1. Care to tell us a little about yourself and how you got involved in the independent film biz?

 

The basic rundown is as follows: White Hair Productions is made up of Harry Masengale and myself along with Starr Anderson and Samantha Bennett who help us out with less creative aspects of running a production company. Harry and I met back in 98 through a mutual friend. We played in a band together off and on for about seven years. We both had a love for movies and that is what we spent most of the time talking about. We used to get into long conversations about crazy ideas we had where we would usually say something like, "We should make a movie about___" "And then we can throw in___" and so on and so on and so on. We never really seriously talked about making movies, as far as I knew anyway.

 

Then one night in 2005 we were drinking heavily and Harry got me to agree that within the next two years we were going to make a movie. I had a vague recollection of the conversation and he held me to it. My entire life I would write stories, almost constantly. I finished three screenplays when I was 15 and at that point in my life the plan was to finish high school and head off to film school. Then on my 16th birthday I spent a few hours trying to mimic some Hitchcock shots with my new video camera when a thought occurred to me, "Are you a fucking idiot? You'll never be able to make movies!" So I agreed with myself and that night I quit writing and began planning to spend my life in the IT industry. A few months later, I started writing again, never anything huge and never very much. I would just write outlines or a few scenes here and there. I thought I could always write, even if nothing ever comes of it. It was the only true passion I had ever known.

 

Shortly after that night in 2005 I began writing a lot. I had one idea that I played around with for a few months that eventually became “Maybe Tomorrow”.

 

2. Can you tell us a little about the film?

 

Maybe Tomorrow is a character driven comedy that has the set up of boy loses girl, boy tries to win girl back, friends try to convince boy that he is an idiot. While it seems to be a film about relationships you’ll find that what it really focuses on is friendship. Even though the film does have a few sweet things to say, it has an extremely dirty mouth and manages to poke fun at every culture possible. It even has momentarily contrast of gay and hetero bashing.

 

 

The dialogue in the film is essentially what would come out if I could have a conversation with myself for an hour and a half. I tend to over analyze anything that interests me and can usually produce at minimum two totally opposite viewpoints. Some people say that I should see a shrink, but it makes for good dialogue.

 

 

 About the time that I began writing the script I had just given up a decade of smoking, cold turkey. That is definitely an experience like no other. That makes its way into the film a few times. I’ve always been fascinated by the diner and coffee shop dwellers, so I shared a little of my conflicting views on that life style. I have endless amounts of observations on relationships that I put to some use in the film as well. I also wanted to capture a moment in everyone’s life that seems greatly important to me; at some point in their twenties (usually) everyone comes to see, “Oh man… Life really does suck.” But most of all I just wanted to create something that I thought was funny. In every way we made this movie for ourselves and if others like it too, that is just an added bonus.

 

 

It is always the characters that influence me. I give them a few lines of dialogue, a name and eventually they come to life and develop a personality. The story usually writes itself. A lot of stuff I write comes from personal life experiences, usually in some metaphorical way. When I actually set down to start writing more than an outline or bits and pieces I always choose a nice playlist of music that fits the mood of what I’m writing. I don’t know if it really inspires me, but it helps me to get into the right mood.

 

 

It wasn't that difficult at all. If you want your film to be a feature, make it a feature. We were refused unbelievable amounts of help due to the fact that we were making a feature. I think that if anyone wants to be a filmmaker the best route to go for that movie that you make just to learn how to make a movie, is to do a feature. That way you can get a lot deeper into it. You could make a short and shoot every scene virtually the same, but in a feature, chances are you will end up dealing with every type of shot that you are able to figure out a way to shoot. Then when you edit you will have more options and the opportunity to be a little more creative.

 

Our film cost a little under $6,000. I could have spent that $6,000 (and much more) going to film school for a year to get a fraction of the experience, doing everything the way someone else advises as opposed to the way I envisioned. Now I know everything that I need to know to make a reeeeeaaaalllly bad ass movie and the best part is, I've already made a movie in the process. My advice to anyone who wants to make a film is, make it fairly simple, get a variety of shots for each scene, including lots of really close shots (you'll understand that in editing), and start editing while you are still shooting.

 

 

We spent about a year asking for help... we didn't get much. We actually had a production company willing to loan us thousands of dollars worth of equipment, but they backed out around a month before production began. Thus, our life savings magically turned into a camera, some lights a microphone and various other equipment. We traded in every favor that we were ever owed for locations, supplies and a very small amount of borrowed equipment. We had a very small crew (at least we got something good for our year of asking for help). The crew was really amazing. The biggest asset was the cast. They came through in a big way. We worked them through all hours of the night and they did it all for a little free fast food.

 

The less money you spend on a film, the harder is to pull it off and the longer it takes to do so. I am pretty proud of the amount of time that it took us to get the film completed. We are premiering the film ten and a half months after the day we began shooting. It’d usually take that amount of time or more for the standard Hollywood production, where you have up to a hundred people doing all of the things that two people did on this film. I did, however, decide that there are a few aspects of post-production that I’d much rather pay someone else to do on future projects.

 

 

Again, the cast was amazing. We auditioned over 60 actors and actresses from Indiana and surrounding states and there were some really talented people, we’ve got something in mind for nearly everyone who auditioned in future projects. We lucked out getting a cast who could play the parts perfectly and even looked the way I saw them when writing the script. They are very hard working and extremely talented, if you get the chance to see them in anything else, you must do so. The principal cast was made up of Patrick Cavanagh, Sarah Morris, Kevin Roach, Jascha Updike and Tristan Ross. They can all be seen in various other indie flicks and theater productions. Sarah Morris is currently out acting in Los Angeles.

 

The small amount of equipment that we did have loaned to us came from the guys at Pelicula Films along with a huge amount of moral support. Their film, “Imaginary You” (www.imaginaryyou.com) will be out later this year.

 

 

In March we are going to start submitting the film to every festival that we can afford. We even plan on submitting it to many overseas festivals. We will also be scheduling a handful of screenings all around the country during the summer.

 

 

We've got a few things in the works. There is another film that Harry and I want to collaborate on in a few years, but before then I have a few screenplays to choose from. The next project, however, will be written and directed by Harry Masengale and produced by myself. We plan on starting pre-production on it around October.

 

 

I think I have said more than enough. Thanks!