The absurdist melodrama, “Dinnertime,” by director Gerardo Coello Escalante, uses a rolling energy and three acts to portray a dysfunctional family dealing with altercations, intrusions, and deaths. We asked Escalante how the project started, what the biggest challenge was, and what comes next for him…

1) Can you talk briefly about your background, and how you first got interested in filmmaking?

I was born and grew up in Mexico City. Watching films was a daily activity for me since I was very young, so I’ve been interested in film ever since I can remember. From childhood and all the way through high school I participated in theater productions where I became very interested in the process of rehearsals. I dedicated myself more seriously to filmmaking throughout high school, and afterwards I went to NYU for my BFA in Film & TV Production. Most of my work has been produced in New York since I started school. “Dinnertime” was my NYU thesis film.

 2) What’s the backstory here - what was the initial idea and how did it evolve from there?

The original idea for “Dinnertime” was to make a film that took place during family dinners in three consecutive years, where the structure of each year was more or less the same to touch upon the mechanical repetition of routines within the family dynamic. However, as I struggled with the writing process, I decided to try a different approach. Since high school I’ve been very interested by the work of Mike Leigh, and the way in which his narratives always begin with the characters, and the plot is developed through a series of improvisations in the weeks prior to the shoot. I decided to use this approach to come up with the characters, and with a very rough idea for the structure in mind, I began auditioning actors and asking them to come up with characters they were interested in exploring. 

Through these auditions I discovered the first characters for the film, and from working on improvisations with them I began discovering the rest of the characters that would live in their world. I had the actors meet in character during improvisations held in different public places of the city and eventually brought the whole cast together for general rehearsals where they explored different prompts. From these general rehearsals is where the plot of the film was discovered and later on written into a script with the collaboration of my friend (and producer of the movie) Joshua Bogatin.

 3) What was the biggest challenge in making this film? And generally what part of the creative process do you enjoy the best, and the least?

The biggest challenge making this movie was probably the logistics of finding times for the rehearsals that worked for most of the cast. For this project I was asking for a big commitment from the whole cast, who not only made themselves available for the shoot, but moved their schedule around the weeks before to be able to attend the rehearsals to explore their characters to find the plot of the film. I was incredibly fortunate to work with such incredible and committed actors who truly put in all their effort and creativity to bring these characters to life and create a story out of them. The process of making this film was always a bit stressful, since the script was never fully finished and there was a lot to explore and discover on set as well. 

The rehearsals and process of writing the script were very fun, as there always were various directions where the film could go. However I think the shoot itself was the most satisfying part of the process since I got to see how all these loose ideas came together during each take in often surprising and unexpected ways. We were shooting a great number of pages every day, but since there was a lot of improvisation involved, no take was ever the same which made the shoot very fresh and incredibly enjoyable for me. Editing was a challenge, but one which was also incredibly rewarding. There were so many options for every scene, that finding the one that worked best for the characters and the rest of the film was always very surprising and gratifying. 

4) What’s a film you’ve seen recently, new or old, that you really loved and why?

I recently had a chance to watch “La Camarista” (The Chambermaid) and I found it to be a truly great film. In my opinion, the film’s greatest strength lies in its commitment to its protagonist, Evelia, and the world within the hotel she works at. The plot is incredibly simple and unravels very slowly and quietly through really small details and interactions. The film is slow paced, yet the way that labor is portrayed in the film is never anesthetized or romanticized. The work that Evelia does is always incredibly fast-paced, stressful and physically demanding; the mundanity is translated through the stillness of the camera and the repetition in the actions. All of the performances are amazing, and the characters are incredibly well crafted. With very few resources, Lila Avilés creates a very effective microcosm of Mexican society within the hierarchies of the hotel. 

5) What’s next for you?

I am currently in the process of writing a feature film titled “Showtime” along with “Dinnertime” co-writer and producer Joshua Bogatin. I hope to be able to make a few short films next year as I continue working as a producer and assistant director in feature films and commercials in New York and Mexico City. 

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Website: http://gerardocoello.com

Instagram: @gcoello94