i think this is only you know the time we're seeing in a big screen um are you guys kind of
shocked by that you know i think you were working on trying to bring it to screen at some point and
it didn't quite work out yes uh yeah no i was always aware that um that this story had never
made it to film and myself and my classmates we never quite understood why that happened because
to us it seemed like the perfect high school movie and in a way it kind of i don't know
what you think alan but i think it's very strange that the europe randomly film didn't happen and
then a couple of years later drew barrymore has never been kissed was suddenly out with
drew in the brandon role it's a kind of ref on the Brandon [Lee] story really never been i've never
um so anyway so it was kind of coming down i was like at some point we're gonna have to tell the
story otherwise we're all going to forget it and so and and memory is a part in the film as well
in terms of what people remember and what they don't remember and so i just thought we all kind
of thought if nobody's going to tell the story we have to do it now so we kind of you know i
knitted it together but it's through the ensemble film where my classmates and i have kind of come
together to tell our verse and friends and how did you you know get alan involved you know how
do you get little just it's it's it's just it's an embarrassing thing it's not like yeah i paid them
the really awkward thing was that alan and lulu were friends of mine so
it was that awkward thing of crying oh i'm making this film do you mind people get no money and by
the way you want to be in this film i don't really know if it's a film but it's kind of a thing
so it was easy once i got alan that was easy because then once i had him
then it was easy for lulu to think oh this isn't too crazy he's involved
she didn't have to i didn't have to save any dms or anything like that no none of that just
picked up the phone actually when did i say i think i said that in person maybe yeah one
time without but i i you know but that doesn't remember me gonna like sort of like as though
he didn't know it was aware i was gonna play him in a film once like what an amazing coincidence
he's like yeah i know that's kind of why i'm asking you in your performance it's um you know
it's not your typical acting gig um how dark was it to approach it and you know in that way
how daunting was it was it for you approach it in that way well it was daunting because it's sort of
like you said it was not really no one had i mean i haven't done anything like that before and i
i mean i i i i just sort of i don't know and also it's a sort of solitary thing you
know you're not acting with other people but it was just a question of trying to get into the
rhythm of his how he speaks so that i mean i i had all the tape had the whole tape of the interview
and then when jono sort of you know decided which bits he was going to use so i had all those little
things so just listen to them a lot yeah and then it was kind of a thing of really
focusing on what how you know people have speech patterns people have little
he he pauses in the same way sometimes and he's got little kind of vocal tics and but he doesn't
it's he's quite sort of he kind of doesn't so it's not it doesn't it's not animated in the
way it speaks so that was something and then i kind of tried to make you know you tried to
actually not just be a lip-syncing person you tried to be a whole character as well
so it was i don't know it's hard to describe because there's not no precedence for it yeah but
it was it was like a and it was like a weird thing i went to this to the set for two days of just
totally focused it was all on beeps you know i think yeah so it was just kind of
quite i think maddening for everybody everyone was the best screaming i said the bits when i was
was they're not there's a couple of bits when we filmed in a corridor as a doctor and they
could have started to end up in the film but those were kind of great to do because it was out of the
classroom and yeah you know a little more liberated that opening scene was something
about horror you know when you're kind of getting unwrapped oh yes that was a really good touch um
the animation that's something i want to you know talk about also you you do some
voice work but how did that came about did you always know that you were going to have
that as part of the story we were battling and i thought i was going to i'm going to make all
this live action and stuff but then i soon kind of became aware how difficult it is to
get live-action reconstruction into documentary and how easy it is for it to go terribly wrong
and so i was trying to think a ways around that we did we tried things on green screen where we
wrote a scoped over the actor's aha style and and that just something too weird about that
um and it actually came from one of my producers who was who fell in love with
the storyboarding version of the cut and was like i just like the storyboards can't
we just keep them and i was like no we can't do that but maybe there's a way that we can um
work with animation and it was actually from watching one division on disney plus in lockdown
and that way that they style the production design of each different era of american sitcom history
and i got to thinking god is there a way that i could we could in our budget
reference the animation styles of the 90s and the 70s and and that was when you know daria came to
mind you know her yeah and brandon's got a lot in common they've got the curly hair the blazer
the glasses so she was my kind of nod you know this icon of 90s high school
life and so we kind of took that on board and yeah it's just i there's a thing about the the
the reason i think the animation works better is it's much easier for us to connect a cartoon
character than it is to look at an actor and think that's meant to be that person whoever
so um yeah it's a scottish animation company we work with wild child who've been fantastic
and it was a real kind of learning curve like this is my first feature documentary let alone
suddenly have to learn how to become an animation you know a director who works with animation um
so yeah it's kind of nice though yeah they're really really really cool and so yeah that's
been it's been a learning curve and then but also to work with the voice actors as well yeah and get
a really great scottish cast together for that so alan is the voice of brandon and you get to
hear the singing voice as well and uh lulu is the voice of our deputy head mistress and is you also
get to hear her voice because she sings the titles and yeah so you know don steele and claire groban
gregory's girl and is in there so i kind of i knew i always knew that i wasn't making that true crime
film i was making a high school movie and so i wanted it to be the ultimate if there isn't
a scottish high school documentary i'm going to make this one and it's going to be yeah it's going
to reference high school movies through the years it's going to have romy and michelle's high school
reunion it's going to have to start with let's all have fun and have a laugh and i just wanted
that the film itself has perhaps a bit of a somber end and i knew that i wanted the audience to sit
and watch that but not leave the audience not leave the auditorium in the summer mood
the person who could do that and bring us all up at the end is lulu i i was so fascinated by
the whole thing um and i had mentioned to him that i have never ever done any acting with a
scottish accent that's not really what you're talking about the granny the alice in porridge
and super grand allison gets caught in a hot air balloon and super grand has to say
there's a story there to the line i had my whole thing so now i've got to shut up but anyway i was
telling you about that i now have a desire to do yeah be scottish yeah um you know because
my accent's all over the place um but also i wanted to yeah anyway so he said oh i've got
that for you it was like was that case that you were actually you know in the studio with the
other voice actors at the same time or you know it's kind of very solitary yeah it's very rare
so quick it was great but uh what what was amazing i was amazed about
first of all you know you hear alan who's a master of his craft taking this part which is interesting
and strange and weird you think oh this could be good and you know talking to jonno who is
you know thinks sort of differently and managed to hold this thing together and let it develop into
something even better almost than it started with it was like oh my god yeah i said yes to something
really good here and then he comes up then he comes up because i thought i've got a repat i'll
just be scottish or whatever he wants me i'll do whatever he wants and then when he asked me to
do the song and the song is a great song and i signed it and i thought god this sits perfectly
within my it's it's on my sweet spot you know oakley it's a great song and it just sounded
great and it evolved yeah i think that's the thing about the evolving thing i think that i i
what the bits i've seen have sort of changed the actual film itself you know i think that's kind of
a documentary you don't really you know it's about a subject but what the actual narrative even is
even the genre the genres have changed in this way yes and i think that's so exciting to see
for it to find it's like you know you find your feet with it and it's and everybody found their
feet yeah found your feet being in it and you know having not done the other one but done this
i think it's special any very fad that you you know loved it you know gives a different insight
authenticity and i think that comes across and maybe it's been a blessing you know the projects
that you were trying to write your light you know didn't happen um one final question i
know time's short but what is it working on next do you get anything in the pipeline uh
i've got an idea for what my next project should be but um it's really early doors i kind
of need to get this out and sell it but i do have something in mind and it's scottish i feel that um
i i just feel that i think i'm able to tell stories scottish stories in a way that i don't
think i necessarily would be with margie very modern it's a modern guy yeah just i i love
the i wanted this film to have humor in it and it's got sadness in it too and all that but um
yeah i guess i think my next project maybe as a documentary i think i've documented myself for a
while because it's so personal as well it's been a really intense process connecting with people
some people want me to do the film some people not want me to do the film it's been really intense
so i think i'm ready to work with purely actors again so i'll be roping you into the next one
today you can sing the theme song this time you'll be blocking these numbers no no we have to do it
do it we have to do it what's the difference i got you babe with a scottish i beat up with me flowers
and just for you and you know what have you got coming up um and forgive me for asking but night
crawler yes dr strange is you know hinting the x-men crossovers in the mcu is that a character
you know that's funny in your past or if it brought something to you
i saw a thing about but i think i think you know a little uh cody smith mcphee yeah i see he's
very keen to get into the marvel universe and he said something about the other day and i was
actually gonna go on it because he was like young me in one of his films so i i sort of
think i mean i think my superhero days are over never seen you never thought toby mcguire would
have come back his spiderman that's true yesterday's future past you could have been
i didn't see um one but i mean i it's not my i mean i would i consider lots
you know look at look what i am i i'm open to lots of weird things and uh i don't have
really a plan so you know and i'm going to do a variety of equally weird things coming up um
i'm going to host a weird game show in a castle oh my gosh i'm going to do another season of the
show for apple plus i did and i'm going to well then i'm going to do my make my solo dance debut
in a show for the national theatre of scotland i mean you have to about robert barnes and starts
an end-run festival so i'm like i'm doing lots of you know it's great i get to do
lots of really weird interests that's exciting i've done a workshop i've been working on working
with these academics at glasgow university and everything it's great it's also just like what the
[ __ ] it's 57 years old exactly exactly i agree with you bring it on and you are so versatile
album and what are you going to be touring well you know i am very soon to be oh my god 60 years
in this business so this whole next year i'm going to be planning for uh 24. um but also i've
got gigs like i've got several gigs of boy george coming up i've got more stuff with jules holland
i'm writing with my brother because one of the song funnily enough one of the most popular songs
that my brother and i ever wrote is a song called where the four boys dance and it's all about me
remembering or returning to my roots and we've had so many people commenting about it
and saying like the ones who don't care about you don't know who she is to look at the chef
go i never knew she could do this kind of thing that's bloody brilliant
you know and you go you know it's brilliant and there's something about that at this point in
my life that i have to revisit and explore a bit more in the writing that sounds great yeah
it's that's that's a big uh thing like i s like i said about wanting to be act in a yeah be scottish
that i am desperate to do in the not too distant future
this big older statesman accident actually so like in 1991 when he was at the national playing and
king lear right and i was doing the national in london and i was playing this in this accidental
death of anarchists and as i bet you when king lear goes off he's away he's got some time off
possibly all the girls do things to kill people and he would and i my play would finish and i
would come into the shower and he'd be sitting in one of the cubicles on the loop reading the paper
we're going to do carpool karaoke together
yeah so we're trying to find a date to make it work for two of us