00:00This is Tim Wasper from Festtrek Concert TV.
00:28I'm here at the Regal Cinema's Union Square in New York City for Dances with Films New York.
00:34Being the producer and being the lead actor, you have to live in those two worlds as well.
00:39I think that was the most fascinating part to explore because you have this character who seemingly,
00:45at the very beginning, they're kind of just not in control of their life.
00:50There's a bunch of aspects of his life that aren't ideal,
00:53and he gets this opportunity to sort of take control of that in a way he never has.
00:58And I think psychologically, playing that was probably one of the most fun parts to explore as an actor
01:04because as a producer, everything you're doing is very kind of technical based in a way.
01:11But when you can get into the artistic part of the producing side,
01:14as an actor, you get to go kind of fully unhinged with that.
01:18And with this character, I was able to explore a sort of psychology that I think,
01:23where the veneer is a lot different than what he presents on the outside.
01:28Welcome. What brings you to the Playboy?
01:43I'm actually a writer.
01:45What do you write?
01:46I write horror novels.
01:49A story you wrote came true.
01:54Yes, like in real time, concurrently as I was writing it.
01:57Somebody help me!
01:59Yeah, so the hotel essentially is supposed to be its own being in a way.
02:04And like you said, the corners of the different places, they are explorations of his mind.
02:10They're not, you know, the parallels that happen later on when he's deeper into his journey,
02:16they come up later in terms of like the lighting of how the hotel looks,
02:20how, you know, what's going on, like the certain events.
02:24And I think the audience is in for a really fun time because it's a really cool build-up.
02:31It's grounded, but you see the humor in it almost, where you're able to play sort of that gallows humor of it.
02:37I think the way we went about that was like you said, it had to be grounded
02:40because you want to make the audience engage with the character.
02:44And if there's comedic elements, you want to make sure that it's not over the top
02:48and that there's subtlety enough where it's realistic and it's organic.
02:52I always go back to the word organic because we're trying to humanize the characters
02:56and flesh them out as much as possible.
02:58So I think that element of where this person's a writer and they have a bunch of stuff going on in their life,
03:03but at the same time, there's a bit of humor to him.
03:06The way he approaches the world, it can be a little lackadaisical in a sense.
03:10And I think that psychology, where you see him go later on, it comes into play
03:14because it's quite a journey Rion goes through.
03:23Scott Richardson brought his family up here on a ski trip.
03:27Police found the massacre.
03:29All he did was write down his intrusive thoughts.
03:45Naja, I wrote that the cell towers went down and I wrote that the bridge collapsed.
03:49I even wrote all those steps, but I didn't write that girl.
03:52And now it's like it's writing itself.
03:54You know how they say that the difference between love and hate, it's only like five feet.
03:58It's true.
03:59Like on these opposite ends of like spectrum, as far as his emotion, the line really is quite thin.
04:05It's somewhat tightrope.
04:06And like you said, writing is such an isolating thing that Rion has this version of himself that he thinks.
04:11But when you boil down to the writing aspect and he's just by himself,
04:15there's probably this nature of him, this innate aspect of him probably comes out through in that writing.
04:20And that's basically the basis of his relationship with Katie and Sarah and where we see where that goes.
04:27It takes an entire village, I think.
04:30And I also think that's the fun part of it.
04:32It's a team sport, ultimately, like I'll use a football analogy, but like you need your offensive line.
04:37You need your quarterback.
04:38Well, you need you can't you can't shoot the movie without actors, but you also can't go on set without proper lighting.
04:43You need a director to be in charge.
04:44So and it's all like this big giant puzzle piece.
04:47And it's such a great learning experience because you get all these different perspectives that you wouldn't never have.
04:52If I tried to shoot it on my own, it would be boring.
04:55You know, it wouldn't even be a fun experience.
04:56And I think that's the best part about filmmaking is that it is such a collaborative process.
05:01And it really is all hands on deck, like the moment, like if even one person is the energies off, like it kind of boils down to everybody else.
05:10The weakest link, you know, and luckily we had a great cast and crew and everybody was like fully committed, but it really was like raising a baby.
05:18Oh, my baby.
05:48And I think the self-aware aspect, it's really fun to play because normally you can have sort of you can have we put him on specific journeys because of that.
06:06Right. There's things that happen in the movie that wouldn't happen if it wasn't meta, so to speak.
06:11And I think that was inspired by a sort of love I had for Scream growing up.
06:16So it that's that's that's what it boils down to.
06:21I think the meta aspect, it's integral because you see a lot.
06:26It's it's very tropey in movies, not that it's bad.
06:28People love tropes and we love cliches.
06:30Especially in the Asian shorts.
06:32So it was it was really fun to explore that.
06:35And I think we kind of just we kind of just twisted it and made it our own meta.
06:39You know, we explored it in a way that our team wanted to explore it.
06:46I'd say one of the more challenging roles was definitely all the stuff in act three.
06:51It gets like because again, you know, it hits the fan.
06:54Yeah.
06:55Yeah.
06:56Yeah.
06:57Yeah.
06:58Yeah.
06:59Yeah.
07:00Yeah.
07:01Yeah.
07:02Yeah.
07:03Yeah.
07:04Yeah.
07:05Yeah.
07:06Yeah.
07:07Yeah.
07:08Yeah.
07:09But you're also shooting out of order.
07:10Yes.
07:11And we're shooting out of order.
07:12So you have to be mindful of where the character is in that specific journey.
07:14Right.
07:15Because you have to perform and you have to play it a certain way.
07:17And because you also don't want to reveal things too early.
07:20You also don't want to make sure like, oh, that's something we should have done earlier.
07:24So you want to just be mindful of where the character is in that specific journey.
07:27Right.
07:28Because you have to perform and you have to play it a certain way.
07:30And because you also don't want to reveal things too early.
07:33You also don't want to make sure like, oh, that's something we should have done earlier.
07:36So you want to just be mindful of where the character is in that journey.
07:40And as long as you have conversations with the writer and the script supervisor and everybody else on set, it's a very fun and explorative process.
07:51I think the biggest thing, and it was definitely like the thematic driving force that we wanted to explore the most.
07:57It's about how does a person deal with trauma?
08:00How do maybe they inflict it on a person and they don't even know it?
08:04Or on themselves.
08:06And how does a person deal with that type of adversity when it's inflicted upon them?
08:11And I think that's a universal theme for anybody, whether you're an 18 year old going to college, whether you're a 70 year old who has grandkids.
08:18I think that type of experience, anybody in life has dealt with, unfortunately, nefarious sort of circumstances.
08:25And I think exploring that and that I think is the it's the emotional anchor for the movie.
08:36So going to look for your way.
08:37Well, listen.
08:38I think it's important to that.
08:39I think it's important to think about the character.
08:42Obviously I don't have the character as a supporter of when I talk a little bit differently.
08:45True to me.
08:59Anyway, I think that stepping up is the Dennisys and one of the people that leave my life.
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