Film Courage: Shane in your new book What You Don’t Learn In Film School was there
a chapter or section that sparked controversy?
Shane Stanley, Filmmaker/Author/Instructor: Oh absolutely.
I think the most controversial chapter in the book is the one that is the most important
is to get out, dig ditches, get your hands dirty and make yourself available and whatever
it takes to get on a set within your morals, values, and ethics parameter to go do it.
And when I came up as we talked about how I made phone calls and hustled to get work
and get on sets, I worked for free, I brought my own lunch.
I showed up first and left last.
I was sweeping floors when it wasn’t in my job description and I have close friends
that our generation grew up…you know I have a friend whose father one two oscars and his
mother has nine Emmys…you want to talk about nepotism?
And when he got his act together like I did he said Hey you know you want to work in this
business I want to be an editor, mom picked up the phone, made a phone call “Okay, he’ll
be there tomorrow.
Two o’clock, perfect, thank you.”
Click.
“You’ve got a job.
You’re sweeping floors at color.
You’re getting paid nothing, pack a lunch, dear.”
And he swept floors for two years and he didn’t have a problem with that.
He thought that’s normal.
I had won Emmys at a young age and started over and we talked about not being able to
make rent?
Where there was something called Crew Call back then when I was coming up and you would
literally subscribe for like $50 a month, you would call an 800 number, and you would
say press one for camera, two for sound, three for electric and you would press these things
that you could do and then you would hear about jobs and you would write it down and
it would be a fax number and you would fax your resume.
You would spend a day a week doing that and pray your phone rang and sometimes it wouldn’t.
So a friend would call and say Hey I need a swing in the camera department tomorrow.
I pay lunch.
You in it or out?
And I was like “Yeah, I’m there.”
The biggest problem I have today is when I talk to film schools or when people read that
chapter about having to invest in yourself and build your resume.
You know so many people in my opinion in film school are sold on hopes and dreams and being
the next Tarantino or Damien Chazelle and my advice is well if that doesn’t happen,
what’s the game plan?
So get out, learn camera, learn sound, learn editing, learn grip, learn gaff, learn AC,
whatever you can and if somebody can’t pay you to do something and you have an opportunity
to make new contacts, learn and be on a set, something good will come from that.
Would you rather sit home and play on your phone, play Xbox or watch repeated streaming
shows that you’ve seen six times?
You want to get out and make new contacts and I find a lot of people think that’s
not the way to do it.
And I also think well okay over 85% of people who spend money and graduate from film schools
never earn a dime in our industry and there’s a reason for it and that’s because they’re
uneducated on how to make their lives work and how to build a career base and contacts
and become steady earners in our business and the way did it and the way I know a lot
of people who did it was they got out there and they proved their worth by hustling.
And some of the best workers like we just finished a film called BREAK EVEN that comes
out, some of the best workers on that film were the interns from [Los Angeles] Pierce
College.
There’s a kid that stands out.
He worked so hard every day, never said a word, head down, he anticipated everybody’s
needs, he was the guy that was cleaning up everybody’s trash at the end of the night,
showed up on days he wasn’t supposed to be there just because he wanted to check in
saying I’m coming in tomorrow, does anybody need anything.
What I always tell people is when you make a movie and you’re trying to carve your
way, make it so the decision makers don’t want to make a movie without you and every
time you do a film you sure meet a lot of people you never want to make another movie
with but it’s nice when you see those one or two diamond in the rough that you say “I
want to bring them back.”
And they were somebody who was a PA, they were an assistant, they were a runner.
I think if people take that approach as I say in the book whenever you offer somebody
a job it’s “What’s my credit?
What’s my pay?”
It’s always the first question “What’s my credit?
What’s my pay?”
And I think it needs to be okay…take a breath and think about what the experience will do
for you.
In the same chapter I talk about the best thing I ever did for my career was say yes
to something I knew nothing about, I did it for free and it took up a month an a half
of my life and that was going to Bally, Indonesia with Zalman King when he directed IN GOD’S
HANDS.
Zalman had seen my work ethic around a sounds stage he owned in Canoga Park [Los Angeles,
California].
I was sleeping floors and he walked in and he goes I thought you were producing or doing
something more important.
I said “Yeah, everybody left.
I wanted to leave your studio the way we found it.”
And he says “What’s your name?”
And he came over and talked to me.
We befriended each other and visited on set and the next thing you know he called me up
and said Hey, what are you doing in November or December?
I said “I don’t know, what do you got?”
And he said Well I’m doing a film in Bally, I think you should come.
I said Do What?
And he said Shadow me, learn.
He says I’ll offer you a free education working with me and we’ll feed you and travel
you, you figure out the rest.
He didn’t pay me a dime and it was like talk about film school.
You’re sitting next to Zalman friggin’ King as he is directing a movie for a major
studio and I was on his hip for a month and a half doing that.
I learned more by just saying yes.
I didn’t ask would I get a credit?
Would I get paid?
They limo-ed me to the airport and first class me round trip and gave me my own bungalow
in a five-story resort.
I didn’t ask for any of that.
For all I knew I’d be sleeping in a tube tent on the side of the mountain, but they
took care of me.
And I think that’s the attitude.
Obviously you don’t want to be taken advantage of.
You don’t want to get into a situation that’s not healthy but there seems to be such resistance
in getting out and experiencing work without worrying about pay.
There’s too many people that will do it.
Film Courage: Do you think that’s because for our generation (Gen X) that there wasn’t
the term “intern” and let’s play the devil’s advocate…yes interns can be taken
advantage of in terms of people using free labor and stringing them along and not [eventually]
giving them a job.
Is that what they’re afraid of?
Shane: I don’t know.
I think honestly as a society we have become pretty tender, I think we’ve become very
sensitive.
I think people are afraid of exploitation which I think is something we all need to
consider but I know I’ve got a nephew who worked is you-know-what off working for a
financial institution in Arizona (Scottsdale), working 18 hours a day, getting their lunch,
cleaning up their mess, getting them coffee.
He didn’t get paid much at all but now he’s an actual worker in that industry and he used
that after college, it wasn’t for college credit.
He graduated college, his dad made a few phone calls and said you’re going to go sweat,
you’re going to wear a tie and you’re going to go ride their wave, you’re not
going to get paid, you’re going to learn.
It happens in other industries but it just seem in ours I think it’s because the hours
are abused.
In a normal workplace it’s an 8-hours workday with an hour break.
In film it’s 10 to 12 if you’re lucky and I think people are afraid they’re going
to be working 16-18 hours a day as free labor.
So it’s hard to say why but I never questioned that.
Maybe it was just the fact that I could be on a set and make connections and learn and
I always figured well I could sit at home and wait for the phone to ring or I could
be on a set and meet a director or a producer who may find my job skills necessary to bring
me to the next journey and then make a great connection and say “By the way I have a
script.
By the way I also do camera, can I get an opportunity.”
And it doesn’t happen by sitting at home, it just doesn’t.
Film Courage: Great…excellent.
Shane: At least I don’t think it does.
I mean you can upload to Youtube and Vimeo until you’re blue in the face.
Film Courage: Yes but working around people is a different experience absolutely.
There is good and bad with that.
Shane: The best gigs and best opportunities I ever had in my life were showing up and
working hard and proving myself as a worker who was competent and the people in the decision-making
capacities going out of their way to say Hey…you know…I appreciate your work today.
Thank you.
We’ve got something coming up next week, I want to get you on that and then they start
to appreciate you and you work these gigs and the next thing you know you have an audience,
you have an ear with the decision makers and when you want to move up in the world or they
know people who will benefit by knowing you.
That’s all it is in this business.
Question for the Viewers: When starting out what matters more ‘credit and pay’ or
‘experience?’