09 Jun Acting and Directing in Two Roads

Making “Two Roads” proved to be one of the more difficult projects I’ve undertaken, but it was also one where I learned a lot about myself as a director, an actor and an artist. I couldn’t be certain that the vision that Christine and I had formed in our heads would actually translate into a good film, but somewhere in the first day of shooting I realized that, yes! We were indeed, shooting something very good and I am proud of what we accomplished. With our dedicated skeleton crew and a handful of actors, we pushed ourselves to the limit because we love to create compelling films and I know we did just that.

3 months ago I had a struggling beard that contained exactly one white hair. Now, having wrapped principal-photography on “Two Roads,” there reside 14 more; gleaming white and Hemingway-esque. And one white ear hair. I love filmmaking, but it can certainly age a person. Yes, even a short film can make you look like that dude from “Indiana Jones” who drank from the wrong cup.

I’m normally pretty stress-free and jovial on set, but I think the weeks of tireless pre-production and a booked-out schedule followed by me playing a depressed and disturbed character in another film just days before the shoot, turned me into the proverbial “brooding artist.” That means I was neither stress-free nor jovial; but this is nothing new on film sets and I know why. This, along with the standard foreseen and unforeseen problems that inevitably arise in filmmaking, especially indie-filmmaking make for a tough shoot.

I won’t get too detailed about the difficult parts because all film productions are difficult and this one too took on its own mercurial persona. The challenges were taking a difficult script to shoot, adding production value, attention to detail and cinematic style, while working with a small budget and thus, a small crew. Fortunately, we were well acquainted with these challenges, as our award winning film “A Bird’s Nest” was shot under similar conditions; so we know from experience (as Christine likes to say) that, a little creative thinking and a lot of hard work can often overcome a challenge as well or better than a large, well funded production. It was tough, but we did just that. We put our heads together, we found creative ways to overcome obstacles, and we got our shots.

It was one of the more difficult shoots I’ve had, but it’s also the one that I’m the most proud of. Despite white hair-inducing stress levels, 22 hour days, emotional roller coster rides, poor tempers, rain, tornados, stubborn bulls, stubborn kitties, biting/stinging insect scares, mud stuck production vehicles, broken vehicles, computer glitches, scheduling headaches, missing equipment, broken equipment and broken bodies, we still had some great moments and even a few acts of God (which we are also used to) and made a great film.

Now, as Christine and I sit for hours on end in the editing room and rip our shots to shreds and coordinate with sound, music and color specialists, we face new challenges. One of which is a question I’m sure most filmmakers ask themselves, “will they like the film?” This is where the self doubt creeps in, but this is also something all artists must face when they put something out for display. The best we can do as artists is be true to our vision and try our best. And that is what we are doing. I think in the end, they will like it.