Hailey Gates, Alia Shawkat, & Callum Turner Talk Creation of 'Atropia' | THR Studio at Park City - video Dailymotion

Hollywood Journal

Director and writer, Hailey Gates, along with lead actors Alia Shawkat and Callum Turner of  'Atropia,' drop in at our studio in Park City talk about the process adapting a short film and turning it into a full length "screwball romantic comedy about the military industrial complex."

Transcript

00:00I was at a house party and I was dancing and all of a sudden I looked over and there was someone

00:05dancing like really specific and I was like that guy's just like letting it loose and it was Tom

00:10York and I was like okay that's cool and then I was like all of a sudden very self-conscious of

00:14like trying not to dance too weird. I wanted to make a screwball romantic comedy about the military

00:27industrial complex. It was kind of like Haley looked at me and said what have you never done

00:32really because we were going to adapt the short film but we're like we needed to make it something

00:37else and I was like well never really done proper like romance right yeah yeah I was like I'm I'm

00:44writing a part for you like yeah what do you want what do you want yeah I think once the project

00:49started to come to life we were like who who could you know fill this kind of role. Cal was like

00:57one of the very first people we thought of and Callum's like an old friend of mine and I was

01:02like now he's like a big movie star and I was like let's see if we can get him and I sent him a text

01:06and he was like yeah yeah sounds great send me a script. I didn't I hadn't seen the the short film

01:10or the script. We did Green Room together 10 years before and fell in love with Alia and I think she's

01:18the best comedic actress of our generation and then I watched the short film I was like I've got to do

01:23this. So it takes place on a train facility how are we described we're describing it as like a

01:30kooky train facility where actors pretend to be in a war zone right that's I mean it's a it's a real

01:38life thing that happens it takes place on a sort of set that the military is built with the help of

01:45Hollywood set builders to create fake Iraqi villages to train soldiers before they deploy to Iraq.

01:52Hayley knows more than anyone should about this place because she's also a documentarian so she

01:57does her due diligence and has done lots of you know filming and stuff and so she wrote lots of it

02:02into the film um whereas I'm just like I'm just here for the movie but when all the details that we

02:08found out like something that's in the film about like the smells that they actually have like

02:13burning flesh smell you know and sewage smell smell fake I mean fried red yeah try

02:21it's quite a bombastic idea that this thing exists before we did green room that's where we met

02:27on one of these sets what do you mean that you were both that's where we started oh right

02:34but that is the story about his character that she wants to become a Hollywood actress and she's

02:38working there I don't know if in real life the role players there really want to be actors what is one

02:43thing about Luca as a producer that stands out that we might not know people only on this director

02:48I mean I think the thing about Luca is that his his generosity is like very very fierce and not

02:56casual and he gives such incredible opportunities to young people that have never you know that are

03:03very green and hadn't done these things before like I mean I guess the last couple movies he's done

03:08have been first-time writers which is incredible um and he's you know he's he's hard on me and like

03:17all the best ways and that's how I know he really loves me I know him because he sent my boyfriend

03:23a fan letter because he was obsessed with paranormal activity three so we had dinner with him like 10

03:29years ago we've been really good friends ever since and um when we were on the set of challengers

03:34somebody got COVID and we were shut down for like a week so I was there for a really long time even

03:40I'm in the movie for just a hot second we were talking and I was talking about this another movie

03:47that I had written that was having some trouble and he was like we make another movie okay I was

03:52like we do okay great and Alia was in um Greece filming a movie called Drift with a producer Naima

04:00Abed who also made Call Me By Your Name which also premiered here um and Naima wanted to do something

04:06else with Alia so we all sort of joined forces does anyone remember the first time you were starstruck

04:15starstruck I think this was really weird but I was in a restaurant when I was a kid and I saw

04:21Charo that's good and I was like hold my god because she was like the hot frog in Thumbelina

04:29oh yeah you know and I was just like I could not believe it that's amazing what if anyone remembers

04:36the movie that made you want to be an actor or filmmaker you could you know I want to say like

04:41the one that makes me sound smart is Harold and Maude because I've watched it so many times but

04:45weirdly meet the parents I've seen that movie many times and it holds up it was just like on HBO a lot

04:52it's a good movie that's a good movie I watch Burden of Dreams a lot have you ever seen that it's a

05:02Les Blanc documentary about the making of Fitzgeraldo it actually premiered here um in the 70s you know

05:09that I saw that nod um and it's so amazing it's almost better than Fitzgeraldo I always say Mean

05:16Streets I was about 15 and I bought a DVD and I had a friend that I'd go to HMV and we'd buy the cheap

05:23DVDs and it was in one of those and we'd be really competitive who can watch faster and that was

05:29just one that's how you watch movies exactly that's how I started yeah watch on fast forward

Hailey Gates, Alia Shawkat, & Callum Turner Talk Creation of 'Atropia' | THR Studio at Park City

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