5 Questions with Isaac Cole
In “Lucy in the Morning,” Chris sets up a date at his Brooklyn apartment, and it gets off to a rocky start and ends suddenly (kind of). We asked director Isaac Cole how the project began, working with his cast, and what’s next for him…
1) Can you talk a little bit about your background and your intro to filmmaking?
I started making films in Salt Lake City when I was around seventeen. My older cousin took a film production class at the University of Utah and enlisted my help on one of his school projects. I then became a regular at the local art-house theater in Salt Lake named The Tower. There was a small but very talented group of filmmakers who worked at The Tower and I tried very hard to be like them. It was like the Empire Records of film in SLC. After making a couple of bad short films I realized I needed some real training and began studying film production at New York University.
2) How did this project begin?
I wrote this short a number of years ago while still in NYC. I wanted to write something we could film without leaving my apartment. It then collected digital dust on an old computer for about five years. Last summer, during a spontaneous trip to NYC (I am back in Utah now) I began looking for something that I could throw together for as little money as possible.
It was the most barebones crew and production imaginable. My friend and collaborator Marc Katz volunteered his talent and camera, another friend, Cory Beisser, was our swiss army knife gaffer/assistant camera man, my friend Siena Brown took time out of her busy schedule to come assistant direct. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that no matter how bare bones I want to be, I still need a good AD to keep us from pissing away the day. I did the sound myself, and that was our crew. It worked out but directing and doing sound is something I hope to never do again.
3) I love your cast. How did you find them and what was your working process like? Were there rehearsals, improv? They have great chemistry - there’s a real tenderness between them. Did they know each other beforehand?
Thanks! The tenderness between them is what makes this film special to me. Chris Haag is a close friend and I’ve made a handful of films with him. He’s a talented musician and filmmaker himself. Raye Levine is also an old friend and I had written the part for her to begin with. They had never met before, but they had chemistry right away. We did one night of rehearsals, which I approached more as a collaboration. We did a lot of improv in that rehearsal that I then put down on paper. We shot it in 2.5 days so we didn’t have a lot of time to improv once on set but that one night of rehearsal and improv was so important.
4) What else are you working on at the moment?
I’m working as a full-time editor on a feature documentary right now, but I have a couple short films on deck for when that’s finished and a book I'd like to adapt. I’m also interested in making a follow up short film that takes place three years after “Lucy In The Morning” ends.
5) What’s a movie you’ve seen recently, new or old, that you think lives up to the hype?
I recently watched Shoplifters and loved everything about it!
Contact Info:
IG: @isaaacole.