Okay, you want some real behind-the-scenes dirt? Here you go.
Making movies with micro budgets is HARD, man. It's hard, even when you get actors and actresses who are there for you, and have your back.
But when you get ones who don't have your back? When they're there only for their reels, or for the money? Big problems.
Today, I give you the segment called "The Fountain". I'm gonna break a little news here that we've kept under wraps.
I met a local author named Ronald Malfi a few months back. It's weird, because he lives near where I grew up, he went to the same high school I went to, and he's published like 20 books, but somehow I'd never heard of the guy.
My buddy Stewie introduced me to him by giving me his book, "The Night Parade". The book was REALLY good. My only problem with it is that there's no sequel.
From there I read a couple of other books, and they were all very good too. Check it out, you can find his books here:
http://amzn.to/2ztc9rt
I just started reading his new book "Bone White", and as expected, it's great too. (the others I can recommend are Little Girls, Floating Staircase and December Park)
So I reached out to the guy and he'd apparently heard of me, and seen some of my movies. (his brother sort of knew me in high school, I think he said) We agreed to meet for a beer and a little chit chat.
At the bar we ended up being there for like four hours. Way more than one beer. That was the first time it occurred to me--hey, it would be cool if he wrote a segment for Terrortory 2...
I can't remember if I mentioned it to him at that meeting, or one of the next bar meetings we had. It's funny, but we'd only plan to hang out and drink a beer or two, and every time we'd end up talking until the bar closed. About scripts and books, ideas and things we were working on.
Anyway, at some point I asked him if he'd be interested in writing a segment. He seemed like he might be. For the next month he started pitching me ideas. A lot of good ones, but he kept throwing more and more out, and finally one in particular seemed fully formed at the pitch.
It was called the Fountain, and had a very EC Comics kind of feel to it. He wrote the whole script and sent it to me, and I said--Yeah, let's do it.
THINGS GET UGLY FROM HERE
I'm pretty sure this segment is cursed. I've been trying to shoot it for three months. I cast the two main leads, but then struggled to cast a part that involves nudity. Not sure why it's so hard to find around here now, but it is.
I've also had to find a remote country store, which is pretty hard to do in this area. Most of them seemed to be around 3 hours away, which is too far. It would basically add an entire extra day of shooting.
Then I needed to find a store I could shoot the inside of, if whatever store I found wouldn't let us.
Through the month of October I struggled to not only create some major props, including the "Fountain" itself, but to get locations and that actress.
I got a name referral from a friend, and reached out to this model(who has done some acting). Here is how the original contact went:
ME:
I'm trying to contact you about a possible acting gig. (XXXXXX recommended you; I've directed her in two films). Can you hit me up at MY EMAIL or respond here will also work I think)
HER:
ok
where are you based
ME:
Maryland. I met you WAY back in the day at a horrorfind convention when my first film came out. (Hunting Humans)
HER:
ok
And that is where the conversation ended until late that night when she followed up with:
HER:
so what is this gig
ME:
It's for Terrortory 2--the sequel to my last film. It's an anthology horror, like Creepshow, and this is the last segment we need to film. The segment is called "The Fountain".
Some of the details are, we're shooting the scenes November 4th. The
nudity is full body but non-sexual--you'd actually be covered in blood and
it's a night scene, so I'm not even sure how much is going to be seen.
It's outside though, so depending on weather could be cold. The pay is
AMOUNT(we'll be shooting some indoor, non-nude scenes from about 5pm-10pm,
then outdoor from about 11pm-1am).
Let me know if it's something you'd be interested in.
Then there was silence for a day, then this:
HER:
so is there a lot of dialogue?
ME:
Not a ton. Long as you don't show it to anyone, I can send it to you to see if you think you're okay with it.
HER:
ok
if lot of dialogue im not interested
That's where I was like...say what? Actors ALWAYS want more lines...but she wants less? Oooookay.
I send her the script, and she says she's in. I give her contact info to Zig and he gets in touch with her to give her details of the shoot.
That's when she sends him this:
HER:
and this is accessbile via traim/bus.? i live i ny so i dont have a car
Okay...let me give you a little advice if you're an actor: If you don't have a vehicle, you may want to PUT THAT IN THE FUCKING CONVERSATION AT SOME POINT BEFORE THE UPM CONTACTS YOU.
Now I'm clearly going to have additional costs of getting bus tickets both ways, plus I have to get someone to pick her up at the bus station to bring her to set, which is about 75 minutes away from the bus station.
Zig finds possible bus schedules. If she comes in at the 3pm bus, she can be on set at 5pm. We'll be shooting until about 1am, then we can get her back to the station by 3am to catch that bus home.
She doesn't want to do that much travelling in one day. I get that. But now that means I'm adding in a hotel. This model has now become over half my total budget for this segment. And judging by how difficult the communication has been so far, I anticipate the actual shoot to be a nightmare.
But I keep plugging away. Working through the Halloween season when I'd rather be enjoying myself. I create this "fountain", I paint it and add some crackle stuff that'll make it look old. With my brother's help I create a weird statue for the top of it.
I find a remote store about 90 minutes away, contact them and they're closed on Sundays. We can shoot the exterior there, no problem. A buddy of mine with an antique store says his store can double as the interior, but they don't close at all during the day. (the scene takes place during the day)
So I'll have to light the place like it's a daylight scene, but I think it's doable.
All the actors say that the weekend of November 4th will work. I'm hoping it's not going to be so cold that the model will freak out when she gets nude that night. I figure we'll shoot a couple minutes, cover her up a couple minutes, shoot a couple of minutes. I don't need TOO many shots of her completely naked.
But then...two weeks before the shoot, the main female actress goes MIA. Doesn't respond to emails. Doesn't return phone calls. I get that stuff comes up. But there's no reason to not drop me an email that says "Hey, something came up, can't do it." That's just unprofessional and dickish.
Anyway, this girl's name is Sarah Burton, and if you're an indie filmmaker, I'd advise you to avoid using her. I certainly will never cast her in anything. I found out by a simple Fb search that she took a new job on October 30th, so I'm guessing that's the reason.
So this week I scrambled to find a replacement. There's not a ton of local female talent that I haven't already used in Terrortory 1 or 2, so it's tough. Nobody could do it on such short notice, so I finally pulled the plug on the segment.
I will attempt it again in the spring, as soon as the weather gets tolerable enough to do so. I will recast both female parts.
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR TERRORTORY 2?
Well, the film is already feature length--probably about 83 minutes after credits. What I could do is either release it whenever it's done, and then when I get the Fountain done, I can insert it and re-upload it to Amazon so people can see it.
Or I can just wait and get the Fountain done and put it all out at once.
Both options are open to me, but I haven't decided yet.
