Film Courage: Markus we interviewed you in 2015 I believe?
Markus Redmond, Writer/Director/Actor/Producer: Really?
Film Courage: I know it’s been a little bit.
Markus: Yes.
That’s a long time.
Film Courage: It’s a long time.
Markus: It was fun though.
Film Courage: It was a great time.
[We interviewed you] at a theater in Ventura, CA.
Markus: Yes.
Film Courage: Your interviews have many, many views.
Many, many comments.
Markus: Really?
Film Courage: Some of them [the comments] positive, some of them not so positive.
I have a question I was wondering if you can address?
And that is some of the people [commenters] felt that you were able to get a film made
or sell a script because you had prior connections?
Can we dispel that myth?
Markus: Oh yeah…totally.
I’m completely locked in because I was on a [TV] show a long time ago so I know all
of the studio executives and I know all of the producers and all of the investors and
they just give me money all the time so it’s super easy.
Film Courage: And you just meet them?
You go to Dan Tana’s for lunch?
Markus: They call me all of the time and go “Hey Markus…we are trying to make this
film?
Would you like 30 million dollars?
We are going to distribute it through Warner Brothers?”
And I’m like “Yeah, great.
Sounds awesome!”
Happens all of the time.
Film Courage: People who don’t live in LA…because for Los Angeles…
Markus: …I’m lying.
Film Courage: Yes, I can tell.
Sarcasm.
But some people don’t realize…they think that you can be bartending and meet Hollywood
producers and screenwriters and get someone’s friends script out there this way.
That’s not really how it works here.
Markus: Well here’s the thing…like…yeah…that’s possible.
It’s all possible.
I have a friend who was a PA [production assistant] and he was working on a studio lot and a very,
very, very big movie star was shooting a movie on that lot.
So everybody was super excited about it and my friend the PA was like “Gosh I’ve written
this script and this movie star is perfect for it.
How do I find a movie star?”
So they couldn’t find him.
He was always not around.
So they figured out which car was his and the PA put the script on the movie star’s
windshield and the movie star took the script and my friend ended up being represented by
the movie star’s agent.
So…yeah…all kinds of stuff can happen.
It doesn’t mean that that is going to happen.
It doesn’t mean that you are set in stone.
Trust me, I mean I’m flattered that folks think that I was that big of a deal on Doogie
Howser, M.D. [TV show].
I was not.
I was like the lowest guy on the totem pole.
I didn’t have extra connections.
I was working in an industry.
I was doing my best to pay attention to things.
I had an agent who had no interest in my scripts.
I think I told the story the last time we talked [Film Courage video interview in 2015]?
I had a friend who was an actor, he had a friend who was a manager.
I did not know the manager.
I had written the script.
My friend was like “You should meet my friend the manager.”
That’s how it happened.
I mean I guess if the concern is you had an advantage because you had a friend, yes I
did.
Would I have had that friend if I had lived in Kentucky?
Probably not, you know what I mean?
But that doesn’t mean that if you’re in Kentucky you can’t become famous in the
film industry because that happens a lot, too.
Like people enter contests or they submit their scripts to to the Sundance Film Festival
Lab or whatever it is?
And they’re in Wisconsin or they’re in Idaho or they are wherever and somebody sees
that script.
They don’t have any connections, they just have a great script.
And people go “We are going to fly you out Sundance and you are going to sit here and
we’re going to help you develop.”
And then the film gets made and they become instantly famous and they are sitting on the
dice and the they are making other films and they are way past me, you know what I mean?
So yes, everybody has advantages or disadvantages one way or another.
But for the record, it’s not like I was connected in that sense.
Film Courage: But would you say that even if someone is on this trajectory of film after
film after film…even for that level that it can still be like starting from scratch
again for something that this person wants to do like their own script?
Markus: The Industry has a very short attention span and a long memory.
So if they remember you well at a high enough level there’s a lot of stuff you can try
and do again.
I like to talk about people like Danny DeVito or Kevin James.
Everybody looks at these guys as leading men and they are.
But they didn’t start there.
Danny DeVito was doing off-Broadway plays playing a dog.
Like literally on his hands and knees barking.
But he continued to grow and got to such a point where people loved his work that he
was able to become a leading man.
Same thing with Kevin James not that he was barking on stage but he was a stand-up comedian
and he was getting roles and stuff.
The stand-up career got him the show.
He was a leading man in the show and then he starts being a leading man in the film.
So you start where you are and you grow from there.
But I think that if Kevin James had started off with his first project like “I’m not
doing this unless I’m the leading man.”
I don’t necessarily think that would have flown, you know?
I think you build a repertoire and people just go with you.
If people like you they will follow you anywhere.
Look at Will Smith.
Will Smith was a sitcom star right?
But people loved the show and they loved him and he was like “I want to become a serious
actor.”
And everybody went “Okay.”
And they show up for his movies.
That’s the thing, it’s not like advantages/disadvantages, everybody’s got them.
Everybody has got both.
But it doesn’t mean that what you want is impossible.
You know…you hunker down and focus on it.
None of these people are different from anybody else.
They are all humans, they just put their minds in a certain space and we’re like “This
is what I want.
I deserve it.
Nothing is going to stop me.”
That’s all really anybody has to do.
I know this sounds “hippie dippie” or whatever.
But that’s all anybody did.
They got rejected and had doors shut on them.
And they are like “Okay, there’s another door.
I’ll go over here now.”
They didn’t necessarily get on a social media platform and complain about the door
that was shut on them they just kept going.
That’s all you can do in my opinion.
I could be wrong but that’s what I think.