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IFH 736: How I Got My Screenplay on Disney Plus with Arash Amel · Indie Film Hustle® - A Filmmaking Podcast

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  You are listening to the IFAH podcast Network. For more amazing filmmaking and screenwriting
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  podcasts, just go to ifahpodcastnetwork dot com. Welcome to the Indie Film Hustle
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  Podcast, Episode number seven thirty six. You sell a screenplay like you sell
• 0:18
  a car if that car was going off a cliff read a brown Broadcasting from
• 0:26
  the back alley in Hollywood. It's the Indie Film Hustle Podcast, where we
• 0:30
  show you how to survive and thrive as an indie filmmaker in the jungles of
• 0:34
  the film biz. And here's your host, Alex Ferrari. Welcome, Welcome
• 0:40
  to another episode of the Indie Film Hustle Podcast. I am your humble host,
• 0:43
  Alex Ferrari. Today's show is sponsored by Rise of the Film Entrepreneur How
• 0:47
  to turn your independent film into a profitable business. It's harder today than ever
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  before for independent filmakers to make money with their films from predatory film distributors ripping
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  indie filmmaker. The old distribution model of making money with your film is broken,
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  and there needs to be a change. The future of independent filmmaking is
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  the entrepreneurial filmmaker or the film entrepreneur. In Rise of the Film Entrepreneur,
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  I break down how to actually make money with your film projects and show you
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  how to turn your indie film into a profitable business with case studies examining successes
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  and failures. This book shows you the step by step method to turn your
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  passion into a profitable career. If you're making a feature film, series,
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  or any other kind of video content, the Film Entrepreneur method will set you
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  up for success. The book is available in paperback, ebook, and of
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  course audiobook. If you want to order it, just head over to www.
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  Dot filmbiz book dot com. That's film bizbook dot com. Now,
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  guys, today on the show, we have screenwriter arash Amal and he has
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  a new movie coming out Rise on Disney Plus, and we talk about how
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  he was able to work on this project for Disney Plus, how he's been
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  able to build his career in Hollywood doing amazing projects and doing some really interesting
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  stuff. His story is pretty interesting on how he's been able to build a
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  career as a working screenwriter. He's worked with some amazing filmmakers along his path.
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  So, without any further ado, please enjoy my conversation with Rashamla.
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  I like to welcome to the show a Rashamla. How you doing. I'm
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  doing good. Thank you for having me. Thank you so much for coming
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  on the show, my friend, I appreciate it. You have a very
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  interesting journey through Hollywood. So I wanted to kind of start at the beginning.
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  Start at the beginning. So you were a small child when you were
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  born, and so my first question, my friend, is why God's screen
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  Earth? Did you want to get into this insanity that is in the film
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  industry? And I don't know, No, I'm joking. You know.
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  It's a really funny journey that I only started to make sense of it over
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  the last few months. So I had after the pandemic, my my parents,
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  we live in England, UH came over and they came over for you
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  know, I hadn't seen each other like two years. They were here for
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  like three months or so, and we just had a baby. And oh,
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  thank you, So you're exhausted. I could see. I could,
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  I had I have two of my ownswer I completely I could. I could
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  feel it's a young man's game, sir, that's all I got to tell
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  you. A young man's ga. Yes, and there's number three, number
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  three. Oh, oh, you're an old had at this that you're all
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  talking. But I had two boys. We now now have a girl and
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  very blessed and and she just turned one. And my parents work it and
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  uh my mom said to me, you know, we were always meant to
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  move here. And I said, what do you mean. She said,
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  well, in nineteen eighty three, so you said we're going back. Let's
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  go back when? So I'm arranging. I was born in Wales while my
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  dad was starting in the seventies over there, and then we went back to
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  Iran. Revolution happened. What happened. My dad worked for reading television and
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  there was a documentary filmmaker and I kind of remember going to set with not
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  set, but we'd go to like the desert and filming stuff and it'll be
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  you know, and I was like maybe four or five. It kind of
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  ingrained, but you know, revolution happened and i'd to do that, you
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  know, sad thing, and my son still sort of can't believe it.
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  But I hadn't need all my toys and everything behind it. And I moved
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  to England and so my whole life, I thought, oh, we moved
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  to England. But it turns out the plan was to move to America.
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  And what had happened was we'd moved to England as a as a pit stop,
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  and then the whole family was supposed to go to LA where my grandfather
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  was here priestly and connect. Yeah, they didn't give my dad the visa,
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  so my mom, myself, and my brother we flew to LA.
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  We were here for the summer of nineteen eighty four and my dad wasn't.
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  But obviously I was like seven six seven, so I didn't really you know,
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  I didn't know what was going on. All I know was they took
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  me to this wonderful sunny place. They took me to Universal Studios. I
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  got to see the night Rider and Airwolf and the city like my pages taken,
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  and I saw the Jewels. Shark tried to eat me. And then
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  we went to Disneyland, and you know, it just all it just kind
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  of went, oh my god, what is this amazing place? And I
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  would get like I remember sitting in my granddad's house here and like we did
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  in TV Guide and watching like, you know, whatever was on TV at
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  the time that you know Manimal, I don't think Madamal. Oh my god,
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  Animal one of the most bizarre, wonderfully bizarre shows ever creating. Imagine
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  if Manimal got greenlit today, even on Netflix, even on that can absolute
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  out of that. I mean, we try to tell my kids about Manimal.
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  My wife and I are huge Manimal fans, and only from memory,
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  not currently to watch it, only from what I remember how cool it was,
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  and it's like it was an eagle, a panther. He turned into
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  an eagle or panther, and I think occasionally turned into something else. But
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  we saw the transfer that we went to YouTube just to see the transformation.
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  Have you seen it lately? I have so bad, so bad, it's
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  so I need some kids. It's like, this is why, this is
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  why our this is why our generation a little bit more resilient than this is
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  what we grew up with. I mean, this is so yeah. And
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  that was I'm gonna I'm gonna end up, like you know, sidetracking in
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  to this. But there was the TV at that time. I mean,
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  you say it was crazy, but it was like you know, you remember
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  Ultimate Man was Auld Temple. Oh my god, you ran my mind.
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  You ran my mind. Yeah, the tru the tron rip off, the
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  drum off, yeah, a little with the cursor that foll around. It's
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  like the first time they discovered like tracking, and like they like, someone's
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  beyond it all. The Daisy Arnetz Junior was the star of that. Daisy
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  Arnett Junior was the star of that. Oh my god. So so now
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  you can see where my genesis was near enough, right, So so Peter,
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  I'm like, and I see all of this. And then they said,
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  you have to go back to England. You're in head. Oh god,
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  right, So we go back and and I'm like thinking, oh,
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  Ingland must be my hope. But that's this, like this is where we
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  always want to be. So for the all of my life, I grew
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  up. So I went back and I was like, I'm obsessed. So
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  I started watching TV. I started watching movies. I became obsessed with cinema.
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  You know. I had a Commodore sixty four. Any games that I
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  would get would be something to do with movies, and I would play.
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  There was this game called Ace that I would play, and it was because
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  I'd seen Top Gun. I could be top Gun and so that sort of
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  seated. And so when I became thirteen fourteen, I kind of started to
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  cognitively understand of what I was, you know, what my passion was.
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  I don't know where it came from. I just had this thought, which
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  was someone must write those, someone like this is right, yeah, and
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  it was it's so unusual with there was sneakers, FLD and Robinson Sneakers that
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  I saw for some reason that just hadn't. Sneakers was amazing, one of
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  the with a cast with Robert Redford and oh my god, it loves sneakers,
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  love sophisticated in terms of its characterization, in terms of how all the
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  little you know, many secrets and like all of the stuff together. So
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  so it was that and you know, and still keeping up with TV and
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  at that point it was you know, as McIver that. So I was
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  like, I'm gonna I'm gonna do this. So I go down to Foyle's
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  bookshop in London. Ah, you know, it's fat then obviously you were
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  saying summer with us not you have to back magazines and bookshops. And I
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  got two books. I got Sidfield's Screenwriters Workbook and Sidfield Screenplay and very you
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  know classical, thirty sixty thirty rop point at twenty to pinch point plot,
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  you know, midpoint, all of that stuff. So and I just at
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  fourteen years old, I started writing and I just would watch movies and I
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  would buy Premier magazine at Empire Magazine, and I would read all the interviews
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  and I would cut out the little posters that they would do, and I'll
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  make these mosaics on my wall, and my mom would come into my room
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  and go like, what do you do? What is? We'll be right
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  back after a word from our sponsor, and now back to the show.
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  This this is you know, this is insanity. I'll take it. I'll
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  take I'll take it one step furtherest or. I actually uh started working at
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  a video store when I was fourteen. Oh so, I'm right there with
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  you. And I was fine to get them too, I'm gonna let you
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  finish. But I was trying to get them to give me a job.
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  They wouldn't because I was fourteen, and for some reason they just didn't feel
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  it was right. And so, but they would let me go through all
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  their posters. But oh yeah, I still have some posters. I still
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  have some posters from the videos. To me, no I worked. I
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  started working at fourteen, and Florida didn't care about these things. So I
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  just got snuck in and got paid paid under the table, and I was
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  managing by fifteen the video store. And it was there I was managing because
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  I was, I mean, I lived the brand, a hustle. I've
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  been hustling since I was a child, so it was just one of those
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  things. So I started. I was managing the store. It was a
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  mom and pop store, and I just got I fell in love with movies.
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  I just would I would consume. And it's hard for everybody listening to
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  understand, but I literally consumed everything that came out every week, which now
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  is in pop because it was four movies, five movies, six six,
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  that was it. That was all that got released in a week. So
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  I would I would watch everything. So from eighty eight to ninety three,
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  my trivia is solid. I can I can go toe to toe with Tarantino
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  in those five year period. Other than that I'll probably lose, But those
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  five year periods, it's really I just remember the boxes. I remember.
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  So that's how I fell in love with movies. And it's something about that
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  time that people from that they don't understand. That's right. I think it's
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  so interesting what you say. You just touched on something about the uh so,
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  the access to to movies. There was a time, I mean that
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  in that era, I actually think that that was a real uh you know,
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  platinum age. I think for cinema, for Hollywood, for cinema that
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  sort of late eighties to about mid nineties, Like there was this decade where
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  the corporations hadn't fully figured out how to you know, cookie cuts of this
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  shit. It was like, okay with there was still a lot of i
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  want to say, kind of greased within the process, the the creativity and
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  the artistry. Still the inmates were still running the asylum. The inmates were
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  allowed to run the asylum for a little bit. And yeah, did small
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  movies existed, you know, the what about Bobs of the World and the
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  Sneakers of the Sneakers of the World and these kind of films were allowed to
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  be made within the studio system and having those kind of resources, which that
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  doesn't exist. But there wasn't this sort of you know, vertical integration that
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  is so many layers deep, and we're talking about you know, global strategies
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  and corporate strategies, and it hadn't I feel that Hollywood hadn't become corporatized.
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  So you sort of still had that, like you said, inmates sort of
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  running the asylum. It was the artists that were running asylum, and within
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  that, I would say the producers were also part of the artists. You
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  still had some of the outsized personalities that were good or for bad could push
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  some of this stuff through. And they made programmers like they made these exceptionally
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  well made movies that weren't supposed to be the blockbuster the you know then terminate
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  us at the time, but they were solid moving within that mid budget I
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  was I was talking to a minute interruptive. I was talking to. He
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  was on the show a while ago. He used to run one of my
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  guests used to run Richard Donner's production company for for a decade. He read
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  it in the eighties up into the early nineties. Was he in that office
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  in at one of others? Like I think, so, yeah, you
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  know, he was wherever wherever Dick was. That's where he was for a
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  decade. So he was there through lethal weapon, he was there through conspiracy
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  theory, all that, all that whole time, and he would tell me
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  the stories of I'm like, how was it back then? He's like,
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  oh, well, Dick would just have an idea and he would he would
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  call up the CEO of Warner Brothers just like, hey, I want to
• 14:28
  make this movie and they're like cool, and I go and that's it.
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  He goes, Yeah, they were in production and he was there ever a
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  budget. They're like, Alex, I never saw a budget on any movie
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  that we ever did. It was never discussed. It was just whatever it
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  took. And Ritt and Dick was really you know, he never went over
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  whatever the number that he gave it. But it was never like Warner Brothers
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  didn' say you only got twenty million to make this. It's like whatever Dick
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  wants. Yeah, can you imagine? No, I mean, he it's
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  it. And I think that tells you. I think it's film was up
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  until in fact, even not long ago, it was a luxury, luxury
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  product, right, I had to call it a product. It was a
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  luxury form of entertainment, and so, uh, you know, you kind
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  of had the same sort of economics around it that you had with sort of
• 15:22
  any kind of luxury goods that they could control. There was only four movies
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  coming out because there was no way I have to shoot with me any other
• 15:28
  way. That was the other way we're going to see us with either you
• 15:31
  go to the theater that you wait for it on BHS or you know you
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  eventually in like twelve years see on TV. Like that was just the sort
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  of that was the outlets. The outlets for for revenue was limited and and
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  but and fair un controlled, very very control. It wasn't the wild wild
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  West that now you know, there's a guy called mister Beast on YouTube who
• 15:52
  has one hundred million followers and is making millions and millions per video of him
• 15:58
  doing what whatever he does. That didn't exist back then, and the control
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  was loosened up but dramatically now now to get back to the fascinating origin story,
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  by the way, right right right? So what was that? Right?
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  Did not? Yes? So I bought the books and I decided I
• 16:15
  was going to write these scripts and I was putting the pictures up on the
• 16:18
  wall, and my my dad, being a good immigrant Persian parent, said
• 16:23
  to me, you need to even though he wasn't being in division himself,
• 16:29
  he said, you need to get your self an education, and I made
• 16:32
  him a deal. I said, I will go to college, I will
• 16:33
  get right the community, I will get, you know, and after that,
• 16:37
  what I do, I'm going to And he said, it's a deal.
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  And I wrote and I wrote and I wrote throughout my college years.
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  And then when I got out, I sort of went and got myself a
• 16:52
  job and paid the way, and my eye was always on hollywoods And at
• 16:55
  that time it was nineties England, so it was all Richard Curtis and forwarding
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  and its Guneral and if you'd look at me with my I was like,
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  there's only so much in common that do I have with the Grant, with
• 17:12
  your grant playing any anybody as much as I loved Hugh's work, and I
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  think it's incredible it you know, they were just didn't speak to me,
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  like it wasn't me. It was like, what are my stories? And
• 17:23
  what am I? So I really turned my attention to Hollywood, and it
• 17:27
  was how do I get from here from South London to over there? And
• 17:33
  it sparked a journey that was maybe from that point, maybe in the late
• 17:37
  nineties. It was about ten years. It was like two thousand and six
• 17:41
  when I wrote the spec that you know that open the doors, and so
• 17:48
  you were over So overnight success is what you're saying. Overnight. I was
• 17:51
  an overnight success for about twenty five years, So you were so you were
• 17:56
  you're really, you know, hustling it out. So how many scripts did
• 18:00
  you write before that one popped? The one that popped was number fourteen,
• 18:04
  number fourteen. So idn't wanted to ask that question because so many screenwriters listening,
• 18:08
  they think that the first one out the gate. That's the what I
• 18:12
  work with a lot of young screenwriters and so I mentor a lot of screenwriights.
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  Now I like to pass on some of this, you know, uh,
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  these lessons I've learned the hard way and the blessing. Number one is
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  it's it's it's the long game, like you have to perfect your craft.
• 18:30
  This isn't about your one script, because the moment you write that one script
• 18:33
  and you said it, the next question is, well, what else you
• 18:36
  got? What's your next thing? What's your you know, here's this big
• 18:41
  franchise. Figure it out? Can you figure it out? Are you're good
• 18:45
  enough to figure it out? Are you good enough to figure it out?
• 18:48
  And deal with the egos of the people who attached to it. Are you
• 18:52
  wait, wait, wait, there's egos in Hollywood happening. So is it
• 18:57
  okay? Can you figure it out in your own room without anyone's interferance,
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  and we'll give you all the money that you want, because that's all.
• 19:07
  And if you don't know how to do it, there's four hundred other guys
• 19:10
  that been caught. Yes, it just is. That's that's that's the business.
• 19:15
  That's it's very it's very high pressure, it's very and today more than
• 19:18
  ever, it's just it's just turnover because today it's not even they don't even
• 19:22
  have any there's you know, the when I started started professionally, professionally,
• 19:27
  so when I got my first studio job, which was two thousand and eleven,
• 19:30
  So I sold my first script twenty ten, twenty eleven. The business
• 19:37
  of open writing, assignments, the business of development. Hey, we've just
• 19:42
  picked up twenty pieces of IP and a short story in a comic book,
• 19:48
  and an exec has an idea, we need a writer. We'll be right
• 19:53
  back after a word from our sponsor, and now back to the show.
• 20:02
  All of that, eleven years later, has gone like it's gone. There
• 20:06
  is no right now it's what is your story, what is your screenplay?
• 20:11
  How do we package it, and how do we just feed it into the
• 20:15
  machine so that they can just go ahead and make it. That whole sort
• 20:18
  of development aspect of it has slowly, slowly erode it to the point that
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  I kind of feel because film is so ubiquitous now, or it's seen as
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  ubiquitous, it's seen as something as you know, the movie of the week,
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  and exposing its disposable, it's become much more disposable. And that really
• 20:37
  is a a real sort of soul searching that's going on right now. I
• 20:45
  look at the minds of my colleagues. I especially posted what happened at Netflix
• 20:51
  in the last few months, and you know, the turnaround that's happening at
• 20:53
  you know, Warner Brothers post Discovery deal, and just everywhere is you know,
• 21:00
  Amazon and MGM trying to figure out what they're going to do. So
• 21:03
  there's a lot of transition right now. I'm within that transition. There isn't
• 21:07
  that business that they used to like that just it's just so few and fablic
• 21:11
  Let me ask you, because I mean, we're going to talk about your
• 21:14
  new new project Rise, which looks fantastic. I caount wait to watch it.
• 21:18
  It comes out as of this recording on Friday, but this will come
• 21:22
  out next early next week. But with something like that, it seems like
• 21:26
  there's the business models are changing so rapidly. Before it was to make the
• 21:33
  tech pole that goes into the theaters, that's pretty much monopolized by Marvel,
• 21:37
  by Star Wars, by all these massive eypsd DC and the Warner Butter,
• 21:42
  Harry Potter, these kind of massive ips is what takes is taken over that
• 21:48
  ten pole process. So now there is another pipeline of content that needs to
• 21:53
  be created in the future world. We're not talking about TV, but in
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  the future world. So films like Rise is need is a film that gets
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  that made to feed to feed the Disney Plus the Disney Plus machine. And
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  then I mean, when I remember during the pandemic, they're like releasing Pixarm
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  movies straight to straight to the streaming, and You're like, and I was
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  like, the whole world's upside down that Warner Brothers last year did the entire
• 22:19
  year of Just Matrix got released streaming? Like what upside down? We're in
• 22:29
  the upside down? We are in the upside down of drink the pandemic.
• 22:33
  I think the pandemic had a lot to do with it, but I don't
• 22:36
  think it did anything new. I think it just accelerated what was already going
• 22:40
  to happen. Because Sunday Your Services put on three years worth of subscribers in
• 22:45
  one year. And I think part of Netflix's problem, for example, is
• 22:48
  they just had such a blowout a year in terms of new customers and and
• 22:55
  you know that you just cannot maintain that kind of growth it should have been,
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  you know, between two thousand, you know, twenty two, twenty
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  three, twenty four, and you just kind of peat. So it's sort
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  of okay, how do we, how do we you know, turn the
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  ship around. But it's a pattern that's that's been uh, sort of progressing.
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  I mean, it has been happening. It's nothing new. And I
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  feel, you know, that we've gone from movies having been this sort of
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  you know, luxury form of entertainments. I was saying that being this sort
• 23:29
  of modesty form of entertainment that becomes sort of disposable, and the audience's attention
• 23:33
  span is kind of it's you know, it approaches it as disposable, and
• 23:40
  part of my thought is like, well, what is the relationship of the
• 23:45
  younger generations with cinema? How do they view cinema? And I and it's
• 23:49
  partly what I've been doing is going around and asking to people much younger than
• 23:52
  myself, Well, you know, it's why do you watch movies? Like
• 23:56
  what is a what does a movie mean to you? What I mean to
• 24:00
  you? What is going to the theater mean to you? And I feel
• 24:03
  that these demographics are changing around us, and I think as artists, the
• 24:07
  one thing that we do have at our disposal is, you know, the
• 24:12
  ability of creating cultural moments and creating sort of cultural relevance and telling stories that
• 24:21
  are so resounding that they don't really matter where they're distributed. That if you're
• 24:26
  doing something on Disney and it's for Disney class, or you're doing something on
• 24:30
  Netflix, it's actually a story that can rise above put the plan, but
• 24:33
  it can kind of rise above the noise because ultimately, as you probably experiencing,
• 24:41
  it becomes a white noise because it's not no longer just either cinema,
• 24:45
  it's also limited series and ongoing series. So we're so fascinating because I love
• 24:52
  this conversation because you know, I always look at my own life and I
• 24:56
  look at what I consume on a daily basis, and you know, you
• 25:00
  know, when I'm at home, I watch a lot of television, a
• 25:03
  lot of great, great, great television series and binge series and just kind
• 25:08
  of go through that with my wife. And then the occasional movie will come
• 25:12
  up. They're like, oh, we're in the mood for this kind of
• 25:15
  movie or that kind of movie. But the event scenario where like I have
• 25:18
  to see that. It's and this is the funny thing. It's usually attached
• 25:22
  to a filmmaker, not of this generation. It's usually a filmmaker from ten,
• 25:30
  fifteen, twenty years ago or older. Scorsesea del Toro, Nolan,
• 25:36
  Fincher, Cameron Spielberg, these kind of legends who are walking around us.
• 25:41
  But they came up at a time when they were the artists given the tools
• 25:48
  by the studios, the resources. So you're basically giving Picasso any brush they
• 25:52
  want, any canvas they want, as big or as small, to tell
• 25:56
  these massive stories. Those filmmakers, I can count them on one or two
• 26:00
  hands that are allowed to do that anymore, the Nolans, but that's because
• 26:06
  of their experience and that's because you know they and I kind of you know
• 26:10
  question, So you made a point about the blockbusters. You know, what
• 26:14
  happens to the blockbuster? What happened to the original? Trust just die hard?
• 26:18
  Right? What happened all that that were? You know? And here's
• 26:25
  the thing, like this is my own some pet theory and and just what
• 26:29
  I'm observed that there is, uh, there is an unknown to making those
• 26:36
  kinds of movies. That there is you don't know, you don't know if
• 26:40
  they didn't know if Jews was going to work or not, they had to
• 26:42
  take risks, right, It's just that the guy from Moonlight, the guy
• 26:47
  from Moonlighting running around when you've got Arnold and Slide who were all ripped up
• 26:52
  and buffed out, and this guy looks like, you know, who's the
• 26:55
  guy from moonlighted with a gun? Right? Arguably the greatest action movie I've
• 27:00
  are created. Like, but someone had to roll the dice. Yeah,
• 27:03
  and and and that that rolling of the dice is essential to cinema. It's
• 27:10
  essential to what we do. Like it's you don't know, like I don't
• 27:14
  know on any of the movies that I've written as to is it gonna Hey,
• 27:18
  is it gonna get made be is it gonna be a hit or is
• 27:21
  it gonna be a flop? Is it going to have be a disaster during
• 27:23
  production or is it gonna work? Because you don't know, you don't know
• 27:26
  what like, you just have your instincts. And again going back to young
• 27:30
  rights, is that's kind of what you're trying to develop as a writer,
• 27:33
  as a as a filmmaker. It's it's it's and I do view rights as
• 27:37
  a filmmakers and it's a whole other topic. But I kind of but I
• 27:41
  think that sense of risk taking is a complete anathema to how a corporate entity
• 27:48
  works absolutely because you cannot you you you cannot enter your quarterly budget numbers with
• 28:00
  uh, you know, any form of risk involved. And so that is
• 28:06
  I feel that you know what has caused you know, the sort of I
• 28:12
  don't want to cause it, called it a decline because I think of it
• 28:15
  as a transition. But who is what has caused this sort of this transition
• 28:18
  period that we're in with. I believe out laws find its way it has
• 28:25
  been the removal of risk from the process because it all has to be you
• 28:30
  know, sequels and I P and and and one thing. But even I
• 28:34
  P. I would say original IP is kind of dangerous as far as if
• 28:40
  it's new, If it's a new I P. That's what ye, it's
• 28:44
  it's you know whatever. Yeah, yeah, but uh, the risk out
• 28:52
  of a series of of comic book heroes based around these or based around them,
• 29:00
  or you know these knowns, well, that's that's kind of that's a
• 29:04
  factory. It's turning, it's it's but you know, it's interesting. And
• 29:08
  you also know what's interesting is that within that system there is still risk being
• 29:14
  taken, but it's very calculated risk. So rag thor Ragnarok, it's mitigated
• 29:19
  risk. It's mitigate so thor Ragnarok is it's an insanity how that movie got
• 29:26
  made within the system they basically gave Until I see Love and Thunder, which
• 29:32
  I'm sure is going to be absolutely amazing, it's gonna it looks insane.
• 29:36
  It looks they really let them loose. Now they're just like, just there's
• 29:40
  goats, it's just whatever, just do what you gotta do. But giving
• 29:45
  him the kind of reins within a property that you know, even if he
• 29:48
  goes a little off the reservation, it's still for it's still marvel same thing
• 29:52
  with the DC universe. I mean, it's the Schneider cut. I mean,
• 29:56
  for God's sakes, will be right back after a word from our sponsor,
• 30:04
  and now back to the show. They let him go, but then
• 30:08
  they pulled back because they got scared. But then but then finally they let
• 30:14
  it go and they're like, oh, it's much better than it was when
• 30:17
  they That's so much better. And so that's the I'm not even going to
• 30:22
  go though, No, we're not going to get into that. No,
• 30:25
  no, why did don't understand? I don't want to get into the conversation
• 30:27
  about that specific film, but the concept of what but what others? So
• 30:37
  DC or Marvel sir, which is doing it better? No, I'm joking.
• 30:40
  I'm joking. No, you're right, but you're right, But the
• 30:47
  business has changed so much and there's only a few I mean, seriously,
• 30:52
  I think between it's Nolan, who can basically he's doing a black and white
• 30:56
  opera imor movie for a hundred million dollars. Who else Hollywood gets to do
• 31:00
  that? Nobody? Yeah, yeah, Cameron is spending I don't know to
• 31:04
  three billion dollars on the Avatar films. I mean, anyone who's earned the
• 31:08
  right to do that. I think it seems skiddy, let Jim do whatever
• 31:14
  Jim wants to do, you know, But Marty is still fighting for his
• 31:18
  for his visions, and the reason why he's getting to do his visions is
• 31:22
  his cast that he brings. When you bring Leonardo and when Quentin wants to
• 31:25
  do something, he keeps his budget lo he brings the biggest movie stars in
• 31:27
  the world to the table. So there there's you know, there is some
• 31:33
  art still being made in the studio system, but it's so mitigated the risk
• 31:37
  it really is, and it is it is, and and specifically when you're
• 31:42
  looking at theatrical I mean, this doesn't theatrical here, And I think,
• 31:45
  you know what I'm really interested in is there are some pockets. So it
• 31:52
  Sony so pulled a train for example, like that. Yeah, but it's
• 31:56
  Brett Pitt, It's brought Pitt. But that's that's how it used to be
• 31:59
  the days, Like that's how it was, you know, I mean admitsically,
• 32:02
  you know, we just named a couple of you know, Jors and
• 32:05
  Diehard, which it wasn't. It was like that was the beginning that even
• 32:09
  even the star driven original movie that you know the original action movie that even
• 32:17
  that is, is it risk? Like, I don't know. I mean,
• 32:21
  outside of Bullet Training, my mind is Joining the Black but I mean
• 32:23
  miss Mission Impossibles. But that's based off on an ip that Tom created for
• 32:29
  himself for the last Time movie seven and eight back to back, Yeah,
• 32:34
  seven to eight back to back. I mean, I don't know how many
• 32:36
  more he's got in them, but I can't wait. I mean, and
• 32:38
  i'd love to hear You'd love to hear your thoughts on Top Gun, Like
• 32:43
  you see something like Top Gun And when I went to go see it,
• 32:45
  I mean, it hits nostalgia for me. It hit so many different things
• 32:50
  for me. But when I'm watching it, I'm like, oh my god,
• 32:52
  this is what a blockbuster used to be. Like, you know,
• 32:55
  it's an event it experienced. It's all in camera, of it's at all,
• 33:00
  but a lot of it's in camera. What they did was something so
• 33:05
  insane. The story telling. To tell that story the way they did was
• 33:10
  very, very tight, very good. I mean in the entire world.
• 33:15
  You know, it's like they said, basically everybody's dad went to go see
• 33:16
  it opening because guys like you and me were like, I'm going to go
• 33:21
  see Tim Gun of course, and I'll tell you. I'll tell you that
• 33:25
  I think my thoughts on it is there are there are two elements of that.
• 33:29
  So one, firstly, I think I admire immensely Tom's determination to single.
• 33:37
  Hadn't they make sure that cinema matchesn't saved cinema because I feel I feel
• 33:43
  we need that, we need that passion. The industry needs that passion.
• 33:46
  It's so easy just to turn on the TV and go, okay, walk
• 33:52
  me with You're on what streamer? And am I going to watch? And
• 33:53
  I feel that there's a real place for that, and that accessibility is great
• 33:57
  and more people can can get to move. But I feel the cinema experience
• 34:02
  and that the wondering magic of cinema, I kind of feel we need those
• 34:08
  champions. So secondly, I've been working with the folks at Rockheimer a lot
• 34:16
  so over the last few years, and I have one project with them that
• 34:21
  is casting right now, and being in that process, it's one of the
• 34:28
  few places where I feel like I'm still in old like I'm still in that
• 34:32
  you know, uh, Jerry and also schadow Man who runs Jerry's company,
• 34:38
  and and you know really is there is such attention to detail, attention to
• 34:49
  detail in the story, in the characterizations, and I mean I felt like
• 34:52
  I was when I started this was you know, I signed on it's called
• 34:55
  the Ministry of my Gentleman Warfare. And when I signed on a it's a
• 35:00
  book, And it was like about the same time as I started Lise,
• 35:04
  and I felt like a kid in the candle store because I could talk about
• 35:09
  Crimson Tide and can't Air and enemy of the State and and really go and
• 35:19
  they would tell me all the different little bits of like well, how did
• 35:22
  that then come about? And how did you do this? And what was
• 35:24
  that? What was the thinking behind you know that line? And you know,
• 35:29
  what did this writer do and what did that right to do? So
• 35:30
  it's been such a an education of the Hollywood that I grew up ad Myra.
• 35:37
  And there is a reason why these movies work, you know when and
• 35:42
  the way that they work, and it is an attention to the cinematic detail,
• 35:49
  to making sure that the story and the characters play as big as possible
• 35:52
  that have emotional residents. There's most of my work and and sort of the
• 35:59
  rewriter and rewriting on the Bruck IRA projects are around, ironically, not the
• 36:05
  action. It's all around the character. It's all around well what is this?
• 36:08
  And you're going down to the and and that is an attention to detail
• 36:12
  that all star producing that you don't really have any more, because I know
• 36:16
  we're talking about the directors. I actually think there's a producing problem, Like
• 36:21
  I feel so on on Rise we had an incredible producer, Bernie Goldburn produced
• 36:25
  three hundreds. Is you know, what are the most detail orientated producers that
• 36:36
  I've worked with who really kind of brings the writer in and really uh uh,
• 36:44
  you know, works and develops and develops and and and land manages the
• 36:47
  process. And I feel these producers who have that cedigree, who have that
• 36:52
  history, who understand that, you know, producing isn't just attaching itself to
• 36:59
  a project and you know, showing meetings and you know, coming away for
• 37:04
  the red carpet, you know, helping it, help being cast a little
• 37:07
  bit. It's it, you know, it's a it's a real creative talent.
• 37:13
  And like the rabber like the rubber Evans of the old old Hollywood.
• 37:16
  Correct, yes, like there is there is a but and and that sort
• 37:22
  of creative input is what bridges I believe the creativity that goes onto the page
• 37:30
  and obviously onto the screen, and that business side of it where you know,
• 37:36
  you can have interference. Now, I've worked with executives who have been
• 37:39
  incredible. I've worked with protective to not being so great. But you know,
• 37:45
  it always needs somebody there to manage it and make sure that that vision,
• 37:51
  that cohesive vision ends up on the screen, and the emotion ends up
• 37:54
  on the screen, and the cinema ends up on the screen. And and
• 37:59
  and I feel that there are there are producers right now. You're incredible,
• 38:02
  you're working. And but that's something that's that's eroded with the loss of the
• 38:08
  of the of the old producer. You know, the lot deals that the
• 38:14
  producer deals. Bungalow, the bungalows, Bungalows, the bungalows. I used
• 38:19
  to visit those bungalows. I used to visit. But ten eleven years ago
• 38:22
  you would go, you know what meeting today are? You're reading so and
• 38:25
  so at that bungalow Universal and then you've got to go to go backs.
• 38:28
  You got to you got to go to you know, warners, and you've
• 38:30
  got to go you know, I remember going to Joel Silver's offices, and
• 38:35
  you know it's you know that used to be you know, and and those
• 38:38
  guys were really really important to the process. And I feel to your question
• 38:43
  about I'm gun two, I feel incredible direction, incredible, but it's on
• 38:50
  the page and that comes from the like that that comes from the writers working
• 38:53
  with the producer and the producer really managing it. And again having been on
• 38:58
  the inside, it's no sur christ because I was, you know, seeing
• 39:01
  those guys as that were making it, and it was like, well,
• 39:06
  if you're if there's any attention to detail like it is here, and you
• 39:10
  know, it's still pushing me as a right to the way that I want
• 39:14
  to be pushed. It's not like, oh, make a difference. It's
• 39:16
  like, well, this moment in this scene when he says this thing,
• 39:21
  how does he what does he really mean? And you need heighten that?
• 39:25
  How do we push that? And if we how do we landed? So
• 39:29
  it's it's it's those little timey decisions I think the I think that in many
• 39:34
  ways, a lot of the old school picks are and the Pixar you know
• 39:37
  teams back in the day, their detail to story and character, I mean,
• 39:44
  up is still the first four minutes of Up is still probably one of
• 39:45
  the greatest still cry. It's still one of the greatest montages of a life
• 39:52
  ever put to film. And it's just a master art work. It's just
• 39:58
  a master work. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor and
• 40:07
  now back to the show. But that was the kind of old school detail
• 40:12
  to story, to beating up every line. And as writers we sit down
• 40:16
  and we'll you know, we'll go through the scenes and sometimes we'll get tired
• 40:19
  and we're like, Okay, the scene's good enough. We just got to
• 40:21
  move on. We did all the time. It just I'll be on.
• 40:24
  Like, you know, if you're you're writing something over with twelve weeks,
• 40:27
  you can't you know, this time it takes and tracks used to hand the
• 40:30
  draft in. There are moments when you know I'm cheating, like I'm I'm
• 40:35
  just I want to get from A to B to C. And then you
• 40:37
  had it in the script and they go, well that bit doesn't quite work.
• 40:39
  Oh go hey, I'll rewrite it. You know. I'm like,
• 40:44
  well, no, my god, look that that's I agree, Like,
• 40:46
  that's the bit I don't even think of that works, But I have to
• 40:49
  hand it in to make the other bits that of connect and so I have
• 40:52
  to I always I always used to do when I was editing. I used
• 40:55
  to always do this little trick. And this is an old editor trick where
• 41:00
  because clients are producers or someone would walk in and they would be you know,
• 41:02
  they a lot of times they have to just especially doing client work,
• 41:07
  like for commercials, they have to justify why they're in the room. So
• 41:09
  you would throw them a Harry, You throw them a little like an obvious
• 41:15
  mistake, so obvious that it's something that they could stick their teeth and oh,
• 41:19
  that shot you need to cut five frames from that. Oh, oh
• 41:22
  that's reverse you made a mistake that, Oh, I'm so sorry. And
• 41:25
  that way they don't mess with anything else. So I know a lot of
• 41:29
  screenwriters would do similar things like that too. They they'll throw they'll throw little
• 41:32
  things in there and let them read it and go, oh, this scene
• 41:36
  here, I'm like, I know, you know, thank you, and
• 41:38
  they'll they'll and they'll go in and retweak it. And so these are little
• 41:43
  tricks that they It would never do anything like that, so I wouldn't ever.
• 41:46
  I'll tell you why I wouldn't do it because it happens anyway any more
• 41:54
  mistakes. I mean, it's that's like you're I'm so perfect, I've got
• 42:01
  to mess this up somehow. That's that's what that's for me. It's it's
• 42:06
  yeah, yeah, it's I look at it and I just go. When
• 42:12
  I'm handing anything in, I'm sure I have to tell myself, don't apologize.
• 42:16
  Just hand it in. Just hand it in. Let them find the
• 42:21
  faults with it, and they will, and then you know, and then
• 42:24
  and then you get into your you know, it was I mean, I've
• 42:27
  been lucky in that. I don't the luckiest the word, but uh,
• 42:30
  let's use lucky. Uh. The since Grace and Monaco, which is movie
• 42:37
  I made eight years ago, which was like this beautiful disaster. It was
• 42:42
  like, you know, it was like a soue flaid, that kind of
• 42:45
  soueflade and then sort of then unsoflating collapsed in on itself. It's kind of
• 42:49
  an overbait, you know, And you know, I learned a lot from
• 42:57
  that, Like I learned I'd learned a lot about the process, but also
• 43:05
  that the process is entirely dependent on who your partners are, who you work
• 43:08
  with and the trust, specifically around the producers who worked who you work with,
• 43:16
  the voice system you have being input it into the script, and ultimately
• 43:23
  you know the directors that you work with. I really went away and so
• 43:30
  recalibrate it. We thought I went to the dark breaks like it was a
• 43:31
  dog. It was like, oh my god, I wrote this script that
• 43:34
  they everyone told me was great, and then I went on to the ride
• 43:37
  and it became this monstrosity of infamy. But you don't be so hard on
• 43:45
  yourself, sir. I'm harder. Look, but listen, listen. Have
• 43:47
  you seen the room? Have you seen the room? Okay? I mean
• 43:50
  there's there's first movies in the world, sir. Let's just take into perspective
• 43:54
  here. It's I don't I don't know how much further above the room we
• 43:59
  are. But are there are there midnight screenings of Grace of the Monaco everywhere?
• 44:02
  No, there isn't, sirtain, Okay, So let's just maybe it
• 44:07
  wasn't bad at all. Maybe that's no. No, if you're going to
• 44:10
  commit to being bad, you've got to go all in. I say,
• 44:15
  there's this skill of badness, because there's bad and like, oh, that's
• 44:17
  horrible. But then there's something that transcends. So it's so bad it becomes
• 44:22
  good. And that is the genius of the room. When you watch it,
• 44:27
  which you can never watch it by yourself. You must watch it with
• 44:29
  groups because if you watch it by yourself, it's sad. But if you
• 44:31
  watch it with a group of people, you just go, oh my god,
• 44:35
  this is the most enjoyable thing I've ever seen. But it's so bad
• 44:37
  that it is endearing and good because of the authentic nature of it. You
• 44:43
  can't go at By the way, also, you can't intentionally go to make
• 44:46
  a bed movie. It just you can't. You can't. I mean,
• 44:49
  it's like you can't in a way. You also comm intention to go out
• 44:52
  to make a great news. You can attempt it. You can attempt it.
• 44:58
  And I think you can intentionally make a good movie, yes, but
• 45:00
  I think to make a great movie that's something that I think is only in
• 45:05
  the stars and so and so, you know, to the point that I
• 45:09
  thank you for your votes of confidence on first monk uh. So after that
• 45:15
  experience, I realized that actually it's it's it's the people who you work with.
• 45:25
  It's such a collaborative media, especially as a writer because it's all about
• 45:30
  interpretation. So you have this vision in your head, set your keyboard,
• 45:32
  right, you write the movie that you believe it's going to be sort of
• 45:36
  the spectacular piece of cinema, and you hand it over. You hand it
• 45:40
  over from the beginning, from the producer the studio, to the director,
• 45:46
  to the casting director, to the production designer to you know, so on
• 45:51
  and so forth. Direct photography, like it all just becomes layer upon layer
• 45:55
  of interpretation and if you've get it right and if you have got great partners,
• 46:04
  it does become like a team that has a snowball effect that they then
• 46:07
  choose to correct people and then it becomes a very cohesive unit and of creative
• 46:14
  vision. And so yes, you can have disagreements. Yes, it's like,
• 46:19
  you know, I think this should go a little bit, you know,
• 46:22
  more emotional. I think should be less emotional. I think should be
• 46:23
  red. I think it should be blue. But as long as you're all
• 46:29
  working to the same vision, these are just choices that continue to make it
• 46:32
  better and it's it's it's not conflicting. And in terms of well, you
• 46:37
  know, I think this should be an impressionist piece, and well, no,
• 46:42
  I think there should be another drama like that that you know you're already
• 46:46
  you know, in trouble, and that happens very very often, but it
• 46:51
  doesn't happen if if you are careful in who your partners are. And that's
• 46:55
  basically for me being one of the guiding principles since since Grace and and and
• 47:02
  so far. It's it, you know, uh, you know, two
• 47:06
  three movies, a couple of movies that I've written, one that I produced.
• 47:08
  Like it's it's been. It's really held out in terms of it.
• 47:14
  I'll tell you, I'll tell you it is a miracle that any movie gets
• 47:16
  made, and any good movie gets made. It's an absolute miracle because as
• 47:21
  a writer you put it on the page and and I've read scripts that were
• 47:25
  amazing, but when they're executed, too much stuff happens, all those things
• 47:30
  you just laid out. If things aren't hitting the mark all the way through.
• 47:35
  There's so many places that this can go askew. The production designer made
• 47:40
  decisions that screwed everything up. The DP makes decisions that screwed things that the
• 47:45
  director does that, the actors make choices. There's there's all of the the
• 47:49
  producers in the studios, the edit. There's so many places where it can
• 47:52
  go bad that it's a miracle that we ever get a good a good product.
• 47:57
  Honestly, it truly is. That's why that's the strongest personalities the people
• 48:01
  who lead, the directors and the producers who are strong in their vision and
• 48:08
  unwavering almost is when you get these kinds of I mean, look at I
• 48:12
  mean you look at a Nolan project and or a Scorsese project or a Spielberg
• 48:15
  product. These are these are people who have such focus on their vision that
• 48:22
  they are the ones that are bringing it in and they're collabor and they've chosen
• 48:24
  the collaborators appropriately to bring it into their vision. But man, it's it's
• 48:30
  such a and as a screen uh. Danny Boyle the other day, I
• 48:35
  think when was it he said that he called it psychotic because you have to
• 48:39
  have this some psychotic ascent vision drives and and and and I as a director,
• 48:46
  I believe you do. I think. I think as a as a
• 48:49
  writer, I feel you comps because I think we then we then then with
• 48:57
  then your Joe Astra House. Uh, all the business is a psychotic.
• 49:01
  Now as a writer, I think you really need to be the glue that
• 49:07
  holds everything together from a story and creative standpoint. And this is one of
• 49:12
  the things that I've been kind of promoting in terms of the vision of the
• 49:17
  writer as a as a as a partner and collaborated to the process, not
• 49:23
  like old Hollywood where and that's one of the real benefits of the change that
• 49:29
  we're seeing is that because movies are getting made quicker than ever before, and
• 49:36
  they need to succeed almost on a one to one, you know, go
• 49:39
  one other days of we develop ten, we make one, we make ten
• 49:43
  one. Now it really has to be one to one. Theatricalt has to
• 49:47
  be one to one or you know, people use their jobs. And also
• 49:52
  on streaming seem on Netflix, We'll be right back after a word from our
• 49:57
  sponsor, and now back to the show. There has to be that quality
• 50:06
  bardans to be hit. Now. One of the issues that has historically been
• 50:09
  a problem is that the writer has always been seen as the typeist, the
• 50:15
  person who gets the idea and might type something up and then hands it over
• 50:17
  to people to make the movie. Whereas I feel that is actually part of
• 50:23
  the reason why movies cannot fail, is that there isn't somebody that's sitting as
• 50:30
  the custodian of the story, vision of the character, vision of the and
• 50:34
  so. And this isn't about ego. It's not about like, you know,
• 50:37
  putting yourself at the center of the story, because ultimately, I believe
• 50:40
  the director has to be you know, it's it's the rhetorical vision. But
• 50:45
  the ability for anyone in the production, starting from the director to produce a
• 50:52
  studio to production designer to props, to be able to always turn back the
• 51:00
  writer at some point in those moments of doubts, in those moments where we
• 51:04
  need to cut a day, we need to you know, compress these scenes
• 51:08
  we don't know you know, you know that So for that's really you know,
• 51:15
  important to the story, like we don't know, like uh where it
• 51:21
  should be positioned, how it should be because of the action that's happening.
• 51:24
  The ability to go back to somebody who from the beginning, from from idea
• 51:30
  stage all the way to the picture block is consistent. Is there is part
• 51:34
  of the process is you know, doesn't need to be on set that all
• 51:37
  the time, doesn't need to be you know, I don't maybe I'll spend
• 51:40
  like a week or two on set on any movie that I make and always
• 51:45
  there as as I try to time it with scenes that it's a lot of
• 51:52
  dialogue scenes, scenes where it's and I just, for example, on Rise,
• 51:55
  they shot all the basketball within the first four weeks. I was like,
• 51:59
  have at it. That's makes it, makes it great. Do whatever
• 52:01
  you're doing, and then I'll come in from what I'm usedful where you sort
• 52:07
  of start needing to make some of these sort of creative choices. So with
• 52:10
  the writer as being part of that process, you do end up taking out
• 52:16
  a lot of the uncertainty, a lot of the a lot of the uh
• 52:21
  oh, well that thing's not working. Instead of trying to solve it in
• 52:25
  the easiest place, which is solving it in the script, you end up
• 52:30
  trying to just throwing the script this side and saying, okay, let's try
• 52:31
  and patch this together, so you know, let's get rid of that scene
• 52:36
  and what what else could we do? And you suddenly have the directors or
• 52:40
  the actors who ever, making up something on the fly as as as what
• 52:45
  I've seen them, and it has really detrimental effect. So this notion of
• 52:51
  you know, the writers and I do a lot of work with the writer's
• 52:53
  Guild, you know, trying to impart this sort of uh less and this
• 53:00
  sense of identity from right. You know, you're not somebody who's just there.
• 53:04
  We just handled the script. You are a film. You have to
• 53:07
  understand how this all process works, and you have to be useful because often
• 53:10
  there'll be fights between people and you'll be the person in book we go,
• 53:15
  so threw up an argument for him. So that's so, is Indiana really
• 53:21
  scared of snakes? And if he is, why you like and the and
• 53:25
  the beauty of it is they see the script for as the Bible, and
• 53:31
  so you are the preacher that is interpreting the Bible. When they all when
• 53:36
  nobody else, when they fall exactly into that scenario, it's like, well,
• 53:39
  is he you know, why is he scared of snakes? Would he
• 53:42
  throw the snake? Or what did he? You know? Is he that
• 53:45
  isn't it? Or better, well, the better question is who feeds all
• 53:49
  the snakes down there? Were? They just sitting there for thousands of years,
• 53:52
  just waiting around for them for them to show up. There's not a
• 53:54
  lot of logic here, but you know what, you suspend this belief a
• 53:59
  little bit when you watch your rad it's just like speking all these things?
• 54:01
  Are they eating themselves? Have they been there thousands of years? Is what's
• 54:06
  kind of ecosystems is down there? It's like, how do they get in?
• 54:08
  What's going on? Like that? What is it? Yeah? That's
• 54:12
  that's that's that's the stuff. Do you go? You guys can figure that
• 54:15
  out, you know. And that's so funny too, because in today's world
• 54:19
  someone would have asked that question in nineteen seventy nine when they were developing that
• 54:23
  script. No, no, no, no, no, no one I
• 54:27
  ever seen anything like that before, don't I just cabal snakes. This is
• 54:31
  like just it doesn't matter. It didn't even didn't even cross anybody's mind at
• 54:36
  that way. But today they'd be like, this doesn't make any sense.
• 54:39
  Why the snake's there? What's going on? So let me tell me about
• 54:45
  your new project Rise. We've kind of hinted about it a little bit.
• 54:46
  It's gonna be airing on I think this Friday on Disney Plus, and I
• 54:51
  saw the trailer of it and I'd love the I'd love Disney has this wonderful
• 54:57
  lineage of amazing sports move that are based on real events, real life events,
• 55:02
  and it's kind of their little niche that they've had for decades, really
• 55:07
  for decades. So this is the next installment in that wonderful lineage. So
• 55:10
  tell me a little bit about it. So Rise is a story of family
• 55:16
  and faith and basketball. I mean, it's really we decided to approach this
• 55:22
  movie, which is based on the life of Giannis Antetokumpo and his family who
• 55:30
  began is really their journey of remarkably is illegal immigrants in Greece and the journey
• 55:40
  that they ultimately went on. And I don't think I need to publicize Giannis
• 55:45
  and Jonas's achievements anymore. And I think he's done, so I he's he's
• 55:50
  done, right, Yeah, I mean it's the most incredible, you know,
• 55:54
  growth of a sportsman. And what's been really interesting was when I started
• 55:58
  the project in twenty eighteen, the first meeting that was January twenty nineteen,
• 56:04
  he wasn't even an MVP. And so to have been writing this story,
• 56:08
  which is incredible on its own, the family of legal immigrants from Nigeria,
• 56:15
  actually your husband and wife, who were legal immigrants whose children were born in
• 56:20
  Greece, the country that they had immigrated to. But yet we're all we're
• 56:27
  outsiders, because in Greece, unless you've had a laws change now but back
• 56:32
  then, unless you've had nine years of school education and in the country legal
• 56:38
  even if you're born there, you're not you're not considered Greek, you're still
• 56:43
  legal. And so there was there was absolutely no part of legitimacy. So
• 56:46
  they basically had to sell stuff on the streets and hide from this. But
• 56:52
  also but we're able to go to school, and he was given to Greece
• 56:57
  as free education to me, which is a very weird setup in the country
• 57:02
  that the community legal immigrant you can still go at the school. And so
• 57:07
  uh Jiannis and his brother thanasas in fact NASA's first but they discovered basketball from
• 57:15
  never having touched the ball, they discovered it touched basketball. They at the
• 57:22
  age of twelve. Janis was the first time me saw some kids playing basketball
• 57:27
  and playground in a neighborhood, and he started playing. And the brothers saw
• 57:35
  basketball as an opportunity for them to not just uh further their own sort of
• 57:43
  future, but actually lift their entire family and h first initially help them pay
• 57:52
  for their parents and helping their parents financially, but ultimately we came about legitimizing
• 58:00
  UH and legalizing family and bring and bring the family together. It's it's the
• 58:07
  journey that they ended up going on that was really such a story of Heis
• 58:15
  and Lotos in terms of when we started the process, it was there was
• 58:20
  a real pursuit of happiness quality to the the journey that that they aren't.
• 58:23
  And for me, that was always that that was always a benchmark for us
• 58:29
  that you know, we were making a sports movie, but were really making
• 58:31
  a movie about the triumph of the human spirit, their family. And one
• 58:38
  of the key things for me is that sports movie is always work when it's
• 58:44
  not actually about winning or losing. It's not about winning or losing game.
• 58:46
  It's not it's not it's the end of team Cup. That it doesn't matter
• 58:52
  if you're you're not going to lay up, You're just gonna hit it and
• 58:57
  tell you you know, you prove your world view and that is your your
• 59:01
  growth and your your triumphs and it and really this story is really about that
• 59:07
  because we all know, we all know what happens to be honest, like
• 59:09
  it's and and it actually helped us a lot that we're able to say,
• 59:16
  Okay, you think you know what happened to be honest, but you don't
• 59:21
  know the emotional journey. You don't know what it was at stake, and
• 59:22
  you don't know when he was sitting there to be drafted, what truly his
• 59:28
  family was going through and what it meant. And hopefully that is lead that.
• 59:32
  Yeah, those steaks of what people take away from this. But but
• 59:37
  yeah, so I'm excited. I'm excited to see it. You know,
• 59:42
  we have a lot, you know, we've got big shoes to fill.
• 59:44
  I mean, remember remember the Titans. There's there's a real miracle and Micah.
• 59:50
  Yeah, it's it's I'm a sucker for a good sports movie. I
• 59:53
  don't care what the sports is. I saw that one that Disney did about
• 59:58
  about cricket. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor, and
• 1:00:07
  now back to the show with John Harry. Yes in an arm and I'm
• 1:00:13
  like, I mean, I don't Yeah, I'm in It's just like it's
• 1:00:15
  there's this this formula of like it just works so beautifully. So I'm a
• 1:00:21
  sucker for a good sports movie. So when I saw this, I was
• 1:00:22
  like, oh, yeah, I can't I can't wait to watch this.
• 1:00:25
  So congrats on on On getting this out into the world. And and we
• 1:00:30
  need something we do need we need we need a little little levity, a
• 1:00:34
  little something that hope in the world. People need hope and inspiration and a
• 1:00:39
  good release. Uh I've seen I've been in some screenings and you know,
• 1:00:45
  bring some tissues people people and and you know, but but in good way
• 1:00:51
  not you know, because it is it is sort of again, it's a
• 1:00:53
  it's a triumph. And and you said Disney man, like they know how
• 1:00:59
  it's made these like, oh, they've been doing them. They've been doing
• 1:01:02
  at oh, Bob, you know the executives at Disney, and the way
• 1:01:08
  that they just kept just again in the right way, just pushing us,
• 1:01:12
  challenging us, and every step of the way. You can see that,
• 1:01:16
  oh they know how to make these movies. And that really And and we
• 1:01:22
  tested the movie a couple of times in the process and it tested extremely well.
• 1:01:25
  But even then it was like, oh, you know, we had
• 1:01:29
  like this person gave it at ninety eight and not one hundred. Can we
• 1:01:35
  can we can we tweak? Can we tweak that scene a little bit here?
• 1:01:37
  Can we can we shave off a few seconds here? But you want
• 1:01:43
  that you want to be you want in the in the development process and of
• 1:01:45
  any project of our especially into Hollywood, you want to take it to the
• 1:01:51
  absolute limit of the best. It absolutely can't be within reason and within a
• 1:01:57
  time period that makes sense. So we're not there ten years later on the
• 1:02:00
  edit. Being an editor for many many years, at a certain point you
• 1:02:07
  got to go, guys, it's done. That's right, that's right.
• 1:02:09
  An idea of the timeline I had. The first meeting was in January twenty
• 1:02:15
  nineteen. It was myself, Bernie and our producer are executives, Chaz Salambia
• 1:02:20
  and Disney, and I walked out with five bullet points, this is what
• 1:02:25
  the movie needs to be well family, And that ended the draft in a
• 1:02:30
  number of yeah, things that have to be in the script. Things have
• 1:02:32
  to be in the script. And then I did about nine months of research
• 1:02:37
  and we had like you know, the family opened the doors and ye honest
• 1:02:40
  and talk to the agents and and all that stuff and coaches, and I
• 1:02:45
  wrote a treatment over Christmas twenty twenty. Disney immediately went go to script.
• 1:02:52
  How did the script? March twenty twenty April twenty twenty. Then a kid
• 1:02:58
  came on our director and then we were off to the races, so in
• 1:03:02
  terms of turnaround, and we were right in the middle of the pandemic as
• 1:03:07
  well. It was you know when I say the speed has really changed,
• 1:03:13
  you went from January twenty nineteen to the to June twenty twenty two the least.
• 1:03:21
  I mean, that's that's a paste that I think in the old days
• 1:03:29
  it's unheard of. And what was really wonderful was on the eve of principal
• 1:03:34
  photography, I pulled out those five bullet points and I was like, hey,
• 1:03:38
  guys, actually flits. It's worth it. So you know, it's
• 1:03:45
  when it works, it works, when the process works, it's a joy.
• 1:03:47
  Now I'm gonna ask you a few questions ask all of my guests.
• 1:03:51
  Is there something that you wish If there was one thing that you wish someone
• 1:03:55
  would have told you at the beginning of your career, what would that be?
• 1:04:05
  I wish it was the advice that I eventually got about ten years ago
• 1:04:11
  from my attorney, who is an extremely experienced man. He represents all the
• 1:04:18
  great chrisquiring that we care so and he just illegal to me then right at
• 1:04:24
  the beginning, I just signed and he said, look, no matter what
• 1:04:28
  do you do in this business, just make sure you stick around. There's
• 1:04:33
  taste change, culture changes, cinema changes, technology changes. But if you
• 1:04:43
  just stay around, stick around, make sure you're not a flash in the
• 1:04:46
  pan. Make sure it's not make sure you're here for the long haul.
• 1:04:50
  You'll find that you'll you'll you'll see success. And that is really I think,
• 1:04:59
  you know, the lesson in the it's to stick around. Just this
• 1:05:03
  this year. It's a creepy there's a great piece of advice. Now,
• 1:05:06
  what is the lesson that took you the longest to learn, whether in the
• 1:05:09
  film industry or in life. Patience, mine too, my friend. That's
• 1:05:15
  my answers because because as you know, the second you had the idea to
• 1:05:18
  become a screenwriter, Hollywood just showed up with money and said, as much
• 1:05:23
  as you want, and whenever you want, what would you like to write
• 1:05:25
  the next Indiana Jones? The next the what do you want? What do
• 1:05:28
  you want? Yes, that's right, patience, patients, and and throughout
• 1:05:33
  the whole process, because it's all slow. I mean, it's it's just
• 1:05:36
  so. And you also get you know, it's things that you set your
• 1:05:42
  heart on, and oh that's and make full the part of any process.
• 1:05:46
  I've had films full the part you know, uh during soft prep, Well,
• 1:05:53
  oh yeah, got bought like pulling the plug. We're pulling the plug,
• 1:05:58
  pulling the plug. And it's just like you said, it's such a
• 1:06:00
  it's a miracle that any movie gets made, and it's a joy to have
• 1:06:08
  one be made. But it also takes a huge hinge amount of time.
• 1:06:14
  And there's so many on suns and you know, the things that you wrote
• 1:06:18
  that you didn't think maybe with that good sending, it made and people love
• 1:06:21
  them. The movies are things that you still has the best thing I've ever
• 1:06:25
  written, you know, it just dies like as a script. It's it's
• 1:06:31
  a it's brutal. This isn't it's not for the fainted heart. This business,
• 1:06:35
  that's for sure. It is. Yeah. I remember watching on Actors
• 1:06:40
  Studio. I saw Dave Chappelle on the Actors Studio and he said, uh,
• 1:06:45
  he said, no, nobody you speak to up here is a weak
• 1:06:48
  person. Nobody. If you've made it in this business, you are not
• 1:06:53
  a weak person. And I thought that was very, very true, because
• 1:06:58
  if you've made it to a certain level, if you're just hanging around for
• 1:07:00
  fifteen years, making a living in one way, shape or form in this
• 1:07:04
  business. You're not You're not a weak person. You're not a weak person.
• 1:07:10
  And last question, yes, three of your favorite films of all time
• 1:07:15
  easy, in no particular order, The Godfather, Back to the Future,
• 1:07:18
  and answer, I mean, can we can we just say that Back the
• 1:07:21
  Future is one of the most perfect films every night it is. I watch
• 1:07:25
  it every couple of months. And that's not an exaggeration. It's just I'm
• 1:07:31
  obsessed with it. I just it's one of those things. Then I don't
• 1:07:36
  know how that woulde became what it became like. It just it's just perfection.
• 1:07:42
  And they started shooting it with the wrong actor and then went back.
• 1:07:45
  Can you imagine two ways of they started the script with a fridge. I
• 1:07:54
  know, the whole evolution of the of the whole of the whole script is
• 1:07:58
  fascinating, But to shot was it two weeks with with another lead actor and
• 1:08:02
  then and then they all go, yeah, this is yeah, we didn't
• 1:08:06
  make the right choice. It's nothing that it's just not the right fit.
• 1:08:10
  And that to start from scratch with a United States can you wouldn't imagine what
• 1:08:15
  the first place? Right with the guy that they wanted the first place,
• 1:08:17
  but he was on a hit show and all this kind of good stuff.
• 1:08:19
  But I think it helped that you had Steven Spielberg sitting behind you going go
• 1:08:23
  ahead in nineteen eighty five. Steven Spieber. Yeah, I mean at that
• 1:08:27
  time, you know, he Yeah, I had the keys to the universal
• 1:08:30
  at that point, I mean to a certain but to a certain extent.
• 1:08:34
  But to a certain extent, Stephen continues to have the keys. And by
• 1:08:40
  the way, I've I've I can't exaggerate this enough. I've spoken to probably
• 1:08:45
  forty or fifty people on my show have all had a connection to Steven Spielberg
• 1:08:49
  in their their development, in their career. Oh I you know, I'm
• 1:08:55
  a child at the eighties. No, no, but no, no,
• 1:08:57
  but like personal hand not just oh no, no, everybody has been affected
• 1:09:01
  by his movies. I'm talking about him personally taking a meeting, connecting him
• 1:09:06
  to somebody, like developing a project. It's it's fascinating how many people Steven
• 1:09:14
  Spielberg has helped in this business and continues to do so to this day,
• 1:09:18
  writing sending handwritten letters to directors saying, hey, I just watched your movie.
• 1:09:24
  It was fantastic, great job. Who does this? Who does this?
• 1:09:28
  It's old school. That's old school. It's old school. It's old
• 1:09:30
  school school that you know. I hope they listen to these interviews. I
• 1:09:35
  hope they listen to these interviews in the future and can think about Like they're
• 1:09:41
  like, what's die Hard? And I'm like, then I have to slap
• 1:09:44
  you. Then I have to slap you. But you know what's going You
• 1:09:48
  know that you've had the generation that it's no look and I'll leave you with
• 1:09:53
  this. I was once color grading. We'll be right back after a word
• 1:09:57
  from our sponsor, and now back to the show. A music video for
• 1:10:06
  one of the biggest music video directors. He was like twenty five, but
• 1:10:10
  he was one of the biggest musical directors in the world, working with all
• 1:10:13
  Daisy and all the big guys, right, And I go, hey,
• 1:10:15
  do you want this video? Do you want this shot to be kind of
• 1:10:16
  like Blade Runner esque? And he's like, what's Blade Runner? And I'm
• 1:10:21
  like, you're a music video director and you've never studied Rickley Scott. Are
• 1:10:26
  you out of your I almost got out of the chair and walked away.
• 1:10:29
  I'm like, I was so disgusted I'm like, you have to watch.
• 1:10:31
  I mean, are you kidding? So there is that, absolutely, I
• 1:10:35
  want to I want to. I know, I know you go to wrap,
• 1:10:36
  but I wanted to just say one thing to your point about directors.
• 1:10:41
  Yes, I feel I'm in some exceptional directors coming through right now. Yes,
• 1:10:45
  there is absolutely I pink. But I do think that when you look
• 1:10:48
  at all the directors that he mentioned of a certain generation. So Jim Canra
• 1:10:56
  and Ridley start Steven Bill Barley. Yeah, Cameron started off making props why
• 1:11:05
  not, right, and joint posters and I you know, and and and
• 1:11:12
  working his way through that whole common studio and and you know, you had
• 1:11:17
  Widley was an art director for British TV, had a thousand commercials before he
• 1:11:25
  shouted first his first feature. Yeah, in his early forces, right Stephen,
• 1:11:30
  Yes, prodigy, right. But at the same time, the education
• 1:11:35
  he got, uh doing TV and and you know, Sugar Out Express and
• 1:11:42
  then all that. Yeah, there is a sort of apprenticeship. I feel
• 1:11:53
  that those old school directors kind of went all somehow went through the industry.
• 1:11:59
  There was no oh, you made full music video. It's great, here's
• 1:12:02
  one hundred and fifty million dollars coming, you know, And yeah, no,
• 1:12:10
  there's a craft, there's a craftmanship. You even look at Fincher,
• 1:12:13
  you look at the journey that he's been on. You looked at you looked
• 1:12:15
  at the work that he's done in music videos. You look at is there
• 1:12:19
  is a pedigree in a journey. And I kind of feel that it's as
• 1:12:28
  much in writing as when it's true in writing, I think it's also true
• 1:12:30
  in directing. And then with we just need to be a little bit more
• 1:12:33
  patient, Like I just feel that craft has to develop craft. You just
• 1:12:36
  can't show up and just be this all seeing. It takes time. Man
• 1:12:42
  artists takes time. Hitchcock took time, Kubrick took time, all of them
• 1:12:48
  they take it takes time to be good at anything in this life. But
• 1:12:51
  let alone in the crafts. And I'll leave you with one story because you
• 1:12:55
  said Cameron and Corman. Do you know how Cameron got hired to do piranha
• 1:12:58
  Tu Despawning. No, he was working on I think it was called Battle
• 1:13:04
  Star something. Whether he was working as a prop guy and he had a
• 1:13:09
  slab of meat and there were some maggots that were in it and they were
• 1:13:12
  he was doing close to be shooting the close ups. He was doing a
• 1:13:15
  second unit he shoot, and then Corman walked by and he he would say,
• 1:13:19
  he turned on the camera and then the maggots would perform for him,
• 1:13:25
  and then we would cut the camera and the maggots would not And He's like,
• 1:13:27
  how the hell is this kid directing maggots. So what he did is
• 1:13:32
  he connected the slab of meat to some electricity and he would just turn on
• 1:13:36
  the and he would shot the meat and then they would do this and then
• 1:13:40
  but he didn't know that, so we know that. And Gorman is like,
• 1:13:43
  if he could direct maggots, he could direct it one of my movies.
• 1:13:45
  Let's give him Prona to That is an incredible story. Oh my god,
• 1:13:53
  I I hear, I listen. I'll tell you from my doing all
• 1:13:56
  these interviews all these years, I get the best stories I get when I
• 1:13:59
  hate the when I stopped the record button, best story I wish I could
• 1:14:01
  do all the off air comments and questions and stories I get are Oh god,
• 1:14:09
  I could be here for hours. But a rash Man, thank you
• 1:14:12
  so much for coming on the show man. It has been an absolute pleasure
• 1:14:14
  talking to you. Continued success and thank you for helping you know, younger
• 1:14:18
  screenwriters and filmmakers coming up and hopefully they'll they'll listen to this conversation and be
• 1:14:24
  inspired to take their time just a little bit more. Just a little bit
• 1:14:28
  a lot of patience goes a long known way. I've actually your friend.
• 1:14:31
  Thank you. Like ones, I want to thank a Roje for coming on
• 1:14:35
  the show and dropping his knowledge bombs on the tribe today. Thank you so
• 1:14:40
  so much, Rash. If you want to get links to anything we spoke
• 1:14:43
  about in this episode, head over to the show notes at any film also
• 1:14:45
  dot com forward slash seven thirty six, and if you haven't already, please
• 1:14:49
  head over to Filmmaking podcast dot com, subscribe and leave a good review for
• 1:14:56
  the show. It really helps us out a lot, guys. Thank you
• 1:14:59
  again so much for listening. Guys, as always, keep that hustle going,
• 1:15:01
  keep that dream alive, Stay safe out there, and I'll talk to
• 1:15:04
  you soon. Thanks for listening to the Indie Film Hustle podcast at indiefilm hustle
• 1:15:09
  dot com. That's I N D I E F I L M h U
• 1:15:13
  S T l E dot com.