Film Courage: Whether you were writing SEARCH AND RESCUE or just in general, do you rely
on certain structure to help you start the screenplay, finish the screenplay?
Jack Perez, Filmmaker: Do you mean a book for the source material or a book for inspiration?
Film Courage: A writing book for inspiration.
Jack: Well, you know there is one book that (I’ve probably mentioned this before) one
book by Stephen King On Writing [A Memoir To The Craft: On Writing] which was key when
I started to sit down and do SEARCH AND RESCUE.
I don’t know why because Valerie did not point me to that book but I think somebody
introduced it to me or I just came across it right at the point where I was like “How
am I going to do this?
Am I really going to commit?
Am I going to do this?”
And then I read that book by Stephen King which is this really thin book by Stephen
King.
Have you read it?
Film Courage: Yes and it’s great.
And he talks about his life.
It’s not just a ‘how-to-book.’
Jack: Right.
It’s not just one of these “This is how you write a book or a screenplay.”
It was very conversational like his stuff is.
It was very unpretentious and it some how demystified it and made it easier to start.
So that book was really key because I felt like I just needed to…It just seemed less
complicated then reading one of these classic screenwriting books “Where’s the inciting
incident?”
And things like that.
It wasn’t any of that stuff.
It was just “This is how I do it.”
It works for me and maybe it will work for you?
And that was key and I actually recommend that book when people say “What’s the
book?”
That’s the book I recommend for writers.
Film Courage: Yes I thought it was good too and I forgot exactly how he says it (it’s
been a few years since I read it) when it actually became a writer (he was hired) and
it was difficult to finish things without substances and all of that.
And you wouldn’t think that this would be a problem because all of us are waiting to
get to that level where we don’t have to have a day job.
And then he talks about not having a day job and having to be disciplined and things like
that.
That’s a problem I think a lot of us don’t think about.
Jack: No, no and also there’s a pressure now you’re not…now you are this thing,
you are this professional thing so you’re are expected to deliver you know?
I just think he made it easy for the prospective writer to realize that yes this is probably
in you and you just have to be serious about it and get down to business.
And it’s the unofficial-ness of it or not mathematical step-by-step process that I think
made the book good.
It spoke to me anyway because I didn’t think that way anyway.
I didn’t naturally feel like I needed to outline every single scene of the movie before
I wrote it.
And in a way it started to kill any of the joy because writing is so hard.
To me the discovery of the piece as you write it as one of the most enjoyable parts of writing
for me because otherwise you’re just executing something that has already been formed and
to a certain degree that’s what you’re doing when you’re making a film but there
is such a translation from the word to the image with actors and everything, it’s such
a huge translation that doesn’t feel boring.
Although I heard that Hitchcock used to say that by the time I made the movie it was so
designed I was bored to death because I knew it so well that I didn’t even want to show
up, it was done in my head.
But for writing I felt that it was so laid out that I would just be a slave to this outline…now
I’ve got to write this scene…now I’ve got to write that scene.
As opposed to something that would sort of reveal itself.
So that to me is like the coolest part of writing is when the story starts to reveal
itself.
So that to me is like the coolest part of writing when the story starts to reveal itself
to you it becomes a living thing.
Film Courage: Have you ever followed a strict routine?
You seem like maybe you vacillate?
Jack: Yes it depends on the situation.
With SEARCH AND RESCUE I knew if I didn’t get up every day and write, I wouldn’t do
it.
It would never get done.
Almost did it so I could just get it over with you know what I mean?
If you just get up and do it…that’s the math I did.
If I can write three pages a day, it’s finite.
That means if I can only have the burden of writing three pages, after 40 days or whatever
it will be done at least there will be something done.
So just like a diet or something just do it.
Nobody wants to do it but I can do it for a month, I can actually do it for a month.
Now that’s why (going back to the “real writer”) a “real writer” stays on that
diet their whole life, they just keep doing it.
But I also think that the “real writer” is addicted in the way that a filmmaker is.
In other words it can’t just be a chore.
As much as a writer will say it’s hard, it can’t be a chore.
It has to be an addiction or else you will not (just like going to the gym for a lot
of people is an addiction).
There is something in the adrenaline, you just get jacked up and now you need to do
this thing so I didn’t continue that once I started writing this script it was like
now I have to think about how I’m going to make it.
That’s why I don’t say I’m a classic writer because if that was the case I would
just put that away and start writing the next thing.
But to me it’s just the step (necessary step) so I can now set about making the movie.
So that’s where I am and I went through the writing process so I could make the movie.
Film Courage: And you have a campaign on Indiegogo.
Jack: Yes, we have an Indiegogo campaign, it’s continuing until the end of October
[2018].
And everything is one there…that was another thing it was like what does it take to make
an Indiegogo campaign?
Well it takes at least this, this, this, and this.
I mean it can be different for everybody but for the people who were working with me they
were like we really have to spend a month or two at least two months of just producing
content that sets up the campaign in other words a building an awareness.
And how are you going to build an awareness?
Are you just going to comment that I’ making a movie or do you or in our case create a
lot of videos, sort of mini teases and sort of aspects of the story and also my biography
as a filmmaker and some of the films I made, it was a production of two months before we
even launched the campaign and then it was all the videos that had to be created for
the campaign itself and even then there is no guarantee how much you’re going to get
but at least I had to put my best foot forward as best a job as I could producing that stuff.
So that’s what we did.
Film Courage: Do you have a target date?
Jack: I want to shoot in January.
I want to shoot the film in January and I think that’s doable.
And like I said the actors are on board.
Kevin Corrigan, Lucy Davis and Barry Bostwick are all on board (Alan Havey just joined the
cast).
And that cast will continue to grow.
And as soon as we are greenlit (fully greenlit) I know we are making it on this day I know
we are actually going to get bigger names to come in because there are a lot of animal
loving celebrities in this town and I’m sure they will want to get involved in the
picture if it’s actually happening and they only have to come in for a day or two.
But January is what we’re shooting for.
Film Courage: Here in LA?
Jack: Yes partly in LA (the movie is set in LA).
But again like all independent filmmakers we will just go where the dollar stretches
farthest.
We actually shot the teaser in Oakland and that’s where a lot of technicians and people
and I had some infrastructure there.
So we may actually shoot a chunk of it in Oakland (in the Bay Area) and here.
But you know, it’s a small budget so you want to stretch the money.
Film Courage: Sure.
And so the crowdfunding campaign most of it goes to production or will some of it go to
post?
Jack: Well it’s all toward production, just the means of making the movie.
And I just have to think about if we get enough to get it in the can, then that’s what we’ll
do.
Then we’ll put it in the can and then use that material to (if we have to) raise the
additional money.
But I think that the most important part of the entire process for anybody is that putting
it into play because there is every reason because there is a million reasons to not
do it.
For most people it is just the fear of it not happening (or maybe it won’t happen)
and the second I committed to the idea but that itself (and this is not a new concept)
but that in and of itself (that mindset) attracted people to the project and it started to get
its own momentum going and building bit by bit, person by person, dollar by dollar.
You just keep going.
So I was very grateful that I was just able to put it into play.
There’s a dog [referring to dog barking], the dog agrees.