Monthly Archives: November 2012

To Sundance or Not To Sundance….

30 Friday Nov 2012

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….that is the question.

After a talk with one of my inspiring indie film friends, I went crazy and booked a hotel room for four at Sundance in Park City at $289/night.  Of course, I can still cancel the reservation in the next two weeks so there’s really no risk to me just yet.  But I figured I can recruit three other crazies to drive in my black Prius, split gas, split the hotel room and dive into the nexus of the film festival world for under $500 bucks.  I already have a lead on one or two potential Prius-Riders (it’s hard to feel gangsta in a Prius, but still, I think I’ll manage to feel a little gangsta).

The question is, is this worth my time and money? I’m leaning “yes” for a couple reasons.

I had planned to hold a reading of the polished screenplay for investors and industry on January 16th.   Well, I might lose some folks due to Sundance on that date and might gain some folks after the festival by moving that to around February 5th, 6th or 7th. (My friend suggested other industry folks might be at their “high point” of interest in indie film right after a successful festival). If all my prep work was headed towards a date that wasn’t ideal, maybe I ought to work with the calendar instead of fighting it. And if I do attend Sundance, I’d have the reading – an upcoming event – to invite people who showed interest in me or the film.

Also, I had previously thought it was better to attend a film festival only after you’ve had a film accepted into that festival.  My friend convinced me that this might not be the right approach. After all, selection to Sundance is very rare and political, so there’s no shame in not having a film there…just yet. Plus, a Sundance experience might connect me to other interesting filmmakers and film-lovers and provide a sort of energetic push for the project.  While I certainly don’t plan to give Park City the “hard sell” on ‘Inside-Out, Outside-In,’ a few new friendships are worth a lot over the course of a career and Sundance at least provides an opportunity – and one OUTSIDE the established power structure of L.A. – to make connections and to be exposed to new ideas and talent. In a sense, everyone there is at least committed enough to filmmaking to travel some distance. So that’s promising in and of itself.

Plus, I’ve never done Sundance and maybe it’s just that time. Maybe this year is the year the itch becomes a scratch and that’s okay.

Will Sundance be worth it? I don’t know, but Hamlet ended up killing himself and his family after bemoaning an existential question, so I’m not gonna take his example and second guess too much. I guess “To Sundance” it is….

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Hunter Lee Hughes is a filmmaker and actor living and working in Los Angeles and the founder of Fatelink. His current feature film Guys Reading Poems is touring film festivals and this blog is dedicated to the process of making his second feature film, “Inside-Out, Outside-In.” If you enjoy the blog, please support our team by following us on Facebook, Twitter (@Fatelink) or Instagram (@Fatelink).

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Intimacy Cinema: The anti-Cool solution to destructive L.A. veneer

16 Friday Nov 2012

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I believe a revitalized cinema must first strip away the sleek “coolness” and visual sophistication that has infected Los Angeles and…through its amplification by Hollywood stars…the world. The demoralizing pretty people on the big screen these days no longer seem to exemplify beauty, but rather seem to be a sum of parts – cute face, talent, hot abs, nice ass, confidence. Whereas something truly beautiful inspires us to live a more realized life, the current crop of Hollywood stars, starlets and films somehow leaves you feeling badly about yourself, not measuring up, as if somehow the films themselves are sending powerful coded messages that its own creators and participants are more valuable than you, sitting in the audience.  While this state of affairs may’ve always been true in terms of raw financial net worth of stars vs audience members, there were periods in movie history where we felt the people on screen were “one of us (only better).” Now, there is an unconscious sense that we’ll never be like the people in the movies…and they know it.

It is a tried-and-true cliche that Hollywood values “special effects” over story. Well, I believe not only that the cliche is true, but the mindset of “special effects” has taken over the casting process and our selection of cultural icons. The modern crop of stars embodies, in a sense, the ethos of this “special effects” mentality. The stars are dazzling, monumental in scale and proportion yet deceptive, flashy and empty of content deeper than a loud “Pop.” Whatever depth of feeling they do generate is almost a spectacle, rather than an organic part of their humanity. As assuredly as something was “missing” from the Old Testament God that rained vengeance on those that didn’t worship Him, something is missing from the stars/myths of modern cinema. What is missing?

A revitalized and satisfying movie experience requires a re-evaluation of the truly important moments in a human being’s life and the most crucial aspects to being alive. I believe the amazing technical and visual sophistication of Hollywood and its ever-increasing ability to dazzle audiences is not simply a product of genius, hard work and technological advances, although all three are to be given some credit. Hollywood’s mind-blowing visual show and piecemeal-perfect stars are also a compensation for something it lacks – the ability to deliver intimacy between its characters and with its audience.

As I ready this script and experience, I want to build a film that convinces the audience – above all else – that the people in the film are experiencing real intimacy with each other. By extension, the audience should be included in that sense of intimacy and made to feel the range of scary, giddy and life-affirming emotions that comes with finding a cinema that knows your own foibles and potential, a cinema that dares to be affectionate and inclusive of the audience’s nascent hopes. Right now, the dying breed of people who truly understand intimate relationships and find the courage to live them out need to rally and create projects that preserve a sense of intimacy in all art forms. Those people may not look as pretty as Hollywood stars (indeed they probably shouldn’t) and they may not inhabit spaces that look as pretty as Hollywood locations, but they will certainly be more beautiful. And that’s what a country mired in the hopelessness of a slow-going recovery really needs. Modern Hollywood slyly celebrates the dominance of the 1% (although they paradoxically are the biggest advocates for socialism), while an Intimacy Cinema celebrates those across the income spectrum that retain the courage to live as individuals deeply connecting against all odds with other individuals. They win freedom of the need for outer approval, even at great cost to their quality of life and esteem. And yet, what they win is something that the audience intuitively feels that it can attain, too.

If we succeed in breeding new types of Intimacy Cinema stars, I promise so many rehabs won’t be needed for their offspring.

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Hunter Lee Hughes is a filmmaker and actor living and working in Los Angeles and the founder of Fatelink. His current feature film Guys Reading Poems is touring film festivals and this blog is dedicated to the process of making his second feature film, “Inside-Out, Outside-In.” If you enjoy the blog, please support our team by following us on Facebook, Twitter (@Fatelink) or Instagram (@Fatelink).

Seeking Actors for Investors’ Reading/Character Breakdown

12 Monday Nov 2012

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We will do a staged reading of “Inside-Out, Outside-In” for potential investors and invited guests sometime the week of December 3rd (exact date TBD). There may be more roles forthcoming but for now, here are some of the roles we are seeking:

Jason Quinn, 27, Caucasian, part Irish, dark hair, very attractive. Struggling leading man becomes convinced by his manipulative agent to toy with the affections of a talented gay filmmaker so that he might win a lead role in a feature film, despite being straight and having serious moral/ethical reservations. Lead. Torn between living life authentically vs. “playing the game” to get ahead. Must be comfortable playing a seduction scene with a man (no nudity, no kissing).

Peter Hearndon, 50-55, prefer African-American, but open to other ethnicities. Hard-nosed, successful businessman, imposing presence. Lead. His gay sexuality may’ve caused some to discriminate against him throughout his life, but that’s only made him more motivated to conquer in the boardroom. Senses he may be losing control of his business, but fighting all the way.

Abhaya, mid 20s, male, Indian monk, playful and spiritual renegade who tries to convince a lover to take leave of a regimented life and experience all that the world has to offer. Supporting.

Angela (and company) – mid 40s, female, quirky production designer who’s confounded by the director’s confusing and conflicting directives for creating the set. Same actress will also play multiple other roles in the reading. Supporting.

Ian – male, 30s, red hair preferred, Irish background, Irish accent. Tough heavy-for-hire who doesn’t lack charm and a sense of humor. Real Irish guys preferred. Supporting.

To submit, please send your headshot/resume via mail to: Fatelink, 7083 Hollywood Blvd., 5th Floor, Hollywood, CA 90028 or email your headshot/resume to: casting@fatelink.com (reasonable size photos please). Please include the name of the role for which you’d like to be considered on the envelope or in the subject line of the email. Auditions will be held between Wednesday, November 14th and Tuesday, November 20th at our office in Hollywood.

Many thanks,

Hunter Lee Hughes

Writer-Director, “Inside-Out, Outside-In”

IMDb link here.

Some of our past work:

www.vimeo.com/channels/fatelink

www.youtube.com/fatelinkproductions

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Hunter Lee Hughes is a filmmaker and actor living and working in Los Angeles and the founder of Fatelink. His current feature film Guys Reading Poems is touring film festivals and this blog is dedicated to the process of making his second feature film, “Inside-Out, Outside-In.” If you enjoy the blog, please support our team by following us on Facebook, Twitter (@Fatelink) or Instagram (@Fatelink).

A Breakdown Is Coming!! (And no, not the emotional kind….) – Five keys to success…

09 Friday Nov 2012

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Next week, I’ll release a breakdown of some of the characters from “Inside-Out, Outside-In” as I cast our December reading for invited guests and potential investors. I’ll be putting the breakdown right here on the blog, as well as on our Facebook fan page a few days before sending it out over traditional avenues like Breakdown Services to give our motivated collaborators and fans a chance to get the one-up on submitting for parts.

What is a breakdown exactly? Well, it’s a summary of short descriptions of characters and their essential qualities for the purposes of casting, along with some contact information. Filmmakers send them into the world with the hopes that agents, managers and quality actors will submit candidates (or themselves) to play a part that matches what we’re seeking. Here’s an example of a breakdown from the web series “Dumbass Filmmakers!” – Fatelink’s last project.

Character breakdown for “Dumbass Filmmakers!”

There are a few questions that naturally come up when writing these breakdowns. First of all, how much information do you reveal about the character? How much plot? I generally think fears of other people stealing your ideas are a bit paranoid. Let me clarify. I do think people might try to steal your ideas and characters, but the chance for them to pull it all off before your film is finished is not too high. And good luck to them! But still, as an artist, one of your assets is knowing what you’re trying to build, while others do not. So while I don’t like to fall into the trap of being paranoid to reveal any information, I don’t want to reveal too much. And plus, at this level, you need people to get excited about the project and become a little curious about it, so giving out a little information works in your favor. If you’re already Woody Allen, well then, you probably think I’m a dumb shit and aren’t reading this blog anyways, but if you are in that position, I don’t blame you for keeping everything about your story an absolute secret.

In terms of actors submitting to breakdowns, here are my pet peeves as a director. So I offer them with the hopes that they might help somebody more effectively respond to a breakdown, mine or anyone else’s.

Top Five Director’s Pet Peeves at Dealing with Breakdowns (and how to successfully navigate them):

1. Receiving submissions that are “way off” in terms of the character description. Trust me, I’ve given a lot of thought to why a character is a certain gender, age, nationality, temperament, etc. So please don’t completely disregard the breakdown and submit yourself if you’re clearly wrong for the part. And if you are going to gamble and submit against the character type, take the time to explain to me why you believe you’re right for it even if it goes against some major part of the description. (In my life, I have changed a character from male to female once based on an actress’ audition, but this is rare and she was right for the part in all the other aspects). If you at least offer an explanation, I know that you have something in mind, rather than just rudely disregarding what I said that I needed.

2. Receiving high-resolution photos that mess up my email account. Please be kind. I’m dealing with an email account that has a limited capacity for space. So if you send me your headshot as a 24 GB file, I’m going to hate you for a minute and may not even wait the requisite time for it to download. And here’s a hint – if you send in a hard copy of your headshot/resume and I like it, I will file it and keep it. And I do go over those files every now and then. Maybe it’s retro, but if hard copy is available as a submission option, I believe it’s worth it. If you don’t know how to size down your headshot to a jpeg of reasonable email size, please teleport back to the late 1990s.

3. Feeling “guilt-tripped” by friends trying to get a part. If you’re my friend, I already think you’re talented and amazing, so don’t ask me to prove it by giving you a part out of guilt. “Hey! You’ve NEVER cast me in anything,” complain some people. Or others, “I came to see both your plays! Isn’t it time we worked together?” I value my friends. I value people who support my work and take time to see it. And I want to work with my friends, all things being equal. But hey! I don’t owe anyone a part. And it’s not fair to guilt me into casting you. If you’ve supported my work in the past only to get a role in the future, well at least be savvy about that and don’t tell me. Know that if there’s ever a part that’s on-the-money for a friend that I know can hit it out of the park, you will likely get the part, all things being equal. If I’m not sure you’re on-the-money for it, it’s just business and we have to see if it will work out or not.

4. Liking an actor for the part, only to later discover he’s unavailable for the dates required. Listen, I know these sound like basic things. But believe me, actors disregard them all the time (or the agents do by not knowing the schedules of their own actors). Our reading is going to take place in December. So if you’re going home to Nebraska for the entire month, please do not submit! We’ll catch up on the next project, the next breakdown and c’ la vie! I really do understand the desire to expand your network or take an audition just for experience, but when you do so knowing that you are ultimately unavailable to work, you are in bad faith with the casting director/producer/director calling you in and this is a reflection on your character. And to an indie film director, character counts because we often don’t even carry insurance on the actors, so we are relying on you to be truthful and forthright about your schedule. So I say, “Don’t submit unless you are available for the dates required!”

5. Having actors flake because they are uncomfortable with the material. Listen, I have produced a number of projects and films with an LGBT element. I’m also from Texas and a family filled with “red state” Christian conservatives. So I really do understand if an actor isn’t comfortable with material I write. If you see in the breakdowns that it’s a gay character, then it’s a gay character. I’m not going to change it. And if you don’t want to play that character, don’t submit for it in the first place. Or, if you do submit, then read the sides and decide you’re not comfortable, simply call and cancel or email and cancel with enough notice for us to fill your slot. What is not cool is being so uncomfortable that you can’t man up (or woman up) and let us know you’re not coming to the audition. It’s also very rude to your fellow actors. That slot could’ve been filled. There are plenty of amazing actors – gay, straight, bi or questioning – that have no issues playing gay roles. And one of them could’ve auditioned for us in your place. A no-show/no-call is almost a 100% guarantee that you won’t be called in for anything in the future. Again, as indies, we don’t always carry insurance on the actors and I simply can’t risk someone flaking and not showing up on set. If you’re uncomfortable with the character, but  cancel your audition respectfully, I might get a better sense of you and might bring you in for something different the next time around, no hard feelings. That’s how we do it in Texas.

Ok, so that’s my advice for submitting for roles and avoiding running into a director’s pet peeves (at least this director’s pet peeves).  Now, look out for the breakdown next week, which will be released to this blog and to our Facebook fan page. And hope you all keep making movies.

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Hunter Lee Hughes is a filmmaker and actor living and working in Los Angeles and the founder of Fatelink. His current feature film Guys Reading Poems is touring film festivals and this blog is dedicated to the process of making his second feature film, “Inside-Out, Outside-In.” If you enjoy the blog, please support our team by following us on Facebook, Twitter (@Fatelink) or Instagram (@Fatelink).

Color Psychology: Can it help in the rewrite process? I gotta say, “Yes.”

03 Saturday Nov 2012

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Last night, I saw Belgian Bavo Defurne’s hypnotic debut feature “North Sea, Texas” and was struck throughout with his adept usage of color to convey emotions and theme in a picture that pointedly veered away from reliance on dialogue. During the first viewing, the colors worked completely on a subconscious level for me. In the moment, I wasn’t aware of why certain vivid colors were selected at certain moments, but knew they were purposeful and effective without knowing why (this is why great films merit a second viewing). Like his lead character, I can only imagine Mr. Defurne’s pathway to directing came from an early childhood fascination with drawing, color and aesthetics. He uses one of his sparing lines of dialogue to point out the importance of color when the child’s mother even says, “Red is the color of love.”

Of course, I come to directing from the completely opposite end of the spectrum, having focused most of my career on acting and creating narrative stories, through screenwriting, through my work with writer Mardik Martin and through years of reading scripts for Paramount Classics/Paramount Vantage. I’ve had the opportunity to observe how the script changed or evolved into a piece of moving art projected onto a screen. And I know how to tell a story. I’m that shy guy at the party who’s quiet for most of the night until it’s my turn to talk and then I say, “So, the other night, I’m at the ATM when….” and everybody shuts up and listens.

Filmmaking all starts with the inner lives of the characters for me, their dreams, desires and conflicts with one another and the world. The aesthetics of the film come second to that, after I’ve worked most of the conflicts and characterizations out in my mind and on paper. And yes, because I wrote plays before I wrote films, I’m turned on by dialogue revealing characters rather than the opposite. But still, film is a visual medium. In our years of working together, Mardik often told me, “With a movie, don’t write with your head or your heart. Write with your eyes.”

So maybe (I’m guessing) Defurne’s impulse to make a film starts with a drawing and mine from a character’s inner life and conflict, but it doesn’t mean I can’t learn from him about the importance of color psychology both in terms of expressing something about the character and provoking emotion from the audience with the palette selected. When I first saw the film, I thought, “Maybe I should just wait and figure out this color stuff after the rewrite. This comes later.” But, as my previous blog post on mindmapping shows, I did include a branch for color for each character. So why not do the work and look into color and try to peg the color schemes for each character, for the situations they face? Although it may not directly change any lines of dialogue, it might help me discover another layer of the characters, which could impact the rewrite. And if I know what characters embody certain colors, I just might add a line to reflect that, as the “North Sea, Texas” screenplay did with its comment on the color red, which works perfectly to reveal that character. It also sounds pretty damn fun.

The biggest fear I have in delving this deep at this point in the process is the fear that all this “extra” work will mean nothing if the film doesn’t get made (I’m a little jealous when I see European film credits that indicate they got funding from their government). My fear says, ‘What if after diving in and realizing that the antagonist should wear purple here and lavender here, we end up with only 25K to make the film and we don’t even have time to buy a purple shirt (or some ridiculous thought like this)?’ This fear of the film not being made has to be confronted frequently (at least for me), but investing more time and energy on deepening the characters, the look, the script and yes the color psychology involved with the film will only pay dividends when the time comes to make the film, no matter what budget we raise. And if i’m armed and prepared to answer every question about not just the characters and their conflict and the script’s structure, but also exactly how I see the film down to the colors of the costumes, I’ll spark more confidence in investors (or even established actors) taking a gamble on an indie film.

Jung has written on color psychology, as have tons of others. I’ll include here a brief YouTube video from About.com that introduces the concept. Happy viewing and let me know what working with color has taught you about your characters and script.

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Hunter Lee Hughes is a filmmaker and actor living and working in Los Angeles and the founder of Fatelink. His current feature film Guys Reading Poems is touring film festivals and this blog is dedicated to the process of making his second feature film, “Inside-Out, Outside-In.” If you enjoy the blog, please support our team by following us on Facebook, Twitter (@Fatelink) or Instagram (@Fatelink).

Halloween: The Soul Revealed through Costume, then Squashed

01 Thursday Nov 2012

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It doesn’t take a social scientist to recognize that a Halloween costume is rarely just that. It’s not random. People must select, on some basis, what they will wear for Halloween. No where was this phenomenon more on display that at the annual Halloween festivities in West Hollywood, probably the single best attended event in the city (with perhaps Pride in June as a close competitor). In the gay world of WeHo last night (which by the way was at least 60% straight), Halloween was a High Holiday and the most common costume was that of Robin, sidekick to Batman. I also saw couples having fun with the concept of “twinning” – both dressing up as prisoners, both as cave men and, in one case, both dressing up as zombies with ‘sex for brains.’ There were some couples that had related but opposite costumes, such as Devil with Angel, Cop with Criminal, Master with Slave, etc. One wonders if these are the accurate psychic representations of the relationship or if they are toying with inhabiting the opposite role for a night (a friend told me he’d once dressed up as a slave to a dominatrix when in fact he held all the power in the relationship). But either way, the selection of the costume means something about who you are and your relationship to your self and others (Know that whenever you are at a Halloween function, psychologists and artists are having a lot of fun looking into your subconscious). Some people are relieved from the stress of choosing to represent themselves as an individual and dress up as whole groups – there was one group of friends that dressed up as the Scooby Doo clan and another group that all dressed up as Waldo from the ‘Where’s Waldo?’ posters. Then, there are those that create or select something that is their costume alone – whether a witch or zombie or fairy or something else of their own creation (inspired by my existentialism class, I wore a black suit, black shirt, red tie, black mask, carried my textbook and went as an ‘Existential Messenger of Death’). And, of course, there are those that choose to wear no costume at all, which in and of itself is another interesting choice. You cannot say nothing about yourself on Halloween, like it or not.

That’s what is truly eerie about Halloween – it’s an opportunity to reflect unseen layers of our psyche for ourselves and others to see. But this potentiality is so powerful that the herd instinct in us rises up to prevent Halloween from its illuminative potential and turns it into the most mundane and meaningless holiday of them all. It starts out as a curious conundrum for the psyche and turns into a boozing mass of conformists confronted with one makeshift hot dog stand after another, all selling the same thing.

There’s an argument to be made that a Halloween costume reveals our own ExistenZ’s struggle to express itself. Karl Jaspers describes ExistenZ as the being inside that fights against “mundane being.” From my understanding, it’s the authentic, transcendent self that takes its cues not from the world and the demands of the world, but from its own essence (a force for the purposes of my movie that I will describe as “Inside-Out”). Maybe it’s the tricky psychic force within that inspires you to dress up as Peter Pan for Halloween in the midst of your Puer Aeternus complex (so you might get a clue). But another powerful force is at work on Halloween. Nietzsche and a host of others identified the concept of a “herd instinct” which some, like Martin Heidegger, believe also exists in some form within each individual whether they are currently engaging with a herd or sitting by themselves (a force for the purposes of my movie that I will describe as “Outside-In”). Maybe it’s the powerful messaging you receive to be like your peers that compels you to gather en masse, drink, have fun and observe the unspoken social contract of what it means to enjoy a Halloween festival.

Heidegger argues that the primal potentialities of the soul are “leveled down” by idle talk and concerns of people on a “group level.” An individual’s instinct to subject itself to the mentality of the herd mitigates the fear of that person’s inward ExistenZ potential…and its impermanence. The herd instinct most fears death. It is something that is processed on a group level that protects the group from processing impermanence on a soul level. The herd tells you what to do when death occurs, but it allows you to avoid associating it with your own eventuality. As Heidegger explains, death happens, but in a strange way it doesn’t happen to you when you’re in the herd. It might sound nice to be protected from the reality of death, but the herd also protects you from considering how your own death might change – and even liberate – your life with all its potential.

Now, back to Halloween…so just when your ExistenZ bubbles up to the surface and demands you choose a ridiculous costume because it desperately wants to show you something about yourself that you simply can’t see, the herd instinct swells with its zombie-like message from the outside: drink, drink more, friends, idle talk, bullshit, HOT DOGS!, other friends, drink, sex, sex, sex, sleep. It is a slumber that costs the transcendent lesson that the ExistenZ made available through the selection of the costume in the first place. It is a slumber that keeps at bay ExistenZ and the reality of our own death…during a holiday that supposedly highlights it.

And so I walked into West Hollywood last night as the “Existential Messenger of Death,” selecting someone in the crowd, usually someone not wearing a costume, that I would then stealthily approach and say, “Happy Last Halloween. End of Days is here. You have been Chosen.” Then, I would walk away, just slowly enough to see either a mocking insolence or disturbed agitation register on their face.

I saw it as my responsibility to inject the idea of Death back into Halloween. People deserve some Dread. Not just because death is part of Halloween, but because feeling the angst of death is the best hope that an individual will throw off their herd mentality and turn towards the inner potential waiting for them to create a uniquely amazing life.

My movie is currently titled, “Inside-Out, Outside-In.” But when you see it (sometime in 2014 with any luck) I hope it might earn the reputation of, “Existential Messenger of Death.”

This essay is the third in a series on the themes of “Inside-Out, Outside-In.” The first two are available on the site and include, “Is Cool cool? Reflections on the New Religion” and “Mutual Self-Interest vs. Love (and why Dr. Phil and Oprah have it wrong).”

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Hunter Lee Hughes is a filmmaker and actor living and working in Los Angeles and the founder of Fatelink. His current feature film Guys Reading Poems is touring film festivals and this blog is dedicated to the process of making his second feature film, “Inside-Out, Outside-In.” If you enjoy the blog, please support our team by following us on Facebook, Twitter (@Fatelink) or Instagram (@Fatelink).