11. May 2009 by admin.

Sorry for no blogging the last few days everybody.  I was out of town due to outside obligations of Water Cooler Productions and never got in front of a computer to blog.

I will start off with bad news (sigh)… Chemical 12-D did not land the actor we wanted because her contract with a television show did not allow her to do horror/thriller stuff.  I won’t name the actress but it sucks that people can partially own your artisitic choices as an individual.  Before encountering this actress, I didn’t even know shit was like that within actors contract’s.  Regardless, I will have a cement cast by Wednesday night so I can move forward with the film and have rehearsal the next night.

For more positive news, I have heard the SFX meeting went well for the 12-D this weekend.  As I said, I was out of town and couldn’t attend.  I guess the producer of the film (David Wagenaar) was confident enough in a few things for the project that he decided to throw a couple extra bucks into the budget so we could a few more things special effects wise easier and more efficent.  Its exciting but still nerve wrecking for me due to the fact I am unsure of how long shooting this project will take (another reason I’m nervous is because I have yet to get a full cast done and I am less than two weeks away from production).

I’ll start updating again daily (or to the best of my abilities) because I’m back in town now.  My appologies for that.  Take it easy.

-Mac Eldridge

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7. May 2009 by admin.

I’m a bit upset with myself that I am still casting for Chemical 12-D with roughly two weeks to go before principal photography begins.  However, we are in works with an actress who is really great and we landed an actor who will really bring our main character to life.  God willing the actress works out so then I can cast the kid I want to play our supporting role.

I mentioned in the previous blog that I was hoping to throw up some stuff from the auditions yesterday.  Sadly, I couldn’t get a hold of a camera to film everything but it is ok due to the very few people we auditioned.  Maybe I can record a rehearsal we have so you guys can see the process of filming and how it all goes down.  Just know that we are still working on getting the rest of our cast solidifed and our crew list should be done tomorrow.  Also, the story boarding and shot sheets have been completed so we are just a few steps away from production.

As  for other news in Water Cooler Productions, we’re shooting our Timothy O’Toole’s commercial tonight from 12:30AM to 2:00AM.  It’ll be the first commercial we’ve ever done (God willing everything goes OK) and if you want to be an extra, come on down to Timothy O’Tooles at 5572 Grand Avenue in Gurnee, Illinois!  We’ll have the commercial done in hopefully a week so once it’s finished, you guys will get to see it first.  Take it easy.

-Mac Eldridge

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6. May 2009 by admin.

Big day today for Water Cooler Productions

We’re auditioning a few actors for Chemical 12-D today.  I think I’m going to bring a video camera with me and upload some of the stuff for shits and giggles to show you guys what it is like to run a casting session for student projects (that meaning, not everybody is all that good). Don’t get me wrong, I respect and admire anyone who tries to get into the acting business.  They are putting themselves in a job where they are told they are too fat, skinny, short, or tall among many other things for roles on a constent basis and that really sucks.  They choose a career where getting chopped down and rejected is a common thing and they just have to live with it and go to the next audition.  I’m a director who actually loves working with actors so don’t think me possibly putting up some footage of the auditions is bashing anyone, just an informitive piece on what it is like to cast a project.

I’ll tell you guys how the session goes and if I feel OK doing it, then I’ll throw up a video of the whole process.

-Mac Eldridge

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4. May 2009 by admin.

Hey all,

I don’t  know how many of you are on facebook but we at Water Cooler Productions have just started a new page on facebook.  It is to really help our numbers for Messiah and future projects to make sure they have an audience.  It will be very hard but I would like to see the member page get up to 1,000 people by the time we release Messiah.  That is roughly 3 weeks to get it to that and I am not sure if it can be done, but damn it, we can try right?

So what I am asking out of all of you is to send a group invite to all of your friends on facebook in order to try to build a fanbase so our future projects can be succesful.  Right now is a crucial time for getting Water Cooler Productions off of the ground and we can use everyone’s help and support to make sure that it happens.  You all can check out the Water Cooler Productions page on Facebook by clicking here.  We can do get 1,000 members, so lets start now.

Thanks everybody

-Mac Eldridge

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4. May 2009 by admin.

Quick blog,

I haven’t thrown up any pictures or videos yet on the blog that I have advertised or especially made a blog for.  Well, here is the first one.  It is small enough to throw on here without whoring it out via facebook and what have you.  It was for my production I class where we (my crew) had to develop a one-shot.  Each crew had a director that had to be chosen.  And with me being a huge one-shot guy, I volunteered myself.  This is what I came up with.  I imagined everyone in the class doing something that progressed the narrative on-screen so I thought I would benefit myself to tell the story (or at least a part of it) all off screen.  What I came up with I was pretty happy about although the shot wasn’t to extensive or anything that required only a few in-camera tricks to make it work out (no worries, it is a true one-shot).  All in all, the project worked out pretty well and my only regret was not having a SFX person on set to bloody me up in the start of the shot and to not have real actors so the project could have been taken a bit more seriously.  Regardless, I thought it was small enough, short enough, and fun enough to put on here.  So, fellow readers, I present to you, Run.

Click on the image to play the short on youtube.

Enjoy.

-Mac Eldridge

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4. May 2009 by admin.

But, I have been a relatively busy person.  So where to start?

Well, first, we got the commercial deal done to help advertise Messiah.   And now, since everything is set to happen, I can say who will be our lone advertiser for the project.  The pub, Timothy O’Toole’s, will be letting Water Cooler Productions shoot them a comercial and play it in front of every episode of Messiah.  It’s a viral marketing thing that will hopefully get them a great commercial and some more regular customers.  We’ll be shooting it Thursday night at their Gurnee location this Thursday night from roughly 9PM to 2AM so if you want to be an extra, be sure to come by for a great time!

Next, I met with Ken, a special effects person who will be working on our next short film, Chemical 12-D.  You can see some of Ken’s past work by checking out this film Fast Zombies With Guns.  Its a good time with lots and lots of blood (done by him, respectively).  Along with him, we will be having a SFX meeting this Friday so our four SFX team can meet for the first time and really get a good idea of what we will be doing for the shoot.  If anyone is at all intersted, you can see Water Cooler Production’s first attempt at a zombie short film by clicking here to see In A State Of.  We made it when we were back in high school and I still find it fun to watch just as others have told me.  Maybe it’ll end up as a special feature on the Chemical 12-D DVD.

Well, I think that just about does it as for all of what I can say.  I’ll be sure to keep up with the blogging better than I have in the last few days.  My appologies for that.  Oh, and tomorrow I’ll post up a one minute short I did for a class.  Its small time stuff but fun to watch regardless.  Take care.

-Mac Eldridge

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29. April 2009 by admin.

Our adventure into the short script Chemical 12-D has officially begun at a fast pace.  David Wagenaar (my D.P/ producer) and I have decided to make this our most complete project thus far and make it something we can really show around to a lot of people and get into some fests.  David has some auditions to do tomorrow as I will be in Gurnee in a business meeting in order to try to build this movie a budget.  It is an exciting time right now and I hope things go accordingly (however I shouldn’t plan it because we are talking about making a movie).

So I will keep you all updated on the events that unfold to making this movie.  Currently, as of today, we are in figuring out which rental house to get our equipment from (we aren’t giving away what we’re renting, we rather have everyone surprised by the images) and we are also getting insurance for the film (another 1st for Water Cooler Productions).  As I said, David will be doing some auditioning tomorrow as I will be story boarding the rest of the short that I haven’t already done.  You should all be expecting a bit of a difference from our other shorts with this one partially because it is our first legit short horror film and also because of how I am changing my style of direction a bit.  I will keep you all updated.

-Mac Eldridge

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27. April 2009 by admin.

I just got back from wrapping on Messiah!  I can’t tell you how happy (and yet sad) I am to see that movie get finished.  As I said in a previous blog, it was something that I have taken on since late December to make sure it gets finished. And, as we wrapped today on the last insert we needed, I was a bit bummed.  I worked with some great actors and added some great crew to Water Cooler Productions because of this production and it really sucks to say we wrapped on the project.  However, I am so relieved to get it done because we have been shooting since the first week of February and because of scheduling, it took this long to get it done.  Anyway, I am pumped yet sad to see the production wrap but I am so happy to announce our next project:

Messiah II: Come Again?

Just fucking with you.  In all seriousness it will be the zombie film I wrote Chemical 12-D and it will star a whole cast that I have never worked with.  That is only because I wrote roles for ages that we have never worked with.  Hopefully we’ll take the next step up picture wise and it is something that is totally for internet/ film fest type of thing.  I’ll keep you updated on that and when Messiah will get an official release date (we are hoping for May 10th still, mind you).  Thanks to everyone who made this great production happen (even Billy).

 -Mac Eldridge

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26. April 2009 by admin.

The title of this blog is a little deceiving.

I am a big fucking fan of the guy since I first saw Slither opening weekend.  It is a movie I have grown to love even more since it’s release and I think it’s one of those movies that will never get as much praise as it should.  His PG-Porn stuff is also funny shit and man, who doesn’t love Scooby Doo?

Anyway, he is one of the few people who have a message board on his site where he has a forum dedicated to Q and A.  I was surprised by this and checked it out.  To my surprise, he actually answers every fucking question that goes up there!  I was stunned by how dedicated to the site he is and I was also surprised he has time to answer all of the questions due to the amount of series he has his hands in currently.  So, I decided to sign up to his webpage and ask him a question just to ask him a question.  I have provided the conversation below just for fellow up and coming film makers who are interested in the “pitching” proccess and what internships are all about in L.A.  I am relatively sure the conversation is now over so I am pasting it as far as it has gone.  If anything else happens, I’ll update my blog with what he says.  Its some pretty intersting shit.

___

Me:

Mr. Gunn,

Hello, my name is Mac Eldridge and I attend DePaul University majoring in cinema. To cut to the chase, I remember you saying you don’t have too much experience in finding agents and such like that as they had came to you. However, I am assuming you had to pitch the idea of Slither to the studio execs at Universal. If this is the case, I was wondering how you as the writer and director pitched the project to them. What did you have to show them and what did you do to get people in on the project and give you money to make Slither?. I have an interview/ pitch to a local production team to direct their full feature and the best thing I can think of is show them some of my past work and essentially just sell myself. Can you offer any better advice? I appreciate and thank you for your time. I hope to eventually collaborate with you one day.

Mac Eldridge

 JG:

Hey Mac -

No, I never pitched the idea of SLiTHER to anyone. I wrote the script on my own, and my agents sent it out on a Thursday night. But Friday morning, I had two places that wanted to make it, and I decided to go with Gold Circle/Universal.

However, I’ve had to do a LOT of pitches — but they’ve always been script pitches. I’ve never had to pitch myself as a director because I’ve only been attached to direct stuff I had written or was going to write (Slither, Pets, Belcoo, Super, essentially).

I’m guessing you’re just pitching yourself as a director. In that case, you need to show them your other work — that will likely be 80% of them deciding whether they want you or not, so remember that. After that, they mostly will want to see you as an intelligent, strong person whom they can trust. And, finally, you’ll want to describe to them accurately how you see the movie — what’s the tone, the shooting style, the color palette. Compare it to other films (and only other films that are extremely successful). If they like you’re work, your take, and you come off as competent, you stand a good chance of getting they job.

If you’re pitching them a script idea, it’s a completely different story. If you are, let me know, and I’ll give you that (Linda, try and leave this unlocked).

Me:

As I am not an arrogant ass, I know what I am good at and I am not a strong screenwriter. So, no, I never tried to pitch a script that I wrote beyond the confines of submitting a production packet where I wasn’t able to talk to the exec. producers of the project… It would seem as if getting an agent is my number one goal then based off of your response. I know how to talk to people but I enjoy the idea of someone else selling me and what I do. If you don’t mind me starting another question in this thread, can I ask how exactly did you get agents to come to you? Did you create a short film or script that sent shock waves through agencies?

JG:

First, you will ALWAYS need to sell yourself, no matter what. It’s a talent to cultivate. Talented people have lost good gigs to some doof who knows how to talk the talk many times — every day in fact.

As far as the agencies, yes, I wrote a script that acted virally. I gave it to some people who weren’t even in the industry, who gave it to others, than others, and so on, until I have all the major agencies trying to get me to sign. All you have to do is one really good thing. I, like most screenwriters, agents, and even screenwriting books (I just read it in SAVE THE CAT recently) think that the great, undiscovered screenplay is largely a myth. People are dying to find good screenplays, as they’re difficult to come by (and difficult to write).

All of the above could also be said about short films, too.

I also have to say I don’t really know what a “production packet” is. I get a lot of questions from people who are talking to people about making a film, and I don’t really understand who they’re talking to. Things are generally very simple. There are two ways to sell a script: you either write a spec script, send it out and sell it, or you go somewhere and pitch it, and you sell it. (For instance, I get a lot of questions about sending treatments to people — I’m sure it exists, but I don’t personally know a single person who has sold a script based on a synopsis or treatment. It’s always through a pitch or finished script.)

To get hired as a director, you have to take a meeting about a script, describe what you want to do with it, and get hired, or you get attached to it beforehand because you have a track record as a director (generally doesn’t happen with newby directors).

When I hear something that doesn’t fit into that system, then I wonder if there’s something else going on. Is there a “producer” who really doesn’t know what the fuck he or she is doing? Is there some mis-perception on the part of the writer or director? I really am not sure.

This is a good thread, Mac. If you have more questions, post them here.

Me:

I’ve assembled a production packet a few times to bring to meetings with me to show I did my homework on what I want to do. Generally, I bring the script that I made my notes in to go over everything, I bring some of my story boards, and, after hearing how Robert Rodriguez got Frank Miller to let him make Sin City, I try to shoot a small scene to show exactly what I want to do. It always works out as a “leave behind.” I guess what I try to do with all the shit I bring is to show I’m a responsible guy who has his life indulged in the project I am getting attached to. Sadly, I haven’t had the opportunity (partly due to my young age of 20 and partly due to the fact I live in Chicago, not LA) to really try to pitch my directing abilities and myself to anyone bigger than a small production team.

Since you’re letting me ask more questions, I want to ask about internships. If I remember correctly, I believe you started at Troma with an internship and ended up writing Tromeo and Juliet. If this is true, how did you get your internship? I want to get out to LA as soon as this summer to get out there and start making connections. Can you offer any advice on this?

Oh, and I read SAVE THE CAT last year for a screenwriting class. Good read, I don’t know how you feel about such tight structure like that, but it works for me whenever I have to write something.

JG:

No, I was never an intern at Troma. I was hired to write TROMEO & JULIET (for 150 bucks), and then was hired to be the head of production at Troma. My brother’s boss, a programmer at Cinemax, helped me to get an interview, and that’s how I got the writing job initially.

I don’t know how much things have changed in almost 15 years, but if you had a good resume that made you look intelligent, and you were willing to work for absolutely free, you had a chance at an internship. It’s difficult work, but I think it’s well worth it.

When you get out to L.A., just let everyone you know you’re willing to work for free. There’s a good chance you can get an internship somewhere. Internships are vastly undervalued in comparison to film school, but they give you the ability to actually be inside the business, see what it’s like, see if it’s actually for you - even if you’re just handing out mail or stacking boxes or making people’s phone calls.

I was just looking over STC - I didn’t read the whole thing, but plan on it. Even today, I think there’s little things I can pick up from a book like that, even if I don’t agree with most of it or some of it.

You’re 20. Be willing to take your time and sow your seeds. I know you’ll hate to hear what I have to say next, just like I did when someone said it to me, but you have to be willing to wait ten years to really do what you want. It might take less time then that, who knows. But people willing to really put in the time and effort are usually the people who make it. You seem to have a good start, just keep moving forward, one step at a time.

Me:

Being 20 I could not say how much things have changed since you were around my age. However, after speaking to a few people out in L.A, it seems that things have to had change a little bit. I say that because I sent my resume to someone who runs a production team in L.A so he can hand it off to get me on set as a P.A of a big production and he said my resume would do me no good. He stressed to me it was about who I knew and resumes won’t help anyone. Now, he could be wrong and totally off the wall but I found that to ring true. Regardless, I am ready to be poor for the next ten years (or even longer) and do anything to make things work out. I don’t really have any other general questions that I can ask you on here but thanks for your time. I really appreciate the detailed answers you provided and I thank you for all of the advice. I’m confident we’ll meet sometime down the road again (I met you at the Fangoria convention in Chicago when you were promoting Slither).

Oh, and I can see why you would disagree with some things in SAVE THE CAT. Its a template as to how to write a script but, for people like me who enjoy creating order within chaos, I dug it and what it was saying.

____

So, there you have it.  Just thought I’d share it with everyone because I think its a pretty cool thing for someone to talk to his fans, thats all.

-Mac Eldridge

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25. April 2009 by admin.

I have finally had to give up on getting my 16MM/HD project made.  It was a project that I really believed in but in the end, if I am unsure about something, I won’t do it.  In this project’s case, it was budget and I won’t get people involved and waste more time than they already have.  What will happen now is the writer and I will work together and make the script stronger and better until we have something amazing and will try our best to film it next fall.  I can’t really blame anyone in the project not coming to life as it was just a bad time to try to make our most expensive film.  I feel bad for having people spend time on essentially nothing however the project will eventually be done because it is something I truly believe in.

So what is next for Water Cooler Productions?  Well, we got a few things happening with crew members outside of Water Cooler Productions and we have a few things happening in association with other production teams throughout Chicago.  For one, I am trying to get myself attached to direct my first feature and I can’t say much beside that.  I’ll keep you all updated if anything transpires with that.  Also, we got a zombie film I wrote being produced right now called Chemical 12-D.  It is a script I’m starting to believe in more and more.  Outside of a few other small projects, we are doing some commercials and stuff for a few businesses throughout Chicago.  Keep in touch with us so we can update you all on what is going on.

-Mac Eldridge

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