Firstly, thank you for taking the time today to talk about ‘Call Girl’ and I’m sure you have read our review of the film (which you can find HERE).

 

Thank you

 

You have done a fantastic job with such a very short piece yet managed to cram in so much depth. So how did it all come about?

 

Well, the script was written by Eric Havens who is a good friend of mine. He sent me the script almost two years ago now and we were going to work on it together and it just got pushed to the background and after a while I asked Eric if I could make it he was like, “Hell yeah, go for it”. Then I started sending the script out and sent it to Laurence Harvey just to get his feedback on it, if it was any good and should I make it and that’s when he offered to be in it and I didn’t know what to do., I was so shocked.

 

A fantastic piece of talent to be involved, which flows into my next question quite nicely. With the two stars of ‘Call Girl’ from either side of the pond with Tristan Risk from Canada and Laurence from the UK which are two growing icons in the genre. How did you manage to get both of those together?

 

I feel like I was in the right place at the right time. I went to LA to visit Laurence and we went to the ‘American Mary’ screening there where I met the Soskas and Tristan and a few months later was when I was looking for the casting and Laurence had actually posted on Facebook that we were looking for a girl and Tristan responded. The whole thing for me was shocking, I was really nervous with myself being huge fans of both of them and being my first movie was worried that I didn’t know what I was doing and they did which is good but it made me very nervous. They both offered and wanted to work together really bad and the y way I could afford to bring them both here was to do a Kickstarter campaign and that went really well. Thanks to that we have this movie

 

Definitely, and now both can add to their résumé a fantastic piece on top of ‘The Human Centipede’ and ‘American Mary’. In terms of the horror community and how ‘Call girl’ has been received, how have you taken the response as we’ve not heard any negativity from the feedback of the film? How has that been for yourself?

 

All of our official reviews have been positive I feel like I need someone to write something really bad about it as I know it’s not perfect and all. It’s been very surreal, I feel like there’s so many great things happen with it I barely can absorb it but it’s great. It’s been non-stop ever since we finished the film and then the festivals and all kinds of stuff I know that I really have my cast to thank for that as they both already had a name, I definitely did not.

It’s been crazy, it makes me really anxious to make another film.

 

And obviously that will be the next challenge. Before we move on I would like to say a huge congratulations as the film has now been selected for this year’s FrightFest. Which has to be the Holy Grail for horror fans.

 

Thank you, that was like a dream of mine from the beginning from submitting to FrightFest, I just didn’t know if we had any chance at all and when I got that email I just lost it so it’s the most exciting thing that’s happened for sure.

 

As you said, it obviously puts a bit of pressure on the next movie you are going to make. Do you have any ideas on what the follow up will be?

 

Well I wanna make another short film. I feel inexperienced having that (‘Call Girl’) being my only movie. I’m working on a couple of scripts with the writer of ‘Call Girl’ with a few ideas. I’m not sure what I’m going to do next, I had one already but felt it was too similar so I’m not sure but I’m really excited to start.

 

So with ‘Call Girl’ being your first film the budget appears to be very well used. The location used in the film a piece of beauty, how did all the making up of that come about?

 

It changed quite a bit actually. At first I was going to use a totally different location and so glad everything changed. At first, even before I was going to cast Laurence, we were going to film in more of a loft style apartment and once I cast Laurence I didn’t think was as fitting. A friend of mine who was helping a lot with the film, it was her house. She has this beautiful house, over 100 years old and people ask her to use it all the time. Once I saw that room I was like, “This is perfect!”

 

I had my set dresser who was Brian Doel who’s great. His personal style is amazing, that’s why I asked him to do it after he’d decorated his place and went “I want your help dressing the set.” We found a lot of it is his stuff, and then some of it we just bought at random antique stores or thrift shops, just second hand stuff. But a lot of it’s his and he has great style. We’ve gotten a lot of compliments on the set and I’m very happy about that.

 

Actually in the bookshelf behind, I put a lot of different personal things just so I would know they’re there but no-one can ever see it. I like to do little things like that for myself as a memory.

 

Would we ever get the chance to see the Call Girl’s return?

 

We’ve thought about it. Eric Havens has been working on a feature version of the story. It’s like the short would barely be part of the film but relate to it in a way, I don’t want to spoil it. I actually haven’t read the full thing yet, he’s given me a lot of ideas but waiting very excitedly to read it.

 

There're two stories, there’s his story and her story. Where were they both before and after? There’s two totally different stories there.

 

We certainly look forward to where that goes next. I’ve read that you have also aided in a short for ‘The ABC’s of Death 2’?

 

Yeah, that was really exciting can’t say which one or who I worked for yet. They keep everything secret until it comes out. Even the actors can’t say what they did. I was hoping it would be out by now, I’m not sure when it’s supposed to come out.

 

Yeah, we were expecting it ready for Frightfest but it’s not shown on the line-up.

 

That’s what I was hoping! That maybe it might show while I was there, it would have been perfect. People need to catch another short film, it’s called ‘Pity’ by John Pata, I produced it. It came out around the same time as ‘Call Girl’ which is touring film festivals all over right now From a friend of mine a few states away, we worked a lot together.