Genre Bias

Yesterday, April 22, 2019 marked the 10 year anniversary of the world premiere of my first and probably only foray into the world of feature film making, “Earth Day”. Film-making, especially independent filmmaking is a collaborative art form takes a lot of dedication, hard work, long hours, ingenuity, initiative, team work, arduous planning, camaraderie, experience, and money to pursue successfully. We had a lot of some of these aspects in abundance, and were sorely lacking in others, and through the process of reading this I’m sure you’ll be able to figure out which was which.

From The Ground Up: Pre Production

Since my teens I’d been trying to finish a screenplay for a feature film to varying levels of success: “The Suburban Hillbillies” a John Waters inspired comedy with hints of “A Clockwork Orange”, “Poor Subjects: When Filth Leads To Fame” a Tarantino-esque anthology again with strong Watersian overtones which then morphed into a musical that took place on a planet that was ruled by an Elvis clone whose DNA was harvested from The King’s final deposit on toilet upon his death. A screenwriting teacher at the local community college I was attending remarked that the script “fit into no current film genre” and that I might try “something more mainstream”. I scoffed at the old man at the time for chiding me for being “too original” but as I grow old I realize he probably had a point. By the time my middle twenties had hit, I’d moved into a house in downtown Eugene with some fellow supportive artist types, including two friends I’d known since middle school and was finally able to focus and complete a project. “Earth Day” was basically an amalgamation of my two greatest cinematic inspirations: the films of John Waters and slasher movies of the 1980s. I basically took those two influences and spackled them with a thick coating of my experiences growing up in Eugene, Oregon, one of the most liberal cities in the entire country and a huge hub for so-called “hippies”.

I finished the script on December 31, 2007 and gave to it my roommate Dustin (whom I affectionately to this day still call “Balboa” due to our mutual love of Rocky III) and his girlfriend at the time, Rebecca Teran, an experienced stage actress whom I’d also attended North Eugene High School with and was, ironically enough, the only person to call and leave a message when I put up casting flyers for “The Suburban Hillbillies” as an overly ambitious Senior back in 1997. They read it that night and gave me feedback, mainly commenting on how they wondered how I was going to be able to achieve some of the more ambitious sequences (Hassan’s flashback, filming twins, lighting someone on fire, etc). I simply shrugged and just surmised that I’d figure it out when we got there which for better or worse was my philosophy when it came to most things on the project!

I can’t remember ever really pondering that deeply whether or not I was actually going to turn the script into an actual film. A brief discussion between Balboa, who had also grown up making home movies and had experience shooting and editing, and myself came to the quick conclusion that we were going to go forward with the project. Now it was time to gather the resources and personnel to bring this twisted vision that I’d concocted sitting in my underwear at my computer into reality. Funds were accumulated mostly through a $5,000 bank credit line and generous contributions from friends and family. If I were to make a rough estimate I’d say that around $15,000 was spent on the entire project and every last red cent ended up on screen.

This was right before the explosion of digital technology, so I bought a Sony MiniDV camera online for the now stomach churning price of $3000, along with a boom mike, the only two pieces of equipment that I purchased for the film’s production. Today you can buy a consumer grade DSLR camera for about $600 that records every in beautiful high definition digital that stores all of the footage on a tiny chip. You could even get a higher quality image using a cell phone! If only. The convenience of today’s tech would’ve made things easier, but in some respects I’m glad we were in the last little window of time when we were forced to do it “the old way”. The cast and crew was culled exclusively from old friends, most of whom had a complete lack of film making experience but seemed utterly and totally committed to making the film a reality. Courtney was a community organizer and we had a good rapport so she got the nod of production manager. Her boyfriend, Brady, ended up as the defacto boom operator most shooting days and also appeared as “Bearded Guy #1” in the film. Cheri, whom I’d known since 6th grade was similarly committed and more importantly, she had a vehicle, which was vital as I didn’t learn to drive until I was 32 years old (I know, I know) shared the “anything and everything” role with Cheri. My best friend at the time and roommate, Brent, committed some money and what time he could to help with the special effects (when we were kids it was a common occurrence for him to make me up into whatever monster was the star of the latest horror film at the multiplex) though as he was simultaneously preparing for his yearly excursion to Burning Man his time was short. Nico None, my first long term girlfriend who became a good friend after our breakup, volunteered her talents in the wardrobe and makeup department and recruited the equally able Shannon Mudge to assist, and their work was absolutely invaluable to the production. Jason Guthrie, a compatriot from my days at Izzy’s who’d now started a company filming instructional videos, graciously allowed us the use of his film lights. Diana Dutra, Ian Dustrial, Tyler Stiffler and Casey Williams (and his loyal dog, Scooby, whom everyone loved) were all invaluable in filling in lending their vehicles, picking up cast members, running sound, and wherever else their talents were needed.

Dr. Peever (Gaylord Walker) shows off his protective footwear.

Rebecca, who had a toe in the local acting scene helped me set up auditions and get the casting call out to local performers. It was also a natural that she would play the role of Simone as I had essentially written the role for her. Gaylord Walker, whom Rebecca knew from the local Actors Cabaret, had always been in the back of my mind for the role of the insane and insidious Dr. Peever, and it didn’t hurt that we shared the same pot dealer. Maida Belove, also came from ACE and had the distinction of appearing in the most famous film made in Eugene, Animal House in the early 80’s and was a close friend of Rebecca (as well as being the mother of Anthony McCarthy, who recorded the score for the film and had auditioned for Leif), portrayed Dr. Felchenstein. I forget where exactly Rebecca knew Elizabeth Myers (Lenora) from, but her unique look and experience as a pinup model was the perfect fit for Lenora’s glamour gone grotesque look. Zak Johnson, a local musician in a band at the time known as “The Dead Americans” answered the casting call, and Rebecca was delighted when she realized that she’d known him from high school,(though I’d attended at the same time, I had no memory of him) and we both liked his portrayal of Leif, so we added another North Eugene alumnus to the cast. We felt that Christopher Anglin, also a longtime friend with a certain Johnny Depp quality who’d also auditioned for the role of Leif, was a better fit for Officer Pike. He not only fit that role but was one of my more loyal soldiers, attending all but a few days of filming and helping whenever necessary.

Adrian Salge in glorious brownface as Hassan

I didn’t require auditions for a few of the roles: I’d met Adrian Salge when he was working in the dish room at the University Of Oregon, and his unique look and sense of humor made him a perfect fit for the role of Hassan, the Middle-Eastern hairdresser. I was delighted to learn that he’d had acting experience (mostly school plays) and he accepted the role with little prodding on my part, though if he knew the amount of work in the form of hours of makeup, paragraphs of difficult dialogue, and spending half of filming saddled with over-sized breast implants which Dr. Peever’s attaches to Hassan as a bizarre form of mental abuse. Joe Gordon, another friend from the University Of Oregon had a mellow, heavy lidded affect that fit Grid’s perfectly as soon as we fitted him with patchwork pants and a hat that had another friend’s clipped dreadlocks hanging out of the sides. Joanna Laemle, a brilliant photographer who also took every single last still for the film, was chosen for the role of Lily as she is basically one of the sweetest, purest human beings I’ve ever known. I can still remember sitting on my bed after informing her that she’d gotten the role and hearing through the window as she remarked in delight to Tyler as they rode off on their bikes: “I’m gonna be in a movie!” To this day she remains the film’s strongest supporter and most adrent champion.

Andrew Diozenghy whom I knew from my days working at an Izzy’s Pizzeria in the late 90’s was a natural for Simone’s tough yet tender bodyguard, Baby Mickey. Likewise, Chris Mix was a co-worker from the U of O whom had retired for health reasons but I knew his gruff exterior would be perfect for Hassan’s domineering father from years of watching students cower in fear as he barked at them from the dish room as they placed their dirty dishes on the rack. So strong was his reputation as a rigid take no prisoners character that he was known among the residents of the dormitory as “Mean Kenny Rogers”. Maycie Williamson secured the role of Melody, Grid’s stoner girlfriend. She was great in her role but between filming and the premiere we lost contact and her number changed and to this day I’m still not sure if she’s ever even seen the film. Tom Kelsey, Bruce McCarthy, Brian Kauffman, and Chris Morgan filled out the supporting roles of police officers and the rednecks who cause the tragedy that sets off the events of the film, respectively.

Bruce Lundy looking suave as Detective Torrance

Only two major roles were left to be filled: We had several auditions for Detective Torrance, the stern police officer whose racist tendencies convince him that Hassan is responsible for the murders despite his obviously mellow demeanor. One guy, who was a cop in real life, whose attitude was a little too close to Torrance in real life demanded all sorts of credentials and credits before he would “consent to appearing in the film”. We did him a favor and drew a line through his name instead. Bruce Lundy, also an experienced local stage and commercial performer (who’d also appeared in Animal House, ironically) did a pitch perfect reading of Torrance, seemed easy to work with, and it didn’t hurt that every woman on the crew found him absolutely adorable, either. Finally, I had to pick the woman who would fill the dual role of twin sisters Pixie and Priscilla. Nico auditioned but admittedly had no experience and was a bit too nervous to let her dramatic talents unfurl. Another possible candidate was so bad that I saw Rebecca scribble “BORING and Zzzzzz” on her notepad as her potential castmate droned through her audition. Another played the role fine but didn’t exactly fit the look we needed for the character. However, the final auditioner had potential. A 21 year old theater student, she fit the look of Priscilla in the script perfectly, and gave a spot-on reading laced with attitude. Rebecca and I both nodded to each other as she finished reading. Our hearts sank, however, when we realized that she hadn’t read the script and was unaware that the film would require extensive nudity on her part, a notion she openly scoffed at. “Your crotch would be completely covered,” Rebecca implored, using her best stage mom voice to convince her that it wasn’t as extreme as she was making it out to be. In the end our potential star decided that she wasn’t ready to bare all in front of complete strangers for little to no compensation.

Priscilla (Daphne Danger) and Pixie (Koi O'Eltressiah) twins in life and in cinema.

I returned home that night in a conundrum. Surely someone not only capable but more importantly, willing to play dual roles had to be found in time for the production to begin. I was explaining my woes to my roommate, Violet, another artist who thankfully kept the household from being a complete sausage party, and her eyes narrowed and she started to nod her head to the left as I pondered the possible solution to my problem. Sitting on the floor was her friend, Lulu, a gothish/punkish gal who fit Priscilla’s outlook on life perfectly. I shrugged. Violette scoffed. “You know she’s a twin, right?” and suddenly a million light bulbs went off in my head. An old roommate, Reed, had told me of dating a “Lu” in the past and her having a twin sister, D.J., whom I also knew but whose appearance and affect was so different than that of her sister that I just simply never put two and two together. I had to stop myself from jumping up and down with joy as the answer, seemingly the perfect one, had literally fallen into my lap. I asked Lulu on the spot if she would read for the role and she agreed, probably not realizing that her character appeared on nearly every page of the script (maybe I left that out when I initially approached her?) or perhaps not believing that I would actually see this project of completing a feature film on a shoestring budget through. (Honestly, I think that is part of the reason that many of my friends agreed to participate: once the runaway train started catching speed, it was going too fast to jump off!) Once Lulu had signed on, it was easy to convince D.J. to perform the relatively minor role of Pixie, though she quickly informed me that I would have to schedule her filming dates around her attendance of Burning Man.

Nico & I amassed the wardrobe from the film by perusing local second hand shops, while most of the islamic wear was acquired online, though Dore Zarlons, another co-worker who happened to be Muslim was kind enough to give me some items that he hadn’t worn in years. Deluxe, a local boutique, was kind enough to donate some more stylish outfits for Priscilla’s scenes, and many of the cast & crew just simply wore their own clothes, one of the definite advantages of “casting to type”.

Bruce Lundy prepares for a take at the school that doubled as the police station in the film.

Locations were a little more difficult to procure, but between all of the connections that the cast and crew had, they were all nailed down weeks before production began. It was kind of amazing how all of these locations that perfectly fit those in the film were basically just handed to me. A crew member’s parents consented to us using the woods in their acreage just outside Eugene for the logging protest, Leif & Pixie’s deaths, and Priscilla & Hassan’s final confrontation with Dr. Peever. However after the first weekend shooting there, his Mother requested that we rent a port-a-potty to prevent the constant rotation of cast & crew coming in and out of her house throughout the day and night to use the bathroom. A cast member’s sister & brother in law were both teachers who worked at a local alternative high school, and since it was Summer and they were both sympathetic to the arts, they simply unlocked the doors and let us use the main office as the police station while they prepared their curriculum for the following school year in their nearby classrooms, unbeknownst to the local school district.

An apparently funny moment while preparing a shot outside the "Peever House".

After our initial location fell through, Adrian consented to letting us use his house in North Eugene as the Peever house, while my personal bedroom was used for Priscilla’s domain where the final confrontation takes place. Landon, Violet’s boyfriend and our roommate, suggested Living Arts Botanicals, a nursery located next door to the machinist shop where he worked and had developed a rapport with the owner, Dalton, as Lily’s nursery, and he kindly consented. A side room in the building doubled as the interrogation room where Priscilla and Pixie have their conversation at the end of the film. Sara, my girlfriend’s co-worker, offered the use of her pad, a perfectly decorated hippie pad for Grid’s domain and site of his demise. Cheri’s sister Tiffany turned over her apartment in the fancy Tiffany building in downtown Eugene doubled as Simone’s luxury apartment and site of her fatal bleach enema. Chris Mix’s daughter kindly allowed us the use of her farm land, deliciously littered with broken down cars and rusty farm buildings as the Hassan family compound in “Pakistan”. Troy Slavkovsky (starring as himself in the film), who owned Diablo’s, a popular downtown watering hole, not only volunteered his place of business as a filming location but allowed us to have a fundraiser party there as well.

Detailed lists were compiled cross-referencing props, locations, characters and the dates and times in which they were scheduled to appear were created and then arduously examined countless times. Honestly, the amount of pre-production that we did, at least in the technical departments, saved us in the end, though a few cast members lamented that we didn’t dedicate more time to rehearsals before shooting commenced.

A frequent sight during production, Adrian being fitted with his fake boobs.

Tilling The Soil: Principal Photography

Shooting was initially scheduled to occur over four three day weekends. Yes, we foolishly attempted to shoot a feature film in twelve days. However, we did only go a total of three days over schedule when it was all said and done. Hey, I’ll take it. Finally, day one of shooting commenced at the farmhouse, where we were to shoot the exteriors of Hassan’s flashback. A friend with an affinity for firearms kindly loaned me an Uzi and an AK-47 to add authenticity of the scenes where Hassan appears at the arms dealers to return the erroneously shipped switchblade combs and ends up having his life changed forever. I basically rounded up all of the brown people I could find (as well as their children) and put them in middle eastern attire. In a sequence that was ultimately excised from the film, Hassan was supposed to first give some Pakistani children M-80s but then as he gained an affinity for hair care hand them switchblade combs instead, which they would throw at him angrily. Already tense on my “first day on the job”, so to speak, the first production snafu occurred as the “crummy” military type truck that Chris had volunteered for our use broke down just as filming began. A local mailman in a rustic looking jeep showed up, and interested in the prospect of an independent film being made in his midst, allowed us to use his mail truck, which I quickly acceded to as time was already slipping away and my blood pressure was skyrocketing. On first take, Adrian drive the car up to the children but then rather than get out and address the children, he simply sat in the car as I yelled at him to get out of the car. This happened a few times before Brent implored me that I needed to calm down if I was going to keep the crew on my good side. Adding to the tensions, a farmer who lived across the street drove up and no doubt incited by a group of apparent foreigners in “terrorist gear” (thankfully, the assault weapons were stored out of sight) and in a very cliched manner demanded that we get “off his property”. Luckily we had gotten most of the footage we’d needed and the mailman had insisted that he needed to finish his route, so we moved the shooting back to my place, where we’d constructed Hassan’s compound in our basement.

Hassan (Adrian Salge) takes instructions from his father (Chris Mix)

It was here that the mood of the film was greatly lifted, by Chris and his delightful improvisations as Hassan, Sr. Knowing that the sequence would be narrated by Adrian in post-production, I gave Chris full reign to improvise his “manifesto” which did hilariously, vowing to send his victims “back to pieces in their family”. Hassan, Sr was scripted to rough Hassan up a bit after he discovers his wayward son using hair care products. I implored Chris that he needed to really lay the shots in to make them look real, and Adrian assented. Chris took great delight in absolutely paint brushing Adrian around with his oven mitt sized hands as he bellowed “toys, you play with toys!”

Despite the second half of day one lightning mood considerably, we weren’t out of the woods just yet. Having utilized a somewhat barebones crew day #1 (Balboa, Cheri, Courtney and Casey manning the boom mike), Day 2 was the first day we’d utilize the full crew. Adrian was in full makeup and Joe had been fitted with his full stoner attire, yet Lulu, who had to carry the majority of the scenes was nowhere to be found. Already an hour behind schedule I started to panic, as the visions of the production breaking down just as Chris’ truck had the day before began to swirl in my head. Perhaps she had realized that participating in the production was too much to and had decided to abandon ship without notice? Knowing where she lived, Brent volunteered to walk over to her house after attempts to rouse her by telephone were unsuccessful. He returned quickly and informed us that the only response he received was from Lulu’s irate roommate, Elise, a friend of ours who responded to being woken up with ire and in no uncertain terms implored him to fuck off before slamming the door.

I was on the verge of shutting the production down for the day, unable to corral other cast members and to film alternate scenes when Lulu burst in the door, sleepy-eyed and apologetic. Nevertheless, I completely lost my temper and unleashed on an torrent of obscenities fueled not just by her tardiness but no doubt the stresses of low budget filmmaking as well. Luckily we were able to film the rest of the day’s scenes with little stress, despite the fact that much of the action took place at Saturday Market, a weekly outdoor craft fair. To their credit, both the patrons and vendors respected our “Don’t Look At The Camera” signs and didn’t ruin a single shot.

Script Supervisor Cheri Browne logs another take.

Day 3 began as we inexplicably drove twenty miles out of town to a rest stop off I-5. Why we did this instead of selecting a more centralized area for the scenes (which were simply Hassan waking up after being freed from Dr. Peever’s basement) is beyond me, but this was just another valuable lesson that we learned the first weekend. The other big one occurred when we returned back to our house, which served as “headquarters” for much of the shoot. A scene full of paragraphs of wordy dialogue awaited for Adrian and Lulu, as Hassan explained to Priscilla the reason for his expulsion from his home country of Pakistan. Despite the fact that Cheri had the job title of “Script Supervisor” (though her big job on the film aside from various production duties was logging each and every take, a log that has proved invaluable in writing this post), it took us until the end of this day to realize that if someone flubbed a line, they simply had to pause, wait for Cheri to feed them the line, and then continue. Instead we would restart the scene from the beginning, as agonizing as that was to everyone involved.

Going back to work at the U of O during the week was almost a relief: I had plenty to talk to my co-workers about, and I could just sleepwalk through my daily duties, stress free, though much of the mornings and evenings before and after my shifts were consumed with planning and coordinating the film’s production.

Cheri and Courtney try on Hassan's fake boobs for size.

The next week we started back at headquarters. Hassan’s compound in the basement had been converted to Dr. Peever’s “operating room” which was merely a bunch of green sheets we’d acquired at a local thrift shop, a table, and of course Hassan’s enormous fake tits. Nico and I found the largest bra we’d ever seen, and for the first couple of weeks, we stuffed it with water balloons filled with gelatin that had a very low water ratio making them thick like silicone. However, we knew that Adrian was going to face a lot of action in the coming weeks, and the process of mixing up new tits for him every day quickly grew cumbersome. I’d read somewhere that Divine used lentils for his tits because they weren’t too heavy and moved naturally, so we stuffed pantyhose with bird seed, and viola! Reliable tits for the duration of the shooting schedule.

The arrival of Dr. Peever also heralded the arrival of our first experienced actor, Gaylord, a graduate of Julliard who had appeared in numerous stage and film/TV productions. I’m glad that we had the first week to at least get some of the kinks in our production out, because Gaylord had many, many lessons to teach us. I first noticed that he played the scene exactly the same every time, which might seem like it should be obvious but for whatever reason hadn’t struck any of us in the first week of production. He had absolutely no patience for lollygagging or wasting of time: not to say he didn’t have a sense of humor or was unkind, but he was absolutely serious about his work. I also learned quickly that he didn’t appreciate arriving at the same time as the crew did. Call time for the actors was different than call time for the cast. When the cast arrived they should simply have time allotted for makeup and wardrobe and the crew should be ready to shoot. I did my best to adjust my production methods as quickly and efficiently as possible. Day four had been pretty easy: we only had to shoot one scene, Gaylord’s professionalism and Adrian’s growing comfort living in Hassan’s skin made for a smooth shoot.

Balboa captures Lily (Johanna Laemle) in a serene moment.

The next day was possibly the most harrowing of the entire shoot, and one that threatened to shut down the entire project, due to my actions, or more accurately, reactions. Several important sequences were being shot over the course of one day, in a public park on the hottest day of 2008, with temperatures peaking at 100 degrees. I had stupidly scheduled us to shoot every single scene that took place in the park: according to the log book, we shot 2 & ½ pages worth of footage or 119 takes over the course of the day. For comparison’s sake, we shot 26 takes the previous day. The first scenes, of Dr. Peever attacking Hassan with the help of Lenora, in Elizabeth’s first appearance went off largely without a hitch, aside from the loud fire horns that we learned would randomly start sounding ten times throughout the day. The stress of having to cram so much footage in one day gradually got to me, as did the heat. At one point, Balboa informed me that the camera battery was almost out. When I learned that no one had charged the others using the car charger I’d purchased for such an occasion (granted, I had not bothered to assign this task to anyone) I threw my copy of the script in a rage and stormed off to the car. I can’t remember specifically, but I must’ve went on numerous other rants throughout the day as the pressure of the impossible schedule I’d created and the heatwave rolling over us burnt my last nerve.

Dr. Peever (Gaylord Walker) confronts Priscilla on a very hot day in the park.

During the opening scene in which the hippies reunite to plant the tree in remembrance of Pixie, three guys (one of whom I’d worked with before at Izzy’s twelve years prior) showed up wanting to use the horse shoe pit which was located right where we were filming. As my delirious, anxious brain began to concoct scenarios as to how I would somehow bludgeon these men and hide them in the bushes so we could resume shooting, Courtney sprang into action, confidently informing the men that we had a city permit to shoot in the park (which was a complete and utter lie) and that she would be happy to call the parks division if they had any questions. Thankfully, they just shrugged and wandered off and our pretend horror movie did not descend into a real life one.

The one incident that did lighten the mood somewhat occured when Rebecca was handing out pills to her compatriots. Trying to stay in character, Zak popped the pills she handed him and when it was time for another take, she asked for them back. “I ate them,” Zak replied sheepishly. “Zak, those are antidiuretics! You helped me figure out what they were!” “Well, what did I take,” Joe asked. “That was just calcium,” Rebecca answered, as Zak sprung to his feet and ran to the bushes, emptying the contents of his stomach onto mother Gaia herself.

To add to the dismay of the day, when we returned home and watched the dailies, Balboa noted that the footage looked grainy. Upon further examination, we realized that somehow all of the footage from the entire day had turned out looking darker and dirty than the rest of the film. We never figured out if it was the heat or a ‘bad tape’ but we ended up going back and reshooting Priscilla and Hassan’s walk in the park as well as Hassan’s meetup with Lily. The filmmaking lessons were coming in hard and fast at this point.

Hassan (Adrian Salge) arrives at Lily's nursery, unaware of the terror that awaits inside.

The next day was scheduled for the nursery, where we were to shoot our first death scene: the dismemberment and replanting of Lily. As the day’s shoot began, Courtney pulled me aside and informed me she had drawn the short straw and been nominated to inform me that I had pretty much pissed of everyone with my temper tantrums and outbursts the previous day, and if I didn’t get my shit together everyone might walk, at least a good portion of the crew whom unlike the cast had to deal with my anxious assholism on a consistent basis. “It’s gonna be ok, man, we’re gonna finish this thing. We’re all here to help you, you just gotta chill out a little.” I nodded, a little ashamed with myself for lashing out at people that had sacrificed their entire Summer to bring this project to life, but it was a much needed wake-up call.

It seemed that most in the crew had to try on Hassan's boobs at least once.

Here Makeup/Wardrobe supervisor Nico None gives them a try.

Originally, I had imagined Lily’s death as necessitating prosthetics, to portray her arms, legs and head being severed and planted in various vases and flower pots, but Landon ingeniously suggested placing Johanna in the planter with her arms and head sticking out while another person laid underneath her and portrayed her severed legs, a duty that Rebecca volunteered for. The effect along with Hassan’s hilarious high pitched scream upon discovering this bizarre piece of horticultural homicide made the first murder scene shot for the film much easier and more effective than I originally imagined. We finished by transforming a side room of the building into the “interrogation room” where Priscilla and Pixie have their final struggle for control of Priscilla’s body in the closing scene of the film.

All pilled up and ready to pop!

Sometime over the next week, the stress finally broke me as I sat down in my office chair, no doubt to examine the shooting schedule for the following week or obsess over some other detail, when I felt a shooting pain that started in the top of my neck and shot down my arm. Upon visiting the doctor, I was informed that I had possibly pinched a nerve in my neck (I later learned it was a herniated disc) and was prescribed a hefty dose of pain pills and a giant neck brace. Andy Kaufman would’ve been proud, I thought, as I cinched the cartoonishly large collar around my neck. When Courtney stopped by my house the next days, she fell to her knees laughing uncontrollably at the sight of someone who had gotten exactly what was coming to him.

Christopher Anglin (Officer Pike) and Bruce Lundy (Detective Torrance) made for a popular duo.

The neck brace and collar, along with Courtney’s sobering speech at the nursery seemed somehow to rein in my mania and it seemed by the third week of shooting that the crew had become somewhat of a well oiled machine. As hard as it is to believe, we didn’t even shoot any of the scenes with Bruce or Christopher (Detective Torrance and Officer Pike, respectively) until the third week, so Bruce missed much of the chaos, though Christopher worked arduously behind the camera whenever he wasn’t needed in front of it. The crew worked pretty quickly to remove any signage from the office of the school that indicated it’s true purpose, taking careful photos to ensure we could replace everything to its original location. Like Gaylord, Bruce’s professionalism shone through and he gave his role a stern, tongue deeply in cheek delivery that nicely balanced the wackiness present in the rest of the film.

Grid (Josef Gordon) and Melody (Maycie Lynn) chill at their pad.

Shooting Grid’s death at Sara’s “hippy pad” was nice and mellow. Her cat, Princess Louie was a willing participant and stayed in place on the arm of the couch throughout numerous takes. Nervous about anything potentially shutting down the production, I anxiously insisted that we use mullen as a replacement for real pot whenever the cast was required to smoke weed, even when we were indoors, resulting in some real life “bad hits” for Joe when he had to take bong rips of the stuff. Joe who played Grid perfectly, had been understandably grumpy during some of the long hot outdoor shoots due to some blood pressure issues, seemed to really relish his death scene where Grid is impaled with broken bong. He confessed that as a kid one of his favorite games was to pretend that he was dying, so being able to do so for a film complete with gore effects was evidently a dream come true for him.

The acreage provided for a nice mellow shooting locale for cast & crew alike to relax between takes.

Over the course of the shoot, exhaustion became a state of being of which I became well accustomed. One day of shooting, I had chosen to make Rebecca the target of most of my jokes and one-liners until, once we returned home, no doubt exhausted as well, she let me know in no uncertain terms that she'd had enough. Quickly mumbling an apology and blaming sleep deprivation for my surge of assholism, I shuffled into my bedroom, sat on my bed, blinked and suddenly my alarms was going off. The four hour window I'd allotted for sleep had gone by "in the blink of an eye", and I was none the more rested for it. Thankfully, some of the more relaxed days of shooting took place on the acreage where we shot the protest as well as both Leif and Pixie’s death scenes. We were able to set up air mattresses for the cast & crew to lounge on between takes and setups, and it felt like we were all on a little campout. However, the first time we shot Leif’s death, we had lost too much daylight and had to resort to using lights from several cars parked near the location site. As they pumped the blood, it sprayed all over Balboa and the camera as he jumped out of the line of fire and visions of a destroyed camera soaked in corn syrup bounced in my head. We ended up re-shooting the scene the following week and while the shooting went smoothly this time (we wisely wrapped the cameraman and the two crew members in parkas fashioned from trash bags), the blood ended up looking too bright & watery.

We wisely wrapped Balboa in a trash bag parka time the second time we shot Leif's death scene.

It’s the one death scene that I wish I would’ve paid closer attention to, though Zak’s screams of pain managed to save it from being a total loss. The night we shot Pixie’s death, which began with the hippies singing “Great Gaia” around the campfire was fun. Earlier in the day I had given Zak a small paragraph of lyrics and he and Rebecca plucked out a catchy tune that still makes me laugh to this day for it’s satirical yet still genuine content and feel.

Rebecca and Zak cut loose at they compose the song "Great Gaia".

The shoot grew more stressful as the night went on as our allotted time was entirely regulated by the amount of fuel left in the generator, which the landowner had generously offered us to run our lights. Courtney & Cheri had both opted to leave as night fell to attend a concert in town, so the crew was pretty barebones aside from Dustin on camera and Christopher on boom. We had also been warned that we had to be careful not to awake the neighbors, so most of the dialogue had to be delivered in whispers and overdubbed later. I’d supplied the cast & crew with cases of PBR to help them get relaxed and into the spirit of the scene and we were about halfway through shooting when the landowner came by to watch. Not realizing that he was a recovered alcoholic, I offered him some beers as a thank you for allowing us to shoot on his property. Before I realized what was happening, he was barking orders at the cast, yelling “cut” and telling them to stop “acting like themselves”. Thankfully, a family member was kind enough to lead my new assistant director back to his house, where he inaccurately informed his wife that we had “given him acid”.

Volunteering myself as a guinea pig as we figure out Pixie's death scene.

The oversized doll head that I’d purchased for Pixie’s death scene didn’t quite do the trick when the truck backed over it, so I replaced it with a cantaloupe, cut in half and filled with hamburger and doused with red food coloring. Due to the rush against time and fuel, we were also unable to get a good shot of Chris’ dick and balls after it had been doused with boiling water, but those are the little disappointments you have to learn to accept in low-budget filmmaking.

Wardrobe/Makeup supervisor Nico None gives Brian Kauffman (Eli) a fresh mullet to help him get into the spirit of his character.

Despite the chainsaw Brian was holding raging in the dead of night, we learned the next morning that the neighbors were completely unaware of any movie shooting happening within our midst, and the generator finally died at around 3 a.m., just as we had finally gotten enough coverage to edit the scene together workably.

One of the many takes of Lenora fellating the pistol that left cast & crew alike in stitches.

Finally, it was time to shoot the climactic scenes of the film, Lenora’s attack on Hassan and Priscilla’s reveal as the actual killer. As the cops burst in and Bruce screams his trademark line, “Sweet Shit Of Christ!” Christopher was scripted to shove his gun into Beth’s mouth and inform her “One move, that’s all it takes”, to which Beth respond by fellating the barrell of the gun, causing nearly everyone on the set to lose it and necessitating about ten retakes before we were able to finish the scene without interruption.

Lulu seems awfully proud of her newly constructed pube merkin.

For the reveal where Priscilla emerges from the bathroom wielding scissors and as Dr. Felchenstein refers to it, “an umkempt pubis”, the source of the mysterious hair that was discovered in the throats of the victims, we found some goat fur that was tied brown and fashioned into a sort of furry g-string merkin that Lulu was able to wear comfortably without feeling too exposed. Everything shot in the hallway of “the peever house” took place at Adrian’s and the final fight after she kicks Hassan in the balls and he stumbles into her bedroom which switched over to my bedroom at headquarters.

Landon tries in vain to get the pube merkin to catch flame.

Landon assumed the role of “torchmaster” and we slathered Lulu’s bare legs and torso with burn gel to prevent her from catching on fire. Landon tried about ten times to light the merkin on fire and surmised that it wasn’t going to catch. The temperature of the room was rising rapidly and the air became thick with the fumes from the gas fueling the blowtorch. Finally Landon filled a little spray bottle with alcohol and doused the pube wig with it, causing it to finally burst into flames after a few flares from the torch. As well as the effect worked, I wish I would’ve taken more time to get better coverage of the scene as the final version feels a bit too rushed to be completely effective. In retrospect I probably should’ve gotten Pixie involved to illustrate what was going on in Priscilla’s head: showing the two sisters arguing then cutting back to Priscilla alone in the room with Hassan. Nevertheless, looking back it is completely insane to me that we managed to safely light someone on fire without the use of any kind of digital effect and Lulu deserves every kudo imaginable for being the trooper of all troopers.

Simone’s bleach enema in the bathroom of her luxury hotel, was no doubt the easiest death scene we shot. Andrew Diozenghy as Baby Mickey, Simone’s bodyguard, leaves after she request some “rum and coke” and Priscilla sneaks into the hotel room and fills her enema bag with bleach from under the sink, squeezing it violently to push the contents into her colon, shooting blood onto the bathtub as her legs flailed frantically. Baby Mickey returns (after Andrew accidentally sent himself down the elevator by pressing the “Door Close” instead of “Door Open” and upon discovering Simone’s corpse chugs some rum and rubs the “coke” into his gums like a teething baby. After a couple of takes, Andrew remarked that he didn’t realize that the rum would be real and admitted to feeling a little drunk, which at least helped him loosen up for his acting debut.

With Simone’s death in the can, we’d finished about two days over schedule (in essence we completed principal photography in just 14 shooting days). About a month later, we recovened for reshoots of Hassan and Priscilla meeting Lily in the park (though in retrospect this was probably unnecessary) as well as the sequence from Hassan’s flashback where he meets Kamala and discovers his love for hair care.

Reaping The Harvest:Post-Production

Shortly after we completed filming, Balboa informed me that he and Rebecca would be moving to Portland, where attended Portland State University to study digital effects. Over the course of the following six months, aside from a couple of visits, my involvement in the editing process was relegated to correspondence with him via email which in retrospect was probably not ideal, though he did a fine job and I am forever grateful for the immense amounts of time and energy that he dedicated to the project.

I moved out of the house in December, shortly after Violet and Landon had done the same. Though he was originally pegged to do the sound design for the film, Landon finally confessed to not really feeling up to the task. Balboa informed me that Rebecca’s sister Jori and her partner, Eric Munch, were experienced sound designers and lived in Seattle. He coordinated this entirely and their work absolutely wrapped the film’s production in a tidy bow and made it feel “like a real movie”. I regret to admit that the one time I met Jori in person, I succumbed to shyness and failed to introduce myself or thank her for her hard work on the film, a slight that Balboa later informed me was not met with great enthusiasm, to say the least. Including the losses of temper and other outbursts that I subjected the crew to, this is the incident from the making of the film that still brings me shame to this day. If I ever make another film and they are willing to participate, I’m paying them double for their brilliant work.

Anthony McCarthy stepped in and put together a great score mixed with some songs from his band “The Rhythm Pimps” that sounded like a circus version of “A Nightmare On Elm Street” on a dose of melatonin. He’s another great artist that I’d love to work with again at some point, ideally with a larger budget available.

I had stupidly assumed that I would have no trouble scheduling screenings for the film at Bijou Art Cinemas, an independent theater located near campus in Eugene. Unfortunately, after I sent a rough cut of the film to the manager, I was told that they would not be willing to show the film due to it being “offensive”, without actually informing me what the offending clip was, though I wouldn’t have been willing to excise anything from the film regardless. I managed to rent space at the Downtown Initiative For The Visual Arts for the premiere, and while the space worked fine, it was not the grand theatrical premiere I’d hoped for and was the beginning of a series of disappointments to follow in regards to the release of the film.

Time was so tight that I didn’t really have time to review any of these elements as the premiere date approached quickly. Balboa and Rebecca arrived the night before and we watched the premiere cut of the film, remarking on this or that but realizing that it was all for nought: we were on the verge of releasing our baby into the wild.

The cast & crew prepare to enjoy the premiere.

Dust In The Wind: Premiere & Release

The cast and crew premiere took place the night before the world premiere, Earth Day Eve 2009. Much of the cast and crew dressed up for the occasion but Balboa and I had been up most of the night endlessly analyzing the film and basically came dressed in our “street clothes”, causing Elizabeth who was dolled up to the hilt to remark, “I thought we were dressing up for this!” The cast and crew was happy with the finished product which soothed my nerves a bit. The public screenings (there were three scheduled for 5, 7 & 9) all sold out and went as expected. Dawn Baby was kind enough to slip me a flash of whiskey as I distributed tickets at the door. Parents, no doubt shocked by some of the content politely thanked us for the invite and the friends of the cast and crew laughed in all the right places.

The god awful poster the distributor created for the DVD release.

About a month after the premiere, I found an ad online from a company called “R-Squared Films”, a budding DVD distribution outlet that was searching for independent films to acquire and promote. I sent a copy of the film to Buzz Remde, the owner, and he quickly replied after viewing the film that his company would like to pick it up. “Wow, that was easy,” I thought to myself as I scanned over the contract he sent, signing and emailing it back to him with little haste. Shortly after, they sent me the prospective artwork for the DVD release, which was an awful and obvious rip-off of “April Fool’s Day” with a sad face motif. Let’s say that the sad faces matched my expression when I inquired as to why they neglected to use the original poster art featuring the “Dirty Feet” and instead utilized stock art featuring actors that weren’t even in the film. “Sex sells,” Buzz replied dryly. “Nobody’s going to want to see a film that’s promoted with a pair of dirty feet.” I took as a slight consolation when he agreed to change the text on the sign that the protestors were holding from “Take Off Your Shirt For Global Warming” to the catchier “Get Naked For Nature”, but unfortunately that was the first and only concession he made in relation to the film’s promotion.

In retrospect, we probably made the film two or three years too early given all of the rapid advances in technology that were imminent and would've helped with the production and distribution of the film. Affordable, high-def cameras were only a few years away, we wouldn't have had any of the problems that bad tapes provided. The DVD deal was signed right about the time that market was dying for good. Today I could promote distribute the film myself selling digital copies and charge a premium price for those who wanted a deluxe collector's edition blu-ray copy rather than deal with a total stranger than may have had his market misjudged and undoubtedly had the ability to shuffle numbers in his favor if it meant increasing his margin.

In the 10 years since the release, I have received probably about $300 in total from Buzz in relation to the DVD deal, though the film became available for streaming on amazon and other horror related streaming services over the years. After a while, he eventually just stopped answering my emails, and now the company seems to be shutdown as the website is dead and it is probably still just available on amazon because no one has ever bothered to tell them to take it down. Since he hasn’t fulfilled any of the terms of the contract, I think it’s safe to say that the full distribution rights have reverted back to me. I created a facebook page with all sorts of photos and other goodies here. I uploaded the film on Youtube and its now available for everyone to check out free of charge:

The disappointment in regards to the DVD release plagued me for years, and there was a time when I almost tried to discount the fact that the film even existed. I couldn’t look at it without it causing great anxiety, it was impossible to watch a single frame without pondering what I could’ve done differently to make it more of a success. About a year and a half after it’s release, I had a chance to pursue a career in professional wrestling and that pretty much diverted me from pursuing film making again, though I have written three more screenplays since “Earth Day”. In retrospect, I gave up on movie making too easily. I probably should’ve just tightened my bootstraps and made another film every 2-3 years or so, and as my skills and techniques improved it might have compelled viewers to go back and check out my earlier work.

Making “Earth Day” was one of the most remarkable experiences of my life. I remarked shortly after making the film that the process really showed me who were my real friends and also who weren’t. I'm extremely proud of the project now that all of the anxieties I'd once attached to it have finally faded away. It's a great testament to the innumerable talents of the extended friend group that I'd surrounded myself with in my teens and twenties. I'm happy to say that I consider most of them dear friends to this day even if I don't see them as much as I'd like. Their faces will remain friendly and familiar to me until the day I die.

Last weekend, I held a 10 year reunion screening of the film at the movie theater I now manage. It was a delight to see all of the wonderful, forever familiar faces of everyone that stuck with me in that crazy summer in 2008. I am happy to say that rewatching the film, in a theater at last, finally free of the anxiety that I’d once attached to it was the most fun of I’ve ever had viewing it. It brought back nothing but happy memories and I feel like time has been kind to the film, brownface aside. I’m delighted to say that I’m finally completely happy and proud of what our merry little band was able to accomplish, and I’d be lying if I didn’t say that the experience rekindled my interest in independent filmmaking again. There’s still plenty of time left to tell more stories and as Pixie remarks at the end of the film, “after all, every day...is Earth Day.”

Friday, November 13, 2020

Tuesday, April 23, 2019

"Sweet Shit Of Christ!" The Making Of Earth Day