Joston Ramon Theney, Screenwriter, Author, Director, Producer: Live your
life the way you want to go out because ultimately that's what we're all doing,
we just don't know it but we're living our lives the way we want to go out.
Film Courage:
What kind of heart does it take to pursue this business or is heart not part of the picture?
Joston: Heart meaning passion?
It has to be something that has its own rechargeable battery. I don't think that I
think you have to go hard I think you have to go hard all the time and you have to
uh I know for me I was having this conversation while I was saying before I hear a lot of people
say oh I die to make a movie I die to make a movie and I say I would never die to make a movie
it's not there's tons of stories you can tell and all that stuff but I've got to finish one because
with all the planning and everything that goes into making a movie it's having that
passion that's gonna help you finish a movie because for all the movies that are out there
that you can think of think about it this way if you saw a hundred movies there were probably
50 000 that got they started making but never finished and of that 50 000 there were probably
a hundred and fifty thousand scripts that were in development and about to start production so if
you look at that number and it filters all the way down to just 100 films it's not about getting the
opportunity to make a film it's about finishing a film and that takes a passion where you where you
have to go into it with the understanding that no matter how excited someone is about your project
be it the actor the the cinematographer the editors anybody who's working on that film
that's not you those people for as excited as they are they do not care as much as you do
they never will so when things start breaking down and it's got to be spit
bubble gum and duct tape to keep it together and to keep it moving it's going to be you
it's going to be you and the second you get tired and you can't finish it that's when it
stops that's when it stops because you you're the you're the person you're the battery you have to
keep recharging that battery that passion you have to keep it going and it has it has to push
you all the way through every adversity and every um every obstacle to get to completion
it has to push you and it can't die ever because that's when the project will just cease to exist
and once it stops it's very rare that projects get picked back up and they finish them it's very rare
so I would I would say in terms of heart I'd relate it to passion
and say that yeah it has to be a rechargeable battery that just doesn't die it can't die
now if you're saying what kind of heart in terms of caring and compassion and that sort of thing
I don't know how far that gets you I don't know I think if you if you get into films that are
very much about um uh society and how to push society forward and make people think about
the world they live in and that sort of thing if that's the direction you're going in I think that
having a heart is for compassion and and love and and all that great stuff I think that it's
I think that it's it's paramount in that because there it takes a great amount of
will that willingness to understand people and open yourself up to to learn about others and
to learn about their cultures and whatever it is that you're going to be talking about in that film
it does take a great amount of of heart and compassion to do that to be willing to to
completely immerse yourself in someone else's world but those are two very different hearts
I think two very different hearts sure and there can be a downside to the other heart in that
things can affect you too much I mean there's been documentarians that have ended their lives because
they saw things they didn't want to see yeah about different countries or wherever and the
atrocities that were going on so that can it can also take you down because there are things you
can't unsee and uh and once you're made aware of them your deep feeling for those things it can
affect you in some profound ways in ways that you you don't expect you know I will never forget um
there was a time back in what was it maybe maybe oh nine was it on nine maybe on nine oh nine I was
doing marketing for a skilled nursing facility and it required that I have a nursing background but
I said you know there's nothing I can learn so of course I had to you know really hit the books and
learn a lot of nursing terms and things of that nature but I digress the thing was is there was
a patient of the skill nursing facility that ended up in the hospital and I had to go visit them and
just kind of see how everything was going make sure social workers were on it and everything and
they told me the guy wasn't going to be released because now he's definitely needed to stay because
he has a stage 4 decubitus ulcer and I was like stage 4 decubitus ulcers I've heard of those those
are bad and they're like yeah they're bad here's a picture of it and that picture I cannot see
I cannot see it's uh it's when a bed sore has basically eaten its way to the bone almost
wow and when I saw that I was like ah why would you why would you not like give me a
second before you did that that's permanently in my mind and now I associate it with this patient
that I've grown to care for so now I’m more like emotionally invested in this person it
makes it hard to do my job now because you're the only thing you're thinking about is there to keep
this ulcer but you forget the other reasons why they were there in the first place the only thing
you want to do is make sure that gets healed because that is the most painful thing that
someone can go through it's an incredibly painful thing and if you if you've ever seen it acute of
stage 4 decubitus ulcers I apologize to you in advance that you had to see it because it's it's
a very nasty wound very nasty wound you know well maybe this is too personal we can cut this out so
I’ll ask it and if you don't want to did you move on from the job I did I did I
eventually I eventually had to move on from from working in a skilled nursing facility it was
it was a place where you you get to know everyone by name you know and you get to
to learn their dietary needs and everything you know so much about you know more about
them than their families do and you spend more time with them than their families do
and you begin to care about them deeply and to to always after it happens the first few times
when someone that you know and you speak to every day passes away it's like it's a huge shock and
it's something about that realization when there is no longer a shock
and that was the moment I realized I've been here too long when I changed from talking about people
that I know and that I care about when I stop it saying that they've passed away that they've
died I stopped saying that and I started using the medical terminology which was they expired
that's when I knew I think I need to step away from this
it had become death had become way too clinical for me
wow yeah did you take time for yourself after that or you had to go into another job right away
I no I took a little time away I took a little time away as a matter of fact I
think that that was the impetus to make me say I really just want to focus on the arts I really
I started having conversations with people and
I don't know how it sounds now I really don't know because back then it was so clinical it
still feels clinical when I say it but I started telling people I've seen the end
live your life the way you want to go out because ultimately that's what's that's what we're all
doing we just don't know it but we're living our lives the way we want to go out so either
your mind's going to go first or your body but live your life the way you want to go out and
as I said that more I realize you know what I will start feeling that regret
that i'm not supposed to feel if I don't now start going 100 after my plan a
that's when you'll start having that regret when you see an opportunity that you let pass by um and
doing that actually led me into uh the film x-men at cutters creek they really did it was because I
left that and I just sat down and really just got back to writing and said I just want to pursue
this and I want to shoot a film by this date I want to forget everything I've been doing before
this and I want to shoot this film and so that's what I did I just devoted all my energy to that
and funny enough a doctor that I met actually ended up financing that film
and so it just worked out you know in that way but uh the impetus for that
the the thing that pushed me to get away from that and into this was that realization and sorry this
was the first Axeman the first example okay so 2012 2013 yeah we shot it in 2012 I believe yeah
2012 is when we actually shot it but before that it was it was me
writing and going to everyone and trying to figure out who was going to finance this thing and
you know it eventually worked out it was the first time I'd done that before that prior to that
everything I'd done was self-financed and then I just realized this one's too big of a film for
me to finance on my own and so I did go around looking for um you know a financier or producing
partner somebody to help me get the movie made and so you were we were coming out of a recession
and so with money was tight for a lot of these investors or yeah money was very tight and two
there's a certain amount of vanity and ego that comes along with I guess sometimes
financiers so that made it that made it a little tough it made it a little tough uh it was very
funny I learned a very an interesting lesson I have a buddy of mine and
and uh I don't mind mentioning his name he won't mind either his name is Eddie L. Watkins
and he's a very big stunt coordinator in the business and he's be producing now as well and
he was in these meetings with me as we were going around and everything and one of the one of the
investors said you know what I would just prefer if we do these scenes the way I’ve written and he
hands me pages that he's now written to rewrite my script right and so he hands me these pages and he
hands one to Eddie and we're in this meeting and Eddie doesn't even read it he just looks at me and
i'm reading him looking at Eddie and i'm like I don't understand why you would do this this is not
you know i'm trying to give him my notes on what he written and the guy is puffing up his chest and
you know he's doing those things and again Eddie's just watching and the guy won't accept any notes
he says to us look this is how the film needs to be written
if you want my money because he who makes the gold he who has the gold makes the rules guy
actually said that wow and Eddie without missing a beat says that's only if we want your gold
and I look at him are we walking and he says yeah we're walking that's it meeting over
and we literally walked out of the door and that was it I thought we finally had a guy
you know and he was you don't want to work with a guy like that because if you don't if
you can't get along with him now and if he has no flexibility now he'll have none during production
and he'll think that every idea is supposed to end up on the screen and that's not someone you
want to work with especially if their ideas don't work for the project and it was very funny because
walking away from that we eventually walked into the investor that we did use yeah it was
a very scary time because I walked away from that job and I spent a lot of time
trying to get the ball rolling but what I did was I took plan b and I tossed it
and everything that came below that no plan c d no escape routes no nothing I want to make this movie
and I want to make it next and that's exactly what happened because I didn't give myself an
alternative I didn't give myself you know a way out of it a way for it not to occur
when you met with the he who has the gold makes the rules person
how many investors in was that how many meetings in was that a first meeting no that was probably
our second okay that was probably our second or third yeah probably our second or third but you
you and and your your friend the stunt coordinator both just had like a gut reaction like
if it's bad now this is the honeymoon phase it's not going to be it's not going to improve
well here's here's the back story to that which is that Eddie has been in the industry forever
he started out as Eddie Murphy's bodyguard that's how he started out and eventually he got into the
industry as a stunt guy and he eventually got into the place where he now coordinates all the
stunts and he has just a long history in the film and he has a lot of experience so he gave me many
life lessons along the way but in this one he he'd done it so much where he didn't even need to read
the paper it didn't matter because this is the guy who wrote it and he knows if it's good or not
that was his only point I would know if it's good or not and if it's not appropriate for the film
we're not going to do it so that's that's how that decision got made.
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