Speaker 1: You are listening to the IFH podcast Network. For more
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Speaker 2: Welcome to the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, episode number four thirteen.
Speaker 2: In the film business, it's basically honor among thieves, Able.
Speaker 1: Ferraro broadcasting from a dark, windowless room in Hollywood.
Speaker 3: When we really should be working on that next draft.
Speaker 1: It's the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast, showing you the craft and
Speaker 1: business of screenwriting while teaching you how to make your
Speaker 1: screenplay bulletproof.
Speaker 3: And here's your host, Alex Ferrari.
Speaker 2: Welcome, Welcome to another episode of the Bulletproof Screenwriting Podcast.
Speaker 4: I am your humble host Alex Ferrari.
Speaker 2: Now, today's show is sponsored by Bulletproof script Coverage.
Speaker 3: Now.
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Speaker 2: So if you need your screenplay or TV script covered
Speaker 2: by professional readers, head on over to covermiscreenplay dot com. Now, guys,
Speaker 2: today on the show, we have filmmaker Greg Hemings. Now,
Speaker 2: Greg is here to talk about something that is not
Speaker 2: talked about a lot in our business, which is abuse
Speaker 2: on the set. Abuse of interns, of people who are
Speaker 2: below you in a way that like not physical abuse,
Speaker 2: though obviously there is that, and there's gonna be two
Speaker 2: movement and all that stuff, but we're here to talk
Speaker 2: about the verbal abuse, the work abuse that's on a
Speaker 2: set that happens, the ribbing, the kind of just this
Speaker 2: nastiness that happens, like you've got to have to like
Speaker 2: kind of go through a hazing process almost when you're
Speaker 2: on set. And Greg has really come out against this
Speaker 2: and wanted to talk about what can be done. What filmmakers,
Speaker 2: especially young filmmakers coming into the business, need to understand
Speaker 2: about abuse on the set. Look I was yelled at.
Speaker 2: I was abused. I was verbally abused by my first
Speaker 2: boss when I was working at a commercial a commercial
Speaker 2: production company down in Miami. I've been abused multiple times
Speaker 2: on sets, meaning a verbally abused and taken advantage of.
Speaker 2: I was working on a TV show as an intern,
Speaker 2: and the executive producer of that show sent me to
Speaker 2: his house to help him move. You know, these are
Speaker 2: kind of things that you do, and what are you
Speaker 2: going to do when you're in that space, when you're
Speaker 2: that young and you know, like this is such a
Speaker 2: powerful person, at least you perceive that they are. They
Speaker 2: can either make or break you. Are you going to
Speaker 2: say no? Are you going to just eat it? Well,
Speaker 2: that's what this whole town is built on. It's built
Speaker 2: on people eating crap a lot of times from other
Speaker 2: people who have made it to a certain level in
Speaker 2: the business who abuse them. And it needs to stop.
Speaker 2: And Greg and I really have a very candid conversation
Speaker 2: about that and what can be done, how you should
Speaker 2: react to those situations and so on. So, without any
Speaker 2: further ado, please enjoy my conversation with Greg Hemmings.
Speaker 4: I'd like to.
Speaker 2: Welcome to the show. Greg Hemmings man. How you doing,
Speaker 2: Greg so good? Thanks so much for having me on.
Speaker 3: This is fantastic man.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much for being on the show man.
Speaker 2: Thanks for reaching out. A mutual friend of ours, Jimmy
Speaker 2: connected us and you know you wanted to come on
Speaker 2: to talk about a bunch of things. And I think
Speaker 2: the main focus we're going to be doing today is
Speaker 2: abuse in the business, which is shocking because I've never
Speaker 2: heard of any abuse in the business. Have been a
Speaker 2: very Pollyannic kind of world of film industry. There is
Speaker 2: no abuse, there's no yelling, there's no you.
Speaker 3: Know, it's just a kind place. And you know, it's
Speaker 3: a it's certainly not a shame based learning environment. It's
Speaker 3: a it's a place to thrive in blossom.
Speaker 4: I I feel, I feel so the same way.
Speaker 2: That's why I'm bringing all my my children will all
Speaker 2: be starting from scrat It'll be great. It'll be great. No,
Speaker 2: We're We're gonna talk about something that really is is
Speaker 2: a little bit more in the news now. I mean,
Speaker 2: Scott Rudin is now famously being basically thrown out of
Speaker 2: Hollywood because of the decades of abuse that he has
Speaker 2: given people.
Speaker 4: I didn't know he was the best.
Speaker 2: He was the source for the very famous film Swimming
Speaker 2: with the Sharks.
Speaker 4: Uh, he was.
Speaker 2: So there was a movie called Swimming with the Sharks
Speaker 2: with Kevin with Kevin Spacey as I mean, you can't write,
Speaker 2: you can't write this stuff, man, I'm sorry. So Kevin
Speaker 2: Spacey was playing the agent, and I forgot who the
Speaker 2: I think it was John Cryer or or not even
Speaker 2: it was John Cryer or another actor of that of
Speaker 2: that generation.
Speaker 4: I forgot who.
Speaker 2: Starred as the assistant. And the assistant was just getting
Speaker 2: i mean, just destroyed by this producer. And everybody in
Speaker 2: town knew who it was, but out in the world
Speaker 2: nobody knew. And it was Scott ruden he was he
Speaker 2: was the producer. So it was a very quiet, hush
Speaker 2: hush thing. But now it just started to come out.
Speaker 2: I'm like, yeah, it Scott Rudin, who was based the
Speaker 2: basis of that that horrible human being, and uh and
Speaker 2: the whole concept of the bullying and all that stuff.
Speaker 4: We'll get we'll get into him.
Speaker 2: But at first, I want to know, how did you
Speaker 2: get started in this fantastically pollyannic world that is Hollywood.
Speaker 3: Well, okay, so I've got a very long version of
Speaker 3: the story which I will not go into, but I'll
Speaker 3: I appreciate it. I'll try my best to connence it.
Speaker 3: So high school, okay, we're going way back into the
Speaker 3: mid nineties playing a rock band, and like every kid
Speaker 3: playing drums in a rock band, you assume that's what
Speaker 3: you can do for a living, and that obviously you know,
Speaker 3: and going to the career of touring and playing music.
Speaker 3: For me, it didn't quite ten out that way. That's okay.
Speaker 3: But in grade eleven, I was in media studies class
Speaker 3: and I was like, I got to make a music
Speaker 3: video for for my band. And back then, of course,
Speaker 3: all we had was multiple VHS decks, and we had
Speaker 3: the video toaster, classic classic software, the best wipes, the
Speaker 3: best stripper wipes you could ever imagine.
Speaker 4: Oh, they had like the oil.
Speaker 2: It was all we were talking about this before we started.
Speaker 2: Was like they had this this woman dancing as a transition,
Speaker 2: which was obviously a stripper. There was a pole transition
Speaker 2: with like I mean they actually just shot the footage
Speaker 2: of these these so there was sheep falling, there was
Speaker 2: oil transitions, but it was literally physical things that they shot.
Speaker 2: And I guess they keyed and then read and transition
Speaker 2: for it. So it was it was revolutionary at the time.
Speaker 3: Like man, just as a quick as side Alex, we
Speaker 3: should do a short film trying to find the guys
Speaker 3: who designed and go girls who designed those wipes like
Speaker 3: their epic and they don't exist anymore, like you said,
Speaker 3: but wipes of falling sheep anymore.
Speaker 2: You know what I gotta tell you. I found I
Speaker 2: found them. I actually did research and I found them.
Speaker 2: They are available because I wanted I wanted to put
Speaker 2: them out. I like, I'm like, I want to just
Speaker 2: create the video toaster, like who owns these things?
Speaker 4: And I found them.
Speaker 2: I think you can insert them somehow in uh in somewhere.
Speaker 4: But anyway, this is a side note.
Speaker 2: Let's not get into a video toaster episode.
Speaker 3: It's a good digression for anybody in the in the
Speaker 3: nineties who was in the in the in the industry
Speaker 3: at all. Anyhow, I made this music video and I
Speaker 3: was like, this is really cool. And so the only
Speaker 3: thing I did in high school with video was making
Speaker 3: and I was like, hey, putting images to music, it's
Speaker 3: really awesome. And I remember I was in my IV
Speaker 3: history class and we were doing this thing on Pompeii,
Speaker 3: and I took Pink Floyd's Live at Pompeii music track,
Speaker 3: but then I started editing a whole bunch of other
Speaker 3: I was essentially rebuilding the film the Pink Floyd did
Speaker 3: it anyway, but I did it my own way, and
Speaker 3: that was my project, and I was like, hmm, this
Speaker 3: is really cool. So for me, it was all music
Speaker 3: and film, music and video and images coming together, and
Speaker 3: I never really thought about it again. But except for
Speaker 3: the fact that I'm a creative guy, I'm a musician
Speaker 3: and that was a lot of fun playing with video.
Speaker 3: Fast forward to graduation. I go to arts at the
Speaker 3: university in my town, and I just felt like it
Speaker 3: was an extension of high school. Nothing no disrespect to
Speaker 3: the university itself, just all my same friends, the same location.
Speaker 3: And I was just going to arts because I didn't
Speaker 3: know what else to do. And then a buddy of
Speaker 3: mine at a Christmas party I was at. He was
Speaker 3: in Ontario and I hadn't seen him in years, and
Speaker 3: I asked him what he's doing. He goes, I'm going
Speaker 3: to film school. I said, that sounds way cooler than
Speaker 3: what I'm doing. So it was literally out of boredom
Speaker 3: that I was like, that sounds way more cool. So
Speaker 3: I ended up flying to go to the same film school.
Speaker 3: I got accepted at Nagara College and in Niagara Falls, Ontario,
Speaker 3: and went there for three years to study broadcast television
Speaker 3: and film. And that's when we're shooting with Super sixteen
Speaker 3: and editing everything on the stainback. And you know, like
Speaker 3: I loved becoming an editor with film, you know, like
Speaker 3: it really was a it was a gift to learn
Speaker 3: on film. You know, Avid was starting to come onto
Speaker 3: the scene, but you know, early days, Avid, it was
Speaker 3: one hundred and fifty grand if you wanted to jump
Speaker 3: into that e then So it was really it was
Speaker 3: really cool to learn the art of storytelling, even as
Speaker 3: a cinematographer, knowing full well how much that little real
Speaker 3: role of film costs. You know, you're not taking five
Speaker 3: six seven takes. You're doing five six seven rehearsals and
Speaker 3: then a take, and then when you make a cut,
Speaker 3: you better be sure it's the right cut, because you're not.
Speaker 3: You don't have the money to get a reprint.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
Speaker 3: So I really think that learning in the film film
Speaker 3: school environment was really cool for me to to become
Speaker 3: an efficient, you know, a cinematographer, director and editor in
Speaker 3: the earlier years. Quick fast forward into graduating out of college,
Speaker 3: I immediately joined the union and started in the IATs
Speaker 3: and I started in the camera department. And it is
Speaker 3: there that I really get to understand the the movie magic,
Speaker 3: you know, behind the scenes of how movies are made,
Speaker 3: and working on big crews, you know, one hundred and
Speaker 3: two hundred people cruise and doing science fiction series and
Speaker 3: you know, movies of the week. And I remember doing
Speaker 3: a Disney movie in my first or second year and
Speaker 3: just at a lot of really interesting projects. And I
Speaker 3: thought at that point my track was to become, you know,
Speaker 3: a director of photography. So you know, the camera department
Speaker 3: was my was my angle. And you know, I don't
Speaker 3: know if this is where we want to go into
Speaker 3: the into the crisis point. But I don't know about you, Alex,
Speaker 3: but if you're a creative person working in what's supposed
Speaker 3: to be a creative industry, but it is like walking
Speaker 3: on eggs shells and you are you're in an environment
Speaker 3: where the stress is so high there's so much money
Speaker 3: on the table, and you know, Pooper rolls downhill as
Speaker 3: they say, my kids just walked in. It's a dollar
Speaker 3: every time I say the sah word. So and I
Speaker 3: just remember feeling after, you know, working you know, working
Speaker 3: through the ranks and the camera department, never being happy
Speaker 3: going to work. You know. I'm like, this is supposed
Speaker 3: to be movie magic, Like is this supposed to be
Speaker 3: like the dream? You know? And I was like, people
Speaker 3: don't respect people here, Like you're respected if you're up,
Speaker 3: but you're not respected if you're down. And you know,
Speaker 3: I understood that concept of shame based learning, you know,
Speaker 3: like if you screwed up, brought the wrong lens, or
Speaker 3: if you didn't guess what the next lens was that
Speaker 3: your first was calling out for. You know, that sort
Speaker 3: of thing got reprimanded publicly. And for me, I had
Speaker 3: the great blessing Alex of never being bullied in my
Speaker 3: life as a kid. I was one of those kids
Speaker 3: that was friends with everybody, you know, and somehow I
Speaker 3: got saved from being picked on. Maybe I was picked on,
Speaker 3: but I probably had thick enough skin that I didn't
Speaker 3: recognize it. I don't know, So being having the sense
Speaker 3: of being bullied as an adult after spending three years
Speaker 3: doing the film school, telling all your friends and family
Speaker 3: that you're gonna be working in the film industry, and
Speaker 3: then a couple of years into it, realizing that you
Speaker 3: don't want to do it anymore, and feeling that awful
Speaker 3: feeling of am I going to quit this thing? My
Speaker 3: whole identity right now is tied up in this thing,
Speaker 3: right But I had that soul issue of I'm a
Speaker 3: creative person and I wake up and go to set
Speaker 3: and I feel I feel like the creativity is being
Speaker 3: beaten out of me. And you know, some people listening
Speaker 3: to this might might think, oh, well, Greg, you know
Speaker 3: tough enough, that's the way it is, and you're right,
Speaker 3: it is the way it is. But that's not the
Speaker 3: way I am, nor is the way I wanted to
Speaker 3: invest my precious life. You know that, you know, going
Speaker 3: to any job where your soul gets sucked at you,
Speaker 3: what's the point? You know? So that's how I got
Speaker 3: into the film industry. And I'll pause there for a
Speaker 3: second because you might have another direction you want to
Speaker 3: go into. But the how right after I quit, like
Speaker 3: literally the day I said I'm done it was the
Speaker 3: last day on a something like a seven month series.
Speaker 3: I lived in a little oter home behind the set.
Speaker 3: It was pretty cool. That part was neat, but I
Speaker 3: ended up going on this adventure that was completely life changing.
Speaker 3: Which I'll pause right now is every great storyteller will
Speaker 3: just to leave you, leave you hanging. But yeah, anyway,
Speaker 3: I just want to ask you a question first, But
Speaker 3: how I got into the industry. I fell in love
Speaker 3: with film at film school, which is kind of a
Speaker 3: neat props to film school because I wasn't a film
Speaker 3: guy for that.
Speaker 2: So so I mean, look, you and I are of
Speaker 2: similar vintage. So you and I as vintage as we'd
Speaker 2: like to say, a nice way of saying we're both old.
Speaker 2: So but you know, we came up around the same time,
Speaker 2: maybe in different parts of the country, maybe in different industries.
Speaker 2: Around the time that you were in Canada doing what
Speaker 2: you were doing. I was down in Florida going through
Speaker 2: that process as well. And my first, my first meeting
Speaker 2: with that kind of environment was my first internship at
Speaker 2: a very predominant commercial production house and there were a
Speaker 2: couple of owners. One of them was the sweetest man
Speaker 2: in the world, and the other one was bipolar.
Speaker 4: He was bipolar.
Speaker 2: In the days that he did not take his medicine,
Speaker 2: he was a monster. And the day he took his medicine,
Speaker 2: he was the nicest human being on the planet.
Speaker 4: So it was you know, and that was the first time.
Speaker 2: That I would get publicly yelled at for whatever I did,
Speaker 2: some thing wrong I was And this is all office stuff.
Speaker 2: So in the office, I would be yelled and everybody
Speaker 2: in the office kind of felt that energy, like, oh, oh,
Speaker 2: he's here kind of energy. And I was twenty whatever,
Speaker 2: I was like twenty one, twenty two.
Speaker 4: I was a young kid, and him yelling at me.
Speaker 2: But then like the next day show up and it
Speaker 2: would just freak you out because you would just like, hey,
Speaker 2: that's how you do it.
Speaker 4: And I'm like, what the hell? Man, Like it's fine
Speaker 4: for what are mine trips? And he says, hey, man,
Speaker 4: you know I want to watch this movie. I'm going
Speaker 4: to show you this movie. So like one day he would.
Speaker 2: Be like a mentor and the next day he would
Speaker 2: literally just come in like.
Speaker 4: A rampaging bull.
Speaker 2: So that was the first experience of that, and then
Speaker 2: that kind of that kind of experience happened again and
Speaker 2: again on sets. I did a lot of internships on
Speaker 2: a Universal's back lot in Orlando when I was in
Speaker 2: film school. I worked on a lot of TV shows
Speaker 2: there and got hired as a PA and all that stuff.
Speaker 2: And I would see the same thing. I was on
Speaker 2: a Fox show and the producer would show up and
Speaker 2: everyone be really quiet, and you know, like, how is
Speaker 2: he feeling today? Is he Is he going to destroy somebody?
Speaker 2: And you would and I would see him. He never
Speaker 2: took it out on me because I was just so
Speaker 2: low on the total pole that I didn't even matter,
Speaker 2: but he he would destroy, like you know, writers right
Speaker 2: there or other producers or other staff. Uh, and you
Speaker 2: want to talk about abuse. One day he's like, hey, uh,
Speaker 2: the the producer Boris. His name was Boris, which of
Speaker 2: course his name was Boris. Uh, the bors Boris wants
Speaker 2: you to do a special run for him. I'm like, oh, great,
Speaker 2: this is awesome. I'm gonna do a special run. So
Speaker 2: that gives me and I'm at his house. I'm like great.
Speaker 2: So I I drive out to the house with a
Speaker 2: couple other pas and you know, we're in the van
Speaker 2: and we basically moved his house for him for free.
Speaker 2: So we basically we were his movers for the day.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we like he was moving far more scandalous. I
Speaker 3: don't know, I didn't know where you were going there, but.
Speaker 2: Uh yeah it could have I could have you know,
Speaker 2: I could have gone real like, yeah, I could have
Speaker 2: been uh you know the the I could have been weinsteined,
Speaker 2: but I wasn't.
Speaker 4: So no, but it was. It was.
Speaker 2: But still that's a form of abuse because what do
Speaker 2: you say.
Speaker 4: Do you say no to that?
Speaker 2: Because if you say no to that, then you risk
Speaker 2: your position in the pro in the production, and if
Speaker 2: you get fired from that production your chances of moving
Speaker 2: up the scales is hard. So they understand that they
Speaker 2: have power that they can kind of twist and use
Speaker 2: an abuse, especially of the young, especially of the of.
Speaker 4: People who are just starting out.
Speaker 2: You just eat it because you have no choice because
Speaker 2: the opportunities of our business are so minuscules. Sometimes, especially
Speaker 2: at that era, there was no like, hey, grab your
Speaker 2: own iPhone and make your own movie like that. That
Speaker 2: didn't that was a tough sell to do that. It
Speaker 2: still cost obscene amounts of money, you know, tens of thousands,
Speaker 2: even on the lower end, you know, Clerk still cost
Speaker 2: twenty three grand, you know, you know, you know, slackers
Speaker 2: still call lost money. You know, these these movies still
Speaker 2: still do cost money. And I was in no position
Speaker 2: to do anything like that.
Speaker 4: So those are the kind of.
Speaker 2: First stories that first times I felt that kind of thing.
Speaker 2: And you're absolutely right with I love that term shame
Speaker 2: based learning, because that's what it is on set. And
Speaker 2: I've been a director for years, and I've been on
Speaker 2: set for years, and I see it. It's never been
Speaker 2: when I'm on a set and I'm a director, I
Speaker 2: never allow abuse. Uh, but that ribbing which sometimes can
Speaker 2: especially in the camera in the grip department. Oh Jesus,
Speaker 2: the camera in the grip department.
Speaker 4: They're brutal. They're just brutal.
Speaker 2: But a lot of times they won't do it publicly.
Speaker 2: They'll do it within their own own own hazingius.
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, it's.
Speaker 2: It's a hazing process. And some of that is kind
Speaker 2: of ribbing, and it's kind of fun and you're like,
Speaker 2: you know, you got oh you got a tough enough.
Speaker 2: It's the business and that's fine and some of that stuff,
Speaker 2: you know, and it's a fun environment as long as
Speaker 2: if the person doesn't feel like they're being abused. But
Speaker 2: even then you've got you got to balance that kind
Speaker 2: of that line, you know, but.
Speaker 3: Think about that in any other industry. So really good
Speaker 3: point is this is why it's so hard for me
Speaker 3: to quit, because I was like, it wasn't easy to
Speaker 3: get into the union, wasn't easy to go through film school.
Speaker 3: And once you get in, you get to wait for
Speaker 3: your next turn to get called back. And so you're right,
Speaker 3: there is a there's a scarcity approach to the to
Speaker 3: the film industry that makes us all want to do
Speaker 3: the right thing and say the right things and you know,
Speaker 3: make the right people happy. But unfortunately, if you've got
Speaker 3: the wrong people in positions of power, the abuses is
Speaker 3: so easy, right and convenient. And that's but like any
Speaker 3: other industry. Hey, it happens in every other industry of course,
Speaker 3: but specifically in the film industry because it's so scarce
Speaker 3: and it's so special, Like the film industry is so
Speaker 3: so magical from the outside.
Speaker 2: Right, it's just a market. It's just a marketing and
Speaker 2: branding tool. Like I always say, Hollywood's great at the sizzle,
Speaker 2: but it sucks at the stake. We'll be right back
Speaker 2: after a word from our sponsor. And now back to
Speaker 2: the show. You know they I mean, and I always
Speaker 2: use the analogy of the Oscars.
Speaker 4: You know, when you see Oscar Night.
Speaker 2: I don't know if you've been down to Hollywood Boulevard,
Speaker 2: but yeah, yeah, if you go Oscar Night, man Oscar
Speaker 2: Night in a normal Oscar Night situation, red carpets, that
Speaker 2: Hollywood Boulevard looks like a magical place. You leave the
Speaker 2: next week, I mean you should.
Speaker 4: You can't walk if you walk a block or two
Speaker 4: away from the Adobe Theater.
Speaker 2: You know, the darker it gets, the more chances you're
Speaker 2: gonna get stabbed or hit with a needle.
Speaker 4: Like it's a horrible, horrible place.
Speaker 3: Funny, I was in Hollywood just before the pandemic hit,
Speaker 3: so I think it was November of nineteen, was that right, Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 3: And we're putting a film festival on at Wanderlust Yeah
Speaker 3: really cool yoga yoga spot as an impact film festival.
Speaker 3: So I brought it in. You know, films from Patagonia
Speaker 3: and from you know, a bunch of different like B
Speaker 3: corp companies that are doing like corporate but like documentaries
Speaker 3: that are really you know, making making the world change.
Speaker 3: And sol pancake plays like that. It was a really
Speaker 3: cool gun. But I remember one of the nights I
Speaker 3: was there, it was like nine o'clock at night and
Speaker 3: everything was shut on Boulevard. There's no like there's one
Speaker 3: pizza place we found, and I was like, I thought
Speaker 3: this place is I thought it was like the strip
Speaker 3: in Vegas. No, no, no, it's horrible.
Speaker 4: It's Look.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you my first experience going to Hollywood Bolvard.
Speaker 2: This is what happens when anyone comes to La who's
Speaker 2: visiting people who live in La. So I was visiting
Speaker 2: someone who lived in La and I the first thing
Speaker 2: my wife and I said, like, we gotta go to
Speaker 2: Hollywood Bullvard and you see the face just go like, Okay,
Speaker 2: it's not what you think it is. I'm like, no, no, golly, Hollywood.
Speaker 4: I want to put I want to see.
Speaker 2: Where the hands are in the prints in the Chinese Theater.
Speaker 2: So we drive there and this is before Madame Tussau's.
Speaker 2: That whole complex was just a parking lot right when
Speaker 2: I got there. So we park right next to the
Speaker 2: Chinese Theater. We get out, and the moment we get out,
Speaker 2: some woman, random woman walking by, she goes, hey, and
Speaker 2: she just flashes us and she's like, whoa Hollywood. And
Speaker 2: then and then my buddy turns to me and goes,
Speaker 2: welcome Hollywood. I was like, holy cow, and like and
Speaker 2: then I just walked around. I'm like, this is horrible,
Speaker 2: Like this is nasty, this is I don't want to
Speaker 2: be here. Anytime I've ever had to go down to
Speaker 2: Hollywood Boulevard, it always I'm like, ugh, I have to
Speaker 2: go to the Chinese theater for a film festival or something,
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh God, I don't want to go down there.
Speaker 4: Oh it's horrible. But that is the sizzle and the stake.
Speaker 2: That's what Hollywood is so brilliant at. They are the
Speaker 2: best propa. They're the best propaganda machine in history because
Speaker 2: Hollywood and movie stars and our culture here in America
Speaker 2: in general has been exported to the entire world.
Speaker 4: In the entire world buys it.
Speaker 2: But the at the end of the day, it's not
Speaker 2: real life is not like friends, you know, it's just not.
Speaker 4: It's it's not.
Speaker 2: It wasn't when they were making it. They couldn't afford
Speaker 2: that damn apartment in New York in a real life
Speaker 2: Like how the hell? So we're going on a tangent,
Speaker 2: but that is this is in the stake.
Speaker 3: You're absolutely right, Yeah, so they that's uh. I think
Speaker 3: it's like a little bit of a dream crusher too
Speaker 3: in a way when when young people get into the
Speaker 3: industry and uh, and they're present and you know what,
Speaker 3: this doesn't happen everybody, you know, it just happened to me.
Speaker 3: You know, other people thrive in that and they learn
Speaker 3: really great in that and all that. I do remember
Speaker 3: feeling great responsibility. It's a camera trainee and there's a
Speaker 3: second camera assistant holding that megafilm that we that we
Speaker 3: shot probably for the last hour and a half with
Speaker 3: who knows what the payroll was for the actors that
Speaker 3: are on that one thing of film. And here's me,
Speaker 3: the lowest paid guy on set going into the dark
Speaker 3: room or into the dark bag? Why would shoot changing it?
Speaker 3: And if one ounce of light gets into that like
Speaker 3: it was incredible. So I understand the pressure. I understand
Speaker 3: why it's so critical to be militant and precise, but
Speaker 3: there's ways of doing that that help people be inspired
Speaker 3: and excited. And you know, fast forward to where we
Speaker 3: are now, that's the film culture. I've been trying to
Speaker 3: build surrounding my company, but you know, going going back
Speaker 3: just to finish off my journey. I ended up. A
Speaker 3: couple of days after I quit the industry, I went
Speaker 3: to see one of my favorite bands play in a
Speaker 3: neighboring town and this this lady came up to me
Speaker 3: and named Charlene. I never met her before, but she
Speaker 3: had a flask of yeagermeister. She's like, you want some
Speaker 3: ygger and I was like, yes, I do. So I
Speaker 3: had a couple of swigs and she told me that
Speaker 3: her her ole man, her boyfriend was this Dutch captain
Speaker 3: who lived in a sailboat in the Caribbean and he
Speaker 3: runs cargo like all over the place. And I was like,
Speaker 3: I used to say when I was a kid, I'd
Speaker 3: love to do that. And literally this week before nine
Speaker 3: to eleven, so it was very easy to get a passport.
Speaker 3: I didn't have a passport yet. Just a number of
Speaker 3: days later, I had my passport and I was on
Speaker 3: an airplane. Had no idea what was getting myself into.
Speaker 3: And like I said earlier, like this, you know what's
Speaker 3: the scandalous thing? Were what to jump into? I was like,
Speaker 3: am I going to be running drugs on the sailboat.
Speaker 3: Is it going to be guns? Is it? What are
Speaker 3: we doing here? Because nobody told me, just like here's
Speaker 3: your plane ticket, he needs crew, So I land and
Speaker 3: I ended up living on a sailboat, on a massive
Speaker 3: one hundred and ten foot saleboat. And there's just captain
Speaker 3: me and this other guy named Tyris from Saint Lucia,
Speaker 3: and we delivered cargo with a little crane. It could
Speaker 3: we pickup trucks, so it could we rive refrigerators, fish, whatever,
Speaker 3: And we'd sail into little markets, I say, markets like
Speaker 3: island markets where the big cargo ships wouldn't be able
Speaker 3: to get to efficiently, so we would get we'd fill
Speaker 3: up the supplies for shops, grocery stores, whatever, very quickly
Speaker 3: and efficiently, all by the power of the wind. So
Speaker 3: like we'd sail like fifteen pickup trucks to islands and stuff.
Speaker 3: And the film industry and the sale it comes from
Speaker 3: the sailing world, right, if you're a sailor, there's a
Speaker 3: good chance you're gonna be a good rigger and a
Speaker 3: good grill.
Speaker 2: Good grip.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, absolutely, all.
Speaker 3: That sort of thing. So it felt very natural, and
Speaker 3: I was smart enough to use a few dollars before
Speaker 3: I went on that trip to buy my first camera,
Speaker 3: which is the Canon gl One, and I just documented
Speaker 3: that whole experience down there, and my time in the
Speaker 3: Caribbean continued. I after the sailing adventure that went on
Speaker 3: for a very long time, I jumped on a cruise
Speaker 3: ship as a theater guy, and quickly they found out
Speaker 3: that I was a film guy. And I opened up
Speaker 3: some of their broadcast departments on some of the ships
Speaker 3: and they had Avid so like one hundred and fifty
Speaker 3: thousand dollars version of that where I'm like, oh, this
Speaker 3: is nice. So I would come home in the summer
Speaker 3: and I would make music documentaries do you know different
Speaker 3: music festivals and whatnot. And I come back in the
Speaker 3: winter and do my job, but also edit all my
Speaker 3: films on the avids on the cruise ships.
Speaker 2: And I did that free time off. Yeah, free time off.
Speaker 2: Isn't it funny though? Isn't it funny? What you're saying
Speaker 2: is because I've said this so many times. When you
Speaker 2: get bit by the bug, you can't it's it's a
Speaker 2: it's it's an infection.
Speaker 4: You can't get rid of it.
Speaker 2: It's it's done. It's in your bloodstream.
Speaker 3: I thought I was done, but I wasn't.
Speaker 2: It comes back up wherever you are in life.
Speaker 4: You're like, I'm gonna cruise ship. I should maybe bring
Speaker 4: a camera. Like that's that's a sickness. It's not like
Speaker 4: I'm just gonna leave.
Speaker 2: It is an illness because like you know, when you
Speaker 2: leave McDonald's from a job, like I quit McDonald's, I
Speaker 2: will never work in the fast food industry again. You
Speaker 2: don't go to another job and go, you know what,
Speaker 2: we need burgers. Like it's not you bring with you
Speaker 2: but a thing. It's once you're in, it's in you
Speaker 2: and you can't get rid of it. And it can
Speaker 2: go dormant for years, by the way, a decade or
Speaker 2: two could go by.
Speaker 4: It'll always live underneath.
Speaker 2: And I got I got sixty year old seven year
Speaker 2: olds seriously come to me like, you know what, I
Speaker 2: just retired. I want to be a filmmaker now again.
Speaker 2: And I got the money. I'm gonna go make my
Speaker 2: first movie.
Speaker 5: And that's it's just it's an illness.
Speaker 3: That's the name of your next book, Alex.
Speaker 5: The illness, the old, the illness, the illness. No, it's
Speaker 5: the beautiful illness, but it's not really It depends on
Speaker 5: the illness. It could beautiful, it could be horrible. It
Speaker 5: all depends.
Speaker 2: But that's fascinating that that's the kind of route you
Speaker 2: went to. Like my route was more post. I found
Speaker 2: my life in post because one, I didn't have to
Speaker 2: deal with anybody, generally the one person maybe a producer.
Speaker 2: The abuse wasn't as much inside of a room one
Speaker 2: on one, because there's a bravery that needs to be
Speaker 2: there from the person in power to yell at the
Speaker 2: person who has control of your entire nobody else around,
Speaker 2: right right, So there wasn't as much abuse. I don't
Speaker 2: think I was ever really yelled at in post. I
Speaker 2: can't remember if I did. I've forgotten it over the years,
Speaker 2: but it wasn't as prevalent. It is on set because
Speaker 2: the egos are on set and you've got to show off,
Speaker 2: and sometimes it's and there's politics involved in all that
Speaker 2: kind of stuff. I did have a fistfight start in
Speaker 2: my in my post suite, not me. I was between
Speaker 2: a client and UH and the agency who got fired.
Speaker 2: The agency got the agency got fired mid edit.
Speaker 3: There's a fist fight.
Speaker 4: It's Miami. It's Miami.
Speaker 3: It's Miami's magic right there.
Speaker 4: It's my It's it's Miami, bro, It's it's Miami. It happens.
Speaker 2: But you, you know you when you when you reached
Speaker 2: out to me the first time you sent me this
Speaker 2: amazing article about your America American ninja or American American, Yes,
Speaker 2: American Ninja, the American the American Ninja. Michael Dudkov on
Speaker 2: sets behavior. Can you please please please throw it out
Speaker 2: into the world.
Speaker 3: I'd love to tell this story because it's it really
Speaker 3: wasn't a hurtful experience, but it embodies everything we're talking
Speaker 3: about here. Okay, so it was my first film. So
Speaker 3: my buddy Andrew Tibby and I he was my buddy
Speaker 3: by the way, that got me into film school. But
Speaker 3: that both of us we got on our very first
Speaker 3: feature film together.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor.
Speaker 2: And now back to the show.
Speaker 3: And Sydney Fury was the director. And Sidney Fury did
Speaker 3: Iron Eagle and Superman four and a bunch of other
Speaker 3: interesting Superman four okay, so look him up though. Sidney
Speaker 3: Fury is one of those guys that that directed a
Speaker 3: whole bunch of awesome films that were that were typically
Speaker 3: with numbers besides them, you know, yeah, but a really
Speaker 3: well respected director. He was a lovely man. I don't
Speaker 3: I'm assuming he's still around, but he was. He was
Speaker 3: older at the time, so this would have been late nineties.
Speaker 3: And I went with Tidby, my buddy, and we we said,
Speaker 3: can we We're in film school right now, our second year,
Speaker 3: can we can we? It was the summertime, can we
Speaker 3: get a gig? And I said, well, we don't have
Speaker 3: any budget, but we're welcome to come and be a
Speaker 3: trainee volunteer trainee, and we're like, let's do it, you know.
Speaker 3: And it was it was a very quick shoe too
Speaker 3: is in like three weeks or something, and it was insane. Man.
Speaker 3: They had like four camera shooting at the same time
Speaker 3: because it was such a quick turnaround. So it was
Speaker 3: it was nutty. And so we started to learn a
Speaker 3: little bit of the ropes and it's totally different film
Speaker 3: school teaching one thing. The real world thing is completely different.
Speaker 3: And hence where I learned immediately about the shame based
Speaker 3: learning thing. And we got bullied really bad, I I
Speaker 3: you know, and that's it was just a weird experience
Speaker 3: to go through. But Michael Dodicaf the American Ninja. I
Speaker 3: remember the scene Marlee Matlin. You know Marley Mattin of.
Speaker 2: Course, the Oscar winning actress from Children of a Lesser God.
Speaker 3: Which was shot in my city, Saint johniey Brunswick.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've always heard she's a very sweet.
Speaker 3: Interestingly, Marley Matlin was back. We were shooting that feature
Speaker 3: here in Saint John and the East Coast of Canada,
Speaker 3: and that would have been her second film here because
Speaker 3: she did Children of a Lesser God back in the eighties.
Speaker 3: Here was the scene and Michael Dudicoff's character was to
Speaker 3: come into the room. She was laying in bed and
Speaker 3: he was coming in with a bunch of papers. It
Speaker 3: was just setting up the scene talking to his wife.
Speaker 3: And so Michael comes in, we do he doesn't come in.
Speaker 3: We do the slates because we had multiple cameras in
Speaker 3: this scene. There's two cameras going on, so my buddy
Speaker 3: Andrew had one slate. I had the other so camera
Speaker 3: a slate camera B slate and then we would tuck
Speaker 3: around the door and then Doudkuff would come running through
Speaker 3: and the scene would start. So he came running through,
Speaker 3: all right, and he tripped over Andrew's leg. All the
Speaker 3: papers go everywhere, and of course the scene gets okay,
Speaker 3: cut cut, and Michael Dudicuff gets up in a rage
Speaker 3: and I'm just it's so bizarre in front and he
Speaker 3: pulls his leg back and wallops Tibby right in the stomach,
Speaker 3: kicks him. And the comedy of all of this is
Speaker 3: the American Ninja himself uses a ninja leg to kick
Speaker 3: Tiddy in the gut. And you know, I talked to
Speaker 3: him to my buddy Timmy just the ed day of
Speaker 3: the story, and we laughed so much because it's like,
Speaker 3: who else can say that they got kicked by the
Speaker 3: American ninja? You know? But the what I recognized on
Speaker 3: that shoot that was so awful in so many different
Speaker 3: ways that nobody said anything, nobody a thing, and it
Speaker 3: was the most inappropriate behavior it was. It was a
Speaker 3: little a little rage that the guy had and he
Speaker 3: didn't hurt Tidby or anything, you know, but it's just
Speaker 3: like symbolically, I was like, oh, this is we're in
Speaker 3: the union. Isn't there some union or something? So here's
Speaker 3: an interesting thing. Just to tie that story up, Sidney
Speaker 3: Fury at the rap party came up to me and said, boys,
Speaker 3: you know, great work. Sorry, I saw a lot of
Speaker 3: a lot of people picking on you guys. Sorry sorry
Speaker 3: about that, but I really appreciate all the effort you
Speaker 3: put in to help me with my vision of my film.
Speaker 3: And then he found out that we were volunteers. And
Speaker 3: then as soon as you found out we didn't get paid,
Speaker 3: he stopped the party. There's a band plan and everything stopped.
Speaker 3: The party got up on the microphone and was so
Speaker 3: pissed off, and he was like, he did this big
Speaker 3: speech to the whole thing and said, I just found
Speaker 3: out that those two guys that you guys have been
Speaker 3: so disrespectful to throughout this whole film, we're not getting paid.
Speaker 3: They were volunteering on my film to help me, to
Speaker 3: help make this a better film. And then he pulled
Speaker 3: out one hundred dollars bell and put it in his
Speaker 3: hat and he goes, everybody's putting money in here. So
Speaker 3: the hat went around the room. Everybody put money in it.
Speaker 3: I bought it. I bought my first motorbike with that money.
Speaker 3: And here's the interesting thing that he said. Remember this
Speaker 3: feature was being shot here in my part of the country,
Speaker 3: so people that I would come to get to know.
Speaker 3: This is our first, my first film, so there's all
Speaker 3: new people. He said, you all of you have to
Speaker 3: watch out. Eventually all of you will be working for
Speaker 3: these two guys, so be careful with who you pushing
Speaker 3: around and bully. Now, interestingly, the bullies on that set
Speaker 3: were the Toronto crew, not the local crew. The local
Speaker 3: crew were great. But that that prophecy came true because
Speaker 3: we did become producers, both of us in our own companies,
Speaker 3: and hired a lot of these guys. And but I
Speaker 3: really liked what Sidney Fury said. There is be careful
Speaker 3: who you disrespect, just on the on the basis of
Speaker 3: it's probably going to bite you in the butt down
Speaker 3: the road, right, And uh, I thought it was a
Speaker 3: really cool of him to do that. Also, I rolled
Speaker 3: my eyes a bit, and I was like, funny that
Speaker 3: if we were getting paid, it was okay to get
Speaker 3: kicked by the American Ninja.
Speaker 2: But to be fair, I mean many people would have
Speaker 2: been would have paid to get kicked by the American Ninja.
Speaker 3: So that I mean, in a way, I suppose we did.
Speaker 2: No like we're laughing, we're joking about it, but that
Speaker 2: that is is so on, that is so unacceptable. I've
Speaker 2: never seen physical violence from an actor to an intern
Speaker 2: or volunteer.
Speaker 4: Ever in my life, let alone to anybody else on set.
Speaker 2: Physical I've never heard much many physical fights, other than
Speaker 2: maybe amongst the higher ups. Like when the gods are fighting,
Speaker 2: that's one thing, but the gods generally don't fight with
Speaker 2: the with the mortals if you if you will in
Speaker 2: that whole And even as I'm saying that it's ridiculous,
Speaker 2: they're they're human beings. Just because they're at a higher
Speaker 2: level in the business doesn't give them more or less
Speaker 2: rights to hurt you or to abuse you.
Speaker 4: It's not right.
Speaker 2: Like we started off the conversation Scott Ruden, who is
Speaker 2: legendary for being a complete ass and and and literally
Speaker 2: torturing people, throwing things at people, physically attacking people, I mean, Harvey,
Speaker 2: mister Weinstein, and that he doesn't deserve the mister Weinstein,
Speaker 2: Harvey the ass. He was the one of the biggest
Speaker 2: bullies in Hollywood in a town full of bullies, and
Speaker 2: and we're just talking about this kind of abuse. I mean,
Speaker 2: obviously the hole Me Too movement is I mean, that's
Speaker 2: a whole other level of abuse.
Speaker 3: That you and I were guy in the you know,
Speaker 3: like like the fact that we felt it like if
Speaker 3: you're a minority, or if you're of a different you know,
Speaker 3: sexual orientation or a female, like everything stacked against you
Speaker 3: on that old school way of doing films. And think
Speaker 3: about where. You know, Hollywood is the birthplace of this culture.
Speaker 3: In those early days, we weren't focusing on businesses that
Speaker 3: are focused on jet you know, justice, equity, diversity, diversity
Speaker 3: and inclusion. We weren't trying to create equitable workplaces and
Speaker 3: safe places. It was run by men that want to
Speaker 3: make a lot of money. And that's that culture continue.
Speaker 3: It's very hard to break those patterns, you know.
Speaker 4: And no question, no, no question at all.
Speaker 2: And I was I was lucky in the sense because
Speaker 2: I came up in Miami where I'm a man of color,
Speaker 2: I'm a Latino man, so it was there was like
Speaker 2: that's the crew. So there was Latino people there in
Speaker 2: Miami when big like bad boys would show up or
Speaker 2: Miami Vice like, there was.
Speaker 4: You know, there was Latinos everywhere.
Speaker 2: But anytime I rarely ever saw a female on set
Speaker 2: unless they were in a certain department, whether it be
Speaker 2: costume or makeup or something like that. Occasionally, once in
Speaker 2: a blue moon, I would see a female grip and
Speaker 2: that always blew my mind. I've had female grips work
Speaker 2: on my set and it blew my mind because at
Speaker 2: the time, I'm like, man, she's got to be putting
Speaker 2: up with some some stuff, because I mean, if you're
Speaker 2: in the grip department, that's the arguably, and I've been
Speaker 2: in the grip department, that's arguably.
Speaker 4: The roughest place to be part of.
Speaker 2: It is the carneys. It is the carneys.
Speaker 4: They eat raw meat.
Speaker 2: I mean it is. I mean it is, and I
Speaker 2: love them, by the way. I love my grips, love
Speaker 2: my grips, and I'll be the first to call them
Speaker 2: out in front to their faces, like guys, you know,
Speaker 2: you guys are crazy. The only the only group that's
Speaker 2: crazier than the grips is the stunt team. Like the
Speaker 2: stunt guys, the stunt guys and gals. The stunt guys
Speaker 2: and gals, by the way, argue really interesting. Female stunt
Speaker 2: women are more respected and more They're much more respected
Speaker 2: than any other area on the set for females because
Speaker 2: I remember having working with a stunt team and the
Speaker 2: female man. They the females were as respected, if not
Speaker 2: more so, for doing the stunts and because I guess
Speaker 2: I don'tn't know why, but it was.
Speaker 4: But the stunt people.
Speaker 2: I've never met a stunt person who wasn't twisted and
Speaker 2: weird it whacked out in their heads somewhere in the best,
Speaker 2: most beautiful way possible, because.
Speaker 3: This is you get it. It's just like being an entrepreneur.
Speaker 3: You have to be you have to bet something wired.
Speaker 2: You gotta be wired differently because this is this is
Speaker 2: this is a conversation as a director to a stunt
Speaker 2: person and or stunt coordinator. I'll go, hey, okay, I'll
Speaker 2: need you to jump off that ten foot beam. They're like, great,
Speaker 2: can I do the forty foot beam instead? We'll be
Speaker 2: right back after a word from our sponsor, and now
Speaker 2: back to the show. Every time, every time I need
Speaker 2: you to do one flip, can I do two flips
Speaker 2: and crash into the like they always are amping it
Speaker 2: up to a place and I'm like, the.
Speaker 3: More to the screen.
Speaker 2: They want to But that's that the beauty of the
Speaker 2: stuff of the stunt community. They always want to just
Speaker 2: and then sometimes us as directors and producer are like, nah, dude,
Speaker 2: you're not jumping off the fifty story building. I know
Speaker 2: you want to, we don't have the budget, Like no, no, no,
Speaker 2: I was kidding it and this is and then they'll
Speaker 2: always just like, no, no, I got a boy who's
Speaker 2: got the rig and the thing, and we could do that,
Speaker 2: and we could do that. I just want it for
Speaker 2: my reel and I'm like, okay, dude, just it's wonderful.
Speaker 2: It's it's absolutely wonderful. I love I love I love
Speaker 2: my grips, I love.
Speaker 4: My stunt teams.
Speaker 2: But there's like I have to ask you though, Okay,
Speaker 2: So look, a lot of a lot of people listening now,
Speaker 2: A lot of people are young filmmakers coming up. Some
Speaker 2: of them are in film school, some of them are
Speaker 2: teenagers thinking about coming into the business. I put myself
Speaker 2: back into that mindset of where I was in that
Speaker 2: production company when I was coming up.
Speaker 4: What do you do?
Speaker 2: Because if you call it out or if you report
Speaker 2: it or something, and this is the reality of what
Speaker 2: we do. If you are called out as someone who
Speaker 2: just calls it out or reports it or creates problems,
Speaker 2: chances are that other production companies, other people in that
Speaker 2: area might hear about them like, oh, we don't want
Speaker 2: that person because they're a problem. And that's happened. I've
Speaker 2: seen that happen. It's not right, but I've seen it happen.
Speaker 2: So what are the options in your opinion for you know,
Speaker 2: what do you do because you are in such a
Speaker 2: powerless situation because you want something that they want, so
Speaker 2: unless you go off and do it yourself like you did.
Speaker 3: I just feel like we're living in a time right now, Yeah,
Speaker 3: right now, and Black Lives Matter, George Floyd, Me Too movement,
Speaker 3: all the stuff, even going back to Occupy Wall Street,
Speaker 3: like we're living in an era Arab's Spring, Like all
Speaker 3: of this is happening right in the last decade. And
Speaker 3: I feel that COVID has been this amazing line in
Speaker 3: history of a lot of people saying it's now or
Speaker 3: never to make the changes we need to make. And
Speaker 3: I got to tell you, like I'm involved with a
Speaker 3: lot of those changes. Like really looking at how this
Speaker 3: white CEO of a very white company in a very
Speaker 3: white town is working at anti block racism, Like okay, well,
Speaker 3: how does that relate to your market? Well, we got
Speaker 3: to figure it out. You know, like ten years ago
Speaker 3: we wouldn't be talking like that, but we are now,
Speaker 3: I say, the business community, which is really exciting. I
Speaker 3: feel like in markets like in our market, Atlantic Canada,
Speaker 3: where the union isn't that strong. It's strong in Nova Scotia,
Speaker 3: but not here. The union wants to grow, right I
Speaker 3: actually wants to grow. And so there's a little bit
Speaker 3: of influence in the non centralized markets to say, hey,
Speaker 3: happy to join the union, but what what what's the
Speaker 3: true repercussions of call and shout out? You know, like
Speaker 3: I think there's an opportunity right now to be bold
Speaker 3: and if the union is doing what the union is
Speaker 3: supposed to do, you're waiting for your you're up next.
Speaker 3: So theoretically you shouldn't be losing your opportunity because you are,
Speaker 3: you know, following protocol because as we know, there's always
Speaker 3: a union rep on site. The problem is what if
Speaker 3: that union rep is the bully? Very possible, right, So anyway,
Speaker 3: my my sign of hope is as you join. If
Speaker 3: you're joining the union, I think it's really your opportunity
Speaker 3: to become a leader yourself within it and and letting
Speaker 3: other crew members, understand your perspective of wanting to be
Speaker 3: treated fairly and with that's it, and you'll work your
Speaker 3: ass off to do it. So that's one thing. Another
Speaker 3: thing which is my approach, and this only works for
Speaker 3: people who've got the uh, you know, the ability to
Speaker 3: start their own businesses and I make their own thing.
Speaker 3: But I feel like what I did was I created
Speaker 3: a new company called Hemming's House and we do TV shows,
Speaker 3: documentaries and a lot of commercial, brand brand film work too.
Speaker 3: And I've created a set culture, a filmmaking culture that's
Speaker 3: that you can thrive and be safe. And we've had
Speaker 3: a few mishaps and we dealt with it appropriately, and
Speaker 3: we've we've changed the culture of of this this this
Speaker 3: world here. So if you're starting out okay, and you
Speaker 3: think the only way to get in is by joining
Speaker 3: the union, getting on the big future sets, why not
Speaker 3: consider finding another company that's small like ours, right, really
Speaker 3: learning your trade really well in a good culture, small company.
Speaker 3: And sure it's not you're not working with the big
Speaker 3: actors and the big producers and all this sort of thing,
Speaker 3: but you're cutting your teeth in the process, and you're
Speaker 3: understanding how people should be treated now it takes time
Speaker 3: to do that, of course, but consider going into smaller
Speaker 3: areas to really get your first your first uh, because
Speaker 3: if you think that that bullshit culture is the way
Speaker 3: it should be, because your first experience in is like, oh,
Speaker 3: this must be the way it is, okay, And if
Speaker 3: you accept that, you will also probably adopt it unless
Speaker 3: you're a rebel, uh, you know, and even if you're
Speaker 3: a really good person, respectful yourself, you're gonna adopt it
Speaker 3: and you're not gonna call it out when your colleagues
Speaker 3: do it to other people because it's but it's the
Speaker 3: status quote. But why we're creative people. We shouldn't be
Speaker 3: we shouldn't be living with the status quote. We need
Speaker 3: to be pushing it. And you know what sad to
Speaker 3: say for some people, that old way of doing it
Speaker 3: is become archaic and unrelevant. So give the industry ten
Speaker 3: more years those old you know, I'm going to generalize here,
Speaker 3: the old guys that are whipping c stands and and
Speaker 3: abusing other people in the culture. If you are like that, now,
Speaker 3: you just wait until the till the younger producers are
Speaker 3: growing up that are have been you know, brought up
Speaker 3: in a world where we are discussing ways to be
Speaker 3: respectful on set and in business, you're not going to
Speaker 3: get hired, you know, it's just And then once the
Speaker 3: union bosses become the ones who are have a little
Speaker 3: bit more conscience and understand how sets need to be.
Speaker 3: And you know, I think the union, I think about it.
Speaker 3: I actually because I was a union I was in,
Speaker 3: it has the opportunity to actually lead the change. I
Speaker 3: don't know how long that would take. It's a big beast, right,
Speaker 3: but the union could be the solution if enough people
Speaker 3: had the nerve to chip away at it, you know.
Speaker 3: So anyway, those are a couple of my my ideas.
Speaker 3: And by the way, not all film sets and and
Speaker 3: experiences are are awful. Like there's no absolutely respectful sets.
Speaker 3: I just personally, it was on a lot of buh
Speaker 3: B films, a lot.
Speaker 2: Of lower budget No, the lower the budget a lot
Speaker 2: of time, the lower the budget, the less professionalism there is,
Speaker 2: and the and the less and and the less experience
Speaker 2: there is. And there's a lot more ego involved and
Speaker 2: a lot more in security involved and all of that stuff.
Speaker 3: Climbers got the climbers who will climb at any right,
Speaker 3: So yeah, yeah, so got to be aware of that,
Speaker 3: and that's why I guess that's my advice. And the
Speaker 3: other thing is to not take it personally, you know,
Speaker 3: uh must but do something.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, I agree with the person because you're you're your
Speaker 3: key grip told you your piece of drunk. You know.
Speaker 4: That's yeah, I know.
Speaker 2: And I think that with with what's going on, what's
Speaker 2: got root and what happened with Harvey Weinstein, if these
Speaker 2: kind of you know, juggernauts in our industry can be
Speaker 2: taken out, there's hope for the rest, for the rest
Speaker 2: of the people. Go wait a minute, there is opportunity
Speaker 2: here to get for change. There is opportunity that people
Speaker 2: are gonna take me seriously if something happens, because I mean, look,
Speaker 2: you're talking about Oscar winning massive guys worth billions, like
Speaker 2: Who've generated billions of dollars for the industry, and all
Speaker 2: of a sudden, just you're gone, like Scott Ruden is gone,
Speaker 2: Brett Ratner gone, Brian Singer gone, Kevin Spacey gone, They're gone,
Speaker 2: And there was a you know, I remember, I remember
Speaker 2: when I was running when I wrote my first book,
Speaker 2: Shooting for the Mob, which is my experience of the
Speaker 2: ultimate abuse, which is an ultimate of physical not sexual,
Speaker 2: but physical abuse and psychological abuse. I think in my
Speaker 2: world at least of a mobster threatening me on a
Speaker 2: daily basis while I'm chasing my dream and meeting all
Speaker 2: these big high profile directors and that and producers and
Speaker 2: actors and stuff like that. Going through that journey. I
Speaker 2: heard about the stories when Me Too happened.
Speaker 4: This was really funny.
Speaker 2: When Me Too happened, my buddies would call me up
Speaker 2: in the industry, like, who do you think is gonna happen?
Speaker 4: Who do you think is going to happen to next?
Speaker 2: And I go, oh, it's gonna be Brett Ratner, It's
Speaker 2: going to be Brian Singer, It's going to.
Speaker 3: Be Kevin Spacey.
Speaker 4: And they're like, how do you know.
Speaker 2: I'm like, on two thousand and one, I'll tell you
Speaker 2: the stories. So when I was running around in two
Speaker 2: thousand and one, I remember we were going to meet
Speaker 2: with Kevin Spacey's people and in Kevin Spacey and this
Speaker 2: is like literally I was meeting all the big stars
Speaker 2: in town at twenty six, working with this mobster and
Speaker 2: making this movie about his life. So it's screat By
Speaker 2: the way, anyone who hasn't read that story, please I will.
Speaker 2: It's a fascinating and listen to the audiobook. It's even
Speaker 2: better because it's me doing voices and it's hilarious. So
Speaker 2: I go the agent at the time, agent or manager
Speaker 2: or representative of some sort. They go, listen, when you
Speaker 2: meet Kevin, understand that he just likes to grab guys
Speaker 2: balls when they first meet him.
Speaker 4: It's a handhe.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
Speaker 2: and now back to the show. What And I was like,
Speaker 2: I was twenty six, I'd already been in the business
Speaker 2: a while, I've been directing a bit already, and I
Speaker 2: was just like, I was like, is this real?
Speaker 4: And it's not like Kevin was in the other room.
Speaker 2: This is like we were setting up the meeting and
Speaker 2: my mobster guys, if that guy grabs my balls, I'm.
Speaker 4: Going to kill him. And that was the end of
Speaker 4: the meeting.
Speaker 2: And that was the end of the potential of working
Speaker 2: with Kevin Spacey. But then we heard stories about Brian Singer.
Speaker 2: I've heard many stories about Brett Ratner. He's legendary in
Speaker 2: that sense. So I saw all of this coming and
Speaker 2: and then I'd call it like five days later and
Speaker 2: like they got Kevin Spacey, like, how'd you know? I'm like, dude, dude,
Speaker 2: It's just And the funny thing is that everybody in
Speaker 2: the business knows. Everyone knew that Harvey win Stein was
Speaker 2: a bully. Many people in the business knew that he
Speaker 2: was doing what he was doing. A lot of people
Speaker 2: knew what Scott Ruden is and who he was and
Speaker 2: how he did business. And there's a lot of other
Speaker 2: producers and directors out there who are are are shaking
Speaker 2: in their boots because like, oh man, I'm screwed.
Speaker 4: I mean, you know who Joe Picka is, right, yep.
Speaker 2: Everybody, even me, the puny pa in Miami, heard about
Speaker 2: Pika stories. Joe Pitka was one of the most successful
Speaker 2: and I'm not sure if he's still doing it or not,
Speaker 2: but was one of the most successful commercial.
Speaker 4: Directors in history.
Speaker 2: He directed space Jam the movie because he did all
Speaker 2: Michael Jordan thinks he was the Nike stuff. He was
Speaker 2: a huge director, but his stories were legendary of the
Speaker 2: abuse that he would put his cast the agency. He
Speaker 2: would break people's arms playing basketball because he was a
Speaker 2: really big, like six foot four, you know, imposing figure, and.
Speaker 4: I would hear, you would hear.
Speaker 2: And that's like the that was like the Boogeyman on
Speaker 2: some of these commercial sets.
Speaker 4: Like Joe Pitka's Gonna Get You. It was like, you
Speaker 4: work with JR.
Speaker 2: Picka, and like the group was like, yeah, I work
Speaker 2: with Joe Picka. He had me running, He had me
Speaker 2: running in the desert.
Speaker 4: I almost died of thirst.
Speaker 2: I'm like Jesus Christ, how did this man do it?
Speaker 4: But that was the business. That was the way things
Speaker 4: were done.
Speaker 3: So consider a considerable world, in a world where water.
Speaker 4: Is wet and ice is cold.
Speaker 3: I'm not speaking to try to sound like I'm any
Speaker 3: more woke than anybody else, but consider a world where
Speaker 3: movie sets are more so run by women and people
Speaker 3: of color. Let's just consider that for a second. And
Speaker 3: trust me, there's lots of bullies in those two communities
Speaker 3: as well. There is, I'm I'm not pretending there isn't,
Speaker 3: but breaking that paradigm, that that that power shift. In
Speaker 3: typical cases, women run projects differently, you know, absolutely, And
Speaker 3: like he's thinking about the oscars now, finally starting to
Speaker 3: give the nods to the you know, at least they're
Speaker 3: coming to the table right, And are we going to
Speaker 3: see that every year more and more and more women
Speaker 3: and people of color starting to rock the scene. And
Speaker 3: what's going to happen to all these these these luddites
Speaker 3: if you will like there, if they're all driven by ego,
Speaker 3: it's going to crush them to know they're not going
Speaker 3: to be relevant anymore. We think about that whole cancel
Speaker 3: culture thing, but it probably sucks to be Kevin's spacey
Speaker 3: to be canceled. You are no longer relevant in our
Speaker 3: pop culture. Thank You're done about it, You're done. So
Speaker 3: I just I'm excited to see more diversity in our space.
Speaker 3: You know, coming from a very very white guy right here,
Speaker 3: but it excites me to know how the seismic shift
Speaker 3: that we will be able to see in all forms
Speaker 3: of this industry, as you know, as the old way
Speaker 3: starts to be hospiced out.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And the funny thing is, thinking back on my
Speaker 2: commercial sets, I almost exclusively used women producers and it
Speaker 2: was weird. I didn't even think about that, But I've
Speaker 2: always been just drawn to women producers. I just like
Speaker 2: the way that they not that there's I've had men
Speaker 2: producers as well, obviously, but I did a majority of
Speaker 2: my commercial work were I always worked with the same
Speaker 2: women producers because they ran sets differently. It was a
Speaker 2: different energy about them, and I just I just identified
Speaker 2: with that kind of energy a lot more, uh sometimes,
Speaker 2: and I've kind I've had wonderful experiences with you know,
Speaker 2: white white men producers and African American producers and Latino producers.
Speaker 3: But you're bringing people to the table. That's the thing.
Speaker 3: It's not about canceling white white male talent.
Speaker 4: It's no, of course not.
Speaker 3: It's like, let's let's let's have it much more round it.
Speaker 3: My company, we've got uh, most of our producers are
Speaker 3: are are women. I'm going through uh some diversity training
Speaker 3: right now as we speak, uh with that really cool
Speaker 3: company out of California called Hella uh Impact, and uh
Speaker 3: they're going through this Jedi training, which sounds so cool.
Speaker 3: Well as I SEEO behind you, Jedi for justice, equity,
Speaker 3: diversity and inclusion in the in the context of leading business,
Speaker 3: you know, and we talk about this at the beginning,
Speaker 3: and it's just really cool to uh, you know, to
Speaker 3: be able to check our our you know, check my
Speaker 3: white privilege if you will, on the back on the
Speaker 3: back burner, for a second and realize that we've been
Speaker 3: successful as a result of incredibly in just systems, including
Speaker 3: racist systems. And uh, I'm learning all this stuff, you know,
Speaker 3: and which means I'm really really excited to now that
Speaker 3: we do have over gender parody. Like at my company,
Speaker 3: there's more women than men, but most of the crews guys.
Speaker 3: And I'm really excited to start getting more women into
Speaker 3: the training system in the crew side and the camera departments, grips,
Speaker 3: et cetera. And also people of color as we as
Speaker 3: we as we diversify and and really hack the system
Speaker 3: and see and prove that we can actually build a
Speaker 3: great storytelling company. Uh that's in the mold of what
Speaker 3: you and I have been complaining about for the last hour.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, And I've you know, anytime I have a chance
Speaker 2: to have a female director on to to talk about
Speaker 2: their process and what they've gone through. I had a
Speaker 2: wonderful author and female director named Naomi Jones McDougall Jones,
Speaker 2: who wrote a book all about women in Hollywood. Wrote
Speaker 2: the book about how they are treated, the numbers, the stats,
Speaker 2: who's it was fascinating conversation. But you know, and again
Speaker 2: everyone listening it's not about cancel culture. It's not about
Speaker 2: you know, just throwing people away. It's about trying to
Speaker 2: open open up the idea, the the inclusion of everybody's ideas.
Speaker 2: You know, the white male or the male story perspective
Speaker 2: is not the only one, uh, and bringing all of
Speaker 2: those kind of people to the table, it just makes
Speaker 2: it's it's like only cooking with pepper and salt, and
Speaker 2: that's all you cook with.
Speaker 4: There's so many other.
Speaker 2: Spices and there's any other spices that you could throw
Speaker 2: in that make it a lot more flavorful and a
Speaker 2: lot better in so many ways. But you know, we
Speaker 2: started this conversation as what can we do to change
Speaker 2: this abuse culture that is ingrained in our business has
Speaker 2: been for decades. I think it started that way. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm sure was that way from the days of Chaplain.
Speaker 2: You know, when anytime you have people in power, there's
Speaker 2: always abuse, always any place, any place, any the industry,
Speaker 2: any society. If you have somebody in power and someone
Speaker 2: that's not in power, there is always abuse.
Speaker 4: Unfortunately, that as part of the human condition, that is
Speaker 4: part of it is.
Speaker 2: But now we're hopefully changing that at least within our
Speaker 2: sets and Hopefully you guys listening now, especially if you're
Speaker 2: young and coming up, understand that there are options and
Speaker 2: you have opportunities. And I think you would agree they
Speaker 2: have kids coming up today have opportunities that you and
Speaker 2: I did not have, like being able to buy your
Speaker 2: own gear, being able to start your ownroduction comp at
Speaker 2: twenty one and just start shooting music videos or shooting docs,
Speaker 2: or just going out there and making content or building
Speaker 2: up online presence, like none of that existed for us.
Speaker 2: We had to go through this system and navigate it.
Speaker 2: There are options now for people like yourself, like you're like,
Speaker 2: you know what, I'm gonna screw it. I'm going to
Speaker 2: make my own company, and you can do it, and
Speaker 2: you could do it anywhere in the world that you're
Speaker 2: listening from.
Speaker 4: So I appreciate you coming on the show.
Speaker 2: Brother. I'm going to ask you a couple questions. I
Speaker 2: ask all of my guests, what advice would you give
Speaker 2: a filmmaker trying to break into the business today.
Speaker 3: I love that question because I get that question all
Speaker 3: the time your parents. It's funny because in this generation
Speaker 3: of kids, it's never the kids call it call it
Speaker 3: it's sometimes it is and I okay, there's a piece
Speaker 3: of advice right there. Don't get your parents to call
Speaker 3: us to say, hey, what's up. Like in the film industry,
Speaker 3: is it's something that my kid can thrive and they
Speaker 3: want to make a movie. If you're twelve years old
Speaker 3: or eighteen years old, find a way to get in
Speaker 3: touch with a producer or anybody in the place that
Speaker 3: you want to be and just get some time on
Speaker 3: the phone. Most people will be thrilled to speak to you,
Speaker 3: and you can do it yourself. Like you don't listen.
Speaker 3: Nothing against having your parents lobby for you, but I
Speaker 3: think it's a thing. It's almost it's very much an
Speaker 3: eye roller. We want to see initiative, you know, we
Speaker 3: want to see creativity, We want to see a personality, right,
Speaker 3: we want to see respect. Because when you're jumping into
Speaker 3: the into the film industry, certainly the way Alex and
Speaker 3: I have, you're not necessarily being hired for your creative brilliance.
Speaker 3: You're being hired because you can be a really trustworthy,
Speaker 3: reliable cog and wheel.
Speaker 4: And you can very nice.
Speaker 2: By the way, that's a very nice, very nice way
Speaker 2: of saying that cog in the wheel that there's other
Speaker 2: ways that could be mule, donkey, heavy lifters, you know, grunt,
Speaker 2: but the cog and the wheel.
Speaker 3: There's other names that are I'm not going to writ
Speaker 3: because we're done with that culture.
Speaker 2: We'll be right back after a word from our sponsor,
Speaker 2: and now back to the show.
Speaker 3: If you are if you can work on a farm,
Speaker 3: you can work on a film set. You know. You
Speaker 3: if you can work, if you can join cadets and
Speaker 3: and go, you know, work in the military, you can
Speaker 3: work on a film set. If you work in a
Speaker 3: janitorial uh, at a you know, at a hospital, you
Speaker 3: can work on a film set. Yeah. And so it's
Speaker 3: not about the creative brilliants and producers, aren't They don't
Speaker 3: really care if about your last short film. Uh, they do.
Speaker 3: They want to make sure that you're reliable and that
Speaker 3: you're that you're going to be good for the culture.
Speaker 3: And perhaps that's the hack to get in, you know,
Speaker 3: the hack is, you know, we're living in a new
Speaker 3: generation where there are we're now becoming the old guys now, Alex,
Speaker 3: I hate to say it, where I'm learning so much
Speaker 3: about this new generation my employees and my staff or whatever,
Speaker 3: you know, from young people, and I appreciate learning from
Speaker 3: them because my ego was kicked out of me years ago. Right,
Speaker 3: So I'm a lifelong learner and culture changes, you know,
Speaker 3: And I'm supposedly making documentaries and films that an audience
Speaker 3: wants to see, and I don't understand them at all
Speaker 3: because I decided not to care about their language and
Speaker 3: the way they want to be respected and all this
Speaker 3: sort of thing. So many people make fun of millennials
Speaker 3: and you know, in the next generation, and but you know,
Speaker 3: that's the audience. What are you doing not trying to
Speaker 3: understand their culture or the way they speak and the
Speaker 3: way they want to be spoken to. So you, as
Speaker 3: a young person can actually come in and find those
Speaker 3: right bosses if you will and say this, I want
Speaker 3: to help you create a culture that is rich, creative, efficient,
Speaker 3: and lean and in a way that's more people like
Speaker 3: me are going to want to come and work for
Speaker 3: your company or work on your sets. And I'm speaking
Speaker 3: in the context of out of the Union, because the
Speaker 3: Union has its own system which is very efficient as well.
Speaker 3: You come into a trainee and then you work your
Speaker 3: way up. Awesome. So if that's if that's what you're
Speaker 3: gonna do, I would say the exact same advice. Find
Speaker 3: someone else's in the union who's been in it for
Speaker 3: a number of years and pick their brain. You know,
Speaker 3: make sure you know what you're getting yourself into. And
Speaker 3: if you're ready, it's be prepared to volunteer a little bit.
Speaker 3: It might not have to be the case, but if
Speaker 3: you're working with smaller companies or even like part of
Speaker 3: a film co op or you know, a short film competition,
Speaker 3: you don't get paid on those, but you get great experience.
Speaker 3: So the more experience you get in film culture as
Speaker 3: far as the mechanism of how it set culture, yeah,
Speaker 3: and set etiquette. And when I was some of my
Speaker 3: early films, I used to stand in front of the
Speaker 3: light and I was the cameras training and I'd stand
Speaker 3: up and I'd be like, hey, guys, you need a lens.
Speaker 3: And so they'd call me a flyboy or something because
Speaker 3: I was like a fly tractor little light all the time.
Speaker 3: Those are things that you learned, said etiquette. Right, if
Speaker 3: someone doesn't tell you, you learned the hard way right.
Speaker 4: Right, and hopefully it's not an abusive way.
Speaker 2: It's hopefully in a fun way, like calling you.
Speaker 3: Fly boy, right and exactly that like talking to people.
Speaker 3: I don't call myself a veteran in that world because
Speaker 3: I only spent a few years in it, but speak
Speaker 3: to veterans and say, hey, what are some of the
Speaker 3: areas I will fail at in my first year? You know,
Speaker 3: that's a good advice. That's good advice to ask, you know,
Speaker 3: and people will like you for that, like if you
Speaker 3: asked a key grip, Hey, I want to get into
Speaker 3: grip in the grip department, But where will I fail?
Speaker 3: And then let me know like some of the hacks
Speaker 3: so I can get around that. And then they're going
Speaker 3: to love the fact that you showed an initiative you
Speaker 3: and ask the question in the first place. Right, long
Speaker 3: answer for you, Alex.
Speaker 2: But fair enough, good answer, great answer, great answer. Now,
Speaker 2: what is the lesson that took you the longest to learn,
Speaker 2: whether in the film business or in life?
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh so many. One is just really important. Again,
Speaker 3: I'm coming talking right now from the entrepreneur perspective, is
Speaker 3: surrounding yourself by people who are better than you. So
Speaker 3: and this is a really good lesson for directors, for
Speaker 3: aspiring directors and producers. But it's okay if you're a
Speaker 3: director and for you to hire a first a a
Speaker 3: d who is way more experienced than you, and it's
Speaker 3: okay if you have to be the you know, the
Speaker 3: key of a Caaron apartment and you and you're hiring
Speaker 3: other people on your team who are actually way better
Speaker 3: DPS than you. The more people you surround, the more
Speaker 3: you surround yourself with people who are better than you,
Speaker 3: and the and the less ego you've got, less pride,
Speaker 3: the more you're gonna learn, and the and and the
Speaker 3: quicker you're you're gonna thrive if you if you do
Speaker 3: this on your own and try to hack your way
Speaker 3: through being the best on earth, a good chances can fail.
Speaker 3: So I've surrounded myself by way better filmmakers in my company,
Speaker 3: way better dps, way better editors. And I remember when
Speaker 3: it happened, like I was the filmmaker at the beginning
Speaker 3: of the building this company for a good four or
Speaker 3: five years, and then once I realized that my crew
Speaker 3: were becoming because they were doing it all the time
Speaker 3: I was trying to grow a business, and I was like, geez,
Speaker 3: you guys are there now, like you guys are now
Speaker 3: the products you know, and I know it was trippy
Speaker 3: for a minute, and I was like, okay, well and
Speaker 3: a good advice one of my young employees told me.
Speaker 3: I thought was great. He goes, Greg, You're always going
Speaker 3: to be a great creative director, a great filmmaker. But
Speaker 3: what this, this is my my employee is saying this
Speaker 3: to me. What we need from you is to go
Speaker 3: out and do what you're doing, what you're best at,
Speaker 3: which is making friends and selling us more jobs. And
Speaker 3: hearing that was really it was tough on my ego,
Speaker 3: but he was right because if we wanted to continue
Speaker 3: grow in this company and doing cool projects, we need
Speaker 3: an executive producer that was going to go go fishing.
Speaker 3: And that's and executive producers go fishing for money by
Speaker 3: curing solid relationships, trusted relationships. So my job at my
Speaker 3: business is to create trusted relationships. And that's that's what
Speaker 3: I do every single day.
Speaker 4: And last question, three of your favorite.
Speaker 2: Films of all time?
Speaker 3: Sweet Hereafter?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember that movie.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's a good a beautiful Canadian film and the
Speaker 3: soundtrack was great. It was so good. I would say
Speaker 3: I have to say fire walk with me. David Lynch Wow,
Speaker 3: a huge Twin Peaks fan. During during you know those
Speaker 3: times and let me see here. It's always a tough
Speaker 3: I absolutely loved Eternal Sunshine. I love Virgin Suicides. So
Speaker 3: I'm failing on answering because there's so many great films
Speaker 3: I love. But I gotta give you one more David
Speaker 3: Lynch film, which is Elephant Man. Yeah it struck me,
Speaker 3: it really did, because Linch is just weird. Usually this
Speaker 3: is not a weird film. This is a sad, heartfelt,
Speaker 3: emotional film. And if you haven't seen Elephant Man, you
Speaker 3: got to see it. And yeah, so I going to
Speaker 3: give you those four or five films as kind of
Speaker 3: my inspirations, and each one of them have a reason
Speaker 3: why I absolutely love them.
Speaker 2: But yeah, very cool, Greg Man, thank you so much
Speaker 2: for coming on the show and helping us shed a
Speaker 2: little light on a problem that needs to be discussed.
Speaker 2: It's not generally discussed in public very often.
Speaker 3: James that and you're doing a great yourself.
Speaker 2: I'm trying, my friend, I'm trying, So thanks again, my friend.
Speaker 3: All right, Alex tears Man, thanks.
Speaker 2: I want to thank Greg for coming on the show
Speaker 2: and really shining a light on this problem that is abuse,
Speaker 2: verbal abuse and people being taken advantage of on sets
Speaker 2: in productions and in this business in general. So Greg,
Speaker 2: thank you, thank you so much for that. If you
Speaker 2: want to get links to anything we spoke about in
Speaker 2: this episode, head over to the show notes at Bulletproof
Speaker 2: Screenwriting dot tv. Forward slash four thirteen. Thank you so
Speaker 2: much for listening to guys. As always, keep on writing
Speaker 2: no matter what. I'll talk to you soon.
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to the Bulletproof Screenwriting podcast at Bulletproofscreenwriting
Speaker 1: dot tv.