48.799 --> 00:18:53.480
that came after Spirit. Brad,
I know you are a huge fan of

250
00:18:53.519 --> 00:19:00.240
the time traveling genre when it comes
to sci fi films. So when we

251
00:19:00.279 --> 00:19:03.519
had the opportunity to speak with Stenson. I knew you were gonna love this,

252
00:19:03.839 --> 00:19:08.319
So Stepson, we got to talk
about this incredible situation where your your

253
00:19:08.359 --> 00:19:12.200
other short, tim Travers and the
time Traveler's Paradox. You know, we're

254
00:19:12.240 --> 00:19:18.279
talking about an incredible short and it's
becoming a feature length film. So has

255
00:19:18.359 --> 00:19:21.920
become has become a feature length film? Yes, past tense. Thank you

256
00:19:21.920 --> 00:19:26.000
for correcting me. Before we get
into it, Can we just talk a

257
00:19:26.039 --> 00:19:30.839
little bit about Samuel Dunning because this
guy is incredible, Like, where where

258
00:19:30.839 --> 00:19:38.160
has he been? Uh? He's
a male model. He's a male model

259
00:19:38.200 --> 00:19:42.279
of the East Coast, and I
hate that. I hate that. With

260
00:19:42.640 --> 00:19:48.519
five of my being tall, good
looking, in great shape, phenomenal actor,

261
00:19:49.119 --> 00:19:56.880
runway model, does multiple um History
Channel documentaries playing historical figures from the

262
00:19:56.960 --> 00:20:02.359
nineteen twenties and stuff like that.
And I meet this guy at a film

263
00:20:02.400 --> 00:20:07.400
festival that was screened and he was
doing a film called Rick and Ruby about

264
00:20:07.440 --> 00:20:14.440
an alcoholic vampire starring himself, and
it was screened quite naturally alongside Spirit because

265
00:20:14.480 --> 00:20:18.440
when you think kids friendly film about
a happy talking robot, let's put that

266
00:20:18.519 --> 00:20:21.920
next to the one with the vampire
drinking people's blood and making love to the

267
00:20:21.920 --> 00:20:25.880
stump and I'm not exaggerating. Oh
my god, Oh I gotta see this

268
00:20:26.119 --> 00:20:30.799
good Ruby. You need to see
Rick and Ruby. We will definitely put

269
00:20:30.839 --> 00:20:37.079
that on the watch list. Yeah, this guy. Are two films and

270
00:20:37.319 --> 00:20:45.680
there is some technical speech being done, I mean, flowing through this guy's

271
00:20:45.720 --> 00:20:52.000
mouth without any stuttering, without you
know, many mumbling, clear, very

272
00:20:52.200 --> 00:20:57.039
very clear of what he's saying.
Confusing, but clear. So I mean

273
00:20:57.039 --> 00:21:00.720
it did a great job with that. I really pushed back at the term

274
00:21:00.799 --> 00:21:04.039
technobabble. I know you didn't use
that term, but some folks will describe

275
00:21:04.079 --> 00:21:07.920
that way because technobabble is the star
trek. Let's make up a thing and

276
00:21:07.920 --> 00:21:12.640
then make a metaphor thing. The
stuff in Tim Travers is describing all real

277
00:21:12.799 --> 00:21:18.559
theory. Now, the big caveat
is that all that theory demonstrably proves time

278
00:21:18.559 --> 00:21:22.200
travel is not possible, and we
do it anyway. But the stuff he's

279
00:21:22.240 --> 00:21:26.839
talking about is real. Sam is
on the record for the by the way,

280
00:21:27.000 --> 00:21:30.519
as having done the short, having
done the feature, and according to

281
00:21:30.599 --> 00:21:34.960
him, he still doesn't have a
damn clue what he's saying in either.

282
00:21:36.559 --> 00:21:40.720
He's just saying it with confidence,
and he's a really good actor, but

283
00:21:40.799 --> 00:21:42.920
he is on the record that he
has the faintest idea what he's saying.

284
00:21:44.559 --> 00:21:48.119
Well, I think the thing about
time travel when you talk about it,

285
00:21:48.759 --> 00:21:52.200
I mean, it's been used so
many movies, and it is my achilles

286
00:21:52.240 --> 00:21:59.799
here. You know, Werewolves,
Batman movies and time travel movies. And

287
00:22:00.160 --> 00:22:03.519
I just recently watched Somewhere in Time
just because it was about time travel,

288
00:22:03.519 --> 00:22:06.880
and the guy told me it was
really good. It was based out where

289
00:22:06.920 --> 00:22:10.920
Richard mathis a novel, so I
watched it. You don't really have to

290
00:22:11.160 --> 00:22:17.640
buy what they're saying about time travel. You have to be in on it

291
00:22:17.680 --> 00:22:21.720
from the get go because it's been
done so many different ways, from if

292
00:22:21.720 --> 00:22:23.079
you have the Marvel films, in
the Back to the Future films, things

293
00:22:23.079 --> 00:22:27.480
like Time cop and even in Somewhere
in Time, you know everything is done

294
00:22:27.640 --> 00:22:32.200
in How did you miss Primer in
that list? Oh yeah, okay,

295
00:22:32.559 --> 00:22:37.039
Primer. But it was like,
you have to put your brain in that

296
00:22:37.160 --> 00:22:41.000
right away. So, like I
said, his stuff is very confusing,

297
00:22:41.640 --> 00:22:45.119
but I bought into it because I
had already accepted this is the way we're

298
00:22:45.160 --> 00:22:49.680
going with time travel in this feature. And if you do that, you

299
00:22:49.799 --> 00:22:55.359
have fun because I for a second. I started to try to follow what

300
00:22:55.440 --> 00:23:00.559
he's saying, and it hurt my
head, and I was like, and

301
00:23:00.599 --> 00:23:03.960
I paused it, and I went
back and I was like, just enjoy

302
00:23:03.079 --> 00:23:07.640
the film, go into it.
It's kind of like what I think.

303
00:23:07.839 --> 00:23:11.799
Remember, Like Austin Powers says,
He's like and he's like, starts explaining

304
00:23:11.799 --> 00:23:14.359
the time travel thing, and he's
like, he is, why don't you

305
00:23:14.440 --> 00:23:17.799
just sit back and enjoy the show? And he looks at it. Yes,

306
00:23:18.039 --> 00:23:22.079
please, you know, don't try
to explain it, and you don't

307
00:23:22.119 --> 00:23:25.000
need to have to explain it,
but it and it works so well with

308
00:23:25.039 --> 00:23:29.400
it. I always think of the
best explanations in the episode of Red Dwarf

309
00:23:29.559 --> 00:23:33.880
when they travel back in time and
they try like four times to explain it

310
00:23:33.920 --> 00:23:37.640
to this one character using various metaphors
or quantum mechanics and particles until one of

311
00:23:37.640 --> 00:23:41.799
them just goes, it's a doorway
to the past. It's like, oh,

312
00:23:41.839 --> 00:23:47.119
I magic door. Why didn't you
say? Yeah? I gotta tell

313
00:23:47.160 --> 00:23:52.880
you. The the practical effects and
the visual effects in this short are awesome,

314
00:23:53.200 --> 00:23:56.440
Like, you know, let's let's
talk a little bit about that,

315
00:23:56.599 --> 00:24:03.359
because I'm assuming you know, the
main the main set piece the machine itself.

316
00:24:04.079 --> 00:24:08.440
Yes, can you tell us a
little bit about the you know it

317
00:24:08.599 --> 00:24:15.799
farely killed several men? Yeah,
yeah, that thing. So to those

318
00:24:15.839 --> 00:24:18.400
who haven't seen the short which I'm
presuming is the overwhelming majority of the listeners

319
00:24:18.480 --> 00:24:26.240
right now, the time Machine is
a twenty four foot tall, triangular pyramid

320
00:24:26.319 --> 00:24:32.599
like monolith of lights running up the
side, nearly jet black. Where to

321
00:24:32.720 --> 00:24:34.839
walk into the pass. Because the
time machine only goes back in time one

322
00:24:34.880 --> 00:24:40.359
minute, there's literally an entrance door
and an exit door. You walk out

323
00:24:40.400 --> 00:24:44.559
the entrance door, and you come
out one minute in the past. That's

324
00:24:44.559 --> 00:24:48.119
how the time Machine works because it's
all about testing the classic thought experiment,

325
00:24:48.240 --> 00:24:52.799
the time traveler's paradox. What happens
if you kill a younger version of yourself

326
00:24:52.799 --> 00:24:56.880
from one minute ago, and it
functions like a hallway pyramid so that you

327
00:24:56.880 --> 00:25:00.640
can stand in front of the exit
side through the energy, then look through

328
00:25:00.640 --> 00:25:06.160
the entrance side, see your younger
self and shoot him. I didn't see

329
00:25:06.160 --> 00:25:11.880
that coming. Yeah, yeah,
neither did Tim, And as I saw

330
00:25:11.920 --> 00:25:15.640
that, I just said, no, that doesn't work, and then he

331
00:25:15.680 --> 00:25:21.240
goes, oh, so it's a
failure. You know, I won't disappear

332
00:25:21.279 --> 00:25:23.799
into dust, you know, by
killing my younger self. You know,

333
00:25:23.920 --> 00:25:27.440
so, I mean immediately he like, you know how everybody tries to be

334
00:25:27.440 --> 00:25:32.200
like I'm gonna I'm gonna catch this. Just I was looking at your effects

335
00:25:32.240 --> 00:25:37.240
and I saw zero flaws in your
effects between you know, fifty tims.

336
00:25:38.000 --> 00:25:44.000
Well, okay, so you've got
multiple tims. You've got you've got massive

337
00:25:44.039 --> 00:25:48.960
gunshot wounds, you've got you've got
Tim's exploding. When you were writing this,

338
00:25:48.480 --> 00:25:52.599
I mean, are you writing this
knowing like, hey, I the

339
00:25:52.720 --> 00:25:56.079
CGI, it's gonna be there,
I can do this. Or was this

340
00:25:56.160 --> 00:25:57.680
something like after the fact where you're
like, let's have some fun now that

341
00:25:57.720 --> 00:26:03.240
we you know, we got some
fun. For something like this, you

342
00:26:03.319 --> 00:26:06.559
have to go in with very careful
planning, and it helps to have a

343
00:26:06.559 --> 00:26:10.720
good sense of who you're working with. So I worked with two studios predominantly

344
00:26:10.759 --> 00:26:15.240
for the effects on Tim Travers.
The production studio is north By Northwest and

345
00:26:15.359 --> 00:26:18.799
Washington State. You may have heard
of a product that there is called c

346
00:26:18.039 --> 00:26:22.759
Nation. That's all them as well
as Black. The Netflix spent off Black

347
00:26:22.799 --> 00:26:27.200
Summer. So they were our set
construction team. They were all of our

348
00:26:27.279 --> 00:26:32.200
crew and for the effects using the
same people that worked with on North By

349
00:26:32.240 --> 00:26:34.839
Northwest. We used Jason McKee of
Mode Effects, who's doing a lot of

350
00:26:34.880 --> 00:26:38.720
the digitals, and then we outsourced
some of that to another gal down down

351
00:26:38.720 --> 00:26:44.000
in La Jacqueline Chesson, who was
focusing all the split screen and the rotoscoping.

352
00:26:44.240 --> 00:26:47.319
We basically had three layers of effects
on it. We had the stuff

353
00:26:47.319 --> 00:26:49.759
that was so easy I could do
it, and that was your standard split

354
00:26:49.839 --> 00:26:55.759
screen effect. We had stuff that
required true rodo so painting stuff out,

355
00:26:55.960 --> 00:26:59.559
that's when Jacqueline would be involved.
And for the really extreme stuff like when

356
00:26:59.640 --> 00:27:02.559
chunks, heads are getting ripped off, stuff like that, that's when we

357
00:27:02.559 --> 00:27:06.799
would go to Jason McKee and with
all of his experience from z Nation,

358
00:27:07.240 --> 00:27:11.319
ripping chunks off of people and zombies
is their bread and butter. So that

359
00:27:11.440 --> 00:27:15.079
was how we had to plant.
And that was one of those films where

360
00:27:15.119 --> 00:27:18.759
it was storyboarded out, shot for
shot for shot beginning to end, so

361
00:27:18.759 --> 00:27:23.880
it was very carefully planned film.
My question is when you were approaching this

362
00:27:25.119 --> 00:27:30.880
right away, did you have to
check all your effects first before you started

363
00:27:30.880 --> 00:27:34.160
writing the script or did you start
writing the script and said, I don't

364
00:27:34.200 --> 00:27:40.359
care if I can't find somebody that
can do this visual wise, I'm writing

365
00:27:40.400 --> 00:27:45.440
it anyway, or do you check
first? You always got to write the

366
00:27:45.480 --> 00:27:48.559
best story first, and then once
you have your best story, then you

367
00:27:48.599 --> 00:27:52.920
figure out what your resources are and
you adapt accordingly. There are several things

368
00:27:52.920 --> 00:27:56.839
that we did adapt accordingly, Like
one effect we could not do in the

369
00:27:56.880 --> 00:28:00.880
original script. The original depiction of
God at the end, or at least

370
00:28:00.880 --> 00:28:06.039
the entity that Tim Travers turns into, was going to be a doctor Manhattan

371
00:28:06.079 --> 00:28:11.119
style thing. So a digital body, perfect sculpted kind of in glowing that

372
00:28:11.200 --> 00:28:15.400
was not feasible. So we decided
to go with taking his character's costume,

373
00:28:15.720 --> 00:28:19.519
which is all dark tones, and
doing literally an invert on it. So

374
00:28:19.559 --> 00:28:23.359
now it's an identical costume to his
normal look, but it's all in white,

375
00:28:23.880 --> 00:28:27.759
right down to him now being albino
and having white hair. So that

376
00:28:27.799 --> 00:28:33.000
was I gotta go back. Yeah, oh yeah, it's an identical costume.

377
00:28:33.519 --> 00:28:36.319
I'll tell you. One of the
things I love about it that I

378
00:28:36.359 --> 00:28:44.279
wasn't expecting was the dark comedy element
because the violence plays like an evil dead

379
00:28:44.319 --> 00:28:48.119
two uh type of field to no
one of my all time favorite directors,

380
00:28:48.160 --> 00:28:52.079
God, I was terrible at answering
that Sam Raving we yeah, we we.

381
00:28:52.839 --> 00:28:56.079
I got a chance to talk to
Sam a couple of weeks back,

382
00:28:56.119 --> 00:28:57.640
so I've had evil dead on the
brain, but watching this, I was

383
00:28:57.680 --> 00:29:03.400
like, holy, like this is
over the top and he's not holding back

384
00:29:03.400 --> 00:29:07.160
on some of these shots. Like
you know, so when you're setting out

385
00:29:07.160 --> 00:29:10.400
writing this, do you find it
easy to write? Because I know,

386
00:29:10.599 --> 00:29:12.720
I know lots of writers have they
can write anything, but when it comes

387
00:29:12.759 --> 00:29:17.599
to comedy, it's it's hard to
do. Like is this something that that

388
00:29:17.640 --> 00:29:19.960
just falls naturally or or do you
feel like you know, I'm going to

389
00:29:21.039 --> 00:29:22.160
write this. I think it's funny, and I wonder if other people think

390
00:29:22.160 --> 00:29:26.039
it's funny for me. I can't
not write comedy now. Whether or not

391
00:29:26.160 --> 00:29:33.400
it's good comedy is a very very
debatable question, But I can't resist doing

392
00:29:33.480 --> 00:29:38.079
things that make myself laugh. I
just I truly cannot help myself now.

393
00:29:38.200 --> 00:29:41.480
Like I said, it's a big
question if it makes anybody else laugh,

394
00:29:41.880 --> 00:29:45.680
but I really can't resist doing that. And that's not the same thing as

395
00:29:45.680 --> 00:29:49.480
saying I write nothing but comedy.
I think I have always found overly serious

396
00:29:49.519 --> 00:29:56.880
storytelling to be kind of the the
Nati year of pretentious for me, simply

397
00:29:56.960 --> 00:30:03.319
because that isn't an accurate reflection of
how human beings behave. Life is funny.

398
00:30:03.559 --> 00:30:07.400
The most horrific things that can befall
people are funny. One of the

399
00:30:07.440 --> 00:30:12.880
main coping mechanisms that human beings use
to cope with trauma is to laugh at

400
00:30:12.880 --> 00:30:15.839
it, to laugh at their own
trauma, which is a different thing from

401
00:30:15.880 --> 00:30:21.319
having somebody else laugh at your trauma, but the use of humor as a

402
00:30:21.319 --> 00:30:26.480
defense negatism, and a protection tool
and a healing tool that is essential to

403
00:30:26.519 --> 00:30:30.200
the human experience, to the point
where when I find traumatic storytelling where nobody

404
00:30:30.440 --> 00:30:34.400
is able to have a sense of
humor or at least a sense of irony,

405
00:30:34.440 --> 00:30:37.319
it pulls me out of the story
because this does not feel like an

406
00:30:37.319 --> 00:30:42.559
accurate presentation of humans. Yeah,
Good Fellas, what they do in it

407
00:30:42.640 --> 00:30:48.400
is terrible, but the movie is
hilarious exactly. And that's one of the

408
00:30:48.400 --> 00:30:51.799
things I like to do in my
own stuff is I'm not going for theater

409
00:30:51.839 --> 00:30:55.440
to the absurd comedy, but i
am going for something that is not pretending.

410
00:30:55.480 --> 00:30:59.720
This isn't absurd and the character should
be aware of it, but not

411
00:30:59.759 --> 00:31:03.240
in the wink at the audience fourth
wall meta thing, but in the same

412
00:31:03.279 --> 00:31:07.480
way that when absurd things are happening
to me in my day, I'm not

413
00:31:07.559 --> 00:31:11.880
churning to some invisible camera and laughing
at it. But I'm still cognizant of

414
00:31:11.920 --> 00:31:17.359
when an absurd situation is befalling me. Right, Because it seems to me

415
00:31:17.640 --> 00:31:25.680
as if Tim, being so straightforward
at the beginning and almost not even ready

416
00:31:25.720 --> 00:31:30.559
to realize that this might work,
and seeing that he is able to travel

417
00:31:30.640 --> 00:31:37.359
through time, he almost loses it. You know, his mind chanic can't

418
00:31:37.400 --> 00:31:41.319
handle this much. You know,
it's almost like he flips up because the

419
00:31:41.440 --> 00:31:45.519
more and more he gets kind of
more insane. Do you agree. I

420
00:31:45.519 --> 00:31:48.519
don't think he's getting more insane,
but he's not. But he is surprising

421
00:31:48.599 --> 00:31:55.200
himself. What part of what inspired
Tim Travers to me is the idea of

422
00:31:55.359 --> 00:32:00.000
a character in a time travel movie
who thinks scientifically that in and of itself

423
00:32:00.119 --> 00:32:06.400
could support a narrative. Tim functions
on an if than system. If this

424
00:32:06.480 --> 00:32:09.599
works, then it implies this Therefore, I can test it with this and

425
00:32:09.640 --> 00:32:14.240
I'm going to repeat the experiment,
And much of the film is him doing

426
00:32:14.359 --> 00:32:19.559
just that, and the big surprise
for him is how much it keeps not

427
00:32:19.720 --> 00:32:24.599
making sense because every logic says this
shouldn't work, and somehow is. And

428
00:32:24.680 --> 00:32:29.599
so his whole arc of a character
is trying to figure out why is it

429
00:32:29.640 --> 00:32:34.640
working when it shouldn't and seeing how
far we can get in how deep into

430
00:32:34.680 --> 00:32:36.799
that we can get. But I
really wanted to make a story about a

431
00:32:36.880 --> 00:32:40.839
character who really does think scientifically.
Well, even with like the little the

432
00:32:40.920 --> 00:32:45.920
comedy aspect, I appreciate the small
things you did. I'm watching the closing

433
00:32:45.920 --> 00:32:52.359
credits sequence and there's like there's like
twenty two Samuel Dunning, you know,

434
00:32:52.400 --> 00:32:55.839
because he's he's he's all these Tims
and he's the god Tim. And I

435
00:32:55.960 --> 00:33:00.039
just cracked up because, like you, you don't see that in close and

436
00:33:00.119 --> 00:33:04.160
credits, and I just I appreciated
that you made that one little last comedic

437
00:33:04.240 --> 00:33:06.599
jab at it. Oh yeah,
you gotta have a sense of hearing with

438
00:33:06.640 --> 00:33:07.839
these things. So I have a
question. You had to name every one

439
00:33:07.839 --> 00:33:10.640
of them yeeah, oh yeah,
and well they had to be named in

440
00:33:10.799 --> 00:33:14.720
It's not a joke. It's not
a joke we put into the credits to

441
00:33:14.920 --> 00:33:19.039
keep track of it while filming it. We had to name them. They

442
00:33:19.079 --> 00:33:23.279
are individually listed in the physical script
of that film, so you know who

443
00:33:23.359 --> 00:33:27.240
is who. And one of the
big reasons for that is one of the

444
00:33:27.279 --> 00:33:30.680
things we have is a sort of
a personality drift. They're they're not parallel

445
00:33:30.799 --> 00:33:35.640
universe Tims because it's time travel.
It's not a brick and Morty parallel universe.

446
00:33:35.839 --> 00:33:39.359
So they are all the identical person
However, the more time they spend

447
00:33:39.440 --> 00:33:43.799
in each other's company, there's going
to be a drift. And one of

448
00:33:43.799 --> 00:33:49.079
the things Sam was doing is really
keeping tracks scene to scene. Who is

449
00:33:49.160 --> 00:33:52.119
who? Who is the Tim that
is the most shit upon Tim? Who

450
00:33:52.200 --> 00:33:55.319
is the Tim that's going to start
being the bully and the belligerent one,

451
00:33:55.480 --> 00:34:00.640
who's going to step into a leadership
role? And when something happens to that

452
00:34:00.680 --> 00:34:05.480
particular leader after they go the other
way through the machine, who immediately takes

453
00:34:05.480 --> 00:34:09.039
over for that? They're all yeah, so each one of those. That's

454
00:34:09.039 --> 00:34:12.159
not a joke we made up for
the credits. It was just like we

455
00:34:12.320 --> 00:34:14.760
did the work, We're just gonna
put it in there for lack of a

456
00:34:14.920 --> 00:34:20.079
reason. Not too well again,
this guy, he's incredible. Um,

457
00:34:20.920 --> 00:34:23.000
next question for you, Stimpson,
You've got he said, he had a

458
00:34:23.079 --> 00:34:27.880
question for us. Yeah, so
you guys seem to have clain a lot

459
00:34:27.880 --> 00:34:30.679
of attention to this film, and
speaking of having a sense of humor,

460
00:34:30.800 --> 00:34:35.000
sometimes I like to get a little
mean with some of the stuff to the

461
00:34:35.000 --> 00:34:37.639
audience. So I gotta ask you
both the question where did the football come

462
00:34:37.639 --> 00:34:43.159
from? I have it in my
notes that was gonna be the final question

463
00:34:43.199 --> 00:34:45.800
I ask you. Like I'm sitting
there, I was like, wait a

464
00:34:45.800 --> 00:34:52.320
minute, where did the football come
from? Like, because he's yeah,

465
00:34:52.360 --> 00:34:57.159
if you follow no seriously, where
the football come from? I? Yeah,

466
00:34:57.159 --> 00:35:01.960
it does because the logic that he
used didn't make sense, so it

467
00:35:02.039 --> 00:35:07.960
doesn't have to make sense. Yeah, I'm not going to answer it.

468
00:35:07.000 --> 00:35:10.599
There is actually a definitive answer to
the question where did the football come from?

469
00:35:10.760 --> 00:35:15.639
Although it's answered better in the feature
film. My request, even if

470
00:35:15.639 --> 00:35:20.840
it's even if it's better answered in
the feature I want to hear about it

471
00:35:21.199 --> 00:35:23.639
on your audio commentary on the on
the four K Blu ray when when this

472
00:35:23.679 --> 00:35:28.039
thing comes out, you know,
because that's what that's gonna be one of

473
00:35:28.039 --> 00:35:30.000
those those things where people are like, wait, where where because it's funny,

474
00:35:30.039 --> 00:35:32.199
But at the same time, I
was like, wait, hold one

475
00:35:32.519 --> 00:35:36.960
who threw the football? Where did
it come from? I will it kind

476
00:35:37.000 --> 00:35:39.159
of makes the short, Okay,
I'll answer the question for the short.

477
00:35:39.239 --> 00:35:44.760
It is a different answer for the
feature because I put so much time making

478
00:35:44.760 --> 00:35:49.000
sure that as hard as the logic
and the short is to follow, it

479
00:35:49.320 --> 00:35:53.599
is one hundred percent there. And
and I wanted to reward people who pay

480
00:35:53.679 --> 00:35:58.880
that level of attention by having all
the logic makes sense internally. And then

481
00:35:58.920 --> 00:36:01.760
it kind of the last second,
and for really no reason other than to

482
00:36:01.800 --> 00:36:07.079
be a troll, I decided to
break it. The football is there because

483
00:36:07.159 --> 00:36:15.800
it disproves every theory the film presents. Okay, the film presents four major

484
00:36:15.920 --> 00:36:19.360
theories at the beginning for how this
could be working, and the football is

485
00:36:19.400 --> 00:36:24.199
one hundred percent not compatible with any
of them. It is there because I

486
00:36:24.239 --> 00:36:30.400
am a massive troll. I love
it. We changed an answer for the

487
00:36:30.400 --> 00:36:34.880
film. There's actually a much better
answer to the feature. Will we see

488
00:36:34.960 --> 00:36:38.559
Tim out and about? If you
can answer that, how do you mean

489
00:36:38.639 --> 00:36:44.440
he does go outdoors in the future
film? Yes, I want to see

490
00:36:44.480 --> 00:36:47.880
that. I want to see Tim
experience the outside world while already doing some

491
00:36:47.960 --> 00:36:51.199
time travel. I love that.
Oh yeah, you even see what a

492
00:36:51.199 --> 00:36:53.800
little bit of Tim's love life looks
like when he tries to make relationships work.

493
00:36:53.840 --> 00:36:59.159
You see how he tries to promote
himself. Tim Travers does something unspeakable.

494
00:36:59.400 --> 00:37:05.519
He goes on a podcast. Yes, So one question I've got was

495
00:37:05.559 --> 00:37:08.840
it always the intention to take this, this incredible short and go feature length

496
00:37:08.960 --> 00:37:12.800
because you've got you've got this,
You've got spirit like, okay, so

497
00:37:13.239 --> 00:37:15.599
how what's the genesis there? How
does this? How does this happen?

498
00:37:16.480 --> 00:37:21.280
So? I had a completely different
feature I was gearing up to do called

499
00:37:21.360 --> 00:37:24.519
Tree Street, about this group of
kids on a Halloween, and we had

500
00:37:24.559 --> 00:37:28.960
already booked out the studio with north
By Northwest, we had worked out the

501
00:37:28.960 --> 00:37:31.559
shooting time, and because this was
going to be my first feature with an

502
00:37:31.559 --> 00:37:37.239
actual sizeable budget for a first feature, a few at the time well known

503
00:37:37.239 --> 00:37:42.159
actors who were attached to it and
working with a very reputable studio. It

504
00:37:42.159 --> 00:37:46.280
occurred to me that I'd be going
into that feature as basically the least experienced

505
00:37:46.320 --> 00:37:51.159
person on set. And I didn't
like that because all of my work prior

506
00:37:51.199 --> 00:37:53.039
to that, even though I've been
doing film fifteen years, has been in

507
00:37:53.119 --> 00:37:57.960
supporting roles. It's producing on other
people's projects. It was frequently coming in

508
00:37:58.000 --> 00:38:00.840
on a lot of shorts, on
a lot of web series. Everything I

509
00:38:00.920 --> 00:38:05.000
worked on was on a much different
production value than the Tree Street feature was

510
00:38:05.039 --> 00:38:08.199
going to be, and that's what
initiated the idea to do Tim Travers.

511
00:38:08.320 --> 00:38:10.599
It was a script that had already
been at the back of my head.

512
00:38:10.679 --> 00:38:14.039
I had already met sam by them, and I knew that if I did

513
00:38:14.039 --> 00:38:16.719
this film, it had to be
Samuel Dunning who played this character. And

514
00:38:16.760 --> 00:38:21.719
so I decided, I'm going to
do this short, but as though it

515
00:38:21.760 --> 00:38:24.880
were a feature film with a full
production, professional union crew behind it,

516
00:38:25.199 --> 00:38:29.599
a full team, a full studio, We're all just going to ignore the

517
00:38:29.639 --> 00:38:32.679
fact that it's a short and not
a feature. That's what Tim Travers was

518
00:38:32.719 --> 00:38:36.559
worn out of, and I had
so much fun with it that as I

519
00:38:36.599 --> 00:38:40.039
was gearing up to do the feature
the following year, the Tree Street Feature,

520
00:38:40.039 --> 00:38:44.360
I decided to do another short in
the same production value with Tim Travers,

521
00:38:44.920 --> 00:38:47.440
and I got the idea that what
if I do an anthology that way,

522
00:38:47.440 --> 00:38:52.000
if something goes wrong with the Tree
Street feature, I have these big

523
00:38:52.039 --> 00:38:54.239
budget shorts I've been doing, and
I would only need to do two more

524
00:38:54.320 --> 00:39:00.280
and it would be fairly financially affordable
to do and then something, And so

525
00:39:00.320 --> 00:39:02.039
we did lab Rats, which came
out really well. It's still in post

526
00:39:02.039 --> 00:39:05.079
production as well at the moment,
so it's not out for a few more

527
00:39:05.119 --> 00:39:08.800
months yet. And then just as
we're finishing lab Rats and we're about to

528
00:39:08.840 --> 00:39:14.559
go into Tree Street, it turns
out that our financiers were a lot of

529
00:39:14.599 --> 00:39:17.440
scumbags. I can't name a lot
of names. I can't name names right

530
00:39:17.480 --> 00:39:23.880
now, but the fallout has been
deep and bloodthirsty, and we were left

531
00:39:23.880 --> 00:39:28.639
and we were left hanging. All
these people had already put aside time to

532
00:39:28.679 --> 00:39:31.840
do the production. There was studio
space waiting, there was a tax incentive

533
00:39:31.840 --> 00:39:36.679
ready to go. And I kind
of realized in this moment that if I

534
00:39:36.760 --> 00:39:39.920
was ever going to do a feature
on my own without big outside financiers,

535
00:39:40.199 --> 00:39:45.679
I will never have a better chance
and opportunity than right now, not a

536
00:39:45.800 --> 00:39:50.800
year from now, not six months
from now, right now. And because

537
00:39:50.800 --> 00:39:53.519
of how well the Tim Travers short
had done, that was as close to

538
00:39:53.559 --> 00:39:57.199
a market test as I was ever
going to get. So if I'm going

539
00:39:57.199 --> 00:39:59.559
to invest my own money, if
I'm going to take this kind of risk.

540
00:40:00.000 --> 00:40:01.400
It's going to be the short that
I consider the best thing I've done

541
00:40:01.440 --> 00:40:07.000
to date, which is Tim Travers. So Tim Travers was never intended for

542
00:40:07.039 --> 00:40:09.559
a feature, but I called up
Sam Dunning. We talked a lot about

543
00:40:09.559 --> 00:40:14.079
what the arc of this character would
need to be because one of the jokes

544
00:40:14.079 --> 00:40:19.239
of the short is that he doesn't
have an art He is fundamentally unchanged at

545
00:40:19.239 --> 00:40:22.119
the end of that film, and
that doesn't which is fine for a twenty

546
00:40:22.159 --> 00:40:24.320
minute film, but that's not fine
for a nearly two hour feature production.

547
00:40:24.719 --> 00:40:29.800
So we need to figure out who
Tim Travers is and what is a story

548
00:40:29.880 --> 00:40:34.199
about him using the same framework as
the original that would sustain it. So

549
00:40:34.239 --> 00:40:37.840
I started writing. We had a
rough draft about a month later, and

550
00:40:37.920 --> 00:40:40.760
I kid you not two months from
the time we finished the rough draft,

551
00:40:40.840 --> 00:40:46.320
we were rolling on day one of
production. That was not even ninety days

552
00:40:46.400 --> 00:40:51.719
from the time that the decision was
made who do a feature, and that

553
00:40:51.719 --> 00:40:55.039
that feature would be at Tim Travers, no script existing too, rolling camera

554
00:40:55.760 --> 00:41:01.360
ninety days. That's unbelievable. I
mean, yeah, so, and so

555
00:41:01.519 --> 00:41:05.960
is your cast. Because we know
Samuel Dunning's coming back as Tim Travers,

556
00:41:06.800 --> 00:41:10.559
and we know we're definitely going to
see a much larger look at this world

557
00:41:10.599 --> 00:41:15.519
because you've got Danny Trio playing uh, and I don't want to give away

558
00:41:15.639 --> 00:41:19.360
you tell me if I'm if I
shouldn't be saying certain things. But we

559
00:41:19.400 --> 00:41:22.920
know he's the leader of a mercenary
army. Um, that's a big spoiler.

560
00:41:22.920 --> 00:41:27.719
He plays a gentleman named Royce.
What happens with Royce I can't go

561
00:41:27.760 --> 00:41:34.480
into. But it's Danny Trejo doing
his ray hoo patented treho. Okay,

562
00:41:35.000 --> 00:41:39.000
how about Joel McHale playing a conspiracy
theory radio host. You you mentioned Tim

563
00:41:39.039 --> 00:41:45.360
was gonna be on a podcast.
Is this okay? So no offense intended,

564
00:41:45.400 --> 00:41:50.079
gentleman, but he is a hard
parody of a lot of a lot

565
00:41:50.079 --> 00:41:54.199
of good podcasters and radio hosts out
there. I bad. I'm sure that

566
00:41:54.519 --> 00:42:00.880
we will find that part hires.
Trust me. Yeah, everyone will find

567
00:42:00.880 --> 00:42:02.719
that part of hilarious. Joe McHale
is one of those actors where Tom sometimes

568
00:42:02.920 --> 00:42:07.480
you just shut up and let him, Yeah, just let him go with

569
00:42:07.519 --> 00:42:12.599
it, like occasionally you remind him
that there's a script. But well there's

570
00:42:12.639 --> 00:42:16.280
there's two other incredible performers. You've
got. Um that I wanted you know

571
00:42:16.559 --> 00:42:20.199
about one at length. I can
name the other, but I can't tell

572
00:42:20.280 --> 00:42:22.079
you what they do. Okay,
so let's let's talk about someone that we

573
00:42:22.119 --> 00:42:28.679
absolutely love. Is Keith David.
Yes, yes, indeed and Keith.

574
00:42:28.920 --> 00:42:31.280
So going back to that hole,
the speed we put this together, we

575
00:42:31.519 --> 00:42:37.719
cast Keith David maybe seventy two hours
before he was on set. Wow,

576
00:42:37.440 --> 00:42:44.639
holy that we had an entire backup
cast for every one of these celebrity characters.

577
00:42:45.320 --> 00:42:49.000
And Keith David was cast seventy two
hours in advance. Like it was

578
00:42:49.079 --> 00:42:52.639
so late in the game that I
still paid the other actor just for the

579
00:42:52.679 --> 00:42:57.880
time they had put aside for the
role. So you're about it's like you're

580
00:42:57.960 --> 00:43:00.519
using like your theater background. You've
got a cast in place just in case

581
00:43:01.000 --> 00:43:07.280
the Yeah, understanding, that's that's
that's brilliant. Uh. Now, let's

582
00:43:07.280 --> 00:43:10.440
talk about Felicia Day. Anything you
can, you can mention about Felicia Day,

583
00:43:10.480 --> 00:43:13.639
and oh, I can talk all
about Felicia. I can't tell you

584
00:43:13.679 --> 00:43:16.320
who Keith David plays, but I
gotta say when he walks in and start

585
00:43:16.480 --> 00:43:22.480
and his first he's such a gentleman
and a dignified man, just exactly what

586
00:43:22.519 --> 00:43:24.360
you would expect from him, and
then when he walks on the set,

587
00:43:24.599 --> 00:43:29.760
from the first words out of his
mouth, when he is in character and

588
00:43:29.800 --> 00:43:35.360
he's putting his full volume behind it, I physically took a step. It

589
00:43:35.519 --> 00:43:39.360
startled me so badly. That man
can shake the foundations of a building.

590
00:43:39.719 --> 00:43:44.119
I can genuinely say I would be
terrified to have him angry at me.

591
00:43:45.239 --> 00:43:49.800
He is so intimidating, and I
mean, we love him and like everything

592
00:43:49.840 --> 00:43:53.119
he does. Obviously we're huge carpenter
fans, so the thing and they live,

593
00:43:53.360 --> 00:43:57.400
you know, did you get to
talk to him about any of that?

594
00:43:58.760 --> 00:44:00.840
I tried not to go into that
with him. He and I went

595
00:44:00.840 --> 00:44:02.960
out to dinner afterwards with Felicia Day
and our producer and we all just had

596
00:44:02.960 --> 00:44:07.280
a good time just sitting around and
chatting. Again, the thing about him

597
00:44:07.280 --> 00:44:10.599
that's so off, that's so startling, is he has such an intensity off

598
00:44:10.599 --> 00:44:16.320
camera, and the moment he's off
he is a very quiet, soft spoken,

599
00:44:16.679 --> 00:44:22.920
almost grandfatherly quality to him. It's
just a he is a wonderfully nice

600
00:44:22.000 --> 00:44:25.400
and easy and get along with human
being, which is part of what makes

601
00:44:25.480 --> 00:44:31.000
that transition when he switches on camera, so suddenly like oh yeah, well,

602
00:44:31.039 --> 00:44:36.199
I even find his voice intimidating,
like when the voice over work he

603
00:44:36.239 --> 00:44:42.559
does for DC's The New Frontier at
the beginning. Oh, it's just impressive.

604
00:44:42.639 --> 00:44:47.480
So the surreal moment I had with
him was so we get it confirmed

605
00:44:47.480 --> 00:44:52.119
that we're actually getting him for the
film and he's going to be on set

606
00:44:52.119 --> 00:44:53.840
in three days. And as I'm
driving home from filming that day, because

607
00:44:53.840 --> 00:44:59.960
we were already about halfway through filming
when this happened, so he calls me

608
00:45:00.079 --> 00:45:02.119
that evening just to chat, and
I have one of those moments where after

609
00:45:02.119 --> 00:45:06.519
we chat for about twenty minutes,
I just randomly put was up next on

610
00:45:06.559 --> 00:45:09.079
my TV to watch and it was
that season finale of Rick and Morty that

611
00:45:09.159 --> 00:45:15.039
he was in. It's like it
was off the phone with this man twenty

612
00:45:15.079 --> 00:45:19.239
minutes ago. It was so strange. Wow. The other person, though

613
00:45:19.239 --> 00:45:22.800
I wanted to go into length,
is Felicia, because Felicia plays Delilah.

614
00:45:23.239 --> 00:45:31.280
Delilah is the long suffering producer to
Joel McHale's podcaster. Oh perfect, and

615
00:45:31.599 --> 00:45:37.079
the joy of getting decass Felicia and
where she is having so much fun is

616
00:45:37.199 --> 00:45:44.679
her character is as far from sweet
as humanly possible. Basically, She is

617
00:45:44.760 --> 00:45:52.320
a nihilistic, world hating degenerate who
delights in making her boss's day worse and

618
00:45:52.719 --> 00:45:57.679
is attracted to Tim Traver's solely on
the grounds that he makes Joel look stupid.

619
00:45:59.000 --> 00:46:02.599
That is the sole focus. I
am so pleased because I was I

620
00:46:02.679 --> 00:46:06.159
was worried when a couple producers or
reading to the script, I was like,

621
00:46:06.360 --> 00:46:08.639
God, I hope these two end
up together. And it's like this

622
00:46:08.800 --> 00:46:14.360
was written to be the most toxic
couple that could come up with, like

623
00:46:14.440 --> 00:46:19.039
just the Tim Travers and Delilah.
So Tim Travers and Felicia Day have several

624
00:46:19.159 --> 00:46:22.079
dates in the course of the film
as they get to know each other because

625
00:46:22.119 --> 00:46:27.880
she provides kind of a nihilistic mirror
to the Tim Travers character, of kind

626
00:46:27.880 --> 00:46:31.360
of a feedback enabling circle. And
Felicia was having so much fun getting to

627
00:46:31.480 --> 00:46:37.199
just be so nasty on screen.
Oh, this is gonna be This is

628
00:46:37.199 --> 00:46:42.920
gonna be great to see Tim sounds
like they're perfect for each other. Yeah,

629
00:46:42.960 --> 00:46:45.159
now, you I know you wrapped
this, uh not too long ago,

630
00:46:45.320 --> 00:46:51.000
you're deep in post any updates on
how it's going with the post production.

631
00:46:51.719 --> 00:46:54.800
Let's say, let me just replace
this coffee with whiskey or something.

632
00:46:55.159 --> 00:47:00.880
Because we are nine days from our
first test screening be finished. At it,

633
00:47:01.760 --> 00:47:06.599
we're doing a test screening and Spokane, everybody who has involved myself including

634
00:47:06.719 --> 00:47:09.000
is forbidden from showing up. Oh
wait, this is gonna air after we've

635
00:47:09.039 --> 00:47:15.480
done the test screening. I'm absolutely
sneaking in. Sorry. Yeah, it'll

636
00:47:15.840 --> 00:47:17.039
be long done by the time this
airs. Sorry, I can give that

637
00:47:17.039 --> 00:47:22.280
away. Yeah, I snuck in
absolutely to see the audience reaction. I

638
00:47:22.280 --> 00:47:25.840
think it's going to be a very
painful night for me. Because the edit

639
00:47:25.880 --> 00:47:30.760
was put together by Jason McKee,
who is fantastic. The edit looks great,

640
00:47:31.079 --> 00:47:35.159
but because the feature film relies but
none of the effects are done,

641
00:47:35.159 --> 00:47:40.079
Like we have probably several scenes where
every single shot has text appearing on screen

642
00:47:40.559 --> 00:47:45.679
describing what's happening in the background.
Because so much of the feature, unlike

643
00:47:45.679 --> 00:47:51.559
the short, is trying to communicate
visually as well as through dialogue that I

644
00:47:51.639 --> 00:47:55.880
genuinely think much of this is going
to be incomprehensible to the audience. But

645
00:47:57.000 --> 00:47:59.920
my hope with this test screening,
and this is what we're really testing for,

646
00:48:00.440 --> 00:48:02.800
is that they're laughing because, just
like with the short film, what

647
00:48:02.920 --> 00:48:07.719
matters is that they follow the arc
of this character and they're having a lot

648
00:48:07.760 --> 00:48:12.679
of fun and laughing with it.
As far as following the actual logic of

649
00:48:12.719 --> 00:48:15.599
it, I will be truly shocked
if people do, at least with the

650
00:48:15.679 --> 00:48:21.119
test skating. So tests like the
really exciting yeah so, but a test

651
00:48:21.119 --> 00:48:24.559
skating like this is just to gauge, like, how's the chemistry with your

652
00:48:24.880 --> 00:48:28.719
your actors? Like, dude,
are the audiences warming up to them?

653
00:48:28.760 --> 00:48:31.719
Are they laughing? It's not like
I don't need to see the giant you

654
00:48:31.760 --> 00:48:35.800
know device, I don't need to
see this, So it's a you know,

655
00:48:35.880 --> 00:48:37.760
so there's benefit to a test skating
like this, then oh yeah.

656
00:48:37.760 --> 00:48:40.119
If there's a lot of benefit,
a lot of it. We just want

657
00:48:40.119 --> 00:48:43.559
to there's a lot of jokes.
We just want to see how they land.

658
00:48:44.119 --> 00:48:45.960
We want to see how people feel
about the pacing of some scenes.

659
00:48:46.440 --> 00:48:50.400
Right now. We've got right now, we've gone with a very organic to

660
00:48:50.480 --> 00:48:54.880
how it was filmed pacing so it
doesn't feel artificially rushed in places. But

661
00:48:55.199 --> 00:49:00.280
the short did actually artificially rush a
few scenes. So I'm wondering if you

662
00:49:00.280 --> 00:49:01.440
know, we'll come out of this
being like, Okay, we do need

663
00:49:01.480 --> 00:49:04.880
to speed up this scene here or
that one there, or maybe we need

664
00:49:04.920 --> 00:49:07.519
to slow this down so people have
more time to just comprehend it. The

665
00:49:07.599 --> 00:49:12.599
testimers are a very useful thing if
you can do it where where they can

666
00:49:12.639 --> 00:49:15.039
be painful, if if you're being
very artsy FARTZI, which I am.

667
00:49:15.280 --> 00:49:20.119
I am absolutely being self indulgent in
artsy FARTZI, where there's a lot of

668
00:49:20.119 --> 00:49:22.239
feedback. You just I'll tell you
this one way or the other. I'm

669
00:49:22.239 --> 00:49:27.320
going to be drinking that evening.
Yeah. What I got, I think

670
00:49:27.320 --> 00:49:30.199
from this film is even if I
think we'll get from the test screening,

671
00:49:30.480 --> 00:49:34.719
that I hope that you walk out
with is this is a kind of film

672
00:49:34.719 --> 00:49:37.039
where you, as the audience member, get to put yourself in that position

673
00:49:37.159 --> 00:49:42.199
later on, get to ask yourself, what would I do? You know,

674
00:49:42.679 --> 00:49:45.880
I would I leave the person that
I was with? You know,

675
00:49:45.960 --> 00:49:49.800
would I kill my other self?
Would I get out a little bit?

676
00:49:49.840 --> 00:49:52.519
Would I team up with my other
self? So you would get to leave

677
00:49:52.880 --> 00:49:55.800
with that experience, Because as soon
as I was done, what do you

678
00:49:55.800 --> 00:50:00.559
think? I was thinking what would
I do? Would I you what Tim

679
00:50:00.599 --> 00:50:05.159
did? Would I try something different? So I think if that is delivered.

680
00:50:05.199 --> 00:50:10.360
Then you you've got them. I
can confidently say that what would you

681
00:50:10.440 --> 00:50:17.280
do if there was a lot of
other us gets very definitively answered in the

682
00:50:17.320 --> 00:50:22.519
feature film. It is, in
fact the meat of the emotional arc we

683
00:50:22.599 --> 00:50:27.039
came up with for Tim Travers.
Well, let's take a let's take a

684
00:50:27.159 --> 00:50:30.639
quick break, and when we get
back we'll find out what's what's next for

685
00:50:30.800 --> 00:50:37.760
mister Snead. Absolutely, Hi,
I'm dating the host of the docum Base

686
00:50:37.840 --> 00:50:44.320
seventy seven podcast. We talk about
everything from Anthrax to the Muppets to West

687
00:50:44.320 --> 00:50:47.320
Side Story. All right, boys, buckle up because we have hit the

688
00:50:47.320 --> 00:50:52.639
bottom of the barrel, because he
slaughters all the Tuscan Raiders. The fact

689
00:50:52.639 --> 00:50:55.440
that she stays by a side that
that tells me everything I need to know

690
00:50:55.440 --> 00:50:59.280
about these women that write letters to
serial killers in prison. You know,

691
00:51:00.000 --> 00:51:06.199
it makes it made sense, you
know Moby Young Sad always dumped Tim.

692
00:51:06.480 --> 00:51:10.559
That was the song. You know
when you listen, Tim, did you

693
00:51:10.559 --> 00:51:17.639
have the volume on? The witches
are definitely much more nightmare fuel, But

694
00:51:17.760 --> 00:51:24.159
the fact that they look like the
Texas Chainsaw centerfolds mum if jancof Thatt is

695
00:51:24.199 --> 00:51:28.280
so awesome. He's hired to be
cloned. Why the hell isn't he doing

696
00:51:28.320 --> 00:51:31.280
the job? He like my clients
getting impatient. Well, you slack ass

697
00:51:31.320 --> 00:51:35.920
mother, whyon't you do it?
You know you're just check us out on

698
00:51:36.039 --> 00:51:40.039
Apple podcast, Good Pods, pod
Beam, or wherever you get your podcasts.

699
00:51:42.719 --> 00:51:45.559
Hey, this is Jason Colvin and
the Surely Can't Be Serious Podcast.

700
00:51:45.000 --> 00:51:49.920
On our podcast, James D.
Graves and I we break down movies of

701
00:51:50.000 --> 00:51:52.199
the eighties, nineties, even the
seventies, and also music. We go

702
00:51:52.239 --> 00:51:55.960
track by track through albums. If
you were an MTV watcher in the early

703
00:51:57.000 --> 00:52:00.159
eighties, you will definitely love our
podcast. And if you enjoyed what I've

704
00:52:00.159 --> 00:52:04.119
said on this podcast, you definitely
want to go over to the film by

705
00:52:04.480 --> 00:52:08.119
Patreon page because I'm coming back and
we're going to do some great episodes over

706
00:52:08.159 --> 00:52:15.440
there. And we are back Brad. Before we talk about what Stimpson has

707
00:52:15.440 --> 00:52:19.559
coming up, the question I want
to ask, you know, I want

708
00:52:19.559 --> 00:52:23.760
to cover because Tim Travers sounds so
incredible. I want to know how did

709
00:52:23.800 --> 00:52:30.280
you come up with it? So
this actually goes back to spirit. This

710
00:52:30.360 --> 00:52:32.920
is one of the great things about
working in film, especially with film festivals

711
00:52:34.079 --> 00:52:37.079
and things tend to bleed one into
the other. So while Spirit was on

712
00:52:37.119 --> 00:52:40.480
the festival circuit, that's where I
met Samuel Dunning. And this was a

713
00:52:40.480 --> 00:52:45.800
few weeks after Boston Sci Fi,
when Spirit had screened there as well,

714
00:52:45.440 --> 00:52:50.039
and I already had the Tim Travers
id in my head by the time I

715
00:52:50.119 --> 00:52:54.639
met sam What happened at Boston Sci
Fi is they screened several time travel films

716
00:52:54.639 --> 00:52:59.400
and I won't name names because I
want my fellow indie filmmakers to succeed.

717
00:52:59.559 --> 00:53:04.320
And I'm about to be very,
very mean, because I really really hated

718
00:53:04.800 --> 00:53:09.960
these time travel movies, just eyes
to them. And a friend of mine

719
00:53:10.000 --> 00:53:15.320
who was study who was studying over
at MIT, came out. We talked

720
00:53:15.360 --> 00:53:17.079
about it a lot. We got
very drunk. After she left, I

721
00:53:17.119 --> 00:53:21.519
started talking to a few other folks
who happened to be at Boston Sci Fi

722
00:53:21.599 --> 00:53:23.960
who also work in particle physics.
I reached out to a friend of mine

723
00:53:23.960 --> 00:53:28.599
that evening in one very drunken night, and then I don't remember the rest

724
00:53:28.599 --> 00:53:30.639
of the evening, but when I
woke up the next morning, there was

725
00:53:30.679 --> 00:53:36.079
the outline for Tim Travers written on
a napkin, which I then adapted into

726
00:53:36.079 --> 00:53:38.239
the script, figured out what I
wanted the script to be and decided I

727
00:53:38.239 --> 00:53:42.880
don't know any actor who can make
this. And a week later I met

728
00:53:42.920 --> 00:53:47.159
Sam and you just so you meet
him at the panel and then you're like,

729
00:53:47.239 --> 00:53:51.199
yeah, this is this is my
Tim. Yeah, this is Tim.

730
00:53:51.800 --> 00:53:54.079
This is the guy. And then
shelved it for several months because I

731
00:53:54.079 --> 00:53:58.039
decided that this would cost way too
much money. And then that's when I

732
00:53:58.079 --> 00:54:00.880
realized I should do this before doing
the feature film. But all these projects

733
00:54:00.920 --> 00:54:05.840
have a way of leading into each
other, and so Whilston Sci Fi,

734
00:54:05.920 --> 00:54:08.760
if you're listening, you are directly
responsible in a way for Tim Travers,

735
00:54:08.880 --> 00:54:12.559
which is good because they gave me
a word for Tim Travers two years later,

736
00:54:12.559 --> 00:54:15.480
which was great. So they so
they know what's coming, they know

737
00:54:15.519 --> 00:54:17.719
that they know good stuff's coming.
Then, oh yeah, they'd be fans.

738
00:54:19.119 --> 00:54:22.039
And I'm a big fan of there. So why leads to the next,

739
00:54:22.159 --> 00:54:27.000
leads to the next, leads to
the next, and oftentimes the creative,

740
00:54:27.039 --> 00:54:30.199
the creative he is getting inspired by
the stuff you see there. It's

741
00:54:30.239 --> 00:54:32.480
I'm sad to say it, but
Tim Travers was born very much of me

742
00:54:32.599 --> 00:54:36.800
watching other stuff and going well,
shit, I can do this better.

743
00:54:37.280 --> 00:54:43.400
Yeah, which is a very childish
and teddy emotion but but sometimes necessary to

744
00:54:44.199 --> 00:54:47.599
give to make make something new.
Right. So, yeah, while while

745
00:54:47.599 --> 00:54:52.079
you're working in post, I know
you've got a couple exciting projects. Can

746
00:54:52.199 --> 00:54:54.880
Can we talk about a couple of
them? Because there's two, two specifically

747
00:54:54.960 --> 00:54:58.920
that I'd like to talk about.
Absolutely, I'm actually in post on two

748
00:54:58.960 --> 00:55:05.400
projects right now. Okay, Well, let's talk about the More Child novel

749
00:55:05.440 --> 00:55:08.800
by Eloise McGraw. The More Child, if you're familiar with it, and

750
00:55:08.840 --> 00:55:13.639
you're very lucky if you are,
is a wonderful Newberry Award winning novel from

751
00:55:13.679 --> 00:55:19.280
the nineties about a changeling child.
It's a book that I currently have the

752
00:55:19.360 --> 00:55:22.039
movie rights too, and we're shopping
around the pitch to it to see if

753
00:55:22.039 --> 00:55:25.360
we can attach a screenwriter and see
if we can get the thing funded.

754
00:55:25.559 --> 00:55:30.400
It's a complete departure from the Tim
Travers or lab rat style of film that

755
00:55:30.440 --> 00:55:34.599
I've been doing recently, and much
more in line with spirit, the sort

756
00:55:34.599 --> 00:55:37.880
of thing that wants to do a
kid's drama and really really wants to make

757
00:55:37.920 --> 00:55:42.320
them cry. If I can get
it, and if I do my job

758
00:55:42.400 --> 00:55:45.159
right, hopefully the adults are crying
real hard too. By the end,

759
00:55:45.800 --> 00:55:47.480
well, I mean because it is. It's a sad story. I mean,

760
00:55:49.199 --> 00:55:52.480
I would say it's an uplifting story, but it's it has a different

761
00:55:52.519 --> 00:56:00.360
set of messages for kids and adults
that you don't see represented, and it's

762
00:56:00.480 --> 00:56:04.760
a message that resonates hard with me. I was an only child. I

763
00:56:04.800 --> 00:56:08.280
had divorced parents, and so I
went back and forth on custody frequently between

764
00:56:08.280 --> 00:56:12.320
two different homes. One of the
side now, I was a very lucky

765
00:56:12.400 --> 00:56:15.159
kid, and that both of my
parents were absolutely wonderful, good people and

766
00:56:15.199 --> 00:56:20.840
did a great job. I mean, just look at the results. But

767
00:56:20.239 --> 00:56:25.039
the downside that sort of bohemian back
and forth upbringing is I was never that

768
00:56:25.280 --> 00:56:30.440
height with any poor community. So
I was a kid who was alone a

769
00:56:30.480 --> 00:56:34.639
lot of the time. More Child
is a story about what it is to

770
00:56:34.719 --> 00:56:40.599
be a lonely kid, and it's
moral, which to me feels groundbreakingly like

771
00:56:40.840 --> 00:56:45.000
perth shatteringly hard, because you don't
see this is The answer is not you

772
00:56:45.000 --> 00:56:50.880
will find friends. The answer is
you probably won't. The ending of the

773
00:56:50.920 --> 00:56:53.760
More Child is not about his character
who finds community. In fact, the

774
00:56:53.840 --> 00:57:00.400
ending of the More Child is her
reaching the demonstrable conclusion that she will not

775
00:57:00.079 --> 00:57:05.440
She is something fundamentally different from the
rest of the world around her and that

776
00:57:05.480 --> 00:57:10.760
will not change, and finding contentment
and happiness within that and the few connections

777
00:57:10.760 --> 00:57:15.119
she does have. It is a
deeply uplifting story and it is something that

778
00:57:15.159 --> 00:57:20.719
you don't hear cold and gotcha.
So for me, it's a story that

779
00:57:20.840 --> 00:57:23.400
I will fight hard to get that
thing made. Now, you're looking for

780
00:57:23.440 --> 00:57:28.360
a screenwriter. Ay, you never
had the thought that you you'd adapted yourself

781
00:57:28.519 --> 00:57:30.480
and write it. Oh, I
definitely had the thought. And my rights

782
00:57:30.519 --> 00:57:34.840
will eventually expire on this thing.
So if I don't find someone in time,

783
00:57:34.880 --> 00:57:37.239
I will. I will out of
your stubbornness do it. I'm just

784
00:57:37.320 --> 00:57:43.320
not convinced that my that my writing
tone is right for it. If that

785
00:57:43.400 --> 00:57:47.480
makes sense, that makes sense.
So we're shopping that around right now.

786
00:57:49.119 --> 00:57:53.840
Okay, well, more make them
cry. Make them cry. That's good.

787
00:57:54.440 --> 00:57:59.039
More on your writing and your your
your tone. Let's talk about the

788
00:57:59.119 --> 00:58:05.880
Dogs. The Dogs was a screenplay
I did years ago about an all female

789
00:58:05.920 --> 00:58:13.320
group of starfighters who steal a group
of tactical warships and start their own pirate

790
00:58:13.400 --> 00:58:17.079
colony. It's about their two warring
factions, and they are the in between

791
00:58:17.199 --> 00:58:22.480
that doesn't want to be pushed into
either camp, basically forming a middle ground

792
00:58:22.519 --> 00:58:25.519
for all the people who are tired
of being used as the battle fodder by

793
00:58:25.559 --> 00:58:31.400
the two ideological extremes of their Star
Wars esque universe. And it was just

794
00:58:31.480 --> 00:58:35.800
so much fun. It got great
feedback from all the studios I worked with,

795
00:58:36.119 --> 00:58:39.960
except for one see ween see little
note that you will never ever sell

796
00:58:39.960 --> 00:58:45.800
this because it would cost over one
hundred million dollars to film conservatively, so

797
00:58:45.840 --> 00:58:47.960
I decided to do it as a
graphic novel instead. My literary agent,

798
00:58:49.039 --> 00:58:52.840
paul As Levine, is shopping it
around right now and hopefully we're going to

799
00:58:52.920 --> 00:58:54.440
get a bite sometime later this year
to see if we can get it out

800
00:58:54.440 --> 00:58:59.519
there as a graphic novel. The
art was done by Marco Consentia and it

801
00:58:59.639 --> 00:59:05.679
is one hundred and eighty pages of
awesome. Oh wow, I just got

802
00:59:05.719 --> 00:59:07.639
to find for me. Yeah,
And you have to shift into a certain

803
00:59:07.719 --> 00:59:14.000
kind of mind to go from screenwriting
to graphic novel writing. I mean,

804
00:59:14.039 --> 00:59:15.599
that's that's that's got to be a
major shift to be like, all right,

805
00:59:15.639 --> 00:59:20.039
I gotta stay away from this.
I got to concentrate more on this.

806
00:59:20.280 --> 00:59:22.280
You know, was that tough or
you know, was that an easy

807
00:59:22.280 --> 00:59:27.000
flow for you? Not as much
as you'd think. A lot of it

808
00:59:27.079 --> 00:59:31.880
was actually free because it is fundamentally
a different medium from film, so it's

809
00:59:31.960 --> 00:59:37.599
something where I could let certain scenes
breathe more. I did decide fairly early

810
00:59:37.679 --> 00:59:42.000
on that I didn't want to try
to pix this as like a six issue

811
00:59:42.119 --> 00:59:45.840
series, because I didn't want to
fit it into that format. I wanted

812
00:59:45.880 --> 00:59:50.840
scenes to have a paycinge closer to
the original script that would allow conversations to

813
00:59:50.880 --> 00:59:53.639
go on that didn't have to have
a certain amounts of action to it,

814
00:59:53.840 --> 00:59:58.400
and so I could pace it all
in building up to one epic battle.

815
00:59:59.039 --> 01:00:02.440
The joy of that sort of storytelling, especially as a graphic novel, is

816
01:00:02.559 --> 01:00:06.840
you can do a kind of detail
that you can't get away within film,

817
01:00:06.880 --> 01:00:12.039
Like we were talking about earlier with
the theatrical screen versus the big screen versus

818
01:00:12.079 --> 01:00:15.119
the small screen. Because the reader
is reading at their own pace, it

819
01:00:15.159 --> 01:00:20.400
doesn't matter if an image is small, because they're always going to have time

820
01:00:20.519 --> 01:00:24.199
to find it. And sometimes it
was really fascinating and I learned a lot

821
01:00:24.199 --> 01:00:28.480
because I got to work with this
wonderful artist. And that's what was so

822
01:00:28.559 --> 01:00:30.719
gratifying for me about it. Anytime
I've ever seen a visual of one of

823
01:00:30.760 --> 01:00:35.320
my stories, it's something I had
to go out and film and shoot myself.

824
01:00:35.679 --> 01:00:37.559
Right. This was the first time
I had the experience of seeing a

825
01:00:37.760 --> 01:00:44.480
fully realized visual sci fi world based
on my setting, where I still had

826
01:00:44.480 --> 01:00:46.719
the same kind of creative control that
I would have as a director, as

827
01:00:46.760 --> 01:00:52.719
every single vehicle design, every character
design, every world and environment was first

828
01:00:52.760 --> 01:00:57.760
approved by me through multiple sketches going
back and forth between me and the artist.

829
01:00:58.400 --> 01:01:00.280
Yeah, and no one to say
no to, you know, like,

830
01:01:00.440 --> 01:01:02.960
oh, we can't build that,
you know, we can't. That

831
01:01:04.039 --> 01:01:07.239
costs too much money. No,
not on paper. I really enjoy that

832
01:01:07.400 --> 01:01:10.559
part. Just let your imagination go
wild. Then, oh yeah, I

833
01:01:10.639 --> 01:01:14.920
was addictive. If I want to
do it again now, Brad, I

834
01:01:14.920 --> 01:01:15.920
don't want to get that book out
there just so I can do it again.

835
01:01:16.719 --> 01:01:20.000
Now, Brad, I know you've
got a bit of a what if

836
01:01:20.079 --> 01:01:23.840
question for Stenson. I'm gonna ask
mine first. So in the Vein of

837
01:01:23.840 --> 01:01:30.079
a In the Vein of a paradox, once Tim Travers becomes a massive success

838
01:01:30.800 --> 01:01:37.159
and once the dog the Dogs becomes
a smash success. Oh, who who

839
01:01:37.159 --> 01:01:38.880
do we get next? Is it? Is it Simpson Seed the filmmaker?

840
01:01:39.400 --> 01:01:43.480
Is it Simpson Seed? Who's going
to continue writing graphic novels? Like when

841
01:01:43.480 --> 01:01:46.719
you have an audience for both of
them, that that puts you in demand,

842
01:01:47.159 --> 01:01:52.679
which which direction do you go?
Both? They're not mutually exclusive,

843
01:01:52.840 --> 01:01:57.840
Yeah, the joy of the One
of the downsides of working in film is

844
01:01:58.239 --> 01:02:00.519
unlike stuff like YouTuber, you're putting
out to every week, You're lucky if

845
01:02:00.519 --> 01:02:06.000
you do a film every other year. That's a good year for folks doing

846
01:02:06.039 --> 01:02:10.280
features, short of the incredibly rarefied
spielbirds who are doing one every year,

847
01:02:10.840 --> 01:02:15.159
So you get a lot of downtime
in there. So as long as so,

848
01:02:15.199 --> 01:02:17.480
there's no reason these couldn't be mutually
exclusive. What I would rather do

849
01:02:17.599 --> 01:02:22.440
as a creative is hone my skill
with it a little bit better. I

850
01:02:22.559 --> 01:02:24.840
learned so much on Tim Tree Trevor's
It was such a shock of the system

851
01:02:24.960 --> 01:02:29.440
doing that as a feature, right
down the fact that I wasn't allowed to

852
01:02:29.440 --> 01:02:32.039
do the kind of precision prep on
the feature that I was able to do

853
01:02:32.079 --> 01:02:37.440
in the short, purely because of
the scale of what was being filmed.

854
01:02:37.880 --> 01:02:40.960
Likewise, with The Dogs, a
lot of that was me just very angry

855
01:02:42.000 --> 01:02:45.559
because I couldn't get this script pick
cut up because of the production costs.

856
01:02:45.000 --> 01:02:49.920
Just stubbornly wanting to keep it as
close to that narrative and as close to

857
01:02:49.960 --> 01:02:52.840
the story that meant something to me
as possible, and not getting to compromise.

858
01:02:53.320 --> 01:02:57.239
If The Dogs gets out there and
sold, I would want to compromise

859
01:02:57.280 --> 01:02:59.679
a little bit. I want to
learn what I did right, what I

860
01:02:59.719 --> 01:03:01.960
did wrong. It deals with an
all female cast, and as you guys

861
01:03:02.000 --> 01:03:05.920
might have noticed, I'm a little
bit on the male side, and I

862
01:03:05.920 --> 01:03:08.400
would really want to hear how folks
who enjoyed this book felt about that.

863
01:03:08.480 --> 01:03:13.480
I would want to be able to
be responsive and in dialogue with that sort

864
01:03:13.519 --> 01:03:16.880
of audience. Likewise, for the
next feature, I would want to explore

865
01:03:16.920 --> 01:03:21.519
another idea and also preferably have a
lot more money for the next feature.

866
01:03:22.440 --> 01:03:27.320
I would really like that one part
especially Okay, that leads into my question.

867
01:03:27.559 --> 01:03:32.760
Like Jeff says, Tim Travers is
a huge success. Now, your

868
01:03:32.800 --> 01:03:39.280
next feature can be any franchise that's
existing at the moment that you could be

869
01:03:39.280 --> 01:03:45.360
a part of, big paycheck and
more personal freedom. On future films.

870
01:03:45.000 --> 01:03:50.400
If that was to come to you, what franchise would you like to be

871
01:03:50.440 --> 01:03:55.360
a part of as director? Ah, that is a good question, really

872
01:03:55.360 --> 01:04:00.960
good question. Franchise specifically, Yes, it can go anywhere from Marvel to

873
01:04:01.079 --> 01:04:09.280
Star Wars, to Burn Too Fast
to The Friday the Thirteenth to anything that's

874
01:04:09.280 --> 01:04:13.639
been made so many times. It's
a franchise television included, I would,

875
01:04:13.719 --> 01:04:16.480
I would assume, right, Brad, Yeah, all right, Yeah,

876
01:04:16.519 --> 01:04:19.840
it definitely wouldn't be any of the
big superhero franchises. Not to say I'm

877
01:04:19.880 --> 01:04:26.360
turning down the job should anyone be
wondering, right, But I would want

878
01:04:26.360 --> 01:04:28.639
to do the sort of thing where
I can get creative. I guess,

879
01:04:28.679 --> 01:04:32.480
if I were to pick any franchise
at all, probably one of the plan

880
01:04:32.559 --> 01:04:39.840
of the Apes films, because they
have been so consistently good and so consistently

881
01:04:39.920 --> 01:04:45.760
focused on letting the filmmakers explore an
idea. I'm not sure what weird demon

882
01:04:45.840 --> 01:04:49.440
magic allowed those three movies that were
so smart, so well made, and

883
01:04:49.519 --> 01:04:54.880
so well financed to keep getting their
financing, but it did for some reason.

884
01:04:55.519 --> 01:04:59.079
Yeah, yeah, they didn't seem
to happen any of the issues of

885
01:04:59.199 --> 01:05:08.199
oversight and Timeline stream fandom issues that
the other big franchises out there have right

886
01:05:08.239 --> 01:05:12.920
now, they just let the filmmakers
do their thing, and the filmmakers delivered

887
01:05:12.960 --> 01:05:15.760
phenomenally. So yeah, if I
could be a part of something like that,

888
01:05:15.079 --> 01:05:18.440
I would jump fast and frankly be
intimidated to be in the company of

889
01:05:18.480 --> 01:05:23.360
those other directors. I'd like in
a way that I would not be intimidated

890
01:05:23.400 --> 01:05:27.559
to be in the company of some
other franchise directors. Well, there's another

891
01:05:27.639 --> 01:05:30.400
Planet of the Apes I know coming
and it feels like they're going to continue

892
01:05:30.440 --> 01:05:34.280
that on and they're gonna need more
directors. Matt Reeves is too busy with

893
01:05:34.280 --> 01:05:40.119
The Batman. They're gonna get more
directors, So oh yeah, just putting

894
01:05:40.119 --> 01:05:43.239
it out there, absolutely, But
yeah, Planet of the Apes. I

895
01:05:43.239 --> 01:05:45.880
would want to go Travers meets the
Planet of the Apes, Yes, or

896
01:05:45.920 --> 01:05:50.559
I would rather get to do a
tim another tim Driver's equel excellent, excellent,

897
01:05:50.599 --> 01:05:56.199
excellent, Stimpson, is there anything
any other projects you want to kind

898
01:05:56.199 --> 01:06:00.280
of hint that before we wrap up? Or yes, okay, and it's

899
01:06:00.280 --> 01:06:03.840
the one that's coming out soonest and
it's my poor middle child of film projects,

900
01:06:04.480 --> 01:06:09.880
poor lab rats. Okay, like
tell us a little bit about lab

901
01:06:09.960 --> 01:06:14.800
Rats. So lab Rats is about
an alien invasion, about the people who

902
01:06:14.800 --> 01:06:18.400
are abducted and experimented on from the
perspective of two people who have been abducted

903
01:06:19.119 --> 01:06:24.960
in a giant ratcage, and the
entire preface of the right down to a

904
01:06:25.079 --> 01:06:30.440
seven foot tall, fully functioning hamster
wheel. Holy cow. It's about drug

905
01:06:30.480 --> 01:06:33.519
dependency because the aliens keep them doped
up, and as they try to figure

906
01:06:33.519 --> 01:06:38.760
out what the aliens are getting ready
to do because the experimentations have stopped,

907
01:06:39.079 --> 01:06:43.159
until they have the horrible realization that
the aliens want them to breed because their

908
01:06:43.199 --> 01:06:48.800
house pets. Nope, it's a
short. It was going to be part

909
01:06:48.840 --> 01:06:54.119
of the same feature anthology that the
original Tim Trapper's short would have been a

910
01:06:54.159 --> 01:06:57.480
part of as well, and it
was the one that I had just come

911
01:06:57.559 --> 01:07:00.639
up off of with the same crew
I was going to do the Tree Street

912
01:07:00.679 --> 01:07:05.760
feature on in just a few months
when Tree Street fell through, and so

913
01:07:05.960 --> 01:07:11.000
poor lab Rats got completely abandoned in
the middle of its post production, so

914
01:07:11.039 --> 01:07:14.960
we could jump into the Tim Travers
feature with all the work that had to

915
01:07:14.960 --> 01:07:18.199
be done on that without warning,
which is why it functionally got put on

916
01:07:18.199 --> 01:07:21.280
hold for the better part of seven
months, and it's only been in the

917
01:07:21.320 --> 01:07:25.519
last two months or so that I've
actually been focusing on the post production for

918
01:07:25.599 --> 01:07:29.159
lab Rats, picking up where I
left off, while Tim Travers is also

919
01:07:29.239 --> 01:07:31.519
in post. But it's going to
be ready for release in about two months,

920
01:07:31.519 --> 01:07:35.239
and it's going to be hopefully going
to as many film festivals as will

921
01:07:35.239 --> 01:07:40.800
have it. It's My Poor middle
It's my Poor middle Child short, and

922
01:07:41.280 --> 01:07:45.880
you'll have some playing in Los Angeles, I hope, absolutely, okay,

923
01:07:45.960 --> 01:07:48.320
because I'm out here. Yeah,
I'll have it wherever they will have me.

924
01:07:48.440 --> 01:07:53.119
The actors on it were great.
Nicole Murrat was so much fun.

925
01:07:53.400 --> 01:07:57.639
She plays our drug adult gal,
who is a Day one abductee, so

926
01:07:57.679 --> 01:08:00.719
she missed the whole invasion. She
was so much fun that we brought her

927
01:08:00.719 --> 01:08:06.280
back in the feature film as Tim
Traver's mother in flashbacks. Oh awesome.

928
01:08:06.800 --> 01:08:10.719
Oh yeah, you get a sense
of what Tim the kid Tim was like.

929
01:08:10.880 --> 01:08:15.880
By the way, so you kind
of had your own Stimpson's Need universe

930
01:08:15.239 --> 01:08:19.560
in a way. You have characters
that are somewhat connected to other films,

931
01:08:19.560 --> 01:08:25.119
and it seems like in Someway,
certainly in casting, I'm I'm not trying

932
01:08:25.119 --> 01:08:29.600
to do any sort of shared universe
thing, if only because and you would

933
01:08:29.600 --> 01:08:32.720
know that, and Brad, you're
in La right. Yeah, we've all

934
01:08:32.880 --> 01:08:38.920
heard various folks whose no one's ever
heard of talking about their shared universe,

935
01:08:39.159 --> 01:08:44.359
and there's always a certain sense of, man, that's just sad. You're

936
01:08:44.399 --> 01:08:46.880
not even working with a big studio. It's like, just yeah, focus

937
01:08:46.920 --> 01:08:50.359
on just making a good film.
But before you start talking about what your

938
01:08:50.399 --> 01:08:55.920
franchise legacy is going to be,
there's a certain part before the horse element

939
01:08:56.000 --> 01:09:00.000
that is painfully cringey. If I
ever got to do a shared universe,

940
01:09:00.199 --> 01:09:02.279
that would be a fun thought to
experiment with. Right now, I just

941
01:09:02.319 --> 01:09:05.279
want to make some movies that are
good. But that doesn't mean there can't

942
01:09:05.279 --> 01:09:11.439
be shared themes. And there's definitely
a shared theme and tone between Tim Travers

943
01:09:11.439 --> 01:09:15.800
and lab Rats, to the point
where if it had still been an anthology,

944
01:09:15.319 --> 01:09:20.239
I would have tried to high in
the elements in the framing device.

945
01:09:20.520 --> 01:09:26.640
So it was more than just so
that there was an overlaping themes that's dead

946
01:09:26.680 --> 01:09:29.760
now because we're doing this. We
did the Tim Travis feature instead, and

947
01:09:29.880 --> 01:09:33.960
it's whatever the kind of mode and
feeling you are in as a director and

948
01:09:34.000 --> 01:09:40.720
writer at this time in your life. Yeah, which is very true.

949
01:09:40.800 --> 01:09:45.119
Tim Travers was very much a me
angrily kind of wanting to show off and

950
01:09:45.239 --> 01:09:50.680
dig in my heels. Lab Rats
was something that's much more leisurely paced,

951
01:09:51.000 --> 01:09:57.239
that's much more contemplative. It's,
weirdly enough, it's funnier than Tim Travers

952
01:09:57.319 --> 01:10:01.560
in my opinion, but it's also
much it's got longer bits that aren't funny,

953
01:10:01.600 --> 01:10:05.039
that are just about letting the characters
go through what they're going through.

954
01:10:05.840 --> 01:10:09.680
So it's got much more of a
contemplative vibe to it. So I'm very

955
01:10:09.720 --> 01:10:13.399
excited for it because between doing that
and then the feature, it's going to

956
01:10:13.439 --> 01:10:15.399
give me a nice little break from
Tim Travers. Well, because Prevers is

957
01:10:15.399 --> 01:10:18.920
going to be in another eight months
of visual effects posts. The amount of

958
01:10:18.920 --> 01:10:26.319
stuff that happens in this feature is
nuts. Yeah, So so lab Rats

959
01:10:26.359 --> 01:10:30.600
will be a wonderful reprieve and a
chance to reconnect with film festivals and hopefully

960
01:10:30.680 --> 01:10:34.960
drum up support for following projects.
Excellent. Well, while while you're in

961
01:10:35.039 --> 01:10:40.279
post and while we're waiting to see
the feature link, Tim Chavers, Brad

962
01:10:40.319 --> 01:10:45.600
and I have had the privilege of
seeing Spirit and Tim Chavers, So,

963
01:10:45.680 --> 01:10:47.760
can you tell us where? Where
can where can our audience where can they

964
01:10:47.760 --> 01:10:53.119
see these these shorts? Um?
Can you? Can you tell us where?

965
01:10:53.119 --> 01:10:55.319
You know? You're like social media? Like, where how do we

966
01:10:55.359 --> 01:10:58.359
how do we get to Simpson Seed
in his work? Well, I've got

967
01:10:58.399 --> 01:11:01.319
good news and bad news to get
to my work and just everything happening between

968
01:11:01.319 --> 01:11:06.640
the dogs, everything else that I
do very easy. Stimpson sneed dot com.

969
01:11:06.640 --> 01:11:12.600
It has links to my Instagram,
to my incredibly anemic Twitter that I'd

970
01:11:12.640 --> 01:11:17.119
make no effort to promote whatsoever.
Don't follow me on Twitter. I'm terrible.

971
01:11:17.159 --> 01:11:19.680
I've got like eight followers, and
I'm never going to give you any

972
01:11:19.680 --> 01:11:25.359
attention because I suck at that app. Instagram is the better place to find

973
01:11:25.399 --> 01:11:29.279
me and my website. As far
as the films themselves, it's good news

974
01:11:29.279 --> 01:11:31.840
and bad news. The good news
is Spirit is readily available where it always

975
01:11:31.880 --> 01:11:35.479
has been at the Aldrin Foundation site, and there's a link to it directly

976
01:11:35.520 --> 01:11:42.239
from my own website. Tim Travers
on the other hand, because it's something

977
01:11:42.279 --> 01:11:45.239
we decided to churn into a feature, which means once the post production is

978
01:11:45.279 --> 01:11:49.359
done, this is going to be
for sale to professional distributors to put out

979
01:11:49.399 --> 01:11:55.840
into the world. Kind of means
we yanked the short from being publicly accessible,

980
01:11:55.920 --> 01:11:59.479
as the short will probably be sold
with the feature as a special feature

981
01:11:59.600 --> 01:12:04.199
to go into the DVD. So
and my hope is maybe in a year's

982
01:12:04.279 --> 01:12:09.840
time will put the short out again
for free online just before the film is

983
01:12:09.880 --> 01:12:13.600
released, as a way to help
promote it. But for the time being,

984
01:12:13.640 --> 01:12:16.359
it's going to continue minding its own
business on It'll be minding its own

985
01:12:16.399 --> 01:12:19.920
business on my heart Drive, Brad. We we have an exclusive in that.

986
01:12:20.039 --> 01:12:25.760
In that regard then it can always
be something incredible special media or a

987
01:12:25.760 --> 01:12:30.399
special feature disc on the physical media
Blu Ray four K copy. Tim Travis

988
01:12:30.520 --> 01:12:34.039
absolutely will be there, and there
are scenes in the feature that we recreate

989
01:12:34.199 --> 01:12:39.039
scenes from the short, not just
line for line, but shot for shot,

990
01:12:39.720 --> 01:12:45.279
using in some cases identical Compot compositions, but with our vastly bigger budgeted

991
01:12:45.399 --> 01:12:47.760
stage. That time machine in the
short, you guys are so impressed by

992
01:12:48.079 --> 01:12:54.119
it nearly killed poor Vincent to Felix, the art department designer who built it,

993
01:12:54.520 --> 01:12:57.079
And I think I nearly gave the
man an aneurysm when I called them

994
01:12:57.159 --> 01:13:00.000
up a year later. And said, hey, I need you to build

995
01:13:00.079 --> 01:13:04.960
did a second time, but this
time even bigger. Oh wow that and

996
01:13:05.079 --> 01:13:09.239
he did, but this time he
had two months to work out as opposed

997
01:13:09.239 --> 01:13:12.760
to three weeks. You know.
The good news for him, though this

998
01:13:12.800 --> 01:13:15.800
movie becomes a big hit, he
can make small ones, like we can

999
01:13:15.840 --> 01:13:20.159
get Tim Travers action figures right,
Well, I'm actually thinking of because the

1000
01:13:20.279 --> 01:13:26.359
crew and I have been playing with
these already. We made a printable design

1001
01:13:26.600 --> 01:13:30.399
of the time machine than anybody could
throw into a three D printer. I

1002
01:13:30.399 --> 01:13:33.680
don't have. Our editor has a
painted one sitting on his desk so he

1003
01:13:33.720 --> 01:13:38.279
can look at the time machine there. I've got a little six inch version

1004
01:13:38.319 --> 01:13:43.199
of it at my plays back in
La So yeah, we might there might

1005
01:13:43.199 --> 01:13:45.520
be stuff like that we put out
there for free so people can have their

1006
01:13:45.520 --> 01:13:47.920
own three D time machine. Maybe
we'll even put like a little Sam Dunning

1007
01:13:48.039 --> 01:13:50.760
on the front of it. Yeah
you got you gotta have a Sam a

1008
01:13:50.800 --> 01:13:55.399
Sam figure like, well, well
it is Sam. I'm gonna wear the

1009
01:13:55.760 --> 01:14:00.920
Tim Travers T shirt in the feature
only once, so he has a very

1010
01:14:00.960 --> 01:14:03.680
different costume in the feature film because
Tim just to be more reflective of who

1011
01:14:03.760 --> 01:14:06.680
Tim is as a character. Now. Yeah, but when he goes on

1012
01:14:06.720 --> 01:14:12.960
the podcast with Joel McHale to promote
himself, he is wearing not just the

1013
01:14:13.000 --> 01:14:17.520
same shirt design, but the same
shirt from the original film. So he

1014
01:14:17.640 --> 01:14:21.560
is wearing that when he's on the
podcast with Joel. Wait, you see

1015
01:14:21.640 --> 01:14:26.399
little kids running around and there a
little Tim Travers shirts. One of the

1016
01:14:26.439 --> 01:14:30.880
best moments we had was when our
liaison at Nevermore Film Festival, a great

1017
01:14:31.039 --> 01:14:36.119
film festival out in Rawling. Our
liaison came to meet Sam and I and

1018
01:14:36.159 --> 01:14:41.199
they had printed out their own Tim
Traver's shirt based on the one from the

1019
01:14:41.239 --> 01:14:45.560
movie Nice. That is a nice
Actually, if you look over my head

1020
01:14:45.560 --> 01:14:47.880
in the video, you can see
one of the from the feature. Yeah.

1021
01:14:48.319 --> 01:14:51.000
Yeah, Like I see, I've
been I've been kind of spotting that

1022
01:14:51.079 --> 01:14:55.439
and going is that like a is
that like the official twenty seven by forty

1023
01:14:55.680 --> 01:14:59.239
one sheet or is that something that
we don't get to see, Like there's

1024
01:14:59.239 --> 01:15:01.960
a profit of movie that's a prop
from the movie. So Travers that in

1025
01:15:02.000 --> 01:15:05.960
addition to me the movie logo,
that's his personal logo for his company,

1026
01:15:06.000 --> 01:15:12.920
Tim Travers Advanced Particle Solutions, LLC. And so it's just the busted up

1027
01:15:13.079 --> 01:15:19.520
steel sign on the massive industrial compound
that he owns. Not just a warehouse.

1028
01:15:19.680 --> 01:15:25.159
He's got a forty acre compound in
the feature film, and that's the

1029
01:15:25.319 --> 01:15:30.239
sign on the gate that random kids
have shot several times. Oh, and

1030
01:15:30.319 --> 01:15:34.199
I made a point of keeping it. Yeah, now I know as Brad

1031
01:15:34.239 --> 01:15:41.039
and I uh fly off the rails
with merchandising T shirts and action figures for

1032
01:15:41.159 --> 01:15:46.680
you. I guess my last question
for you would be the h the audience,

1033
01:15:46.720 --> 01:15:51.239
like, what kind of rating are
you looking to get from for the

1034
01:15:51.239 --> 01:15:57.840
feature length? Tim Travers? Is
this gonna be a I had to ask

1035
01:15:58.199 --> 01:16:00.399
based on the short and what we
see, Like, you know, it

1036
01:16:00.479 --> 01:16:03.399
just felt like it was going to
be a good R rated sci fi comedy.

1037
01:16:03.520 --> 01:16:10.359
Is that that the that is that
the intention aggressively? So this is

1038
01:16:10.439 --> 01:16:15.359
a this is an adult adventure.
You know, there's plenty of time travel

1039
01:16:15.520 --> 01:16:18.640
films for kids, you know,
let let let adults have this experience.

1040
01:16:19.520 --> 01:16:23.640
Just like in the short, we
do not tone down the violence of when

1041
01:16:23.640 --> 01:16:28.199
he's doing his acts of time travel
self harm. And it's worth remembering that

1042
01:16:28.279 --> 01:16:30.680
because of the world is bigger,
we get a larger sense of how he

1043
01:16:31.520 --> 01:16:35.520
had made this machine work in the
first place. I'll give a hint.

1044
01:16:35.760 --> 01:16:40.880
Just like in Back to the Future, he did steal plutonium to power it.

1045
01:16:41.439 --> 01:16:47.520
And there is at least two hitmen
the film who are very confused by

1046
01:16:47.520 --> 01:16:54.279
the multiple tim situation, but they
still do their job. Yeah. Yeah,

1047
01:16:54.439 --> 01:16:57.039
two hitmen you have. It's very
funny. One of them is a

1048
01:16:57.119 --> 01:17:05.119
completely incompetent hitmen so naturally and the
and the other is the kind of guy

1049
01:17:05.239 --> 01:17:09.600
who has a certain shall we say, is a much more dangerous, much

1050
01:17:09.640 --> 01:17:14.520
more serious villain who has a certain
shall we say machete as quality to him.

1051
01:17:15.239 --> 01:17:18.920
Say, no, yeah, for
adults only. You know why adults

1052
01:17:18.920 --> 01:17:24.359
are so obsessed with time travel movies
because they're always thinking about going back to

1053
01:17:24.399 --> 01:17:28.039
the past because they want to fix
all the things they screwed up on Okay,

1054
01:17:28.079 --> 01:17:31.279
oh yeah, that's why time travel
is so entertaining tasks. Yeah,

1055
01:17:31.359 --> 01:17:34.399
keens don't want to fix the past. They want to visit like aient Egypt.

1056
01:17:34.720 --> 01:17:39.119
Yeah, they want to use it
for tourism. Yeah. What have

1057
01:17:39.159 --> 01:17:42.239
they done so far? Yeah?
Yeah, well they haven't had time to

1058
01:17:42.239 --> 01:17:44.800
screw anything up yet. That's,
you know, one of the good parts.

1059
01:17:45.199 --> 01:17:49.119
Yeah. You know, the film
is very very r rated and there

1060
01:17:49.159 --> 01:17:54.640
are several elements that I cannot talk
about on this podcast to your audience that

1061
01:17:54.760 --> 01:17:59.680
have nothing to do with violence.
Well, Stimpson, we we gotta thank

1062
01:17:59.720 --> 01:18:02.800
you so much for U for taking
some time out of your schedule, uh

1063
01:18:02.840 --> 01:18:08.720
to talk with us talk about these
projects. Hopefully maybe we can get you

1064
01:18:08.800 --> 01:18:12.479
back when you when you are able, when you are at Liberty to talk

1065
01:18:12.479 --> 01:18:15.600
about some of these things, because, um, you know, I'm sure

1066
01:18:15.600 --> 01:18:17.800
I can. I can speak for
Brad when I say we've had We've had

1067
01:18:17.840 --> 01:18:21.479
an excellent time. Oh yeah,
I've sen this stuff with you. Feeling

1068
01:18:21.560 --> 01:18:26.800
is mutual, guys, I've had
a blast. All right, Well listen.

1069
01:18:27.000 --> 01:18:30.840
Uh. If you want to check
out some more on Stepson Steed,

1070
01:18:30.880 --> 01:18:38.319
please go to www dot Stepson sneed
dot com. Find him on Instagram,

1071
01:18:38.760 --> 01:18:43.239
find him on Twitter, where he
will ignore you. Uh hey, we're

1072
01:18:43.399 --> 01:18:47.159
we're one of your followers on Twitter, so I'll not being Uh yeah,

1073
01:18:47.199 --> 01:18:53.720
that's great. Well then I'm hoping
then on if you follow your Instagram or

1074
01:18:53.880 --> 01:19:00.159
website, that there will be updates
of Tim Travers eventually this will be coming

1075
01:19:00.159 --> 01:19:03.159
out very soon. Where to see
it, how to see it in what

1076
01:19:03.319 --> 01:19:09.319
cities? I hope? Yep,
yep, absolutely and hopefully it will.

1077
01:19:09.640 --> 01:19:14.399
And the ultimate goal for Tim Travers
is to sell to a big enough distributor

1078
01:19:14.960 --> 01:19:17.439
that you will be able to see
it from pretty much anywhere. All Right,

1079
01:19:17.720 --> 01:19:21.159
well, Stepson again, thank you
so much and we look forward to

1080
01:19:21.199 --> 01:19:25.439
talking with you again. Sir,
absolutely, absolutely