Speaker 1: Oh ye is boot. It should die.
Speaker 2: People say good money to see this movie.
Speaker 3: When they go out to a theater, they want cold sodas,
Speaker 3: hot popcorn, and no monsters in the protection booths.
Speaker 1: Everyone pretend podcasting isn't boring.
Speaker 3: Got it off? Tenseltown is attempting to reboot another nineties sitcom.
Speaker 3: Randy Robbins is behind the reboot of A Baker's Dozen.
Speaker 1: But the whereabouts of his coast style vegas are unknown.
Speaker 4: Aren't you gonna do that?
Speaker 3: Show?
Speaker 1: Everybody who said they loved me and supported me left
Speaker 1: me alone as soon as that showing sorrna first rate.
Speaker 3: It's no more anniversaries.
Speaker 2: Excuse me, Paul, I'm Nela.
Speaker 1: By the way, take care of yourself.
Speaker 2: Because there are a few nice people who give a ship.
Speaker 5: Just feels like I'm stuck here forever.
Speaker 1: There is no suck Munster, explain this. It's a suck.
Speaker 1: What should I call you?
Speaker 2: Hey, folks, welcome to a special episode of The Projection Booth.
Speaker 2: I'm your host, Mike White. On this episode, I am
Speaker 2: talking with Sean Whalon. He may not be a familiar name,
Speaker 2: but he's definitely a familiar face and he's also the writer, director,
Speaker 2: and star of the new movie Crust, which is now
Speaker 2: available on DVD wherever finer DVDs are sold. Had a
Speaker 2: great time talking with mister Whalen. I hope you have
Speaker 2: a great time listening to it. Thank you so much,
Speaker 2: and I hope you enjoyed the interview. I've seen you
Speaker 2: in so many things for so many years, starting all
Speaker 2: the way back when I was in college and the
Speaker 2: famous Gott milk commercial was on and I'm just like, Yeah,
Speaker 2: this guy, he's got a great face. I want to
Speaker 2: know more about this person. I want to see him
Speaker 2: in more things. Tell me more about you, and how'd
Speaker 2: you get your start?
Speaker 1: I started as the youngest of four who was just
Speaker 1: trying to get out of doing dishes. So I would
Speaker 1: entertain my brothers and sisters and they would laugh and
Speaker 1: clean the kitchen. From our previous conversation, I haven't grown much,
Speaker 1: I was, by the way, I was just telling him
Speaker 1: that I was glad that our meeting was the lady
Speaker 1: so I could clean the kitchen and knock up my
Speaker 1: wife put me in the doghouse. Yes, I haven't grown.
Speaker 1: And so then one they figured it out and they'd
Speaker 1: go they were leaving and I'd go, hey, we're not
Speaker 1: done yet, and they go, we're done. This is your
Speaker 1: pans to clean and I was like, I need a
Speaker 1: new kit. And I got into it and then I
Speaker 1: had the but you needed to direct a version of
Speaker 1: Rumpel still Skin, and I put my girl Crush in
Speaker 1: the lead of the thing. I saw her like just
Speaker 1: a couple of years ago in France. She's French, and
Speaker 1: she was like, why was I in then? And I
Speaker 1: was like, it was a terrible accurance, but I remember
Speaker 1: having the greatest time doing the role. And then I
Speaker 1: said it was We did it for the whole school.
Speaker 1: I was getting a great response, and when I came
Speaker 1: out to do my curtain call, my school went nuts.
Speaker 1: They just were crazy and I was like, wait a minute.
Speaker 1: I love doing this, they loved seeing it. This is
Speaker 1: really my thing. This feels right. Didn't do a lot
Speaker 1: in junior high school. That was fifth grade in elementary seal,
Speaker 1: but I did do a very big community theater version
Speaker 1: of Tiny Tim. It was like I was ten years old.
Speaker 1: It was like six weekends and three or four that
Speaker 1: was a weekend. It was a real it was a
Speaker 1: big deal. So and then I did some ward in
Speaker 1: junior high school and then just the normal theater kid
Speaker 1: high school kid. So I did chorus, choir, men's choir, barbershop, quartet, musicals, theater,
Speaker 1: the whole thing, and then I got into UCLA. Didn't
Speaker 1: really love the program, but I did have a nice
Speaker 1: role in a play with Dafties, a negive from Spaceball's
Speaker 1: Fame and Melrose places fame, and she and I had
Speaker 1: a great time. I got some heat. It was just
Speaker 1: too much. I just came out from Maryland and I
Speaker 1: just knew I wasn't emotionally intelligent to handle that yet,
Speaker 1: and so I just thought I didn't like the program.
Speaker 1: I wasn't ready for the heat, and so I just
Speaker 1: finished my years out building a fraternity with some friends
Speaker 1: and had a great We were basically like Revenge of
Speaker 1: the Nerds. It was great. And then I got into
Speaker 1: Growlings and that changed everything. My boss used to go
Speaker 1: to the shows. I went to the shows and I go, oh,
Speaker 1: this is the place for me. I have to be here.
Speaker 1: Did the Groundings for a while, got into the Sunday show,
Speaker 1: had a blast, and then I didn't get in the
Speaker 1: main company on my first go round. The extended me again.
Speaker 1: I thought I'm just gonna go learn how to act,
Speaker 1: went into playoffs West It's serious drama thing. And then
Speaker 1: I got a coach that merged my comedy training with
Speaker 1: my dramatic training, and I got a couple guest stars,
Speaker 1: and then I got people under the Stairs. That wasn't
Speaker 1: a big break, which is shocking because we were number
Speaker 1: one for six weeks and we never got the same
Speaker 1: love that if we were number one for six weeks today,
Speaker 1: it would be a big deal. Oh yeah, back then,
Speaker 1: it wasn't that big of a deal for a horror
Speaker 1: movie because that was why Dalloween. No one cares. But
Speaker 1: we did very well. But my big break came when
Speaker 1: I was doing more commercials and theametrical stuff, and I
Speaker 1: did the milk commercial. Bailberg saw it, he loved it.
Speaker 1: A student of mine worked with him and said, he's
Speaker 1: going to put you in something. I guarantee it. Eight
Speaker 1: months later, I auditioned for Twist and the rest was
Speaker 1: history for the nineties. The nineties blew up for me
Speaker 1: because the milk commercial got me seen, but it killed
Speaker 1: my commercial career. Never did. I think I did three
Speaker 1: commercial stints, but it started my theatrical career, which is
Speaker 1: what I wanted in anyway. And because I worked with
Speaker 1: Spielberg and Twister, meaning the executive produced Twister, you were
Speaker 1: on a hot list in town and I saw the
Speaker 1: difference and I got into a lot of good roles
Speaker 1: since then since that time. And then it flowed down
Speaker 1: in the two thousands because everything changed after nine to
Speaker 1: eleven and companies bought Hollywood and things like that. So
Speaker 1: I had a slow period of time right when I
Speaker 1: had kids, right when I had a house, and so
Speaker 1: I had to sell blenders and do demonstrations of pans
Speaker 1: and a costco and I literally knew everything about the
Speaker 1: costcos and they used me for a reference all the time.
Speaker 1: So wow, it was great. And there is one scene
Speaker 1: in the movie where they say we need you to
Speaker 1: walk around and talk about that, and I go, I
Speaker 1: got it that it doesn't want and I walked through
Speaker 1: and I knew all the terminology and everything like that,
Speaker 1: So that was really fun. Or else I would also
Speaker 1: say I got to feed my kids. Man. After that,
Speaker 1: I got into teaching, and then I was always writing.
Speaker 1: I started writing the Groundlings I wrote, and then I
Speaker 1: got a job on Disney Channel cartoon shows. PEPPERH. Jake
Speaker 1: American Dragons. Phil Moore, another show by Scott Gimble actually
Speaker 1: did The Walking Dead. He did a cartoon show and
Speaker 1: it was great and I was a writer on that
Speaker 1: in terms of punching up, and I wrote a couple
Speaker 1: of scripts. So I've always been writing, and I had
Speaker 1: a few scripts that I had written over the years,
Speaker 1: tried to sell and then I wrote this after a
Speaker 1: depression in twenty fifteen, after my divorce. It just flew
Speaker 1: out of me. I had an idea before about a
Speaker 1: cheap idea of horror movie, which is just one location
Speaker 1: a guy in a sock suit. I thought it would
Speaker 1: just be cheap and take white clothes and cover it
Speaker 1: with socks and that's it. But as I get closer,
Speaker 1: I realized and definitely for the guy who designed Crust,
Speaker 1: Eric Porn, who does the special effects forteen wolf On,
Speaker 1: he built Crust and he said, what should be like
Speaker 1: Oogie Boogie in a basket except for a cute part
Speaker 1: of Ougi Boggy, the nicer part. And he was right,
Speaker 1: and he built that puppet. We tried to get it going,
Speaker 1: meet Felicia Rose, other people tried to get it done
Speaker 1: in twenty sixteen, and we just didn't know enough about
Speaker 1: indigogo or producing. And it was the seven years in
Speaker 1: between where Felissa ga is a producer and learned a
Speaker 1: lot more, and I learned a lot more. And then
Speaker 1: I had gone with other producers, maybe starting up, and
Speaker 1: they'd be like, oh, I don't like the color. I
Speaker 1: was not going to play well in Walmart, and I go,
Speaker 1: this is not for Walmart. And then they go, yeah,
Speaker 1: but the DVD you would put it in the wall.
Speaker 1: I go, no, I won't. This is going to be
Speaker 1: in the nerd guy's garage that has the block buster
Speaker 1: racks and racks and he's gonna name you forty movies
Speaker 1: you've never heard of. That's who this is for. For
Speaker 1: that guy. We just got a screening now at the
Speaker 1: Coney Island Freak Show Theater. Well they did, and this
Speaker 1: is a serious question. He goes, when you come for
Speaker 1: the screening, now you don't have to do this, but
Speaker 1: before year screening, we could do a fifteen minute sideshow
Speaker 1: freak show for you.
Speaker 4: And I was like, absolutely, are you kidding? And I'm
Speaker 4: not insane, of course I want that as my war.
Speaker 4: And then I circle back a falescent. She had her
Speaker 4: new partner Dan Kearney, who was every other producer, was like,
Speaker 4: maybe more movies, or maybe more blood, or maybe not
Speaker 4: black and white or maybe whatever, always things that did.
Speaker 1: And he got on our zoom colony said I know
Speaker 1: what you're doing. I've had mental health myself, and I went,
Speaker 1: this is the guy. He gets it. We got a
Speaker 1: going Indiegogo was great. It was starting to get really hectic,
Speaker 1: so we brought in Chris Surgy, my NIXT producer that
Speaker 1: helped us really get through. Definitely helped us sort out
Speaker 1: SAG stuff and landed the plane at Anchor Bay and
Speaker 1: all distribution and things like that. It's how I got here.
Speaker 1: And then when I was gonna direct it or no,
Speaker 1: I was producing it, co writing and starring, and I
Speaker 1: thought this is great, told my manager. He said eh,
Speaker 1: and I go what and he goes, Unfortunately, in this
Speaker 1: town it doesn't matter unless you direct. And I thought
Speaker 1: really and he goes yeah, and I go, I guess
Speaker 1: I'm directing it. And I watched master classes with Ron
Speaker 1: Howard and Spike Lee and it's one of those things
Speaker 1: where you know more than you'd think. Yeah, I just
Speaker 1: I've been on so many since I've learned so much.
Speaker 1: I was panicking. Bradley Cooper before he did A Star
Speaker 1: Is Morning. He was like it, I was in researching
Speaker 1: and doing it and I hadn't done any of that.
Speaker 1: But I also just knew more than I thought. I
Speaker 1: worked a long time with my DP, which was the
Speaker 1: part I didn't know the most. I prepped a lot.
Speaker 1: I rehearsed a lot with all my actors. And that's
Speaker 1: one thing I have heard is that you're acting throughout
Speaker 1: it is fantastic. And I was like, it'd be embarrassing
Speaker 1: if I was an actor director and my actors. Of course,
Speaker 1: I had to make that a priority and it came
Speaker 1: very easy to me. But I think it's also feeling
Speaker 1: powerless as an actor. Then you're finally in control of
Speaker 1: all of it. As an actor, we don't know who
Speaker 1: we're going to act with, what the set's going to
Speaker 1: look like, how it's going to be edited, will I
Speaker 1: even make the final cut? And so I thought, this
Speaker 1: is a great one. I love filmmaking, and Rebecca Kennedy
Speaker 1: and I were just bonding as friends. Her husband is
Speaker 1: a great friend of mine, my wife is a great
Speaker 1: friend of hers, and we just all four got together
Speaker 1: and said let's do this because we want more control.
Speaker 1: We did a comedy series which drops in two weeks,
Speaker 1: which I'll plug, which is Psyche on Sunset. It's going
Speaker 1: to be on our website. Four episodes, but the hottest
Speaker 1: restaurant in LA where all the waiters are trained and
Speaker 1: licensed there Base, but they're the worst therapist in LA
Speaker 1: because they couldn't get her an office trip. They gased
Speaker 1: like you and stuff. So it's Oh, I'm gonna have
Speaker 1: a martini and my wife will have the same. It's wow.
Speaker 1: So you don't think she's capable of ordering for herself
Speaker 1: and you're like no, and she likes it. He goes
Speaker 1: on instead of you telling us how she feels, how
Speaker 1: about you telling I do it all the time. When
Speaker 1: he goes, oh, you're a control for you, she's gas
Speaker 1: lighting and fun and they're really fun. And that drops
Speaker 1: in a couple of weeks. That's me and Rebecca Kennedy's production.
Speaker 1: So she is a production company with her husband. I
Speaker 1: have a production company my wife and we co produced
Speaker 1: and we're co producing another feature that's coming that we're
Speaker 1: shooting in February and pre production for that. So it's
Speaker 1: great and yeah, so it was really great. I learned
Speaker 1: a lot and move forward and yeah, that's my journey
Speaker 1: on how I got here.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you said you've been on a lot of over
Speaker 2: one hundred roles credited. That's pretty crazy.
Speaker 1: During the pandemic, TikTok saved my life just because I
Speaker 1: had something to do. My wife was a essential worker
Speaker 1: because she does insurance for nursing homes and things like that,
Speaker 1: so she was going into work every day. I was
Speaker 1: just alone with my kids, you know, divorce. I would
Speaker 1: get comments all the time, you're such a great actor,
Speaker 1: you're so underrated, you should get bigger roles, and I'm
Speaker 1: it's not up to me. But then what the new
Speaker 1: fandom and Indiego Go and all that showed me you
Speaker 1: don't need the gatekeepers anymore. It felt like it's a
Speaker 1: wonderful life almost. They were like, you've entertained us for
Speaker 1: so long, we wanted to see you in a bigger part.
Speaker 1: For you to say that is so powerful for me
Speaker 1: to hear, because through their actions, the town that you're
Speaker 1: trying to make says you're not a lead or you're
Speaker 1: gonna pop in every once in a while and do
Speaker 1: something fun and give us some spice. But you're not
Speaker 1: elite and certainly not a romantic lead. Not in a
Speaker 1: million bazillion years have I, Me or Rebecca ever gone
Speaker 1: out for those lead romantic roles. What's beautiful about this
Speaker 1: new community? In the way social media and Indigogo and
Speaker 1: all this stuff works, people know you can reach people more.
Speaker 1: But then they can say, you know what, I don't
Speaker 1: agree with the studios. I have to show them, oh,
Speaker 1: I actually can be a leader. But they wouldn't know
Speaker 1: that unless they saw it. So again, I'm not knocking them.
Speaker 1: I'm just saying I couldn't wait for you to decide.
Speaker 1: Kevin Hart did a great thing. He goes. I just
Speaker 1: didn't understand, coming from stand up when I would go
Speaker 1: and just take in charge of my career, that all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, I'm supposed to sit here and wait
Speaker 1: till you decide when I work. That makes no sense
Speaker 1: to me. And he started producing his own stuff, and
Speaker 1: that's I think that's the new thing. And I've already
Speaker 1: got an investor who's all say, A felt like you
Speaker 1: followed me your old career, and now he wants to
Speaker 1: finance my next several films. So a few investors, so
Speaker 1: I'm booked and busy for the next few years. I've
Speaker 1: got our next movie that we're doing, and then yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm literally booked to twenty twenty seven and just movies
Speaker 1: that I'm producing and directing and acting in every single one.
Speaker 1: And then after this one that I'm doing that I
Speaker 1: didn't write, the next three year all ones that'll write, produce, direct,
Speaker 1: and star. And again that's so great. Yeah, it's really great.
Speaker 1: But thank you for saying that, because you think am
Speaker 1: I crazy? But then when I hear it from someone
Speaker 1: who's following Mega, No, they actually did want to see that.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, Like I said, before we even started talking,
Speaker 2: just the idea of when you would show up, it
Speaker 2: was just always such a thrill. Oh there he is
Speaker 2: in Cable guy. Are people in the stairs? Such a
Speaker 2: great role? Or my god? And I hope you take
Speaker 2: this the right way. But the level of geekdom and
Speaker 2: Twisters and just having that crew together with Alan Ruck
Speaker 2: and just like every nerd character that you can think of,
Speaker 2: and even phillipsy Moore Hoffman, Like before that broke big,
Speaker 2: it was just like, Holy, I'll look at all of
Speaker 2: these guys.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Todd Field, he's an Academy Film Director and writer
Speaker 1: and so great. I didn't have the Allan Rock career
Speaker 1: where he had a lead role when he was very young,
Speaker 1: and that starts a conversation that goes, oh, he's supposed
Speaker 1: to be in big roles, and either you do small
Speaker 1: roles and then busting the big roles or whatever. But
Speaker 1: when I started to think, wow, five ten years ago,
Speaker 1: I don't think this was ever. They're never going to
Speaker 1: put me in a lead of anything or a regular part.
Speaker 1: Hopefully this allowed to keep people to go, I actually
Speaker 1: can be a leader. Look, and I was a terrifying proposition.
Speaker 1: Rebecca had done a couple of lead roles, felicaid lead roles,
Speaker 1: and I hadn't been, so I thought, oh my god,
Speaker 1: you do you wake up in the middle of the
Speaker 1: night with those night sweats and going what if people
Speaker 1: go you can't carry a movie? And luckily no one
Speaker 1: has said that, So I'm glad.
Speaker 2: With the smaller roles. Were you having a good time?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I never thought. I wasn't sitting there pining for a
Speaker 1: lead roll or whatever. I was like, all right, this
Speaker 1: is my career, but it's better than not having any
Speaker 1: kind of career, and yes, I had lean times. Like
Speaker 1: I said, for eight years I had to sell stuff
Speaker 1: in a costco stuff like that. But I was fine
Speaker 1: with it. But then I thought, I may as well
Speaker 1: give this a shot. As you get older, I thought
Speaker 1: this great analogy, like if yours are cookies, younger people
Speaker 1: have more cookies than me statistically, right. Well, so I go,
Speaker 1: if I'm getting older, this is the time to make
Speaker 1: a stab and go. You know what it's like the MNFL.
Speaker 1: You got one shot, like I got a few more
Speaker 1: years left, so you may as well just go for
Speaker 1: it and see if it works. But it doesn't, at
Speaker 1: least I tried. My role is always try something for
Speaker 1: a couple of years. And I tried Crust. And it's
Speaker 1: been two years since we started it, but since I
Speaker 1: shot it, it's been less than two years. And already
Speaker 1: I've got my second movie, green Let, which will be
Speaker 1: dropping in the trades in the next few days about
Speaker 1: who's in it and things like that, and so I go, okay,
Speaker 1: I'm not crazy. I think that. Thomas Zembeck, the president
Speaker 1: of Anchor Bay, nailed it at our La premiere and
Speaker 1: he said, I kind of challenge anyone to not have
Speaker 1: a good time at this movie. It's just fine, and
Speaker 1: that's what I love more than anything. If you follow
Speaker 1: me on, So for me, like Evan, fine making people laugh,
Speaker 1: being silly, engaging with people, and if I can give
Speaker 1: anything to this modern world a couple hours of fun,
Speaker 1: that's it. Message of mental health.
Speaker 2: Tell me a little bit more about the shoot. How
Speaker 2: was that actual experience for you, being both behind and
Speaker 2: in front of the camera.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I crapped a lot for me and my DP
Speaker 1: and he was great. Jared Letis was fantastic. He got
Speaker 1: me to storyboard this whole thing wait beforehand. We finished
Speaker 1: a few weeks before shoot, but then we'd go over
Speaker 1: it and review stuff. And then he came in a
Speaker 1: couple days early and we looked through the set and everything,
Speaker 1: and I made sure my costumes were alling up. I
Speaker 1: had my notebook with my C numbers and my what
Speaker 1: page we're on and the continuity and all that stuff,
Speaker 1: and so I got very prepared. And the great thing
Speaker 1: was on the set. I knew we had to move,
Speaker 1: but I was so excited to see these people speak
Speaker 1: my words and say this stuff out loud, that you're
Speaker 1: I'm having such a good time, And people said it
Speaker 1: was one of the funnest sets they've ever been on,
Speaker 1: because I was so excited to be there, to have
Speaker 1: this opportunity. I think I knew I was lucky. When
Speaker 1: you've had success young and then you don't have it,
Speaker 1: when you get any whiff of another shot at it,
Speaker 1: you're so much more grateful because you don't know what
Speaker 1: you have when you first get it. Could you just think, oh,
Speaker 1: I've worked a lot in high school, and I worked
Speaker 1: a lot after I could get in the growling and
Speaker 1: moved there really quick. Of course I'm gonna work, And
Speaker 1: so I didn't know how lucky I was, And now
Speaker 1: I absolutely know how I d am. So you ingested
Speaker 1: a lot more and respect it more. But I just
Speaker 1: had so much fun on set. And then at night
Speaker 1: we had a playlist. Everyone had a playlist, but they
Speaker 1: couldn't have songs at not sixty percent of the crew new,
Speaker 1: and we had old people down to twenty somethings, and
Speaker 1: we would always dance to it, and friends came in
Speaker 1: later in the shooting. I've never seen a more joyful,
Speaker 1: fun set. And it's a night shoot and you guys
Speaker 1: are having a dance party at lunch, which was crazy.
Speaker 1: So it was great. But acting wise actors, and we
Speaker 1: all do, and because I've had problems with anxiety, we
Speaker 1: get in our head. But because I was so busy
Speaker 1: with everything else right before we rolled, I had no
Speaker 1: time to think about anything. So because I couldn't think
Speaker 1: about anything, I thought to myself, there's no overthinking, and
Speaker 1: I would just go, So there's a similar moment in
Speaker 1: the movie, which you know that involves music and dancing
Speaker 1: and fun, and the movie is before that and after that,
Speaker 1: because everything before that is a little sand and everything
Speaker 1: after that slowly starts to change, right, I would always go,
Speaker 1: what scene is it? Oh? Is it before that thing?
Speaker 1: Because I knew it was sweats, sad makeup, and then
Speaker 1: or it was after that and it was starting to grow.
Speaker 1: So I think it was honestly a gift because I
Speaker 1: had no time to think about my acting that I
Speaker 1: really do think it's the best acting I've ever done
Speaker 1: because I had no time to worry about it, so
Speaker 1: I was just open and available. And it's a scrip
Speaker 1: I knew for years.
Speaker 2: And you said a seminal moment. You are putting yourself
Speaker 2: out there in this.
Speaker 1: Movie, no ego. It feels I think The biggest inspiration
Speaker 1: we have of that these days is Viola Davis. Even
Speaker 1: Meryl Streep, who I'm a huge fan of, thinks she's amazing,
Speaker 1: can make herself, she doesn't care what she looks like whatever.
Speaker 1: But I've never seen her like And again, I know,
Speaker 1: I'm doing a very weird reference with Fences that she
Speaker 1: did with Denzel Washington and there's a fight scene in
Speaker 1: the backyard and she's so mad and she's so exhausted,
Speaker 1: and she's yelling him and she's crying and literally snot
Speaker 1: is coming out of her nose. Her ears are rolling
Speaker 1: down her face and smearing her makeup. R Wag is
Speaker 1: tilted not and it's amazing and you have to realize.
Speaker 1: And that's when I went, oh, you can't care well
Speaker 1: what you look like at all. You just can't. You
Speaker 1: just have to be in it, because no one in
Speaker 1: real life goes, gosh, I hope he's thinking that I'm
Speaker 1: not rocking in my chair too much for this podcast,
Speaker 1: and we don't do that. You're not sitting here going oh,
Speaker 1: when should I not? When should I not? Yacht? You
Speaker 1: know what I mean. You're just living life and you
Speaker 1: don't care what you look like you're just engaged. And
Speaker 1: I think that was a lot of it that I thought,
Speaker 1: And definitely in terms of me and Rebecca bonded as real.
Speaker 1: Our friendship just grew tremendously because she never got cast
Speaker 1: in those roles. I never got cast in those roles.
Speaker 1: We would never be casting those roles, and so we
Speaker 1: knew as people who have the quirky side parts taking
Speaker 1: a sabbag or we had to rely on each other.
Speaker 1: And we worked in an acting class for a few
Speaker 1: months before because we said, if our chemistry doesn't work,
Speaker 1: we don't have a movie. And luckily everyone goes, you
Speaker 1: guys have good chemistry.
Speaker 3: You do.
Speaker 1: She works acting wise to get to where he isn't
Speaker 1: a role is different than mine. But when we get there,
Speaker 1: we worked the same way. We were very loose. We
Speaker 1: have total trust and that was the other thing. I
Speaker 1: had to have total trust in her and me, and
Speaker 1: so the flow was amazing. Look there's actors who worked
Speaker 1: different ways. Felisa Rose walked in there. She was busy
Speaker 1: and we only had rehearsed my emotional scene, which I loved.
Speaker 1: The colors she brought to it, the sadness, the pain
Speaker 1: which she's supposed to be really mean to me, but
Speaker 1: you feel for her a little bit. There was someone
Speaker 1: who said she's the most grounded character in the whole
Speaker 1: thing because she's sang, yes, I'm depressed, but years of
Speaker 1: it is takes its toll on the people around you.
Speaker 1: And we rehearsed that one. But when it was time
Speaker 1: to do her later stuff, when she gets a little
Speaker 1: more animated, she was fearless, just fearless. She just dove
Speaker 1: right in and did it and she was great, so good,
Speaker 1: and I have to prepare and just let it go,
Speaker 1: and she again gets an instinct and just goes. So
Speaker 1: everybody's different. But yeah, I guess I also wanted to
Speaker 1: show no ego. That's why that funny underwear scene at
Speaker 1: the end where I'm in my underwear. I thought of
Speaker 1: that in the middle of the night, and I thought
Speaker 1: that's a good excuse for me to get in shape,
Speaker 1: and I'd be in better shape for the shoot and
Speaker 1: the whole thing. And it inspired me to do that.
Speaker 1: But yet I think that it's like Brian Transton said
Speaker 1: in his book, he goes. I just told the writers,
Speaker 1: do whatever you want with me. So he was in
Speaker 1: tidy whites tied to a truck and he was covered
Speaker 1: in bees. And my other friend did that on OZ.
Speaker 1: If you ever watched OZ, he would Jak Simmons. He
Speaker 1: was Ropes and JK simmons right hand man, and he
Speaker 1: said the same thing, just do whatever you want. And
Speaker 1: his art was insane, but he just trans for a while.
Speaker 1: He was getting me all this crazy stuff, and I thought,
Speaker 1: that's what I wanted to do. I want to just
Speaker 1: I'll worry about this stuff. Who cares? As long as
Speaker 1: it's grounded in something emotional and real, then it's fine.
Speaker 2: So how much of a brave new world was it
Speaker 2: for you for the post process? Because obviously you've done
Speaker 2: so much free, But how was that.
Speaker 1: The post process was a brand new lesson for me?
Speaker 1: I know, I didn't do it the way other people
Speaker 1: do it. My editor, who was my DP, was out
Speaker 1: of town. He pieced together episode. I didn't look at
Speaker 1: every single take. In all honesty, we only had a
Speaker 1: few takes of each scene, so I knew he picked
Speaker 1: the best one, you know what I mean? And I
Speaker 1: knew one we marked is the best one. So it
Speaker 1: wasn't like there was a vast bunch of takes and
Speaker 1: shots that I had to. Like we went in there.
Speaker 1: We would shoot a few minutes of a scene and
Speaker 1: cover it and then move on. We only two or
Speaker 1: three takes. Like being Rebecca's date scene on those dryers,
Speaker 1: that was a five minute scene and Rebecca and I
Speaker 1: did it three times. That was it. And that's how
Speaker 1: good she is that we could go and seen in
Speaker 1: the bed at the end. That's a one shot the
Speaker 1: entire thing. You don't move from us at all. There's
Speaker 1: no editing. And that was another one that she just
Speaker 1: came in and we just knocked it out in a
Speaker 1: few takes. But that's what I think help when you
Speaker 1: bring up circling is the preparation in acting help and
Speaker 1: also the idea that when you're going in you can't
Speaker 1: overthink it.
Speaker 2: You've already mentioned your DP and your editor, and I'm
Speaker 2: sure so much of the work that you do is
Speaker 2: finding the right people to work with, the people that
Speaker 2: you can trust. You've talked so much about your co
Speaker 2: stars and your producers. How do you find your crew?
Speaker 1: Is so me and Fu listens deal as she has
Speaker 1: produced smaller budget movies before and stuff we said, she said,
Speaker 1: I'll hook you have great cats and a great crew,
Speaker 1: and I said, oh, and I picked the cast because
Speaker 1: there are people I need to know that I work with,
Speaker 1: who I trust, I know how they work. I cast
Speaker 1: the movie Fellis brought in, which were fantastic choices. She
Speaker 1: brought in Ricky deem Logan who just that scene. He's
Speaker 1: so good, he's just so good. And Ashana Rawlings, who's
Speaker 1: Wendy White, the junior college reporter. But most people I
Speaker 1: brought in the crew she brought in, and when she
Speaker 1: was younger, she said, I wanted to be a matchmaker.
Speaker 1: That makes a ton of sense if you've ever met
Speaker 1: her seen her. She knew the right DP for me.
Speaker 1: She knew the right guys. She brought in this young
Speaker 1: crew and then as a fluke, our guy who liked
Speaker 1: the gaffer had to drop out. We got this other
Speaker 1: guy that she had worked with and he said, yeah,
Speaker 1: I know had a light noir and he just tossed
Speaker 1: it off in one of our zoom meetings. But on
Speaker 1: the first day we were doing all the back room stuff.
Speaker 1: The back office was all shy back there in the
Speaker 1: first three days, and he took that light underneath and
Speaker 1: lit up those wires in the back that you see
Speaker 1: in my office and I go, this looks like Frankenstein's Layer.
Speaker 1: It's unbelievably cool. And he said, that's the thing about noir.
Speaker 1: When you think there shouldn't be a light behind you,
Speaker 1: you put it behind you. Just don't put it as
Speaker 1: a shadow. You just point the light behind you somewhere else.
Speaker 1: And I thought, that's it pretty much. And we said
Speaker 1: it so casually, but it looked tremendous. Brian's just amazing.
Speaker 2: Oh that's fantastic. You talked about that thrill of hearing
Speaker 2: actors say the lines that you've written. I'm so curious.
Speaker 2: Tell me about the premiere. Tell me about when you
Speaker 2: get to see it with an audience for the first time.
Speaker 1: It was very exciting. It was in La My family
Speaker 1: had flown out. Melissa got us this theater in Gardena.
Speaker 1: It was pretty big and we said, oh, we're only
Speaker 1: going three three hundred and then I just didn't think
Speaker 1: that many people were coming. Two hundred and fifty two
Speaker 1: seventy five people there. Rebecca's parents flew in from out
Speaker 1: of town. Danny got to come with his family and friends.
Speaker 1: I got a lot of my family, like I said,
Speaker 1: flew out to see it. And we're in town to
Speaker 1: see it it. My movie is one that in the
Speaker 1: first five minutes, if you're not in by the time
Speaker 1: Chris appears on street, if you're not in, then you're
Speaker 1: never gonna be in. Because my first set of jokes
Speaker 1: from Tinseltown to Night is very dark humor, and if
Speaker 1: you don't buy into it, then you're probably not gonna
Speaker 1: get the movie. But I thought, so I'm unapologetic about
Speaker 1: my tone. And then I thought, wait a minute. So
Speaker 1: as Star Wars, there's a slong scroll of this big
Speaker 1: story we never heard of. And then all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: this guy that's all in black grams. The guy gills him.
Speaker 1: It looks it's insane, and they do the same thing,
Speaker 1: and I go, that's what all the good movies do.
Speaker 1: And Orson Wells said, if people aren't furious at your
Speaker 1: film and loving it, some loving it and some hating it,
Speaker 1: you didn't take a risk. And so I thought, Luckily,
Speaker 1: I've had people I think you'd agree with me. My
Speaker 1: acting is there, my writing is there, my cinematography is there,
Speaker 1: my sound is there, my special effects in terms of
Speaker 1: practical with the puppet there. It's either not for you
Speaker 1: or it is free. I don't think anyone could come
Speaker 1: at me and go, you have crappy actors. There's huge
Speaker 1: whole plots, plot holes. I don't think people will come
Speaker 1: for me at that, but they might just say it's
Speaker 1: just not for me. It's not what I expected. It's
Speaker 1: not boobies and blood, and it's not terrifier by any means.
Speaker 1: But most people are getting it, which is great. They're
Speaker 1: saying it's a shlock movie framework, not that it is one.
Speaker 1: It's a shlock movie framework with tons of heart and
Speaker 1: great characters. That's what I'm getting the most of, and
Speaker 1: I feel proud of that.
Speaker 2: How many people did it take to run the Puppet One?
Speaker 2: Just one?
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Her name is Rachel Berson. She did that show, The
Speaker 1: Muppet Show with Doctor Tiste and the Medicine Show that
Speaker 1: was on this summer on Disney. If you're a Muppet fan,
Speaker 1: I'm highly recommending the show because I want to see
Speaker 1: it because I know she was on there as a muppeteer.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, it's so much fun. It's great. It's
Speaker 1: so funny, like they really and because it's Disney channeled
Speaker 1: stuff they could really lean into. They don't get like
Speaker 1: crude or anything. But they can lean into a little
Speaker 1: more adult the stuff because the band they are all adults.
Speaker 1: But it's so fun, has great heart and everything. But no,
Speaker 1: she I had that thing built by Eric Morn. Like
Speaker 1: I said, it was heavy, and I thought, oh, it
Speaker 1: might have to be gutted now that I'm giving it
Speaker 1: to a real puppeteer. Maybe it's too heavy, maybe it's this,
Speaker 1: maybe that, And it's like ten fifteen pounds and she
Speaker 1: just goes or put it on our lab and she
Speaker 1: made that thing go. It was unbelievable. And I filmed
Speaker 1: it and my producers like, do we really want to
Speaker 1: pay him that much money to a puppeteer? And I
Speaker 1: went watch this and they are like okay, because to me,
Speaker 1: it's like, why would you don't want to cut back
Speaker 1: on the move et, don't go We're gonna spend money
Speaker 1: on everything but the creature. And it doesn't make sense.
Speaker 1: And she wasn't asking for anything, you swearing, but man,
Speaker 1: she would be laying there and I don't know if
Speaker 1: you've ever seen the way the Muppets do it. They
Speaker 1: have a TV monitor right in front of them and
Speaker 1: they're watching what's going up in here. And they're moving
Speaker 1: to match something that is above them and in an
Speaker 1: opposite angle, which is insanity, makes no sense. And she
Speaker 1: was doing that with little iPhones and stuff. So then
Speaker 1: I finally said, listen, when it's your turn to do
Speaker 1: a Crust scene, you are directing, period. And I would
Speaker 1: just turn the set over to her because it's something
Speaker 1: I don't know and I don't have an ego about it.
Speaker 1: I'm not gonna pretend I do. And I let her
Speaker 1: run the set when it was time, because she never
Speaker 1: ever was green screened out, not once. The only time
Speaker 1: that you see that stuff was our only VFX shot,
Speaker 1: But she never had greeting screen on anything. The only
Speaker 1: thing she might have had is maybe a few more
Speaker 1: socks down her arm. But she was hidden in every
Speaker 1: single one of those shots, which is outreache. She's a
Speaker 1: huge talent, and Crust becomes a character because of that.
Speaker 1: We weren't looking at a tennis ball in a poll
Speaker 1: or a green treet. We were acting with Rust, and
Speaker 1: there was plenty to work off.
Speaker 2: The emotions that the puppet shows are just remarkable. I
Speaker 2: really enjoyed that so much.
Speaker 1: I want to Crust, and I said, oh, I have
Speaker 1: a crust plung sheet. They're like, I want the cute
Speaker 1: thing that gets rid of all anyway. So yeah, plus
Speaker 1: she's good. But I've had a look. People understood what
Speaker 1: I was doing after a depression and my indigo, and
Speaker 1: a lot of people signed on. I had a fan
Speaker 1: club starting right before we were shooting it, and it
Speaker 1: was three hundred and fifty people strong, and they had
Speaker 1: me being the movie. They just loved the idea and
Speaker 1: was a huge supporter of Excuse Me, and so it
Speaker 1: was great.
Speaker 2: What's happening next for you?
Speaker 1: Our comedy series drops a couple of weeks, Then we're
Speaker 1: having our Blu ray DVD release the Summer tenth, which
Speaker 1: is coming.
Speaker 2: Up very soon.
Speaker 1: And then we have our next movie that I'm directing.
Speaker 1: I didn't write it. I have an acting role in it.
Speaker 1: I'm working with Chris Sergey, my producer, Rebecca Felssen, dan
Speaker 1: or Off doing a million movies of years. I'm not
Speaker 1: allowed to say much until it drops in the press,
Speaker 1: but it is a horror movie. It's not a horror comedy.
Speaker 1: It's a straight horror movie that takes Texas Chainsaw mask
Speaker 1: here and flips the whole trope upside down. So it's
Speaker 1: a woman's saving her brother and other men from family
Speaker 1: of tortuous women. It's a horror thriller which will be
Speaker 1: really fun, and we have iconic characters. Look, here's how
Speaker 1: I feel. When I went to my latest convention scare fests,
Speaker 1: there was Michael Myers, Freddie Krunker, Jason, and Art the Clown.
Speaker 1: I went, Okay, these are studios who know that horror
Speaker 1: is huge, who know these icons are huge, and they
Speaker 1: for twentyy some years couldn't come up with a new one.
Speaker 1: They just retreaded Freddie, Michael Myers, Jason, they just retread, retread.
Speaker 1: It was the fans and a real special effects, a
Speaker 1: guy who knew that brought us the Clown. It wasn't
Speaker 1: even from the studio system now. And so I said, Okay,
Speaker 1: if Art the Clown can be the new Freddy, maybe
Speaker 1: Krust can be the new Gremlins. That's my hope, because
Speaker 1: I think that's the job of us is to create.
Speaker 1: And these sisters, you have no idea. They're mute and crazy,
Speaker 1: ones got a sickle, ones bald and talk. They're going
Speaker 1: to be iconic in their characterization. And I think that
Speaker 1: that's what we need. We need new How many years
Speaker 1: can we keep wearing Chucky Freddy? It's the same, and
Speaker 1: then Chucky dB series. There's nothing fresh, there's nothing new,
Speaker 1: and young people are all over it. They're so happy.
Speaker 1: And then they keep telling me we grew up with
Speaker 1: corporate MCU, DC, BRED, Harry Potter and Star Wars. That's
Speaker 1: and every iteration of anything all is retreaded and remixed
Speaker 1: and reunited and whatever. And they said, we don't have
Speaker 1: we didn't have Rocky Horde, we don't have Repoman, which
Speaker 1: if you saw all the plain labels on everything that
Speaker 1: was the information was Repo Man. And they go, we
Speaker 1: don't have anything like this. And I was at a
Speaker 1: screening with one of twenty somethings recently, and since this
Speaker 1: was made for you guys, you get to have your Freddy.
Speaker 1: I remember seeing Jason the first time, I remember seeing
Speaker 1: Freddy the first It's great, it was exciting, and I
Speaker 1: want this for you guys, just like Terrifier is doing
Speaker 1: so well because of that. Oh, they're very happy that
Speaker 1: this younger generation is very in tune with their mental
Speaker 1: health and talking about mental health. Plus they don't get
Speaker 1: anything weird and original. People my age, our age whatever,
Speaker 1: talking about how it feels like a lot of movies
Speaker 1: they've seen, but nothing they've ever seen, which is exactly
Speaker 1: what I intended. And the younger people are going, thank
Speaker 1: you for giving something weird and fun for us that's
Speaker 1: outside of the thing. And that's why they love the
Speaker 1: clown because it's theirs. It's their generation. It came out
Speaker 1: during their young life, not their parents' young life. Oh
Speaker 1: let me turn you out down to fred that's your guy.
Speaker 1: Freddy is your guy? Where's my guy? Art the Silent
Speaker 1: is my guy? And hopefully they'll go and crust is
Speaker 1: mine too, So we'll see.
Speaker 2: You mentioned the series dropping. What websites should people go.
Speaker 1: To for that? Oh, I'm gonna put on it. It's
Speaker 1: a psyche on Sunset dot com, so I'll it's yeah,
Speaker 1: it will be all. If you follow me on social media.
Speaker 1: You can follow me on all social media's including the
Speaker 1: New Blue Sky at Shawn Whalen Actor. If you look
Speaker 1: up at Shaun Whalen Actor follow me. You can be
Speaker 1: part of the Krusty's fan plit page. The fan pages
Speaker 1: is hash to egg Crusty's and that is a fan
Speaker 1: page on Facebook. But if you follow at Sean Whalen
Speaker 1: actor on all socials, you'll see plenty that I'm going
Speaker 1: to be posting about it. But this web series, it's
Speaker 1: going to be dropped the week before Thanks Getting. Some
Speaker 1: people can pass it around with the family and make
Speaker 1: each other laugh. That psyche on Sunset dot Com and
Speaker 1: then everything else you can find out as Sean Whalen actor.
Speaker 2: Is it true that Lynn Manuel Noriega ows his entire
Speaker 2: career to you?
Speaker 1: Not at all. He was on a trip to Hawaii
Speaker 1: and he literally said it was like, I needed a
Speaker 1: book for the trip, and he goes, I want something
Speaker 1: with meat, and he was in the bookstore. Alexander Hamilton
Speaker 1: bio was like okay, and then he said fifty pages
Speaker 1: in and he was like, this is like a hip
Speaker 1: hop guy. If you think about it, he feels like
Speaker 1: the journey of a hip hop star. Same idea, the
Speaker 1: hustle of hip hop artists who go from rappers to
Speaker 1: actors to producers to the movie and so that's where
Speaker 1: he got a buy. Leslie and Junior said on all
Speaker 1: his interviews, he said, I didn't know anything about Alexander Hamilton.
Speaker 1: Alls I knew was about that nineties milk commercial Joe
Speaker 1: it all the time, and so I called him and said, hey, man,
Speaker 1: Leslie's talking about Sean's commercial all the time and they're
Speaker 1: showing clips of this commercial. Wouldn't it be fun to
Speaker 1: have Leslie meet Sean in New York at one of
Speaker 1: the shows. It would be so fun, the guy who
Speaker 1: loved Alexander An all the whole thing, and it would
Speaker 1: be great publicity. And they go, we're sold out for
Speaker 1: ten years. We don't any publicity. If we were like,
Speaker 1: how about for me? What do you people don't know
Speaker 1: about it? What he will would? Oh? That's great? So
Speaker 1: I DM Leslie and m JUNR a long time ago.
Speaker 1: Hand never responded, but I just said, hey, I'm that guy.
Speaker 1: Do you keep talking about? It's all my bucket lists
Speaker 1: to meet him and say thanks for mentioning.
Speaker 2: It a lot.
Speaker 1: Yeah. When I went and saw Hamilton, that was funny.
Speaker 1: People are like, no, he the export and I was like,
Speaker 1: are they talking about and my wife? Because you're the
Speaker 1: expert in the duel, don't you? And I was like,
Speaker 1: oh I didn't get it, so no he does not. Okay,
Speaker 1: the fuck on a shell?
Speaker 2: So thank you for setting the record straight.
Speaker 1: Yes, I'm setting the record straight, Leslie, I'm compan at you.
Speaker 2: Thanks again, mister Whalen. I really had a great time
Speaker 2: to talk with you.
Speaker 1: Thank you, and please keep in touch. I'll have more
Speaker 1: stuff to talk about right.
Speaker 2: Sounds great, Thank you serious bye bye La