5 Questions with Kelly Curran, Lindsey Normington, and Creston Brown
Lindsey Normingon (left), Kelly Curran (right), Creston Brown (back)
1) Can you talk briefly about your backgrounds, and how you first got interested in filmmaking?
Kelly: I have always taken drama classes since I was young. I was in my first feature film at 18 (in Michigan) and it made me want to pursue a more serious career in the field. Initially, I was solely an actor but I have found writing to be just as enticing.
Lindsey: My background is primarily in stage acting. I moved to LA to pursue acting and writing for film. Once I started regularly auditioning for things, my interest in writing was expedited by all of the (mostly) bogus scripts I’d read every day.
Creston: I’ve always used videography to express myself, but I’ve been writing and directing my own projects for a few years now. I worked on this project while working as an editor at an ad firm, in which I used the previous short I made to get a job at.
2) What’s the backstory here - what was the initial idea and how did it evolve from there?
Kelly: This is a story based on real events (unfortunately). Though pretty scary at the time, it ended up making for good content. In reality, it had happened somewhere much grimier and in a scarier part of town. Due to resource constraints we had to rewrite the story a bit as well as add some comedy to make it into something fun and viewable.
Lindsey: The worst actual rock bottom day of my fucking life- which did not in fact happen in a beautiful mansion, but in a sketchy glass shop in the wholesale district. It had kind of voluntarily bled out of my memory by the time Kelly came to me with a rough draft of the script. It was hilarious, and at that point, it clicked! There’s a reason for everything, and maybe this could be the reason for my total and utter mortification.
Creston: I met Kelly through a couple of mutual friends and followed her on instagram. She shared the seed for the project on a story, so I reached out to see how I could help out. I ended up meeting her and Lindsey, and we quickly discovered we made a great team. They’d written an awesome script, and I was fortunate enough to bring it to life!
3) What was the biggest challenge in making this film? And generally what part of the creative process do you enjoy the most, and the least?
Kelly: I would say, as above, resource constraints proved to be a challenge for us. We had a completely different location in mind for the majority of the shoot but it was a place of business and we had trouble getting anyone to agree to our filming there. Money plays into this as well, as I’m sure it does for many NoBudge films. But we worked with what we had, did some rewrites and it came together beautifully in the end. I really do enjoy the creation of a project: ideas being offered up, plans made, solidified and carried through to an end. After shooting I’m pretty useless with editing or marketing at this point. I hope to work on that.
Lindsey: Our biggest challenges seemed to be logistical things - locations changing, keeping people organized, etc. As a first time writer/director this was difficult to get the hang of. In the past I’ve been somewhat of a self-preservationist. I’m used to strictly performing on set, and not having to worry about many other details. Acting can be a very self-centered activity, while other aspects of filmmaking will crumble if you’re not working as a team.
Creston: Time, location, and money. While we were working on this project, we all had full time jobs, commitments, and obligations we had to fulfill. It was a challenge figuring those things out, but once they came together and things started clicking, it got easier. Navigating in post-production was a challenge as well, since a lot of the editing work was new to me. Luckily, we had Louis, who worked as an amazing sound editor for the project. There were a lot of learning curves, but it was really just a game of constant adaptation.
4) What’s a film you’ve seen recently, new or old, that you really loved and why?
Kelly: “King of LA” written by Ember Knight and Bobby McCoy is an independent film I really enjoyed. In more mainstream news, Parasite was incredible.
Lindsey: I was very fortunate to see Spree at this year’s Sundance Film Festival while I was there performing in a different project. Coming off of a year of films about “cool” old white guys who enact their rage in these over-indulgent, cinematic ways, it was refreshing to see the script flipped. It’s basically calling a spade a spade. These white male revenge fantasies are truly born through cringey incel ideals.
Creston: A friend of mine Roger Hayn made an amazing film called “Congratulations, Debby”, and I haven’t been able to get it out of my head. It’s darkly comedic, and the tonal change throughout the entire film made me feel uneasy like I’ve never felt before. It was astounding. Uncut Gems fucking ruled too.
5) What’s next for you?
Kelly: Hopefully something wonderful and unexpected! Personally, I am currently working on a feature film to submit to the Page Awards, as well as editing a pilot in hopes of producing a series! I’m sure Lindsey Normington and I will work on many projects together in the future :))
Lindsey: Hopefully beginning production on my feature film this year, and continuing to work on projects that feed my creative drive rather than destroying it. (Lesson learned!!) Anti-Gone, the mixed reality play I’ve been acting in which just premiered as part of Sundance’s New Frontier Program, will also hopefully be touring and developing into future iterations.
Creston: I’ve got another short hopefully coming soon... but for now, I hope to continue to develop and work on projects with Kelly, Lindsey, and the many many talented people that came together to make this film possible!
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Instagram:
Creston Brown: @crlbr_
Lindsey Normington: @lindsey.bug
Kelly Curran: @kellyasap