This is a transcript of SYS 454 – Is Film School Worth The Money? With Julian Higgins and Shaye Ogbonna .
Welcome to Episode 454 of the Selling Your Screenplay Podcast. I’m Ashley Scott Meyers, screenwriter and blogger with sellingyourscreenplay.com. Today I am interviewing another writing team – Julian Higgins and Shaye Ogbonna, who just did a feature film called God’s Country starring Thandiwe Newton of Westworld fame. They’ve got a very interesting story about how this film all came together for them. So, we dig into that. So, stay tuned for that interview. If you find this episode valuable, please help me out by giving me a review in iTunes or leaving a comment on YouTube or retweeting the podcast on Twitter or liking or sharing it on Facebook. These social media shares really do help spread word about the podcast, so they’re very much appreciated. Any websites or links that I mentioned the podcast can be found on my blog in the show notes. I also publish a transcript with every episode in case you’d rather read the show or look at something later on. You can find all the podcast show notes at www.sellingyourscreenplay.com/podcast and then just look for episode number 455. If you want my free guide How to Sell a Screenplay in five weeks, you can pick that up by going to sellingyourscreenplay.com/guide. It’s completely free. You just put in your email address, and I’ll send you a new lesson once per week for five weeks along with a bunch of bonus lessons. I’ll teach the whole process of how to sell your screenplay in this guide. Teach you how to write a professional logline and query letter and how to find agents managers and producers who are looking for material really is everything you need to know to sell your screenplay once again just go to sellingyourscreenplay.com/guide. So, now let’s get into the main segment. Today, I am interviewing screenwriters Julian Higgins and Shaye Ogbonna. Here is the interview.
Ashley
Welcome Julian and Shaye to the Selling Your Screenplay Podcast. I really appreciate you guys coming on the show with me today.
Julian
Thank you so much for having us.
Ashley
So maybe to start out you can give us a little bit of background. Where did you guys grow up? And how did you get interested in the entertainment business, and Shaye maybe you go first and then Julian and you can pipe in and just you know one to two minutes sort of summation of your career so far.
Shaye
I mean, I grew up, I’m a southern kid I grew up on Bridgette from Atlanta. And so, my high school years in Texas, I mean, honestly my love for films and everything just comes from A) Just always been a big fan of storytelling as a kid, like a lot of my socialization in terms of like storytelling came from just stories that my family would tell me that just like they would just embellish everything. And that was kind of like the beginning of my storytelling muscle. But also, my mom was a big movie buff, she would just like rent, you know, I grew up in like the blockbuster era, I’m a little bit older. So, then she would rent movies like blockbusters like I remember one time she really liked like Goodfellas, I’m like, 12 she brings it home. And you know, we get about like five minutes. It’s like I don’t know about this is pretty well, she’s going to stick to it and we watched him he watched the whole movie. And she would just like, she just like, she just had a really good sensibility about movies. Like she showed me the Godfather when I was like around that age, and she broke it all down, I mean, everything. So, it really just came from, you know, something that’s passed down to my mom. And in terms of my like, my entry into the industry is pretty traditional, I went to film school, American Film Institute in LA. And that’s kind of how I first came in contact with Julian and kind of just took a traditional route. When I graduated from film school, I was in a collective of writers and filmmakers collective and we just like made shorts, and sketches and comedy, stuff like that. And it was kind of like our way of kind of like, always stay creative, and always making things and that ultimately led to my first independent feature, which will be called Low Life, just a small kind of independent crime drama. And it was at the screening of that film, like a cast and crew screening that I ended up officially meeting Julian and that was kind of like the beginning of LA, our kind of creative partnership.
Ashley
Gotcha, perfect. So maybe Julian, you can give us a similar story.
Julian
Yeah. Well, my first kind of creative instinct, as a kid was drawing, I was sort of like the kid that drew you know, growing up and that turned into interest in acting sort of strange, I suppose. But like, I’ve always kind of had that creative, you know, imaginative instinct, that was sort of what I wanted. I thought I was going to be an actor for most of my childhood. And I love acting, not just doing it but also knowing about it and learning about it. And to this day, my favorite part of the process is working with actors. And I no longer want to be an actor, but that has been like my experience acting growing up has been the most valuable experience I’ve had as a director and along the way and maybe seventh grade, I as a kid who wanted to act and be in silly sketches, you know, with his friends like we picked up a camera we started filming some of our scenes we had written and that was really the moment like it wasn’t really seeing a movie, I had grown up with two single parents. So movies were very much like part of my experience growing up always, but once I had the camera and had to figure out where it would go, and like what that means, and like the relationship between the shot and the actor and how I would get to sort of make those decisions as the director, that I was sold immediately. And writing for me came out of wanting to put myself in the position to Direct work, you know, I definitely think of myself as a director first. And the writing has allowed me to tell the stories that I’m going to care about. So, writing kind of came along with the directing, it’s only been recently, frankly, it’s been since working with Shaye, that I have started to really feel comfortable as a writer. Maybe we’ll talk about this a little bit, but you know, writing is notoriously difficult and anguishing. And it’s been a real learning process for me, but I definitely learned a lot from Shaye working on this process.
Ashley
I’m curious Shaye, you know, I get a lot of people just ask me questions about film school, obviously, American Film Institute’s big, is a big school here in LA one of the top film schools. What’s your take? I mean, when people ask you, should you pay the money for film school? What is your take now as someone who’s been through it and sees you know, the financial aspect of it? And is there an ROI on this? Do you recommend a young high school student comes to you? Do you recommend Film School for them?
Shaye
It depends. I mean, it depends on the person, I’d say it’s about you got to have a plan going into film school, especially because of the with the top film schools, the investment that you’re going to be making in order in that institution, especially like me, I don’t come from privilege, I come from pretty, just kind of normal mean. So, like, I had to, like really go into debt in order to do it. But for me, like the difference between me I think, from school isn’t for everybody. There’s a lot of people who can go out here and do it on their own. I think there is value, obviously, there’s value from school, I’m a product of it. I think, to me, what it did was it gave me an opportunity to connect with other filmmakers always say this, but I had a plan and it was to find my tribe. That was my that was my goal. When I went to film school to find other, people always talk about this. It’s about networking across not networking. And so for me, I was looking for people that were in a similar position as me and had similar interests and had, you know, similar drive. And I found those people that I constantly work with those people. And sometimes you find people that you don’t work well with, but it really was about building those relationships and those connections for me, and that’s served me well. That’s the reason I’m in the position I am right now is a reason I’ve been able to work with Julian because I had a plan. I saw Julian’s work when I was in film school, and I was very much moved by it. And I had an idea. I was like, I hope I worked with this guy one day. And the universe worked in a way that I ultimately ended up meeting him through the people that became my tribe, and he is now a huge person in my life; creatively and personally. So, I just say have a plan and going in, if you go in with the level of investment that you need to make financially, and you don’t have a plan, you’ll get exposed to be frank. So that’s kind of always my MO when it comes to these.
Ashley
Yeah, go ahead, go ahead.
Julian
As a fellow because I went to undergrad Film School at Emerson and AFI for graduate school. And I went pretty much back-to-back, you know, and that was, I mean, both my parents are college professors. So, there’s like very high value placed on education in my family. However, I definitely do not believe Film School is for everyone. And I think, especially given how it I mean, when we went it was much less expensive than it is now. And like it’s a huge sort of responsibility to take on. So I think my advice to people who are considering Film School is unless you have a very strong like, proactive reason to go and you have as Shaye says, a plan, it’s better just to wait and see what you can do on your own. I mean, you can be a high school dropout, and be a great successful filmmaker. So, it’s not necessary, you have to have a reason to go and you have to really want to make that commitment.
Ashley
Now Shaye, you mentioned at some point you saw something that Julian had created and you were impressed by it. Just talk about that a little bit what was impressive to like what stood out amongst all of these student films that you saw Julian’s that wow, that’s somebody I do want to work with.
Shaye
To be frank now a lot of people in the film school they’re going to film school with a certain ego and sense of like the type of films they’re making. And a lot of those films that they’re making a film school like film school is where you want to play around and make mistakes, I get it. But a lot of those students don’t meet the need for like movies. Like I said, I grew up I have an appreciation for our house cinema halls have appreciate for high concept you know, studio cinema, that’s what I that’s literally how I grew up. This is stuff I grew up watching. And so, for me like I felt like Julian’s work more than anybody that I had seen at AFI encompass both of those things, he had a film called Beef. That literally was like in terms of like the concept of it. So, it was very high concept, but the approach was very sophisticated. And I was like it was the first thing I saw was like, this is the first movie I’ve seen while I will pay money to see it. This is a movie that plays in that it will play a multiplexes but also win awards. And that is the type of material that has always been interesting to me like I love genre, but I like to elevate it and elevate it with character and perspective. And Julian’s work, that particular project spoke to me because it had such scope for being the thesis film, but it was so grounded. And I was just like, yeah, that do right there. That’s the voice. That’s the dude that I want to work with that and not I want to meet him and just I have a conversation with him. And I was fortunate to do that. So, that was what specifically spoke to me about Julian’s work outside.
Ashley
Perfect, perfect. So, let’s get into now your recent feature film God’s Country, we can kind of talk about that maybe to start out you give us a quick pitch or logline, what is this film all about?
Julian
Well, so this is based on a short story by James Lee Burke. And it’s a very simple framework for a story. It is essentially about a college professor who like lives and works in this rural college town in the American West. And she one day encounters two hunters on her property. And she very politely asked them to leave, and you know, doesn’t have a great feeling about them, but as you know, trying to sort of handle it like an adult. And, and that is it doesn’t go over very well. They kind of don’t take no for an answer. They don’t necessarily look at her as someone who should be telling them what to do. And it kind of starts to spiral from there. And this very small incident becomes something that really pulls in all of their lives into this kind of, well, we describe it as a modern Western thriller. So, it’s kind of got elements of the western genre thriller. And we can I’m sure we’ll talk more about that.
Ashley
Yeah, so where did this idea come from? What was the genesis of this idea?
Julian
So, the story that James Lee Burke wrote, came out in the early 90s. And, you know, it’s actually the main character in the short story is an older retired white man. And, in our version of it, we changed the nature of the main character, and all kinds of subtext, of course, changes with that, because we were trying to respond to what we are seeing happening in our culture in our country, in our politics in the world, frankly, the director of the film Ryan Prowse, and invited me to his previous screening of Low Life that Shaye wrote and acted in. And at that screening was about a month after the 2016 election, Shaye and I had a conversation afterwards, where we really kind of shared the feelings that we were having about, you know, our future as filmmakers with the world being what it is. And I think we concluded that it was time to sort of double down and like, get into these issues that were so important to us as people, but do it in our work. And also try to do it in a way that was not going to oversimplify it. It was going to actually try to capture the complexity and sort of the intersectionality of all of these different issues. I mean, this movie touches on a lot of things, a lot of major themes in American life. But we don’t want it to be a preachy kind of overtly, you know, message movie, we wanted it to be dramatized fully through these characters. And so that was, you know, then the short story seemed to provide a great framework for that conversation. And then once we sort of explored the idea of changing the main character, we would have better access to the themes we were trying to talk about. And you know, and Shaye has more thoughts on that I know, but that was sort of the genesis of it.
Ashley
Yeah, Shaye you have some want to add some thoughts?
Shaye
Yeah, I mean, no Julian pretty much captured everything. I mean, for me, and now, we’ve obviously talked about this before. I mean, I’ve always grown up as a fan of the Western specifically. And it’s obviously a very male dominated genre. And it deals with themes that are very much connected to like American exceptionalism. And the thing that was interesting about me you in terms of like changing that main character to a person that was that is marginalized. It gives us an opportunity to kind of like deconstruct the West and also, like, explore certain themes that don’t really get a chance to get explored in Wests. But also, do it in a very kind of, like, nuanced way. So like Julian was said, just saying, like, we wanted to, like we didn’t want things to be simple. We didn’t want to simplify characters, like the hunters in this movie could easily be stigmatized, stereotyped, simplified, reduced, as they say to like, stupid racist or whatever you want to call them. And it was like it was important for us to go into their lives and explore these people that is to fully function, fully formed human beings and just like we’re trying to explore the main character who was kind of like other than his world, so for me, it was just a great it just the moment we decided to change that character, it was just it opened up a lot of opportunities. That were the reasons I got into this industry to be able to, like tell stories from perspectives that you don’t get a chance to see those from so that, you know, just kind of like pontificating on that. That was the reasons that were very much like, exciting for me in terms of like the story.
Ashley
Yeah, yeah. So, let’s talk about your guys’s writing process. What is the collaboration look like? And I’m talking about just like the logistics to start. Are you guys in the same room? Are you using some sort of zoom to talk? Do you guys get in the same room just talk about things you do index cards and then you start to write up to divide up scenes. And then you critique it, just walk us through sort of your collaboration? How does your collaboration work?
Shaye
First thing, we’re both I mean, Julian speak to this as well, I’m big on like, structure. So, first thing we did was we kind of like broke down the script into a specific structure. For us specifically, it was like these eight sequences that ultimately made up, you know, the three acts of the film. So we went, we worked within that paradigm. And we really like in terms of just like approach, we were big on index cards, we were in the same room, we were Julian’s play. So, in terms of like the breaking of the story, we were very much a two headed monster when it came to that. And we all well, we seem to be kind of like a hive mind, we’re kind of one mind we have very similar even though we obviously are very different people, we have very similar sensibilities. So, it was like, you just have no cards on the floor, we break it down. Another thing we do is we talk would become we love to talk about story, we can talk about something for like, two hours, specifically within the rewrite process and only like change, you know, a couple of lines, but that that that change changed the chemistry of the scene. So, we’re really big in terms of process and story and talking story. But in terms of the actual when it came to the actual writing of the screenplay, we were rarely in the same room, I would take a path and then Julian would take a path. And then when it came to the rewrite process, we will then we will be more a little bit more. Not necessarily the same room, but in terms of like the conversation and everything will it will be very much like us working together.
Julian
I would say that, you know, our conversation is the top layer of the collaboration process, the script is almost secondary, in a way, like we need to get a lot of stuff out on the table and hashed through before we can ever make any decisions about how to like, What the what order the scenes should be, or even what the scenes should be themselves. So, we spent maybe six months talking about the things we wanted to deal with in the movie, before we really ever wrote anything. And, um, initially, it was just conversations about like, all the themes, I mean, the raw material that we’re bringing into this is, you know, our relationship with our parents and our thoughts on you know, politics and religion and the country and everything that we wanted to pour into this movie, we had to kind of feel each other out and see what we got. And then it goes to notecards. But, you know, initially Shaye was going to write the scripts on his own. And, and I was just going to be part of sort of developing it. But then along the way, we, you know, we sort of came to this understanding that we had so much shared conversation going on that we kind of both needed to have our, our hands on the script itself. So, we kind of, as I recall, we divvied up scenes, some of the scenes just kind of felt more like shade scenes, and felt more like Julian seems whatever, we’d split them up, do a first pass of them. And then for literally years, as we tried to put the movie together, we were talking about the script and revising stuff. And now it’s very hard to know, like, who came up with what or who wrote what scenes or whatever. It’s very much our scripts, and I’m very proud of that.
Ashley
How did you guys, if you got to some points where you couldn’t agree? How did you get past those? Do you have some tips for when, you know, competing minds have different ideas about things?
Julian
You know, it’s hard for me to think of a moment when we actually had like, what I would describe as a disagreement. And I think it was because I mean, maybe you can Shaye, but I feel like we had a very, like it was one of the most, sort of, positive and ego free collaborations I’ve ever had in my life. And I think it was because from the very beginning, I think it was the foundation of all of that kind of vulnerability with like what we wanted to deal with. We were making our decisions based on questions we had, it wasn’t like about whose idea it was, it was like; oh, how are we going to solve this? And then we would just kind of sit around and there were many moments when we came into a meeting with some big problem that we just didn’t know how to solve, and I had no solutions. And we would just get into the space together and just start asking questions about it. And then by the end of that meeting, we would have not only solved that problem, but like, made progress in other ways. So, it was just kind of like it really was that conversation approach versus, like, I think there’s a in collaboration, there’s two different kinds, there’s, when you feel like you have to kind of perform for the person you’re collaborating with, where like, you have to do your work ahead of time. And then when you feel good about it, you come in and present it. And then there’s the other con, which is it’s just an ongoing dialogue, where there isn’t that kind of a sense of having to like, be 100% all the time. So, I would come into meetings going like, I don’t know how to solve this. And that’s where we would start. And then we would just, we would, we would get into it and try different things. And we had all these sort of principles of like, this is what we’re trying to do this what we’re not trying to do, so the answer would present itself very clearly to both of us. And that’s how that’s what Shaye means, by the hive mind, like, we would know, we just trusted that we would know when we had the right answer, and it just never failed us.
Ashley
Gotcha. What is your development process look like? Do you have some other writer actor, you know, agents, managers, once you had a draft that you like, what does that process actually look like? How do you go out and to get notes from? And, you know, how does that process work for you guys?
Shaye
I mean, Julian, probably more to this than me. But I know one thing that we in terms of the development that we did do was, we are two men, we’re two men writing a story with a woman, a female protagonist and an only female protagonist, but a female protagonist of color, living in a situation where she’s, you know, like I said, she’s the only person that looks like her. So, one thing that we definitely tried to do in terms of development process was involved, as many women and specifically like black women as possible to read the script, give us notes, does it feel authentic. And we’ve been focused about the focus on black women who live rurally live in areas where they were, like I said, the only person that looked like them. And so, we were very much in tune to like, to the fact that we are two men writing the story about a female protagonist. So, in terms of like, we definitely made it a point to reach out to as many you know, women as possible to read the script and just give us brutal unflinching notes. And we also like, you know, did that development process also, including, also included sending it out to people who didn’t necessarily agree with the decisions that Sandra was making. And, you know, obviously taking that on advisement, and a lot of I mean, obviously, with those particular notes that fueled our fire to want to, like push farther or anything like that was part of the win, because we do want to, there’s definitely a point where we want it to like, not necessarily disrupt, but we want to, like we want it to push and press conversation around a lot of the themes that we were talking about. So, in terms of just like, that was one part of the process, and I’m sure Julian has been further, like, involving my producers, and anybody that…
Julian
Yeah, I mean, I don’t think we saw feedback on the script as a script not really as a commodity in the marketplace. That’s really the honest truth. Our approach was, we were going to make it one way or another, like, we think we had both worked on things that were sort of looking ahead to a marketplace. And it felt to me like those are the ones that felt compromised. And like, we wanted to write something exactly the way we thought it should be, and hold ourselves to a very high standard of like the storytelling. But we weren’t really worried about trying to get it made. And I know that sounds really obvious, like weird, and like, not obvious, but it was kind of like, my plan was to try to go to people who had given me money in the past for shorts, or people that I thought had access to money and just raise whatever money I could, and not involve the system at all. That was the game plan. So that being said, we decided not to pull any punches, we decided to make the script exactly the way we thought it should be. And we spent about a year and a half working on it. Without any, you know, moves to try to get it made. So, we didn’t really, I mean, I didn’t send it to you know, people in the industry really, it was more like trying to send people we thought were smart and informed about different things and trying to get good quality feedback from people that would tell us the truth, which I honestly think is just the way to go in general. And then once we decided, okay, we should try to get this made, then it goes to a different group of people for different reasons.
Ashley
Once you guys had a draft that you guys were very happy with, and ready to go, what were some of those next steps you just mentioned? You went back to some of these investors? What does that process look like? What is your pitch to them? I mean, just exactly what you said. It’s not as though you’re really trying to make this you know, a financial success. You’re really trying to make it an artistic success, like what is your pitch to these folks look like in terms of ROI? What are you offering? Then what is the incentive to come on this ride with you guys?
Julian
I mean, my strategy with fundraising, which has served me well, with shorts, and now with this feature is to be extremely honest, and not try to sell anybody anything. It’s really like, I know, that’s counterintuitive for the show that we’re on. But like, my selling method, is to be really honest about what the movie is, and why I’m making it and let people support it because they love it. Not necessarily. I mean, like, one thing, I was very straightforward with the potential investors was a, it’s going to be an independent film, it’s very rare for independent films to make their money back, you have to like what we’re doing here, you have to support it, you have to want to see this movie in the world, you know, that’s the reason to support it. And that’s not going to work for everybody. But like, the movie is about some pretty challenging, it’s designed to challenge it’s designed to get into some, you know, things that can be minefields, like race, gender, sexism, misogyny, class, like, these are delicate topics. And we needed people who got what we were trying to do, and wanting to support it for its own sake. Which of course, makes the task a lot harder. But now we feel really good, because we know that the people who did come on board really do support we’re trying to do at the moment.
Ashley
Yeah, yeah, for sure. I’m curious. With Thandiwe Newton, did you have her on board before you started to fundraise? Or did you fundraise and then bring her on board? And I asked the question, sort of in the context of, I wonder how an actor I mean, obviously, she’s got great credits and is a great actress. But it’s not like she’s a big major movie star. And certainly distributors would not necessarily think that that she can carry a movie. But I wonder when you go to pitch these folks that are not necessarily in the industry, is that impressive to them? Is that a piece of this that they’re investing in? Oh, she was on Westworld? Or, you know, some of these things? Like how much does that affect your fundraising?
Julian
It’s funny, go ahead, Shaye.
Shaye
I mean, again, I think that’s also the nature of our industry. Like just hearing you say that, like, that’s not the way I perceive Thandiwe, like to meet Thandiwe, she’s been a movie star 20 plus years, she just hasn’t had an opportunity to, to carry the movie, which is also I think, a problem in our industry that we’re trying to, like, you know, correct, in terms of like our activism and our work. We were looking, we were looking for Thandiwe, even though we even though we didn’t know we were looking for Thandiwe Newton in the way we can see this part we were looking for the underappreciated movie star. And to me, she embodies that. And the idea that a distributor would think she couldn’t sell a movie. I’m like, she’s an international actress. Yes, she’s on Westworld. She’s part of an Ensemble, but everybody to a man loves her own Westworld and say she’s the best thing about Westworld. And if you looked at the things she’s been, people have always said how much they love this look to me, she was like this, I don’t want to say dominant in a rush. She was like this kind of like, unappreciated commodity, I hate to use that word. But it just shows a disconnect between sometimes the business side and the creative side, and even like the audience, because to me, she’s always seem that way to me. So, when we had the opportunity to evolve in his project, I mean, me and Julian always, like approached her like, to us, she’s a movie star that is just hasn’t had the opportunity. It’s in our DNA, she just hasn’t had the opportunity in the platform to show that. And this is like, we’re so lucky to be able to do that for her.
Julian
Yeah, I mean, the role is a difficult role to cast, especially if you’re, you know, like, there, this is a problem that is not is pretty pervasive is that, you know, it’s people know, they’re just, they’re not that many great roles available for, you know, 40 something black women. And we designed this role to be a very complex and challenging and engaging role for an actress. Of course, we know, we had talked about Thandiwe. But like, you don’t assume that you’re going to get someone of her caliber in a movie this size. The answer to your question is, the casting was not an important part of the financing component. Mainly for the reason I just said, like, unless you have, there’s like a couple of actors that actresses that can like open, like a blockbuster movie who are black women. But, you know, if you don’t have one of those actresses, then it’s kind of a moot point. So, for this particular movie, we wanted to try to find someone who would do justice to the role we wrote obviously, the but someone who would really like have a chance to almost in a way like break through. You know, it’s shocking that after the career Thandiwe has had was all these indelible roles that she’s played. It’s so rare. I mean, she’s just like, I can’t think of another film where she’s had a true Lead Role. And she’s in every scene of this movie, you know, it’s like, it’s a showcase for her, frankly, like incredible ability as an actress and her range. And of course, like she really identified with the character and really wanted to, you know, be the person who told this story. So, it didn’t happen the normal way where like, you got to get an actor to get the funding, like it actually happened the opposite. Like we had money, and we needed to find the actress. And frankly, she came after us like she really wanted to do this. So.
Ashley
Perfect, perfect. I always like to wrap up the interviews just by asking the guests if there’s anything they’ve seen recently that they thought was really great. You know, is there anything you guys are watching currently, or have watched in the past that you think maybe a screenwriting audience would appreciate?
Julian
I’ll go first with this one. I mean, my favorite movie of last year came out right at the end, it was called the Worst Person in The World. And it was it’s by a Norwegian director, Joachim Trier, who made Oslo, August 31st, Reprise. He’s a fantastic director, but the Worst Person in The World, especially for screenwriters, I think it’s a beautiful, emotional, funny, entertaining movie. But it’s also like, fascinating structurally. And the what he’s doing in the movie with breaking the movie into chapters and the things he skips, normally would become the entire movie. Like it’s very kind of the elliptical, episodic storytelling, but it creates this impression that so much bigger than like a more linear story could have. I think it’s really beautiful, brilliant movie, and I highly recommend it to everyone.
Ashley
Gotcha. Shaye, what about you? Is there anything you’ve been watching recently?
Shaye
I haven’t got a chance to watch anything new recently, I have like 17 jobs and a child. So instead of just like going out and seeking movies. Obviously, the last new movie I watch was the Top Gun movie. But in terms of like what, I sort of watched this series recently on Hulu, and it’s called The Bear. And it’s about the kid in Chicago who was like a sandwich maker. And he goes back and starts running his family shop in Chicago. What I love about the show, in terms of the writing process, the ways that eliminates information, like a lot of TV shows, like did you structure or you’re socialized. In terms of the pilots, you just get everybody upfront, I give everybody everything upfront in the first bobbins. This is what the show is about, this who the character is, what his problem is. And the way they are just so restrained, and just like disseminate character information, not only about the main character, but also the characters in that work in this world and how like, it mixes comedy and drama. And it’s constantly like, I can’t predict it. I like to watch that, why can’t see where it’s going. Because I’m so used to like as, as a writer, as a storyteller as a filmmaker, like you always look at like, you know, you’re always trying to find out where it’s going. You’re always trying to kind of like break down the code. And this one is constantly, it’s just I’m enjoying it as a viewer because it’s constantly taking me in places that I’m good at that are so unexpected. So, that’s something I’ve been watching recently, I was like, I’ve only been able to watch like two and a half episodes, but I’ve been fully engaged. I’m not double streaming or anything I’m watching. Because if you don’t like our movie, if you’re not watching, you’re missing something because just like movie, this movie is demanding engagement, is demanding you to pay attention because if you don’t, you’re going to miss something. And so like, that’s something I’ve been watching recently. I’m actually a pretty big fan.
Ashley
Okay, yeah, that’s a great recommendations. How can people see God’s Country? Do you guys know what the release schedule is going to be like?
Julian
Yeah, so the movie comes out on Friday, the September 16th, comes out nationwide. Chances are, it’ll be screening in a theatre near you wherever you happen to be. We’re extremely fortunate that IFC picked up the movie out Sundance and wanted to put it out theatrically in this climate putting it in hundreds of theatres across the United States, like really doubling down on a theatrical experience is pretty awesome. It was designed to be a big screen movie. And it also really matters I will say that people support independent films in theatres, the distributors watch this stuff. They watch the crunch the numbers. If this sounds interesting, you watch the trailer, it seems interesting to you, do check it out in theatres because it was intended to be seen that way and it also matters just for the future of independent film to support.
Ashley
Amen to that for sure. Check it out in the theatre if you can. What’s the best way for people to keep up with what you guys are doing? Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, anything you comfortable sharing, I will round up and put in the show notes.
Julian
I mean, Shaye, you want to go first?
Shaye
I’m terrible at social media. I’m terrible. I’m on all the platforms, but I’m rarely like Julian is pretty good about … Julian is really, really heavy on Instagram. I am not but yeah, like I had like my handle is @shizzleobizzle, if you catch that I’ve got you with that.
Ashley
So yeah, we’ll do something.
Shaye
Well, yeah, I’m like, I’m not that heavy at socials, I’m there. But yeah, just like look me up on the internet and I’m sure you figure out what I’m doing.
Julian
I am on Instagram and that’s the only platform my mind, I’m @filmJulian and you can also go to GodsCountryfilm.com And you’ll be able to find like local show times for your area on there.
Ashley
Okay, perfect. Perfect. Well, guys, I really appreciate you coming on talking to me today. Good luck with this film and good luck for your future films as well.
Shaye
Thank you so much.
Ashley
Thank you, we’ll talk to you guys later.
SYS’s from concept to completion, screenwriting course, is now available, just go to www.sellingyourscreenplay.com/screenwritingcourse. It will take you through every part of writing a screenplay, coming up with a concept, outlining, writing the opening pages, the first act, second act, third act and then rewriting and then there’s even a module at the end on marketing your screenplay once it’s polished and ready to be sent out. We’re offering this course in two different versions, the first version, you get the course, plus, you get three analyses from SYS reader, you’ll get one analysis on your outline, and then you’ll get two analyses on your first draft of your screenplay. This is just our introductory price, you’re getting three full analyses, which is actually the same price as our three-pack analysis bundle. So, you’re essentially getting the course for free when you buy the three analyses that come with it. And to be clear, you’re getting our full analysis with this package. The other version doesn’t have the analysis, so you’ll have to find some friends or colleagues who will do the feedback portion of the course with you. I’m letting SYS Select members do this version of the course for free. So, if you’re a member of SYS Select, you already have access to it. You also might consider that as an option. If you join SYS select you will get the course as part of that membership to a big piece of this course is accountability. Once you start the course, you’ll get an email every Sunday with that week’s assignment. And if you don’t complete it, we’ll follow up with another reminder the next week, it’s easy to pause the course if you need to take some time off. But as long as you’re enrolled, you’ll continue to get reminders for each section until it’s completed. The objective of the course is to get you through it in six months so that you have a completed power screenplay ready to be sent out. So, if you have an idea for a screenplay, and you’re having a hard time getting it done, this course might be exactly what you need. If this sounds like something you’d like to learn more about, just go to www.sellingyourscreenplay.com/screenwritingcourse. It’s all one word, all lowercase. I will of course the link to the course in the show notes and I will put a link to the course on the homepage up in the right-hand sidebar. On the next episode of the podcast, I’m going to be interviewing Canadian screenwriter – Brandon Rhiness, who was on the podcast before in Episode 225 and episode 318. So, check those out. We talked about how he got his start in the business in Episode 225, how he broke in as a screenwriter. And next week we’re going to be talking about his new horror film feature film which he wrote and also directed, called Grotesque. We’re talking about how he got that film produced as well. So, keep an eye out for that episode next week. That’s the show. Thank you for listening.