Latest / Bulletproof Screenwriting™ Podcast / BPS 416: The Brutal and Honest Reality of Self-Distributing a Film Today with Jeff MacIntyre

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BPS 416: The Brutal and Honest Reality of Self-Distributing a Film Today with Jeff MacIntyre · Bulletproof Screenwriting™ Podcast

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: You are listening to the IFAH podcast Network. For more
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to ifahpodcastnetwork dot com.
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, Episode number four sixteen.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: I believe, along with many others, that you must first
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: ask for what you want before you can have it.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: Wally Amos broadcasting from a dark, windowless room in Hollywood
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: when we really should be working on that next draft.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: It's the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, showing you the craft and
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: business of screenwriting while teaching you how to make your
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: screenplay bulletproof.
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: And here's your host, Alex Ferrari. Welcome, Welcome to another
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: episode of the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast. I am your humble host,
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: Alex Ferrari. Now, today's show is sponsored by Bulletproof script Coverage.
• 0:52
  Speaker 3: Now.
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: Unlike other script coverage services, Bulletproof Script Coverage actually focuses
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: on the kind of project you are in the goals
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: of the project you are, so we actually break it
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: down by three categories, micro budget, indie film, market and
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: studio film. There's no reason to get coverage from a
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: reader that's used to reading tempole movies when your movie
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: is gonna be done for one hundred thousand dollars, and
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: we wanted to focus on that. At Bulletproof script coverage,
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: our readers have worked with Marvel Studios, CIA, w MEE, NBC, HBO, Disney,
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: Scott Free, Warner Brothers, The Blacklist, and many many more.
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: So if you need your screenplay or TV script covered
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: by professional readers, head on over to covermiscreenplay dot com. Now, Guys,
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: today on the show, we have seventeen time Emmy Award
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: winning filmmaker Jeff McIntyre. And Jeff is the director of
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: a new film called The Great Cookie Comeback, which is
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: basically a documentary about the founder of Famous Amos Cookies
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: and how he lost everything and is trying to make
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: a comeback in his eighties and now. Jeff decided to
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: self distribute his film because he was getting such ridiculous
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: offers from traditional film distributors, so he thought that he'd
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: have a chance on going at it alone and seeing
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: what he could actually make. You know, and we have
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: you know somebody who's you have a niche of cookie lovers.
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: You have someone who's a celebrity, people who know who
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: Famous Amos is. A lot of things are in his
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: favor with self distribution, the cost of the film was low,
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: all of those kind of good things, but he had,
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: you know, a few mishaps and a few wins, a
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: few you know losses during his misadventures self distributing. So
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: he wanted to come on the show to talk about
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: the good, the bad, and definitely the ugly of self
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: distributing a film in today's world. And if you are
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: thinking of self distributing your film, this is an episode
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: you absolutely need to listen to. So, without any further ado,
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: please enjoy my eye opening conversation with Jeff McIntyre. I'd
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: like to welcome to the show, Jeff McIntyre man, thank
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: you so much for being on the show.
• 3:03
  Speaker 3: Brother me. Yes, great to be here. Alex, thank you.
• 3:08
  Speaker 4: I appreciate the guy to say right to kick things off,
• 3:10
  Speaker 4: I think I have to state the obvious, you know,
• 3:12
  Speaker 4: with everything that's going on in the world right now,
• 3:15
  Speaker 4: I don't think there's any bigger warning sign that the
• 3:18
  Speaker 4: end is near by the.
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: Fact that Alex booked a failed filmmaker on a show.
• 3:23
  Speaker 4: I mean, come on, if that's not proof the end
• 3:25
  Speaker 4: is coming, just start digging your bunker.
• 3:28
  Speaker 3: These are desperate times.
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: Listen, listen, my friend. I'm the host, and I'm a
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: failed filmmaker in many ways as well, so don't worry
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: about it. So we have all failed in one way,
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: shape or form, so it's all good. But I always
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: also do believe that you learn much more from failure
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: than you ever do from success. So that's why, and
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: that's why you and I which are I'm assuming similar
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: vintages as far as age is concerned, that we old enough, sir, exactly,
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: we have the shrapnel and uh and you what is it?
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: What's that saying? My my wife says it all the time.
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: The devil is more devil because of how long he's
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: been around, how old he is. So it's not because
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: he's a devil.
• 4:14
  Speaker 4: Oh yeah, he's had more practice, practice, perfect, just devilish antic.
• 4:20
  Speaker 4: So yes, we have the shrap, but we've also got
• 4:22
  Speaker 4: the medicine to help shooe the wounds.
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: I think he's holding up wild turkey.
• 4:30
  Speaker 3: Is that this is high west, high West. Look at
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: that whisk You like good.
• 4:37
  Speaker 4: Bourbons and whiskeys. They are just knocking it out of
• 4:40
  Speaker 4: the park.
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: There you go, there you go.
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: I know I could shoot you. Possibly don't believe me.
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: And you need a little proof.
• 4:45
  Speaker 4: So what I'll do for the community. I'm taking one
• 4:47
  Speaker 4: for the community. Or I feel this guarantees this show
• 4:52
  Speaker 4: is only going to get better.
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: I feel that this is going to be a good episode. Jeff.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: I'm just have a feeling that this might be a
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: fun episode. So first and foremost, Jeff, how how did
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: you get into this ridiculous business?
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  Speaker 3: That is a key word. I'll take you way back
• 5:07
  Speaker 3: to the ripe young age of fifteen.
• 5:10
  Speaker 4: I got started in radio at this cheeseball local radio station.
• 5:14
  Speaker 2: What does this radio you speak of? I don't understand.
• 5:17
  Speaker 3: Oh is it like a podcast? No?
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  Speaker 4: No, no, This was a real FM radio station back in
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  Speaker 4: nineteen eighty five.
• 5:27
  Speaker 3: It was a true cast, not a podcast.
• 5:30
  Speaker 4: And they eventually acquired even a cheesier cable access station.
• 5:34
  Speaker 4: So that's kind of where the ball started rolling. About
• 5:37
  Speaker 4: sixteen seventeen, started doing on camera stuff. But the real
• 5:40
  Speaker 4: pivotal moment where things really broke open and I really
• 5:44
  Speaker 4: owe a lot of my career too, was AFI not
• 5:51
  Speaker 4: the film school alternative fact interpretation.
• 5:55
  Speaker 3: AFI.
• 5:56
  Speaker 4: I told a couple of really big lies to score
• 5:59
  Speaker 4: some really sweet positions with ABC TV. This is back
• 6:03
  Speaker 4: in the nineties, and they desperate spot. They needed technicians,
• 6:07
  Speaker 4: they needed shooters, editors, and the bar was so low
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  Speaker 4: anyone with a pulse and one working good eye probably
• 6:14
  Speaker 4: could have gotten the gig.
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  Speaker 3: So I come in.
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  Speaker 4: I meet with the headhunch show, this gruff old, grizzled
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  Speaker 4: news guy.
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  Speaker 3: Eh, well, who are you? What do you? What can
• 6:21
  Speaker 3: you do for me? Well? I'm an editor, Sure i am?
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  Speaker 3: Why not?
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  Speaker 4: I can be anything the guy wanted that day, and
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  Speaker 4: granted to that point, I had edited very prestigious productions
• 6:33
  Speaker 4: like weddings and bar mitzvahs, so I understood the basics
• 6:38
  Speaker 4: of cutting, but maybe not on the broadcast news level.
• 6:41
  Speaker 3: But the interview's progressing. Can you edit? I sure? Can
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: you can do news? Well, it would be news to
• 6:47
  Speaker 3: me if I couldn't do news. So this sounds good.
• 6:51
  Speaker 4: So you'll start tomorrow, I said, Oh, just out of
• 6:53
  Speaker 4: curiosity for your news business. Here, what kind of equipment
• 6:57
  Speaker 4: do you use to edit your news?
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  Speaker 3: Oh? The Sony Arm four fifty. Oh of course, great choice,
• 7:03
  Speaker 3: that's what I'd use. Thank you. I'll see you tomorrow.
• 7:05
  Speaker 4: So I get in the parking lot and I break
• 7:07
  Speaker 4: out my big huge cell phone. I call a buddy
• 7:09
  Speaker 4: who owns a production company. Hey, great, it's chef. I
• 7:12
  Speaker 4: just got this sweet gig at Channel seven, but I
• 7:14
  Speaker 4: have to learn how to edit. Do you have a
• 7:15
  Speaker 4: sony arm through four fifty? And he said, come on over.
• 7:18
  Speaker 4: He got me up to speed, and that's what really
• 7:21
  Speaker 4: started the professional ball rolling.
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: And from there I told some.
• 7:25
  Speaker 4: Other sweet lies and sure, I know how to shoot
• 7:28
  Speaker 4: professional stuff and produce in the field, so they send
• 7:31
  Speaker 4: me to foreign countries. And that's what I tell young
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  Speaker 4: filmmakers and professionals. Don't wait till the door opens for you.
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  Speaker 4: The moment you see a crack, you bust through that
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  Speaker 4: door and show up with confidence. And if you know
• 7:45
  Speaker 4: in your heart you're not going to screw people over
• 7:47
  Speaker 4: and you probably can learn on the job and do
• 7:48
  Speaker 4: so quickly, you do it because those opportunities rarely come twice.
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  Speaker 3: And that's those moments.
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  Speaker 2: And that is exactly what I did with my fake
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: editing demo reel, which I used by grabbing other people's
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: commercial spots raw footage, re editing them, slapping a Nike
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: logo at the end of it. And I would go
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: and they were like, you know, twenty like ten million,
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: five million, dollar commercials whatever like, but they were foreign
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: raw footage from like Europe, and I was edited. I
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: was working at a production house. I grabbed it all,
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: put it together, send it out and I started working
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: as an editor really quickly.
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  Speaker 3: But you knew you had the skills.
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  Speaker 2: Had fake it till you make it back, correct. That's
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: the thing. That's the thing. When you're gonna fake, fake
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  Speaker 2: it till you make it, you need to understand that
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: you might have to bend the truth to get in
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: the door, but you've got to produce once you're in
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: the door, or learn on the job and things like that.
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: And I did that multiple times while I was coming up,
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: and I think all big you know, all all professionals
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: at one point or another extended the truth of what
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: their capabilities or experience was and figure it out along
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: the way just to get the opportunity. Because you're right,
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: if you see that crack, you gotta bust through that
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: with up question.
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  Speaker 4: Definitely, it's not like today where we all own the
• 9:04
  Speaker 4: transmitter basically, we all have our own channels. But back
• 9:07
  Speaker 4: in the days you and I were coming up, I mean,
• 9:09
  Speaker 4: there were hugekeepers, gun guarded gun guarded gates.
• 9:15
  Speaker 3: They weren't letting you and me in.
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: That's for damn sure, sir. Now tell me about your
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: new film, The Great Cookie, comeback, tell me about it.
• 9:26
  Speaker 3: I really prefer not to talk about that film. I'd
• 9:28
  Speaker 3: like to talk about some interpretive dance. What. Oh my god,
• 9:34
  Speaker 3: Oh my god, it's gonna be fine.
• 9:35
  Speaker 4: Okay, we'll talk about that film. So I don't know
• 9:41
  Speaker 4: too long to admit. About four or five years ago,
• 9:44
  Speaker 4: I producing partner Jason. He lives in Hawaii, Honolulu, and
• 9:47
  Speaker 4: he crosses paths with this guy named Wally Amos. And
• 9:53
  Speaker 4: just by namesake, yeah, Wally Amos.
• 9:55
  Speaker 3: I don't know. I've never heard of him.
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
• 10:08
  Speaker 4: But then when you learn that he's the Amos behind
• 10:10
  Speaker 4: famous Amos cookies, which we've all enjoyed at a gas station,
• 10:15
  Speaker 4: uh near you vending machine? Yes, and these actually have
• 10:20
  Speaker 4: the shelf life of gravel the package version, so that
• 10:24
  Speaker 4: this is good bunker.
• 10:25
  Speaker 3: Uh you know.
• 10:29
  Speaker 4: But back in the day, so Wally Amos. The cool
• 10:32
  Speaker 4: thing about Wally I'm so the booze is kicking in,
• 10:36
  Speaker 4: so the focus here, So my my buddy crosses Crosses
• 10:40
  Speaker 4: passed with him, and then uh, the idea is, oh,
• 10:43
  Speaker 4: let's do a reality show with Wally. I'm like, no,
• 10:45
  Speaker 4: no one wants to see a reality show with his
• 10:47
  Speaker 4: eighty plus year old guy.
• 10:48
  Speaker 3: Let's do a documentary. His life is so rich and
• 10:51
  Speaker 3: most people only know him, you know, based on his
• 10:54
  Speaker 3: sweet treats.
• 10:56
  Speaker 4: But his life or cookies was just droppingly interesting. He
• 11:01
  Speaker 4: was a music agent, one of the first black talent
• 11:04
  Speaker 4: agents in the US, where for William Morris he discovered
• 11:08
  Speaker 4: people like The Temptations, he signed Diana Ross, Marvin Gaye,
• 11:12
  Speaker 4: he discovered Simon and Garfunkle.
• 11:14
  Speaker 3: Jesus so exactly.
• 11:17
  Speaker 4: So that part of Wally's life is really really interesting.
• 11:22
  Speaker 4: And so that's how his entrede of cookies came to be.
• 11:27
  Speaker 4: He was representing an actress, Sherry Summers, who was in
• 11:30
  Speaker 4: Harold and Maud, which is one of my one of
• 11:32
  Speaker 4: my more favorite classic films, very quirky, and as they
• 11:37
  Speaker 4: were finishing up a meeting, Sherry busts out this bag
• 11:39
  Speaker 4: of chocolates of cookies, and Wally's like, where'd you get these?
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: Oh? I made them. I just love to make cookies.
• 11:44
  Speaker 4: So Wally started eating them and It reminded him of
• 11:47
  Speaker 4: the simpler days of his past when his aunt used
• 11:49
  Speaker 4: to make cookies. So he went home that night just
• 11:53
  Speaker 4: started making cookies. He was so he fell so in
• 11:56
  Speaker 4: love with the process of baking cookies and giving them
• 11:59
  Speaker 4: away that in Hollywood at that time, that became his trademark.
• 12:03
  Speaker 4: Whenever he'd take a meeting, he'd bring a small bag
• 12:06
  Speaker 4: of his famous chocolate chip cookies. So he kind of
• 12:09
  Speaker 4: he had this reputation around town as the cookie Man.
• 12:12
  Speaker 4: So one night he's meeting with Quincy Jones's secretary. They're
• 12:18
  Speaker 4: having dinner on the Sunset Strip, and she says, you know, Wally,
• 12:20
  Speaker 4: you and I should start a cookie store. And he
• 12:23
  Speaker 4: left that meeting and that idea has stuck in his
• 12:26
  Speaker 4: head ever since decades later. So, in nineteen seventy five,
• 12:30
  Speaker 4: Wally opened the very first chocolate chip cookie store. And
• 12:34
  Speaker 4: I know, by today's standards, there's candy stores, there's cookie stores.
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: Back in the day, it wasn't.
• 12:40
  Speaker 4: He took a big risk to try something brand new,
• 12:44
  Speaker 4: and it took off. He became a pop culture icon.
• 12:48
  Speaker 4: He was on every TV show and for ten years
• 12:51
  Speaker 4: he kind of ruled the roost in cookies. Until he
• 12:55
  Speaker 4: didn't and he lost it all. But should we go there?
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: Do I need to take it?
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: I mean, you have to watch the movie. They have
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: to watch the movie.
• 13:05
  Speaker 3: So that's it exactly.
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: Well. I actually we were discussing before we got on
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: air that I actually saw Wally on Shark Tank. He
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: was pitching his new cookies that he was trying to
• 13:15
  Speaker 2: h his new cookie company he's trying to launch. But
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: H just just just know everyone that watched the movie,
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: but generally speaking that Wally lost everything, lost his company.
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: H it was pretty It's a pretty brutal story, a
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: pretty brutal entrepreneurial story. And uh, and then this this
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: documentary is about his comeback. I'm assuming hence the name.
• 13:37
  Speaker 4: Right, and it digs into some of the pitfalls along
• 13:41
  Speaker 4: his path, and it's it's great lessons for anyone in business.
• 13:44
  Speaker 4: You don't sign contracts without really understanding what you're signing.
• 13:47
  Speaker 4: The big thing that kind of crippled him since the
• 13:51
  Speaker 4: eighties and what he's been trying to overcome ever since.
• 13:55
  Speaker 4: When these companies would take him over, he signed away
• 13:59
  Speaker 4: the rights to use his own god given name and
• 14:01
  Speaker 4: likeness for any future Baked Good Company and that's all
• 14:05
  Speaker 4: he does, cookies, So they prohibited him for using what
• 14:10
  Speaker 4: everyone knows him for and he started like twelve other
• 14:13
  Speaker 4: cookie companies since Famous Amus, But nowhere along the way
• 14:16
  Speaker 4: was he able to say, hey, you out there, cookie lovers,
• 14:19
  Speaker 4: I'm the guy who started that cookie that you remember
• 14:21
  Speaker 4: in love. That really hurt him and that's why he
• 14:24
  Speaker 4: didn't get a deal on Shark Tank because there's no
• 14:27
  Speaker 4: access to this woman on that show said yeah, you're
• 14:29
  Speaker 4: just another random cookie on the shelf, now if we
• 14:32
  Speaker 4: can't tell the public who you were, So that was
• 14:35
  Speaker 4: really tough. But I think the better takeaway from the film,
• 14:39
  Speaker 4: the inspirational lesson is despite of setback after setback, nothing
• 14:45
  Speaker 4: stops this guy. He continues to persevere at eighty five
• 14:49
  Speaker 4: and he's trying to start his quote unquote final final
• 14:51
  Speaker 4: Cookie company, but nothing slows him down. And that's a
• 14:54
  Speaker 4: great lesson for all of us, especially in this space,
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: really hang on.
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: To absolutely absolutely you can never Filmmakers we have, like
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: I said, we all have a sickness that once you're bitten,
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: you can't get rid of it, and it flares up
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: and it goes dormant, but it's always there. It's always there.
• 15:12
  Speaker 3: Now, but you have to be smart in how you
• 15:14
  Speaker 3: manage the symptoms. Well, that's good. I like that.
• 15:17
  Speaker 2: I'm wanted to use that one.
• 15:18
  Speaker 3: I like that one cash tagged baby.
• 15:20
  Speaker 2: And now if you don't want me asking, what was
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: the budget of this documentary?
• 15:25
  Speaker 4: Chance I wear all the hats, maybe because I like
• 15:28
  Speaker 4: to cover my bald spot. I shot it, produced it,
• 15:33
  Speaker 4: edited it so hard cash hard costs were roughly fifteen thousand.
• 15:40
  Speaker 3: And that included everything. It's nothing, And I try to
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: keep my productions low.
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: And that's very smart. I've been yelling that for the
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: top of the Mountain for a long time. Keep your
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: overhead as low as humanly possible. So fifteen grand for
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: a documentary with a known entity like famous, amis? I
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: mean everybody? You just say famous, same as everyone goes,
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: oh the cookie guy. Oh, this is the documentary about
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: the cookie guy. So so you actually have a winning
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: formula here. You've got a known person who's very recognizable
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: around the world just by the name at least, and
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: then you also have very low cost So this is
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: a perfect Like if you were coming to me and
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: I was consulting you on this, I'll be like, you
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: are a perfect candidate for self distribution without questions? So
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: what made you decide to go down the self distribution
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: route as opposed to going down the traditional route where
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: you could have easily I think, gotten a distribution deal
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: off of this, and you might even been able to
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: get some sort of MG because of the topic and
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: because of the star of the documentary.
• 16:45
  Speaker 4: One step back before I try to dodge your question.
• 16:50
  Speaker 4: So another great thing that was in our benefit, and
• 16:52
  Speaker 4: I think it's smartest filmmakers to really zoom out and
• 16:55
  Speaker 4: survey the entire landscape of what's going on in some
• 16:58
  Speaker 4: of your main subjects live, what is their network like?
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: And this was right at the time we embarked on this,
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: we knew he was going to be.
• 17:06
  Speaker 3: On Shark Tank.
• 17:07
  Speaker 4: Whenever you can leverage somebody else's free press.
• 17:10
  Speaker 3: I mean, this episode is.
• 17:12
  Speaker 4: Rerun probably eight nine times, and if you or I
• 17:15
  Speaker 4: were trying to try by a ten minute slot on
• 17:17
  Speaker 4: that network, forget it. There's no way we could afford
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: that kind of had money. So that was great to
• 17:22
  Speaker 4: put him back on the radar of public consciousness on
• 17:25
  Speaker 4: that show.
• 17:25
  Speaker 3: That helped in our efforts.
• 17:27
  Speaker 4: And yeah, I mean I'm kind of in the same
• 17:31
  Speaker 4: Rocky Leaky Boat as other indie filmmakers, thinking, well, let
• 17:35
  Speaker 4: me google film distribution, let me listen to Alex's show.
• 17:40
  Speaker 4: I know he interviews some distributors now and again. These
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: must be the good guys, so I'll blast them all
• 17:45
  Speaker 4: with emails, links to trailers, get them excited. And I
• 17:49
  Speaker 4: did all that, and I was met with, you know,
• 17:53
  Speaker 4: ninety of f you we have no interest, Thanks but
• 17:57
  Speaker 4: no thanks.
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: The one or two who.
• 18:00
  Speaker 4: Bit on the chocolate chip you know, did the standard
• 18:05
  Speaker 4: crappy offer and threw They threw the flame in the
• 18:09
  Speaker 4: dumpster to see if I wanted to buy the dumpster
• 18:11
  Speaker 4: before the fire really took off. And it was at
• 18:14
  Speaker 4: this time I was getting really frustrated, and that's when
• 18:17
  Speaker 4: I stumbled upon your buddy Rob Hardy had a course
• 18:21
  Speaker 4: Film Audience Blueprint, where it taught you how to go
• 18:25
  Speaker 4: find an audience for your film, I identify niches and
• 18:28
  Speaker 4: then market directly to them. And that course really was
• 18:31
  Speaker 4: an eye opener because at the moment I knew I
• 18:37
  Speaker 4: couldn't take on Hollywood's marketing machinery. There is no way
• 18:41
  Speaker 4: I can compete with their ad spends, match them, or
• 18:44
  Speaker 4: out spend them.
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: We will always lose on that front.
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: So the shotgun approach Hollywood uses to spray out their
• 18:52
  Speaker 4: message to everyone, hoping that everyone is their niche and
• 18:55
  Speaker 4: their audience can't work for indie filmmakers. So I thought
• 18:58
  Speaker 4: the only way I could survive is do a laser
• 19:01
  Speaker 4: targeted niche focus with my market, find the niches that
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: I think the story resonates with, and market direct. And
• 19:10
  Speaker 4: through taking this course, it gave me the confidence to
• 19:13
  Speaker 4: step it on my own after getting a couple crappy
• 19:17
  Speaker 4: offers from distributors, and I just felt that I could
• 19:19
  Speaker 4: do better. Maybe not, Maybe I didn't.
• 19:23
  Speaker 3: The first round didn't back that principle, but I still
• 19:26
  Speaker 3: have hope.
• 19:28
  Speaker 4: That when I do launch two point zero, I'll be
• 19:30
  Speaker 4: a better armed to make a much bigger splash the
• 19:33
  Speaker 4: next time.
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: So how did you? Because because now I'm I'm kind
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: of breaking this down and analyzing the film and how
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: I would approach it. It is a niche film, but
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: it's a fairly large niche. Are we talking about, you know,
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: seniors because he's older. Are we talking about entrepreneurs because
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: of who he is? Are we talking about cookie enthusiasts.
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor.
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: And now back to the show, like who are your niches?
• 20:08
  Speaker 4: And how do you hack my excel talc al, I mean,
• 20:11
  Speaker 4: how did you do all that?
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: So how did you first of all identify those niches?
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: And and to thinking and and and those three niches
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: I just threw out there. Some of them are obvious,
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: some of them are not, Like seniors is not an
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: obvious choice, but it is a niche that I think
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: that you could address with this film. How did you
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: first of all pick your niches? And then how did
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: you plan to target them?
• 20:35
  Speaker 4: So we just broke down at its core, what are
• 20:40
  Speaker 4: this film's two or three major messages? What groups of
• 20:44
  Speaker 4: people would make them say, Hell, yes, I want to
• 20:48
  Speaker 4: get to know Wally, I want to hear his story
• 20:50
  Speaker 4: out to be moved by it. I want to find similarities.
• 20:53
  Speaker 4: So seniors, of course, And that was just kind of
• 20:58
  Speaker 4: a no brainer based on Wally at the time when
• 21:00
  Speaker 4: we started shooting, he was eighty two and his story
• 21:03
  Speaker 4: is so inspirational and it really plans to seed in
• 21:07
  Speaker 4: other seniors, people who are retired. It's never too late
• 21:11
  Speaker 4: to start a fresh chapter. There's always a blank page
• 21:15
  Speaker 4: waiting for you to turn your passion into something profitable
• 21:20
  Speaker 4: to start a business, even if it's crocheing toilet seed covers.
• 21:23
  Speaker 4: If you love crocheting, look at Wally. He turned his
• 21:26
  Speaker 4: love for chocolate chips into a viable concern and it
• 21:30
  Speaker 4: brings him joy. So I think that's a great lesson
• 21:33
  Speaker 4: for seniors. And as you know today, seniors have never
• 21:36
  Speaker 4: been more active, so they dig it. And then of
• 21:41
  Speaker 4: course there's the.
• 21:43
  Speaker 3: Entrepreneurial, the small business owners.
• 21:46
  Speaker 4: And I think when I do my kind of Phase
• 21:49
  Speaker 4: two revenue run, I will reach out to business schools
• 21:53
  Speaker 4: and I will cut two different versions of this film
• 21:56
  Speaker 4: to sell to the educational space, because his story is
• 21:59
  Speaker 4: so chock full of great business lessons that are timeless really,
• 22:05
  Speaker 4: and that brings a lot of hope. And also, once
• 22:11
  Speaker 4: again on the Phase two revenue scheme, reach out to
• 22:13
  Speaker 4: all these assisted living facilities retirement communities that are in
• 22:17
  Speaker 4: desperate need of programming. There's activity directors in every.
• 22:21
  Speaker 3: One of these.
• 22:23
  Speaker 4: Retirement communities that are dying for fresh content. So instead
• 22:28
  Speaker 4: it is selling them a DVD. I put together on
• 22:30
  Speaker 4: a whole activity in a box. So this includes the film,
• 22:33
  Speaker 4: a discussion guide, it includes activities, it includes an opportunity
• 22:37
  Speaker 4: to start a club, and this really eases a lot
• 22:42
  Speaker 4: of their pain, like what should we do with all
• 22:43
  Speaker 4: these retirees? Well, I think if you could solve other
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: people's problems with your art. I mean, those are just
• 22:50
  Speaker 4: checks that will hit your account eventually. So that's really
• 22:56
  Speaker 4: the two main niches. I considered bakers and cookie lovers,
• 22:59
  Speaker 4: but it was too broad early on.
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: Well, I mean, to be fair though, like seniors and
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: entrepreneurs are too very broad. They're niches, but they're pretty large.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: They're pretty large.
• 23:11
  Speaker 4: Incredibly, yes, so maybe I didn't drill down enough. I
• 23:15
  Speaker 4: got lazy and I did. I mean, as you know,
• 23:17
  Speaker 4: it is a grueling process to make the film. To
• 23:20
  Speaker 4: finally get it out, you're pushing it through the creative
• 23:23
  Speaker 4: birthing canal and it's painful. At that point, that's where
• 23:28
  Speaker 4: a lot of filmmakers they've run out of gas, not
• 23:30
  Speaker 4: only physical, psychic creative gas, monetary gas for many, and
• 23:36
  Speaker 4: they don't have the juice to take you.
• 23:38
  Speaker 3: The next mile.
• 23:39
  Speaker 4: And to me, I know you probably agree the next
• 23:42
  Speaker 4: mile is the most important, the marketing mile. Oh absolutely,
• 23:46
  Speaker 4: we better have our best shoes strapped on for that
• 23:48
  Speaker 4: last leg of the journey.
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: Most filmmakers don't understand that. Before, like when you and
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: I were coming up, making the movie was the toughest part.
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: It was the most expensive part. There was no access.
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: You know, just doing a color grading session would cost
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: you three hundred dollars an hour. You know, it was
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: it was insane. But now making the movie technically is
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: the easiest part of the entire filmmaking process. And we've
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: been trained, and Hollywood has been putting out this message
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: that you put out all the audio. I mean, you
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: put out all the art first, and then you hand
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: over the business as somebody else to handle. Where in
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: the new film economy, you've got to know everything from
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: script all the way to how to generate revenue with
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: your film. And if you don't understand that that last part,
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: after that final cut is cut and the deliverables are ready,
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: you're done, you're done. And most filmmakers don't get that,
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: but they learn the hard way.
• 24:48
  Speaker 4: They do, and it either drives them away or it
• 24:50
  Speaker 4: makes them stronger once their wounds heal. And to me,
• 24:53
  Speaker 4: this last leg of the race, the marketing rate, it's
• 24:57
  Speaker 4: like it's like climbing a mountain. It's a log it's
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: climbing a mountain barefoot through three feet of snow with
• 25:05
  Speaker 4: COVID positive piranhas nipping at.
• 25:07
  Speaker 3: Your heels just to get to the summit right.
• 25:10
  Speaker 4: And for many the first time they get a blister
• 25:13
  Speaker 4: on their little toe, Oh my feet are and I'm
• 25:15
  Speaker 4: going home, and they throw in the towel. This is
• 25:17
  Speaker 4: where strength and resilience and perseverance for us will carry
• 25:22
  Speaker 4: us to the top and get us to the summit
• 25:24
  Speaker 4: where we pop the cork.
• 25:25
  Speaker 3: We celebrate.
• 25:26
  Speaker 4: But not only do I believe is it a win
• 25:28
  Speaker 4: for our own films to make it across the finish line,
• 25:32
  Speaker 4: but it's a win for the whole indie film community
• 25:34
  Speaker 4: because we show it is possible to win absolutely and
• 25:39
  Speaker 4: the more examples of that, I think, the more inspiration
• 25:42
  Speaker 4: will provide other filmmakers or maybe too scared to go
• 25:45
  Speaker 4: through the pain of the climb. So and that's the
• 25:48
  Speaker 4: vital I think where we're at today. That's one reason
• 25:51
  Speaker 4: I released that that brutally honest case study, because we
• 25:54
  Speaker 4: have to all be more transparent if we truly are
• 25:56
  Speaker 4: a community, it's up to us start sharing our wins
• 26:00
  Speaker 4: and our losses so we can learn from each other.
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: So you so now you've just you've you've identified your
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: niches uh, and you've identified your audience, and you have
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: your film and you've decided to go self distribution. What
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: platform did you decide to use or platforms did you
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: decide to use to put the film out online?
• 26:18
  Speaker 4: I guess let's one step before that. I had to
• 26:22
  Speaker 4: start generating buzz and market it. You want to talk
• 26:25
  Speaker 4: about because I did spend a good amount of time
• 26:28
  Speaker 4: building the Facebook page.
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: Well, let's let's talk about the Let's talk about the
• 26:31
  Speaker 2: platform real quick. The next question is all about the marketing.
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: So what platform did you I used gum Road okay,
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: and then and you didn't put it on any of
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: the other major platforms iTunes, Amazon.
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: Oh okay, no, thank you, thank you, Alex.
• 26:44
  Speaker 4: I'm sorry. That also is part of phase two. I
• 26:48
  Speaker 4: kind of got sidetracked. I wanted to try this launch
• 26:50
  Speaker 4: by myself to market direct to the fans with UH
• 26:53
  Speaker 4: to sell and rent stream only no, yeah, to own
• 26:58
  Speaker 4: or rented the film from gum Road, which I controlled
• 27:01
  Speaker 4: the majority of those profits. And then I'm going to
• 27:04
  Speaker 4: do the whole you know, svo D A v O
• 27:06
  Speaker 4: D T v O D that still is on the list,
• 27:10
  Speaker 4: but to date, no, no, I have not ventured into
• 27:13
  Speaker 4: those waters. So I'm excited to get it up on
• 27:15
  Speaker 4: those platforms for sure.
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: All Right, So we'll come back to the platforms in
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: your ROI in a second. But how did you now
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: start planning on putting the word out on this film?
• 27:26
  Speaker 3: I think two years.
• 27:30
  Speaker 4: Two years before I released it, you know, I launched
• 27:33
  Speaker 4: the Facebook page and tried to start building up an audience,
• 27:37
  Speaker 4: producing a ton of original content, custom graphics, memes, clips
• 27:43
  Speaker 4: from the film.
• 27:44
  Speaker 3: So I hustled to.
• 27:47
  Speaker 4: Just drive engagement and to build the numbers. I boosted posts,
• 27:50
  Speaker 4: I put tons of money in Zuckerberg's pocket.
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: With varying degrees of return. And so I mean, at
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: the end of the day reperd a launch, maybe I
• 28:00
  Speaker 3: had close to three thousand Facebook fans.
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: Which, yeah, which is it's not It sounds like a lot,
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: but in the scope of Facebook, it's it's it's nothing. Yeah,
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: it's not a whole lot, not for a film launch, now, Mike,
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: So you decided to focus all of your energy towards
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: a Facebook page as opposed to a homepage or a
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: blog or something like that.
• 28:23
  Speaker 4: I nope, you good, good question. I also had the
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: film's website where I had set up, you know, a
• 28:29
  Speaker 4: squeeze page. So a lot of the campaigns on Facebook
• 28:33
  Speaker 4: would be to drive traffic to the film website where
• 28:36
  Speaker 4: people I could capture the email, get them on a
• 28:38
  Speaker 4: news get my email list, I could send them newsletters,
• 28:41
  Speaker 4: because that's what filmmakers have to The first thing they
• 28:44
  Speaker 4: need to do is start building your list.
• 28:46
  Speaker 3: That is so important and whatever you have to do.
• 28:50
  Speaker 4: I I tried a couple different enticements to see what
• 28:53
  Speaker 4: would move the needle.
• 28:55
  Speaker 3: I offered some people his recipe for free. For others,
• 28:59
  Speaker 3: it was.
• 28:59
  Speaker 4: A discount movie ticket, and then I tracked what gave
• 29:03
  Speaker 4: me the most bang for the buck, and.
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: Those are called lead generators for people listening. So that's
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: basically a lead. So you give away a freebie of
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: some sort to get people on your list so you
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: could start building a relationship with them and you provide
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: a tremendous amount of value to them with that lead generation.
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: Whatever that might be could be a video, could be
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: a PDF, could be a recipe, could be a checklist,
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: It could be a thousand different things, as long as
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: it's really irresistible to the audience. You're targeting. So that
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: and then if you don't really ask me, how big
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: was your list when you launched?
• 29:37
  Speaker 3: Pass?
• 29:38
  Speaker 4: Okay, so the email wait wait, wait, no, damn it,
• 29:42
  Speaker 4: you're driving me to drink again, I think of.
• 29:46
  Speaker 3: I'm a it was pathetic.
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: Okay, it was truly pathetic.
• 29:50
  Speaker 4: It was no, it was like one hundred and twenty
• 29:51
  Speaker 4: one Okay, so big fail, big fail.
• 29:54
  Speaker 3: There.
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: and now back to the show. All right, So okay,
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: so you brought you brought your So you have a small,
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: very small email list, and you've you focused a lot
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: of energy on Facebook and you're getting people into your
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: funnel and things like that. So out of all of that,
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: and you have gum Road as your your main place
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: that you're going to be selling your film. So the okay,
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: how much did you spend on Facebook ads on your launch?
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: And how many ads did you use?
• 30:36
  Speaker 3: So I ran one hundred and twenty one ads. Now
• 30:37
  Speaker 3: this keep in mind, this.
• 30:39
  Speaker 4: Is probably too know. Through February into February, right to
• 30:43
  Speaker 4: the launch, one.
• 30:46
  Speaker 3: Hundred and twenty one ads.
• 30:47
  Speaker 4: I dropped one three and eighty three dollars, not a
• 30:52
  Speaker 4: penny more in ads and.
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: Not a penny more.
• 30:57
  Speaker 3: Hell no, Zuckerberg got enough of my high hard earned money.
• 31:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah dare he h.
• 31:04
  Speaker 4: And then this is just to build on your last
• 31:06
  Speaker 4: point why it's absolutely crucial to own your audience's info
• 31:10
  Speaker 4: because with one algorithm change poof all your connection to
• 31:16
  Speaker 4: your potential fan Oh, it's gone.
• 31:18
  Speaker 3: You don't want any.
• 31:18
  Speaker 4: Other social overlord to control your fan base. You must
• 31:22
  Speaker 4: be able to reach out directly and communicate with your people.
• 31:26
  Speaker 3: That's why you have to build a list.
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: Well, that's exactly what happened with Facebook originally. If you remember,
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: like we're talking about eight years ago or something like that,
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: you used to be able to post something on your
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: Facebook page and thirty forty percent of people would see it.
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: Now it's half a percent for free, unless it goes viral,
• 31:42
  Speaker 2: unless it gets shared, unless something else happens organically, generally speaking,
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: gets to pay to play. So that changed the business
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: model for millions of companies around the world, millions of
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: people around the world overnight. So you always have to
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: play in your own sandbox. You have to control the sandbox,
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: because when you played in somebody else's sandbox, you play
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: by their rules. YouTube did the same thing. People were
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: making a lot of money off of their ads, and
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: all of a sudden, Facebook just went Amazon their affiliate
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: marketing fact they turned no more and people lose their minds.
• 32:13
  Speaker 2: So because you are, you're completely dependent on that platform.
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: So a one hundred percent agree. The email list is
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: the most powerful thing any marketer has, more powerful than
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: a million two million followers on Facebook. It doesn't mean anything.
• 32:31
  Speaker 4: You're exactly right, And to do it again, I would
• 32:33
  Speaker 4: have focused more effort on pointing all my ads to
• 32:38
  Speaker 4: that landing page. But keep in mind, and I think
• 32:41
  Speaker 4: a lot of indie filmmakers suffer from this. Early on,
• 32:44
  Speaker 4: we really we get drunk on the dopamine likes shares.
• 32:50
  Speaker 3: It is intoxicate.
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: They like me, they really like me.
• 32:53
  Speaker 3: Oh my god. I don't have to spend money on
• 32:55
  Speaker 3: a therapist. I just have to post something and I'm loved.
• 33:00
  Speaker 4: But listen up, you damn indie filmmakers. As hustlers, this
• 33:04
  Speaker 4: is really important. Never confuse the like button with the
• 33:09
  Speaker 4: buy button. One causes a temporary chemical reaction, the other
• 33:14
  Speaker 4: produces a long lasting financial one. And never get wooed
• 33:19
  Speaker 4: in by a like or as share, because those are
• 33:22
  Speaker 4: meaning they're vanity metrics that won't pay your rent. You
• 33:26
  Speaker 4: can't call your landlord and say, oh, you know what
• 33:27
  Speaker 4: this month's rent, I'm a little short.
• 33:30
  Speaker 3: Do you take likes?
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: Can I can give you? I can give you twenty
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: thousand followers? Is that because that pay my right?
• 33:36
  Speaker 3: Well?
• 33:37
  Speaker 5: That may have some value if you're offering, but though
• 33:41
  Speaker 5: it doesn't because if you're just giving followers away, that
• 33:43
  Speaker 5: doesn't it doesn't work. You can buy followers, you can
• 33:46
  Speaker 5: buy empty like tomorrow. You can spend I think I
• 33:49
  Speaker 5: think the number is like twenty or thirty thousand dollars,
• 33:52
  Speaker 5: and you can have a million followers, and seriously, that's
• 33:55
  Speaker 5: literally the cost of buying followers.
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: But it means nothing. It's complete vanity because you their
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: robots or their fake accounts, or their people from god
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: knows where who have no interest in what you're doing.
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: So it's basically just like, look how cool I am?
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: I remember I spoke to a filmmaker that that decided
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: to spend I think he spent like seven thousand dollars
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: on YouTube views to get his trailer to be viewed
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: over a million times, and the movie costs like you know,
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: it's like a low budget fifty thousand dollars, like action
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: horror film or something like that with like you know,
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: I think Michael Madsen was in it, or Eric Robbers
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: or something like that. So and he was used in
• 34:38
  Speaker 2: his mind and he was a little bit out there
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: as far as ego is concerned. And that's saying a
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: lot because we're all crazy. But he then called all
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: the film distributors like, look, there's a million people who
• 34:50
  Speaker 2: saw our film. You've got to buy it. I guess what.
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: It didn't really work and they lost eight thousand dollars
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: because of it. Because that's vanity, total vanity.
• 34:59
  Speaker 3: It's complete vanity. And that's the thing. You know. Likes
• 35:03
  Speaker 3: can be bought, but sales have to be earned.
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: Mm hmm. And before you come, make sure the thing
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: is with sales, especially with independent film, you've got to
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: your value proposition has to be massive if you're if
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: you're trying to go outside the normal world of like iTunes, Amazon,
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: places where people are very comfortable spending their money because
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: their credit cards are ready on file. They just click
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: a little button and it's done. When you're going to
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: a platform like gum Road or Vimeo, Vimeo or something
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: like that they are. They don't know who this is.
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: So now you want me to pull out my credit
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: card type it into the site that I have no
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: idea about, to watch a documentary about cookies, or to
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: watch an independent film that I made about filmmakers running
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: around Sundance like it doesn't you know it's it's it's not.
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: It's not a good business strategy. And I love gum Road,
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: don't get me wrong. I think they're great. And VHX
• 35:58
  Speaker 2: before they were bought by Vimeo was great as well.
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: But you're adding another few layers to the process, which
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: creates less sales. So let me ask you, since you've
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: been so forthcoming with your numbers. Out of that thousand level,
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: it was eleven hundred dollars and eighty three.
• 36:16
  Speaker 3: Cents, thirteen eighty three.
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: Thirteen eighty three, okay, thirteen eighty three. Out of that
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: thirteen eighty three, what was your ROI? What was your
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: return on investment?
• 36:24
  Speaker 4: So these numbers I think covered the first two weeks
• 36:28
  Speaker 4: of launch. That was all point of that video to say, hey,
• 36:32
  Speaker 4: this is what self distribution can do for you if
• 36:34
  Speaker 4: you follow all.
• 36:35
  Speaker 3: The steps the gurus give you.
• 36:39
  Speaker 4: So the grand total that week was thirty six dollars
• 36:45
  Speaker 4: and ninety four cents.
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: Now that's a that's thirty six American.
• 36:51
  Speaker 4: USD no bitcoin, but keep in mind.
• 36:55
  Speaker 3: But then I it was that was already depressing enough.
• 36:58
  Speaker 4: But then I said, oh, it's not thirty six because
• 37:01
  Speaker 4: to test gum road, I did a couple of test transactions.
• 37:06
  Speaker 3: So the grand.
• 37:06
  Speaker 4: Total, now let me check my math here was twenty
• 37:09
  Speaker 4: nine dollars in ninety six cents for a launch of
• 37:12
  Speaker 4: a film that took five years, thirteen hundred and eighty
• 37:15
  Speaker 4: three bucks in advertising.
• 37:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly.
• 37:21
  Speaker 3: Plan.
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: So so do you mind if I can kind of
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: dissect this the situation.
• 37:27
  Speaker 3: A little bit, get your chainsaw out.
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: I want I want to. I want to because I
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: want to. I think this is a really great and
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: I think why you put the video out originally, and
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: I will put that in the show notes. That video
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: is amazing, that it's like forty almost an hour, it's
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: insane manifesto, it's a manifesto. It's a fantastic video. I
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: think because you want to help filmmakers. So I think
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: this is a great learning moment. So you did a
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: lot of the concepts, right you You found you have
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: a niche product, which is a niche a film that's
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: aimed at certain groups which you could arguably get to.
• 38:05
  Speaker 3: It is a.
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: Valuable good value proposition because there really isn't anything like
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: this out there. And then the now that's the good stuff,
• 38:16
  Speaker 2: and you and you, you wanted to self distribute. You
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: put it on a platform so you can control the money.
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: Also good. There's a lot of that stuff. And then
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: you started doing targeted Facebook ads, and you even started
• 38:26
  Speaker 2: building an email list to a certain extent. So I
• 38:30
  Speaker 2: think you've discussed it already. We said it. The biggest
• 38:32
  Speaker 2: mistake you made is all these ads that you were
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: spending money on were not into a funnel. We're not
• 38:38
  Speaker 2: directly aimed at that email building list.
• 38:42
  Speaker 6: Real quick before you slaughter me, guys, I'm not beating
• 38:50
  Speaker 6: them up. Guys, listen, I'm not beating him up. This
• 38:52
  Speaker 6: is why we're not.
• 38:53
  Speaker 4: No, he's being incredibly kind. Two other things I did,
• 38:58
  Speaker 4: or I attempted to do, but the other parties bailed on.
• 39:02
  Speaker 4: But I really believe in and I think this is
• 39:03
  Speaker 4: really key for especially documentary filmmakers. I reached out to
• 39:08
  Speaker 4: influencers who I felt would gel with this film, who
• 39:15
  Speaker 4: have an audience that totally would love Wally's message. And
• 39:18
  Speaker 4: let's say, for example, a business blogger, one of the
• 39:20
  Speaker 4: top business bloggers as a podcast a decent audience, and
• 39:25
  Speaker 4: I analyze, and I think every filmmaker, you should come
• 39:27
  Speaker 4: up with a spreadsheet where you put you list all
• 39:29
  Speaker 4: the influencers that.
• 39:31
  Speaker 3: Could relate to your niche, and then you also put
• 39:34
  Speaker 3: other social numbers. How many followers do they have? That's important.
• 39:37
  Speaker 3: You want to align yourself with big beefy networks. I
• 39:41
  Speaker 3: reached out to them.
• 39:41
  Speaker 4: I said, hey, listen, I want to try something new
• 39:44
  Speaker 4: for marketing a film. I'd like to work with you
• 39:46
  Speaker 4: and create a course. I want to create a course
• 39:49
  Speaker 4: that uses Wally's story to really drive home some of
• 39:54
  Speaker 4: the principles you teach.
• 39:56
  Speaker 3: Part of your mission statement.
• 39:59
  Speaker 2: Will be right back after a word from our sponsor.
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: And now back to the show.
• 40:08
  Speaker 3: And you watch the film.
• 40:10
  Speaker 4: You'll pull out five key business lessons in this film,
• 40:14
  Speaker 4: and then I'll produce it for you. We offer it
• 40:16
  Speaker 4: to your audience as an add on to the film,
• 40:19
  Speaker 4: or if you want to give it away as a
• 40:21
  Speaker 4: value add great. But you make a course, because as
• 40:24
  Speaker 4: you know, courses are huge and all these guys are
• 40:27
  Speaker 4: looking for fresh content.
• 40:29
  Speaker 3: I thought it would have been a slam dunk and
• 40:31
  Speaker 3: I got one or two people on the hook and
• 40:33
  Speaker 3: then they just they vaporize.
• 40:34
  Speaker 4: But I think that is key because then they have
• 40:37
  Speaker 4: skin in the game and they're going to work to
• 40:39
  Speaker 4: promote this course that they can.
• 40:41
  Speaker 3: Then monetize themselves. So I recommend that. Yeah.
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: Absolutely, education, online education, especially post COVID is huge, huge, huge, huge,
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: And as I'm sure you following what I do, I've
• 40:56
  Speaker 2: added a tremendous amount of education to my business. And
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: and that's something that I've because that's what the audience wants,
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: that's what my my my tribe wants, what my customers want,
• 41:08
  Speaker 2: and the people that I I'm trying to serve want.
• 41:11
  Speaker 2: So yes, absolutely. In my book Film Rise of the
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: Film Entrepreneur, I talk about courses as one many of
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: many ways you could do it.
• 41:19
  Speaker 3: So to get back to your yeah, so that was
• 41:22
  Speaker 3: to break down.
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: So like if I was gonna, if I was gonna
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: go down this road with this film, I would have
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: first and foremost, I would have seen if there was
• 41:32
  Speaker 2: you see, he couldn't go after another cookie company because
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: he's competing with another cookie company, so that that you
• 41:36
  Speaker 2: can't kind of leverage that you might have to. You
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: can maybe find some sort of entrepreneurial organizations, nonprofits, things
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: like that that you could have maybe partnered with to
• 41:48
  Speaker 2: get the word out, get on their email list, start
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: leveraging their emails list. And then why you haven't created
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: a course specifically on entrepreneural course of your own based
• 41:58
  Speaker 2: off of his That something you should be doing, because
• 42:01
  Speaker 2: I think you'll make a lot more money selling that
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: course off of his name and cut them into it,
• 42:06
  Speaker 2: by the way, and you give them yeah, absolutely, so
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: you you partner with him on a course on entrepreneurial
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: course and that's a huge that would be a huge,
• 42:16
  Speaker 2: huge money maker revenue. It's kind of like really low
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: hanging fruit in my mind where I see this personally
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: as the film as a lead generator. It's a it's
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: a lost leader. There is. If you can make some
• 42:28
  Speaker 2: money with it, great, but if you can't, it's all good.
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: You should be able to generate enough other things that
• 42:36
  Speaker 2: could do it, Like if you could reach out to
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: uh Sir Latab or those kind of like chefy baky
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: kind of companies and see if you can incorporate into
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: their world somehow where you give the movie away. Look fact,
• 42:53
  Speaker 2: Sick and Nearly Dead did this so beautifully. I use
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: them as a case study in my book. And he
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: literally gave the movie away and he partnered with the
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: Brevel Juicer in the movie. And now when I went
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: to go buy my Bevel Juicer, because that's the juicer
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: I was gonna buy because that's the movie I saw.
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: So it was great marketing. I went to bed Bath
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: and Beyond and when I went to go buy it,
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: guess what was sitting right next to it a DVD
• 43:19
  Speaker 2: of the movie. If you buy it, you get a
• 43:20
  Speaker 2: copy of the movie for free. And it just was
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: He built an entire business around this concept of juicing.
• 43:29
  Speaker 2: There's potential for that here in the cookie side of things.
• 43:32
  Speaker 2: In the baking side of things, you can partner with
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: companies in regards to how you create baking, educational baking packages.
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: There's so many different things that you can do to
• 43:46
  Speaker 2: kind of combine him and the film and trying to
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: generate other revenue sources obviously t shirts, hats, aprons, bake goods,
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: things like that. But if you're able to create this,
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: but you're now creating an ecosystem with your film, and
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: if you can create that ecosystem, and I think that's
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: one place where you could you could do probably a
• 44:09
  Speaker 2: bit better. Now it's actually not focused on so much
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: on the getting of the revenue from the movie itself,
• 44:14
  Speaker 2: but from all these other revenue sources, because it is
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: a it's a it's a absolutely film entrepreneurial play. Like
• 44:22
  Speaker 2: the movie is a giveaway almost one hundred percent.
• 44:26
  Speaker 4: And there's a real evergreen quality to it too, absolutely,
• 44:30
  Speaker 4: And that's something like I said for Phase two, it's
• 44:33
  Speaker 4: institutional sales too. It's reaching out, like I said, to
• 44:36
  Speaker 4: the senior homes business schools right and repackaging it in
• 44:41
  Speaker 4: that form. And I think I forget which hotel chain,
• 44:43
  Speaker 4: maybe Radison. They one of their trademark is they actually
• 44:48
  Speaker 4: leave out hot chocolate chip cookies for guests. So I've
• 44:52
  Speaker 4: a while back, you know, I try to be in
• 44:55
  Speaker 4: contact with them to want not put Wally's face on
• 44:58
  Speaker 4: these cookies or use his and we could put the
• 45:01
  Speaker 4: we could stream the movie on the hotel video on
• 45:05
  Speaker 4: demand systems for a couple of months. Airlines, there's a
• 45:09
  Speaker 4: Midwest Express, uh, it was a Wisconsin based airline years ago.
• 45:13
  Speaker 4: Used to give out hot chocolate chip cookies.
• 45:15
  Speaker 3: Once again, Pivot give.
• 45:17
  Speaker 4: Out Wally's new cookie and you get to watch the
• 45:19
  Speaker 4: movie free in the in the seatback or stream it.
• 45:24
  Speaker 2: Is there a package? Do you have a package where
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: you get cookies and the movie for sale early on?
• 45:31
  Speaker 3: Yes?
• 45:32
  Speaker 4: But once again, the thing with Wally is when we
• 45:34
  Speaker 4: embarked on this journey, he actually had kind of a
• 45:38
  Speaker 4: good thing going. He had started a cookie company called
• 45:40
  Speaker 4: Cookie Kahuna, which when you watched him on Shark Tank,
• 45:43
  Speaker 4: that was the company who was promoting. But wouldn't you
• 45:45
  Speaker 4: know it, a couple of months before we release, he
• 45:50
  Speaker 4: splits from that company.
• 45:54
  Speaker 3: Thank you, moment of silence. Moment of silence, and then
• 45:58
  Speaker 3: for all the money maker, I'm not going to pull
• 46:02
  Speaker 3: the bottle up again, and Drake I already did that
• 46:04
  Speaker 3: when it happened. But yeah, he really threw us for
• 46:07
  Speaker 3: a curve.
• 46:07
  Speaker 4: But then the story only got a little more juicy
• 46:10
  Speaker 4: because then he had to do so he had to
• 46:12
  Speaker 4: leave his home state to try to start another company,
• 46:15
  Speaker 4: and he was a victim of elder abuse in this
• 46:17
  Speaker 4: other state he went to, So the story got really wacky.
• 46:23
  Speaker 4: But yeah, that's just kind of in true Wally form.
• 46:25
  Speaker 4: He's and he'll tell you he's never been a good businessman.
• 46:28
  Speaker 4: He's a great marketer, but he never truly, you know,
• 46:33
  Speaker 4: understood the whole business thing.
• 46:35
  Speaker 3: Well.
• 46:35
  Speaker 2: I mean even even that you can go down to
• 46:38
  Speaker 2: Costco and buy cases of famous am As cookies and
• 46:41
  Speaker 2: package them yourself and sell them. I mean you could arguably.
• 46:47
  Speaker 3: Right there is yeah, there is exactly, you know, like
• 46:52
  Speaker 3: if it's like.
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: Look, I mean, if you could you could do something
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: like that, I mean, there's there's there's a lot of
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: potential here. I think you said this, you said this
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: in the in your video. It's like it wasn't lack
• 47:04
  Speaker 2: of plan as much as it was execution and figuring
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: out those kind of dialing in those certain things. Because
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: like if I was trying, like it's seriously, if I
• 47:16
  Speaker 2: sat there and started thinking about how to market this,
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: I would be creating bigger value propositions like crazy like
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: cookie packages and baking and all these other kind of
• 47:28
  Speaker 2: revenue streams and seeing what I can leverage as far
• 47:31
  Speaker 2: as audiences through other companies and things like that, as
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: opposed to going down the road of and influencers are
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: great and going down the business side is great, and
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: I love your ideas with the senior living and the
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: cruise lines and the airlines and business schools and all that.
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: That's excellent. I know, I know one documentary filmmaker made
• 47:53
  Speaker 2: over a million dollars with a senior based of.
• 47:57
  Speaker 3: Film with the age of Champion guys.
• 48:00
  Speaker 2: Those guys yeah and Chris, Yeah, yeah, they they.
• 48:03
  Speaker 4: Killed and I based a lot of this on them.
• 48:05
  Speaker 4: They're incredible what they did.
• 48:06
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And I think you could go to that same
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: senior living convention once COVID is done and sell and
• 48:13
  Speaker 2: sell licenses there. There's just no question you could do
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: that as well. So there is definitely a bright future
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: for the Great Cookie comeback. There is definitely a bright future.
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: So we've discussed what you've done right and a few
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: things that you did wrong as well. Let me see
• 48:31
  Speaker 2: how on a second, uh, because we covered a bunch
• 48:35
  Speaker 2: now that so yeah, we covered a lot of stuff already.
• 48:38
  Speaker 4: I mean, if you want to, if you want to
• 48:40
  Speaker 4: dive into I did get a couple offers from distributors.
• 48:43
  Speaker 2: So okay, So with distributors specifically, because I'm let me
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: tell you what the let me see if I can guess,
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: So okay, and let me see if I can guess
• 48:52
  Speaker 2: these deals no money upfront, so no MG's okay, great,
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: so no money up front. I'm gonna say it's going
• 49:00
  Speaker 2: to be an eight to ten year length, give or.
• 49:04
  Speaker 3: Take if I was lucky, but okay, yeah, oh right.
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: Or fifteen years. Yeah, I was trying to be nice.
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: It's about fifty it's about fifteen years.
• 49:10
  Speaker 3: Right, thank you. I appreciate that.
• 49:13
  Speaker 2: Then there was also call the marketing expenses, of course,
• 49:18
  Speaker 2: which they'll cap, and it's going to range. I'm gonna say,
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: on the less predatory side, fifty thousand, on the more
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: predatory side one hundred thousand.
• 49:30
  Speaker 4: A little lower, but yeah, I don't think they Yeah, yeah,
• 49:35
  Speaker 4: twenty twenty thousand.
• 49:37
  Speaker 2: Okay, that was Actually that's not a bad marketing cap.
• 49:39
  Speaker 2: But then that means you'll never.
• 49:40
  Speaker 3: See I'll never see anything anything.
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: You'll never see anything. It's basically a lost leader. At
• 49:46
  Speaker 2: that point. Those were the deals you were gotten. But
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: that's the standard deal. And if you would have been
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: a lesser filmmaker in the sense of your knowledge, you
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: would have just been on one of those and prayed
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: because you're like, oh, it only cost me fifteen grand,
• 49:59
  Speaker 2: you know, I'm sure I'll get that least that back.
• 50:05
  Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor.
• 50:11
  Speaker 2: And now back to the show.
• 50:15
  Speaker 3: Never which you won't, which you won't.
• 50:18
  Speaker 4: And thanks to guys like you and Rob Hardy, I mean,
• 50:21
  Speaker 4: you've you're really rattling the cages and shouting this from
• 50:25
  Speaker 4: the mountaintops and you're keeping us awake, and it's all
• 50:28
  Speaker 4: of our responsibilities to stay sober and not be wood
• 50:32
  Speaker 4: because once again, just like likes and shares, it's very
• 50:34
  Speaker 4: intoxicating when you get an email or return email from
• 50:37
  Speaker 4: a distributor, Oh my god, they like my film, and
• 50:40
  Speaker 4: then you know, the Hollywood red carpet fantasy starts playing
• 50:43
  Speaker 4: and you're in your mind, but no, you have to
• 50:45
  Speaker 4: shut that down. You got to pull the plug on
• 50:47
  Speaker 4: that projector because it rarely ever works out that way,
• 50:51
  Speaker 4: and it's just it's like waiting. It's high school prom
• 50:56
  Speaker 4: all over again. Will you wait till week before the
• 50:59
  Speaker 4: big dance?
• 51:00
  Speaker 3: Ask a girl out?
• 51:01
  Speaker 4: And your options are so limited by then and you're
• 51:03
  Speaker 4: really nervous and you're desperate.
• 51:05
  Speaker 3: They all smell that on you and you get a.
• 51:07
  Speaker 4: Bunch of no's and the day three two days before
• 51:10
  Speaker 4: the prom and eventually this one girl says yes, and
• 51:12
  Speaker 4: you're so elated and relieved.
• 51:16
  Speaker 3: Despite your reputation, she still said yes.
• 51:20
  Speaker 4: Right, the chances that she'll show up or or actually
• 51:23
  Speaker 4: be there at midnight or dance with you, and then
• 51:26
  Speaker 4: lopper comes on time after time.
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: Well, obviously, isn't this the beginning of every Blake Edwards film.
• 51:32
  Speaker 2: I think maybe that's what I'm channeling now, that's right, exactly, exactly, yeah, exactly.
• 51:40
  Speaker 3: And oh and then by the end of the evening,
• 51:43
  Speaker 3: absolutely no distributing will be going on.
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: No, there'll be no distributing. None, no distributing, No distributing
• 51:51
  Speaker 2: at all is gonna happen. Now, did you think of
• 51:55
  Speaker 2: possibly going with a film aggregator to get your film
• 51:57
  Speaker 2: up on these platforms? Is that something you're thinking doing?
• 52:02
  Speaker 4: And this is an area that I really haven't dipped
• 52:04
  Speaker 4: my toe in the water enough. I mean, film hub
• 52:06
  Speaker 4: seems very intriguing.
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: No, I'm sorry, that was just a twitch in my neck.
• 52:11
  Speaker 3: I apologize, Oh gotcha, I think it was Freudian. I'm
• 52:15
  Speaker 3: gonna replay the video. But aside from them, tell me
• 52:21
  Speaker 3: who should I call or all?
• 52:22
  Speaker 4: All of us are on the edge of our footons, Alex,
• 52:25
  Speaker 4: what are some city aggregators.
• 52:28
  Speaker 3: I'm catering on the edge.
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: Well, because of the whole Distributed debacle and how I
• 52:35
  Speaker 2: heavily promoted them for two years. It's one of the
• 52:37
  Speaker 2: reasons why I came out so heavily guns of blaring
• 52:40
  Speaker 2: against them when I found out what happened. I try
• 52:45
  Speaker 2: not to recommend any specific company because a company that
• 52:48
  Speaker 2: could be good right now is not a company that's
• 52:50
  Speaker 2: going to be good six months from now. And I've
• 52:52
  Speaker 2: found that anytime I release one of these podcasts, they
• 52:54
  Speaker 2: are evergreen, and I hear people are like, oh, I
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: went with this distributor because they were on your show.
• 53:00
  Speaker 2: And then I'm like, oh, but they're not good anymore
• 53:03
  Speaker 2: because they did this or that and their companies this now,
• 53:07
  Speaker 2: and I have to delete that episode. So I, oh wow, Yeah,
• 53:12
  Speaker 2: I've become Ever since distriber, I've become very militant. So
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: I if I hear any negative thing about a past
• 53:20
  Speaker 2: company or guest that I've spoken to that could possibly
• 53:23
  Speaker 2: harm filmmakers, I go back and delete it and I
• 53:26
  Speaker 2: delete it from everywhere.
• 53:28
  Speaker 3: Well, thank you on behalf of all of us.
• 53:30
  Speaker 4: Thank you, because we do look to you and others
• 53:32
  Speaker 4: in the space for kind of stage advice because we
• 53:35
  Speaker 4: don't have access to these big guys. So you're in
• 53:38
  Speaker 4: a really, I think a unique position, and you know
• 53:40
  Speaker 4: it to be able to bring us people that.
• 53:44
  Speaker 3: We cannot connect with.
• 53:45
  Speaker 4: So we take that to be almost an endorsement when
• 53:48
  Speaker 4: I get your position. But the deal I got was
• 53:52
  Speaker 4: from a guest from one of your past podcasts, a
• 53:55
  Speaker 4: distributor that I have to check your library to see
• 53:58
  Speaker 4: if they're still on, not to say.
• 54:00
  Speaker 2: They are, Oh, I know exactly who you just by
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: the terms, I knew who they were, and they are
• 54:05
  Speaker 2: no longer and they are no longer on the on
• 54:07
  Speaker 2: the podcast.
• 54:08
  Speaker 4: Right yeah, rhymes with crappy toss. But which is the
• 54:13
  Speaker 4: nature of the deal.
• 54:17
  Speaker 3: No one will get that.
• 54:19
  Speaker 2: I have no idea what you're talking about, sir.
• 54:22
  Speaker 3: Uh. But what a world?
• 54:28
  Speaker 2: What a world it is? It is it's it's an
• 54:32
  Speaker 2: insane world, and it's getting insaner. You know, can twenty
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: twenty be over with? Please? It's a general statement, let
• 54:39
  Speaker 2: alone everything else. If I would have told you in
• 54:43
  Speaker 2: January that not only will the entire world shut down
• 54:46
  Speaker 2: and the economy would shut down in the United States,
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: but all movie theaters will be closed. There would be
• 54:52
  Speaker 2: no summer blockbuster season whatsoever without any real foreseeable future
• 54:58
  Speaker 2: of movie theaters coming back to what they are, and
• 55:02
  Speaker 2: that the only Loane film that might hold some sort
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: of theatrical hope. And it's a it's a it's a
• 55:12
  Speaker 2: Hail Mary. Not because of the film, but because of
• 55:14
  Speaker 2: the circumstance. Is a film that has very few stars
• 55:19
  Speaker 2: in it, and it's based on based on an original
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: ip created by Christopher Nolan called Tenant, and and that
• 55:27
  Speaker 2: and and and don't get me wrong with Robert Patterson
• 55:29
  Speaker 2: and stuff like that, but you know they're not It's
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: not a giant Marvel film. So actually the Marvel DC
• 55:36
  Speaker 2: and James Bond films were pushed because they were scared.
• 55:40
  Speaker 2: But they're hoping that Tenant might open. And they're still
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: talking of like as of this recording. You know it might,
• 55:46
  Speaker 2: we might, we might hold on to it.
• 55:48
  Speaker 3: I don't know.
• 55:49
  Speaker 2: That's a two hundred million dollar plus gamble theatrically. And
• 55:55
  Speaker 2: by the way, you have to watch that film theatrically.
• 55:57
  Speaker 2: That's the way you watch a Christopher Nolan film. You
• 55:59
  Speaker 2: watch it and I, if at all possible But if
• 56:02
  Speaker 2: I would have told you all that you was that, Alex,
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: you're insane, You're insane.
• 56:07
  Speaker 3: Put the bottle down, Alex, come on exactly.
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: But that's the world we live in. And I've been
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: and you know, I've been saying this for a while,
• 56:14
  Speaker 2: that Rome is burning. Uh and the coronavirus, unfortunately, has
• 56:19
  Speaker 2: added a lot of gasoline to that fire in our industry,
• 56:22
  Speaker 2: and it's gonna It's never gonna die, but it will shift,
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: and us as filmmakers need to shift with it, need
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: to pivot, need to figure out new ways to make
• 56:31
  Speaker 2: this work and use the new technology at our disposal
• 56:34
  Speaker 2: that we can use to empower us little instead of
• 56:38
  Speaker 2: defeating us. So, to go back to what you were saying,
• 56:40
  Speaker 2: as far as aggregators are concerned, I'm not sure that
• 56:44
  Speaker 2: it makes financial sense to go with an aggregator for
• 56:49
  Speaker 2: your film. And I'll tell you why, because if you're
• 56:52
  Speaker 2: spending money to get on iTunes.
• 56:55
  Speaker 3: For tivod no, never, I never do iTunes.
• 56:58
  Speaker 4: Okay, So for a film like this, there's so little
• 57:01
  Speaker 4: what I've heard, there's so little return on investment. I'm
• 57:03
  Speaker 4: not gonna spend a grand and a half to make
• 57:06
  Speaker 4: twenty four.
• 57:06
  Speaker 3: Dollars correct exactly, So, so iTunes.
• 57:09
  Speaker 2: You're not gonna well, first and foremost, t VOD as
• 57:12
  Speaker 2: a general statement is pretty much a dead. It's dead
• 57:16
  Speaker 2: for independent filmmakers unless you could drive traffic. Unless you
• 57:19
  Speaker 2: could drive tremendous amount of traffic to those spaces, then
• 57:23
  Speaker 2: you can make it. But being found organically yet not
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: not it's gonna happen. So iTunes, Google Play, Fandango and
• 57:31
  Speaker 2: those kind of TVOD places not worth it. Amazon, you
• 57:35
  Speaker 2: could upload yourself. It will take a lot longer if
• 57:38
  Speaker 2: you upload it yourself, other than if you would have
• 57:42
  Speaker 2: went with, you know, another a distribution company or an aggregator.
• 57:45
  Speaker 2: But you could have do it yourself, and they do
• 57:48
  Speaker 2: take a big chunk, but they are the biggest marketplace
• 57:52
  Speaker 2: where everybody's on it and everybody's comfortable hitting that that
• 57:57
  Speaker 2: that rental. If you're gonna put it on evod, I
• 58:00
  Speaker 2: would put it up for ninety nine cents because it's
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: better than the three cents you're going to get per
• 58:06
  Speaker 2: hour screened on Amazon Prime. So that would be my suggestion.
• 58:12
  Speaker 2: Don't spend three to four five thousand dollars with an
• 58:15
  Speaker 2: aggregator to get them all all these platforms, because that's
• 58:17
  Speaker 2: a mistake that a lot of filmmakers make, and you
• 58:20
  Speaker 2: really should try to focus your energies as much as
• 58:23
  Speaker 2: you can on one major platform, if at all possible,
• 58:25
  Speaker 2: And I think Amazon will probably be the best bet
• 58:28
  Speaker 2: for you if you can find a way to get
• 58:32
  Speaker 2: on AVOD, that's where I think your money's going to
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: be made. And I think AVOD is right now as
• 58:39
  Speaker 2: of this recording. AVOD is where the money is. And
• 58:42
  Speaker 2: I agree, like to b TV, to b Pluto, Peacock
• 58:46
  Speaker 2: is coming out, there's so many of these these AVOD
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: platforms coming out where that's the only place people are
• 58:54
  Speaker 2: making money right now. Six months, I have no idea.
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: In the year, I have no idea, But right now
• 59:00
  Speaker 2: that's where money's made. Like when I released my first feature,
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: I sold it to Hulu. That's not possible now, not
• 59:07
  Speaker 2: possible now. So I actually sold it to China through
• 59:10
  Speaker 2: foreign distributor not possible now, not possible now. So there's
• 59:16
  Speaker 2: moments of time that things are available, Like there was
• 59:18
  Speaker 2: a moment for Tivot in twenty ten, eleven, twelve thirteen,
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: Tivod was killed. It was killing it, s FOD was
• 59:26
  Speaker 2: nah and there was no AVOD, then s FOD started
• 59:28
  Speaker 2: picking up and so on. You might, and this is
• 59:33
  Speaker 2: a big mit, you might want to talk to a
• 59:36
  Speaker 2: good qualified producer's rep to see if they can pitch
• 59:40
  Speaker 2: it to a Netflix or a streaming platform and see
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: if they would take it, take it on. I actually
• 59:48
  Speaker 2: will Glenn Reynolds and Sebastian toward as both of them
• 59:51
  Speaker 2: have been on the show. They're both really good producers
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: reps who actually do what they say they can do,
• 59:56
  Speaker 2: and they actually care about filmmakers. It might be a possibility.
• 59:59
  Speaker 3: No, they don't exist.
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: and now back to the show. I know they're they're unicorns.
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 2: They're actually unicorns in the space, but that might be
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 2: a possibility as well. Again, it's a conversation. It's a conversation.
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 2: It is not again, I guarantee it's a conversation.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 3: It's it's worth happening.
• 1:00:25
  Speaker 4: I did speak with a couple of producers reps and
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 4: they just really turn like in your other job, do
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 4: you sell cars?
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 3: Yeah? Really slick and slimy.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Most producers reps, most sales agents, you know a
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: lot of them are very predatory and a lot of
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 2: them are very slick. Oh yeah, I can get you this,
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 2: so I can get you that, and I could do this,
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: and I could do that, and like, you know, look, guys,
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: do you believe you can make some money with this film?
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 2: Make a freaking phone call submitted to Netflix. If you
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 2: make it, we're gonna cut. We'll cut, We'll cut the deal,
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 2: all right. If not, forget it, Yeah, moving on. You
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 2: know that's what I need you for. If you can
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 2: make it happen, great, let's cut a deal. If not,
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 2: I'm not gonna spend a whole lot of money for
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 2: one platform, you know, or this or that. It's just
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: not that kind of film. But those are some of
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: the avenues I think you can go down. But listen, man,
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 2: I appreciate Jeff that you've come on and talk so
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: freely about this process. It is a rarity I do.
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: Anytime filmmakers want to do this, I generally, if it's
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: a good story, I definitely want to bring them on
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 2: the show. Because I've had a few of these bad
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 2: distribution story kind of situations on the show and they're
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 2: very popular. People love them, and I think it's a
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: real good service to the community to actually hear people
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: who are in the trenches going through it, figuring it out.
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: But what I love about you is that that was
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: one point oh. Release one point oh. Now you're planning
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 2: release two point oh, which is a whole other world.
• 1:01:52
  Speaker 2: And please let me know what happens with release two
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: point oh. I'd love to hear what happens. How you're
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 2: able to generate revenue. I think you have a lot
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: of potential with this film. There's a lot of money
• 1:02:01
  Speaker 2: that could be made, and it could help a lot
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 2: of people to watching this inspirational wise and and things.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 4: And and that's the goal, turning a loss into a win.
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 4: And these are all I think losses are real. They're
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 4: teachable moments and to lean into it because I was
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 4: kind of part of me struggle do I really want
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 4: to release this to the world.
• 1:02:19
  Speaker 3: And say, hey, I failed.
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 4: But the community has been really supportive and and I
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 4: have to give a shout out. You know who kind
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 4: of inspired this was a guest you had on your show, Naomi.
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 2: Yes McDougall jones right her.
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 4: Bite Me film, and she did the whole cross country
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 4: tour and she's amazing. She cut an incredible YouTube series
• 1:02:41
  Speaker 4: which I implore every filmmaker to watch her little Her road
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 4: Trip series.
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 2: It is available. It's available on Indie Film Muscle TV.
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 3: Oh wonderful. Watch it. You'll learn a ton and maybe
• 1:02:53
  Speaker 3: it'll light a fire under you.
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah, she was great, try something new, and she interviewed
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 2: a couple of filmmakers who then I brought on as well,
• 1:03:00
  Speaker 2: who had a horrible distribution deal as well, and they
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 2: actually were like, they were brutal. They just like, this
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 2: is the company and this is what they did to me,
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: and they haven't paid to me, so screw them. And
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: this is don't say I'm like, okay, all right, let's
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: do this.
• 1:03:18
  Speaker 3: How do you really feel? But that's so important and
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 3: to your audience.
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 4: I just want to follow up with thank you for
• 1:03:25
  Speaker 4: posting the manifesto, but to let everyone know if they
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 4: actually make it through that and they're still standing, we
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 4: want to continue the educational process and offer a free course.
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 4: That's where I teamed up with Rob Hardy, your buddy,
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 4: and for people who watched the video, they could opt
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 4: in and we were like delivering over an hour and
• 1:03:43
  Speaker 4: a half of free content to arm people with the
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 4: right steps to find a niche and market to them directly.
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 3: That's awesome, that's totally free.
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'll put it. I'll put all that in the
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 2: show notes without questions. Now, what's next? What's next for you?
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 4: So two days after the lockdown orders came and you're
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 4: in LA.
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 3: You remember those texts the mayor sent out.
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 2: I'm still getting I'm still getting text about the riots, sir.
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 3: So oh right, the curfew.
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 4: Oh we're cutting it close, we have, but we better
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 4: wrap this up and shut the shades. But uh, I
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 4: had met a guy at a party in a couple
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 4: of months earlier. And this party I only found out
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 4: the next day on Facebook. It was a Who's who
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 4: a former child stars, like every child actor was at
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 4: this party. It was a birthday party for a guy
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 4: I used to go to a junior high with and
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 4: he actually was a pretty big child star, Keith Coogan.
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 4: His grandpa was Jackie Coogan. He was okay, he was
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 4: in Adventures in Babysitting to Mom, the Babysitters Dead Toy,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 4: so every eighties TV show. So I contact this guy
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 4: who hosted the party, who happened to be a screenwriter,
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 4: and said, hey, Ryan, we're.
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 3: Not doing anything. Now, let's do something.
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 4: Wacky and creative. Let's come up with a show that
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 4: we could, you know, put child actors in and shoot
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 4: it all on Zoom. So we came up with the
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 4: first kind of scripted Zoom comedy. It's called The Quarantine Bunch.
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 4: And we've got like six former child stars on here,
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 4: even Ted Lanes from The Love Boat Isaac he makes
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 4: an appearance, and some other guest stars, and it's a
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 4: who the premise is all these child stars, you know
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 4: the reputation.
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: They're all a little yeah yeah crazy.
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 3: That's callfaul. Thanks you you said it.
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 4: So they used to have a support group where they
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 4: met in person, but since the Quarantine now they have
• 1:05:29
  Speaker 4: all their meetings on Zoom where everyone could tune into
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 4: their drama. So the Quarantine Bunch was born, and it's
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 4: a fun little show. But it just shows the necessity
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 4: of being able to pivot when you can no longer
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 4: produce content in a way you're used to. We have
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 4: to quickly turn on a dime and channel our creativity
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 4: in another format.
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 2: In well, first of all, you had me at support
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 2: group now, but like, and this is something that filmmakers
• 1:05:56
  Speaker 2: of today don't understand, is that you know, when you
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 2: and I were coming up. Everything was pretty well established,
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 2: like things really hadn't changed in I mean occasional little things.
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 2: Here VHS showed up and kind of threw a little
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 2: monkey wrench in right. Then then DVD showed up.
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 3: Cable.
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 2: Remember cable was.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 3: Gonna knock everything out, Channel Select TV.
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, all this, so there's things and then you know,
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 2: but then it's once it once Netflix showed up in
• 1:06:25
  Speaker 2: OA in the in the streaming space, not in the
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 2: other space, in the DVD rental space, but in the
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 2: streaming space. Everything's accelerated so quickly that the marketplace, the technology,
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 2: everything has changed so much prior to the nineties. Really,
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 2: I mean when I went to when I went to college,
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 2: I learned on a flatbed, but I also learned on
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 2: that Sony and the CMX thirty six hundred. Let's let's
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 2: start dating myself the Grass Valley as well. But then
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 2: I used the now this is for the for the
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 2: old folks, listen, the montage as my editing. Yes, the montage.
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 2: The montage was the nonlinear editing system I learned on,
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 2: which was on Windows three one one. And then I
• 1:07:15
  Speaker 2: would take the floppy and walk it over to the
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 2: CMX thirty six hundred, plug it in and try to
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 2: get that EDL to work, which it never did.
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 3: Good luck, it never did.
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 2: But then by the time I graduated DV Mini, DV
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 2: started showing up, and then HD started showing up, and
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 2: then Avid showed up, and then every so it was
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 2: kind of like it was just weird. I was right
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 2: in the middle of the shift, so a lot of
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 2: the stuff I learned in school was pretty much useless.
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 2: Like I know what time code is, I know what
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 2: drop frame is. You know, all this kind of stuff
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 2: that I needed back then, beta's SP's and digi beta's
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 2: and all that stuff. I mean, all that kind of
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 2: crazy Oh, titles, Camember.
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 4: My wife, movie trailers, movie getting and the young bucks
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 4: who come in there when they kicked back a spot
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 4: because it wasn't QC properly.
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 3: And then they come to my wife and say, what's
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 3: this thing called titles?
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 4: Aren't the titles safe already because they're on a screen,
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 4: nothing's threatening them.
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 3: Oh my god, yeah, these little things.
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 2: But but then but now yeah, no, no, But then,
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 2: but then you have to pivot because things started changing
• 1:08:24
  Speaker 2: so rapidly. You know, I went from an AVID editor
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 2: to a final cut editor because I couldn't find any
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 2: work as an avid editor in my market, because everybody
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 2: started using final cut, because everyone started all these in
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 2: house agencies and in house production company started buying final
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 2: cuts because it was more affordable. So I learned that.
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 2: Then I jumped into color, Then I jumped into post supervising.
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 2: Then I was directing, you know, not just commercials, but
• 1:08:48
  Speaker 2: other things. So it was just this constant pivoting and
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 2: shifting where if you you're like, oh, I'm only going
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 2: to make my movie this way and I'm going to
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 2: get it out this way, you're done. You've got to pivot.
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 2: You've got to be able to change, and you.
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 4: Have to continue to evolve. If you don't keep evolving,
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 4: you start devolving, and then you do a circular spiral
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 4: back into the earth from where you came. And I
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 4: think for a lot of filmmakers, the seed is planneted.
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 4: You're a movie guy, the seed is planned. Early on,
• 1:09:13
  Speaker 4: when we went into the theater, we were misrized by
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 4: the flicker, the twenty four frames per second flicker of
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 4: dreams on the screen. And we love these icons our
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 4: film heroes, and a lot of filmmakers still think that's
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 4: the only way they can produce their craft, their art
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 4: is through the template that their icons used.
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 2: Correct, and that doesn't I remember, I was, I remember
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 2: I was coming up, and I just in two thousand
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 2: and five, I released the DVD that I sold to
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 2: filmmakers about how I made a movie a short film.
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 2: Back then, and in two thousand and five, there was
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 2: no online education. There was no educational products for independent filmmakers.
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: I know it's hard to believe, but there was none.
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
• 1:10:02
  Speaker 2: and now back to the show. And I decided at
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 2: that point, and I made one hundred thousand dollars off
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 2: of a short film and we sold five thousand units,
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 2: and we did a lot of great stuff back then.
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 2: But I was if you go back to YouTube, I
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 2: actually have the first tutorials filmmaking tutorials up on YouTube.
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 2: It's still there.
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 3: Oh that's awesome, and.
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 2: I but I, uh no, it's actually really fun. They're fun.
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 2: I mean they're an SD and there. H yeah. I look,
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 2: I looked so much better than I did now. But
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 2: but the problem, the point is that I decided not
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 2: to keep going down that educational route. One, because no
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 2: one knew what YouTube was going to be, and no
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 2: one knew what the whole I didn't see that much ahead.
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 2: But secondly, I said, well, Spielberg never did this, why
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 2: should I? Scorseseing never did this. I'm not gonna like,
• 1:10:52
  Speaker 2: I don't I'm not going to be an educator. I'm
• 1:10:54
  Speaker 2: not going to go down this road or do something
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 2: else that my icons, my my idols didn't do. And
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 2: you can't think that way. You've got to think about
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 2: what's new, what's the space, what's the technology, what are
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 2: the platforms, How can I get my message out? How
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 2: can I move my career forward. When I jumped into
• 1:11:12
  Speaker 2: podcasting five years ago, there was a lot of podcasts
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 2: out there, but not nearly as many as there are now.
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 2: It's in the filmmaking space. Now it's everybody has a
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 2: filmmaking podcast. But I'm one of the few that have stayed.
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 2: I'm one of the few that survived these last five
• 1:11:26
  Speaker 2: years where a lot of my contemporaries decided to just
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 2: you know leave. But it's because I found that niche.
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 2: I was like, oh, well, there's somewhere here I can
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 2: make some noise here, as opposed to jumping onto YouTube
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 2: and trying to do it there. So it's always about pivoting.
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 2: It's always about shifting and adjusting and putting more tools
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 2: in that toolbox.
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 4: And staying persistent. And I think that's really the foundation
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 4: of your success, is you remain vigilant and persistent and
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 4: where most don't. Once again we come back to the
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 4: views conundrum, where it's tough to create content these there's
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 4: a lot of competition. There's so much noise out there,
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 4: signal to noise, Oh my god, how do you pierce
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 4: through it? And it is only through consistent creative output,
• 1:12:09
  Speaker 4: And that's a lot of work to feed the beast.
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 4: But then when you don't get the views, the social proof,
• 1:12:14
  Speaker 4: I mean, it's easy to turn tail and say, you
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 4: know what, I put eight videos up, they didn't hit.
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 3: I'm going home. I'm trying something new.
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 4: So to stick with it and get over the hump
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 4: like you did with your podcast. That's really the formula
• 1:12:28
  Speaker 4: for success show. Just digging down, just showing up is
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 4: half the battle.
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 3: One hundred percent.
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 4: And you don't have to be perfect, don't wait until
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 4: you have it all, just you learn as you go,
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 4: but keep producinglutely building your library.
• 1:12:44
  Speaker 2: Absolutely no question. Now I'm gonna ask you, if you
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 2: get a question to asked all my guests, what advice
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 2: would you give a filmmaker wanted to break into the
• 1:12:50
  Speaker 2: business today.
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 3: I'd say, really explore a good trade school.
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 4: I mean, refrigerators always need repairing, plumbers or in demand
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 4: during this time, toilets, boat engines, oh, boatings to get
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 4: the hell out out of the country.
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 3: Don't.
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 4: But but if you have to, if you're so moved
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 4: by your inner child to pick up a camera, I mean,
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 4: really stay sober about this big career choice and make
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 4: really smart decisions. Don't give all your money to a
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 4: school with the promise that they're going to arm you
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 4: with the tools and the career possibilities, because they won't.
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 4: You don't need anyone but yourself in an internet connection
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 4: to be a self taught success story. So don't spend
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 4: money on a film school. I'm sorry that pisses off
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 4: a lot of people who are still in debt to
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 4: their film schools. But you don't need that static anymore
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 4: because you've got the only tool you need to start creating.
• 1:13:48
  Speaker 2: Oh no, Yeah, there's so much, so much education out there,
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 2: either free or even paid at a much much more
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 2: affordable rate than it is to go to a film school, which, honestly,
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 2: when you start film school, if you there for four years,
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 2: do you think everything you're learning is going to be
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 2: even up to date by the time you're out, Like,
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 2: it doesn't make any sense.
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 4: I mean, journalism schools up to three years ago, they
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 4: still were focusing heavily on print. I mean, hello, this
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 4: is a sign of the times calling it's twenty twenty.
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 3: Maybe you've heard.
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's.
• 1:14:21
  Speaker 3: A disservice, they really, I mean it's such a disservice
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 3: because then you put someone in a vice script, an
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 3: economic vice script. Oh, you give them relevant information and
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 3: you get them on the hook for the next twenty
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 3: years to pay you for information that won't produce a
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 3: dime in their pocket. That pisss me off, it does.
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 2: It's yeah, I mean, it's all about ROI.
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and you have to stay focused on that. And
• 1:14:44
  Speaker 3: some the peerists will say, oh no, but I'm an artist.
• 1:14:47
  Speaker 3: I fix my beret. I can't focus on the money.
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 4: But if you don't focus on the money, you'll never
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 4: have the backing to create your art and buy your berets.
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 2: So there's a balance and you're monocle. Don't forget the monocle.
• 1:15:00
  Speaker 2: Oh the monocle, sir, And let me ask you. I
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 2: went to film school, I went to a trade school,
• 1:15:05
  Speaker 2: I went to full sale and my education was fairly
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 2: affordable at the time. Ask me how many times I've
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 2: shown my degree or have been asked for my degree?
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 3: Alex, how many times have you shown?
• 1:15:18
  Speaker 2: Never? Once has anyone asked me where did you go
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 2: to school? Let me see your degree? What are your qualification?
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 2: Where they just go? Can you do the job and
• 1:15:29
  Speaker 2: what I hire you to do? Do you have a
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 2: real do you have a resume? Do you have references?
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 2: That's all I care about. We are carnies, and the
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 2: sooner people understand that we're high tech carnies. That's what
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 2: the film industry is built on. High tech carnees who
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 2: either are in posts in a closet like I was
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 2: for many years, or on set directing or on set
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 2: you know, doing other jobs. You are a carne in
• 1:15:53
  Speaker 2: one way shape of high tech carnee. And in the
• 1:15:56
  Speaker 2: Carney world they don't care about credentials.
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 4: No, But in the Carner world it's all about your game.
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 4: It has to stop someone for a second, catch an eye,
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 4: hook a heart, grab someone, and then it's your pattern
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 4: and you have to bring something very different that someone
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 4: else in that marketplace can't bring. So once again, it's
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 4: really getting in touch with your unique sorry for the cliche,
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 4: unique value offering to the world, and you can't be
• 1:16:19
  Speaker 4: scared off by maybe going down a different path. It's
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 4: so important to stand out these days and have the
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 4: courage to be your unique self because.
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 3: The market wants that.
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 4: I mean, we're in this era of authenticity and authentic
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 4: storytelling is a currency, so lean into that. I think
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 4: that's what the market really wants more of these days.
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 2: It's the only value.
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 3: One more tip.
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 4: This episode's going on three hours, but I thank you
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 4: Skype for not shutting the servers down. Another tip for
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 4: young filmmakers, and this really helped me, especially if you're
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 4: thinking about going into documentary. I learned so much of
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 4: every facet of the process by working in TV news
• 1:16:58
  Speaker 4: because you have to be a one man band, and
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 4: it may not it may be cause an eye roll. Oh,
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 4: I don't want to tell those kinds of stories. You
• 1:17:05
  Speaker 4: know you're not there for that. You eventually will tell
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 4: the stories you want to tell. But you learn every
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 4: facet of the technical process and you become very quick,
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 4: and that is really key. I don't want filmmakers laboring
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 4: for five years. There's zero ROI if you spend five
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 4: years on a project, you need to turn your your
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 4: your your productions around much quicker and spend less money
• 1:17:26
  Speaker 4: on them.
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, like you made your you made your film
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 2: for fifteen thousand dollars and that's not that's doable because
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 2: of your tools and the toolbox you've put over the.
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 3: Years one hundred percent.
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 2: Or also if you want to have to pay people
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 2: to do your jobs and you just be the artist,
• 1:17:41
  Speaker 2: don't forget if you were just the artist and you
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 2: had your beret, that's a one hundred fifty two than
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 2: two hundred fifty thousand dollars job film. And same thing
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 2: goes with me with my last film. I spent around
• 1:17:50
  Speaker 2: three thousand dollars making my feature. But it was but
• 1:17:53
  Speaker 2: it was a you know, it was a different ballgame,
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 2: but it was. I just did a lot of it
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 2: myself and hired key people that I and when I
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 2: say key, there's three you know other than the actors
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 2: and you. But I did that because I have twenty
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 2: odd years under my belt that I have a lot
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 2: of tools on my toolbox and I carried a lot
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 2: of that weight to my own shoulders. If not, that
• 1:18:14
  Speaker 2: movie costs you know, one hundred thousand bucks. You know,
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 2: if I do it right.
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 3: There's no way to get that back.
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 4: As indie filmmakers, where a lot of us are, you
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 4: really have to to learn the craft so you can
• 1:18:25
  Speaker 4: perform at all levels of it and not rely on others.
• 1:18:28
  Speaker 4: And we know people older filmmakers who still bring on
• 1:18:32
  Speaker 4: a DP a sound version and they have to hire
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 4: a crew of five, which maybe you and I can
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 4: single handedly.
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 2: Do correct, correct, And it's all just different and try.
• 1:18:41
  Speaker 2: I think the generation coming up behind us and behind them,
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 2: they're very self sufficient and they're handling.
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 3: Definitely, and that's exciting. That is exciting.
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 2: Yes, Now, what is the lesson that took you the
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 2: longest to learn, whether in the film business or in life.
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 4: This sounds really crappy, it's it's multifaceted.
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
• 1:19:13
  Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 3: Nobody gives a damn absolutely about your film. They don't
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 3: or you.
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 4: It's the fun and that is it's liberating once you
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 4: can lean into that zero expectations from the world or
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 4: your audience, and.
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 3: It's on us to.
• 1:19:33
  Speaker 4: Help people care about something that is important to us.
• 1:19:36
  Speaker 4: And you can find a common ground to where people
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 4: will lean in a little if you're offering them something
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 4: of value. But also, you're not a slave to what
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 4: the market thinks of your work. If this, if this
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 4: project causes you joy while you're creating it, Wow, that
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 4: is one hundred percent ROI. Your happiness during the creation
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 4: process is huge that can never be discounted.
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 3: And we forget that once we labor for a year
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 3: or two, we put it online and it just flops,
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 3: and we think, because we got twelve hundred and fifty
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 3: three views, it's a failure, But we forget how much,
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 3: you know, fun we had and how much we learned
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 3: during the process of making it.
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 2: Yes, without question, great answer. And three of your favorite
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 2: films of all time?
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 3: I knew you're gonna ask that. Uh, Honestly, I'm not
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 3: a real film guy.
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 4: Uh.
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 2: Three of your favorite documentaries? Documentaries?
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 3: Okay, I do have some favorite. My favorite film is Airplane.
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 4: Oh no, I don't know if anyone's ever given you
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 4: that answer, Oh, has.
• 1:20:38
  Speaker 2: It's been on the show. Really, you could turn on
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 2: airplane right now and piss yourself. It's so funny. I
• 1:20:46
  Speaker 2: picked the wrong data, start sniff and glue. I mean
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 2: it's just so good.
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 3: You ever been in a cockpit? You ever seen a
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 3: grown man naked?
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 2: You spent any time? You like watching Barbaria? Do you
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 2: like watching Barbarian films? Johnny, I've ever seen? Have you
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 2: spent any time at Turkus? And it just smoke.
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 4: And there's easter eggs throughout that You could watch it
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 4: like ten times and you'll find something new to last
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 4: and it's I Actually I sat on the plane next
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 4: to we were going to Beijing for a project, next
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 4: to one of the I'm blanking on.
• 1:21:17
  Speaker 3: Who are the two guys?
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 2: Jay Is Abrams Abrams Abrams and Sucker Sucker Sucker Zuckerman.
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 3: I sat next to Jerry hilarious guy. But uh, I
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 3: mean I love Quirky. I mean there's a guy.
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 4: I wrote this guy's name down because I love Stephen Conrad.
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 4: He on the TV's The Perpetual Grace, The Patriot on Amazon.
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 4: He did a Secret Life of Walter Mitty. Have you
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 4: heard I love Secret Left film I love quirky, just different.
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 2: Fair enough. Now, where can people find you in your work.
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 3: As if they want to after this?
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 2: If anyone's still listening one I.
• 1:22:05
  Speaker 3: Don't know, go to.
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 4: Movie marketingmakeover dot com. That's how you can get this
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 4: free course. You could find me there. I mean, I
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 4: don't know, you can find oh. I have a company,
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 4: by the way, I've only had it for like twenty
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 4: five years, but I have a production company called Content
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 4: Media Group here in Los Angeles, so you could find
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 4: me there too. I love you know, opening an ear
• 1:22:29
  Speaker 4: to the up and coming generation of filmmakers, So feel
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 4: free to reach out with any questions. But we're all
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 4: here to support each other and to keep indie filmmaking
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 4: alive into the future.
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 2: Amen, Brother, preach, sir, preach, preach Yes, Amen sir, Amen,
• 1:22:43
  Speaker 2: Amen passed the plate. Jeff, thank you so much for
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 2: being on the show Man. I really appreciate it, and
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 2: thank you for being so honest and raw about your experience.
• 1:22:53
  Speaker 2: Thank you for allowing me to beat it up a
• 1:22:56
  Speaker 2: little bit for the scope of education of our audience.
• 1:23:00
  Speaker 2: I do truly appreciate it, because I think we do
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 2: learn much more from our mistakes than we do from
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 2: our victories, as I have put my mistakes out there
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 2: in many, many ways, many times in my books, everywhere else.
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 2: But I think it's really great of you. So thank
• 1:23:14
  Speaker 2: you again for everything you've done, and good luck to
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 2: you with Launch two point zero.
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 4: And thank you for keeping us all awake to the
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 4: possibilities of what we can become as z Indie filmmakers. Alex,
• 1:23:27
  Speaker 4: thank you for building this great community.
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 2: I want to thank Jeff for coming on the show,
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 2: not only dropping major, major knowledge bombs on the Trive,
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 2: but for being so transparent and open about his successes
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 2: and his failures going through this journey of self distributing
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 2: his film. Self distribution, guys, is no joke. If you
• 1:23:48
  Speaker 2: are going to self distribute your film, you really have
• 1:23:51
  Speaker 2: to be on your a game. The higher the budget
• 1:23:54
  Speaker 2: of your film, the tougher it's going to be to
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 2: recoup your money intoday's world. Try to keep those budgets
• 1:24:01
  Speaker 2: as low as possible, but the higher that budget goes,
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 2: the better You have to execute your plan, and you
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 2: have to have a plan in the first place before
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 2: you try to self distribute it. If you plan on
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 2: just putting your movie out there on iTunes and Amazon
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 2: and Google Play and YouTube, and you expect people to
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 2: find your movie and that's how you're going to make
• 1:24:21
  Speaker 2: your money back. In self distribution, I promise you you
• 1:24:24
  Speaker 2: will more and likely fail because that is not an
• 1:24:27
  Speaker 2: option anymore in today's world. So I talk all about
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 2: distribution and a lot of the pitfalls of distribution and
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 2: what you can do to actually generate revenue with your
• 1:24:39
  Speaker 2: film in my best selling book, Rise of the Film Entrepreneur,
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 2: which of course you can get at filmbizbook dot com. Now,
• 1:24:48
  Speaker 2: if you want to get links to anything we talked
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 2: about in this episode, head over to pullaproof Screenwriting dot tv.
• 1:24:54
  Speaker 2: Forward slash for sixteen. Thank you so much for listening, guys,
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 2: As always, keep on writing no matter what. I'll talk
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 2: to you soon.
• 1:25:01
  Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Bulletproof Screenwriting podcast at Bulletproof
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 1: Screenwriting dot tv.