• MIA: Inhabitance Bad

Scrooge

In order to fully grasp all the troubles that came from Scrooge, it's best to know the full story behind Inhabitance Bad.  Luckily that article was posted a few days ago and can be accessed by clicking here.

A lot was learned from our experiences with Inhabitance Bad.  Unfortunately, Josh Nichols and I didn't quite grasp those lessons until much later on.  So really Scrooge ended up being the new Inhabitance Bad.  Mistakes were repeated and some new blunders were thrown into the mix as well.  While Inhabitance Bad created the stress and distrust amongst our group, Scrooge added to it exponentially.  You may think that we are horrible people due to this project and Inhabitance Bad turning out to be complete disasters.  However, Scrooge was essential to the evolution of Lilredhead Studios for it showed we needed to change our ways or quit making films altogether.  Fortunately, we chose the former even though that came close to not being the case.

It was early November of 2004 and Inhabitance Bad was trying to keep its ugly head above water.  Meanwhile, mainly due to our problems with Inhabitance Bad, Josh Nichols was struck with inspiration.  There were many organizations at Dickinson State University that were able to request funds and use facilities on campus.  So why not start a film club and get the same benefits?  The idea had been casually passed around before but Josh, being the motivated young chap he was, took the initiative and wrote up a proposal for a filmmakers club.  Before I knew it, mid-November had rolled around and Josh was pushing this whole concept on me.  Although I wanted a filmmakers club on campus, there was a problem with Josh's proposal and that was he wanted to be President while I took his side as Vice President.  This was the same problem repeating itself all over again, except this time instead of fighting over script ideas we would be fighting over creative control of the films we produced.  Now, please keep in mind, that this was not the case once the club established itself, but at the time my close mindedness led me astray.  As a matter of a fact Josh stated several times that the title "President" was just a title and nothing more but I refused to believe it.  I wasn't the only one who had this mind set either, as a matter of a fact one person was so pissed off about this movement that by the time Scrooge was canceled he would end up disbanding from the group.  But after mulling it over I figured if I didn't like how things were going, I would simply quit.  I didn't need Josh, he was a newbie who ruined the Inhabitance Bad script (again, not true, it's just what I thought at the time).  So with all this in mind and against some of my friends' wishes, I agreed to be Vice President of the newly formed DSU Filmmakers Organization, the first meeting was scheduled for late November, and the nightmare known as Scrooge began.

The first meeting of the club was pretty uneventful.  It took place in a classroom and the people who did show up didn't seem all too interested in what we had to say (although I can't blame them).  At the end of the meeting we talked about movies and spoke of future projects.  Our hope was to make a movie that could be submitted to a film festival.  We brainstormed for a while and nothing seemed to stick.  But suddenly an idea hit me.  Since it was so close to Christmas, I thought about A Christmas Carol (a favorite of mine).  I mentioned possibly doing a remake.  Josh and I started talking and before we knew it an idea to do a musical Christmas Carol parody was born.  The idea was to film this 50 some paged script during Christmas break, edit it in January and have the movie ready to ship to a festival by February.  Yes, we made this movie for the sole purpose to submit something to a festival and if you're a filmmaker you should be laughing your ass off at the absurdity of this mission.

What's funny is that my involvement with Scrooge and the DSU Filmmakers almost ended before it started.  Once things started to get rolling in pre-production Josh did what he does best and that is take charge of hectic situations.  When hammering out ideas there were some fights as to how things should be done.  They were minor arguments, nothing compared to Inhabitance Bad, but they were there.  And the memory of Inhabitance Bad was still burning inside me.  Before the script was officially done, Josh and I began searching out costumes.  The DSU Fine and Performing Arts Department had a costume shop dedicated to the production of their plays.  This meant we had to go through the lady in charge of the custom shop (she also designs the costumes for the DSU plays).  This was a battle in itself.  Here we were, two disorganized nobodies with no idea what we were doing, barging into the costume shop and grabbing what we could.  It's no wonder the costume designer was pissy with us.  Although at the time I just thought she was completely unreasonable.  Looking back I can't really blame her for distrusting and not really liking us but since then our relationship has improved.  But with the story squabbles, costume troubles, and the reality setting in that I was in for another nightmarish Josh-involved project, I started having second thoughts about everything.  After a talk with one of my friends (and old time crew member who later on disbanded after Scrooge), he convinced me that it may be time to accept that Josh will never be an asset to us and to forget about Scrooge, forget about the DSU Filmmakers Organization, and start over completely.  I remember this clearly because we were up in the costume shop when it took place.  When my friend left and Josh came up to the shop to start costume hunting, I was not motivated at all.  As a matter of a fact I had no opinion whatsoever as to what costumes best suited what.  Josh would ask me something and I would respond with a "whatever" or "it's up to you".  Basically, I was acting like a child.  Josh caught onto this quickly and as we were dumping garbage bags of costumes into the trunk of his car he finally asked me what the hell was wrong.  "We need to talk", I said in a not so happy tone.  Josh and I sat down at a table outside and what is now known as "The Talk" began.  As the conversation started I told Josh I wanted him to take over the project completely, that I had no desire to continue on with it.  When he inquired why I told him the truth and that was I thought he was over extending his power and taking it over anyway.  Now based on the past three months of our work relationship, you'd think that this would have blown up into a huge argument and we would have started slapping each other (we can't punch because we're wussies).  However, the conversation went over very well.  We calmly expressed our differences and talked about ways to solve it.  Josh as well thought I was too controlling and new compromises and solutions were made.  I think we both had new motivation to take on Scrooge after the discussion.  If "The Talk" had never taken place, things probably would have gone much worse and the results would have been devastating to the future of the DSU Filmmakers.

Besides the minor differences in the beginning, scripting, unlike Inhabitance Bad, went pretty smoothly.  As a matter of a fact I remember Josh and I having a blast with the script.  One particular scene involved a young Scrooge playing with matches.  When a blanket in the living room catches on fire, Scrooge acts fast and throws the blanket out the window and into the trash can.  The trash can gets knocked over, rolls down a hill, and starts a house on fire.  This of course leads to an outbreak of fires which sets the whole city on fire.  Another favorite scene called for a teenage Scrooge to ask Belle out to the dance.  Teenage Scrooge came equipped with big dorky glasses and uncontrollable acne.  Josh wanted Scrooge to pop one of these boils and have a shit ton of puss hit the mirror.  The idea seemed a bit too far for me and due to time constraints it never happened (although Josh did get to fulfill this dream a few months later in another production).  The only scene that was ever really up for dispute was the Ghost of ChristmasPresent's appearance.  Josh wanted the naked spirit to appear out of a big Christmas package while I wanted a bow wrapped around him in which Scrooge had to unravel to open his "gift".  This minor technicality was the first major blow up but it eventually was solved and we continued on our little quest through hell.

The script called for a lot of ambitious stuff.  Resembling the Inhabitance Bad script, the movie was just too damn overwhelming for us to handle.  We needed a city set, numerous interior scenes including a living room, bedrooms, an old time school, costumes, and lets not forget a cast ranging to at least 20 people.  Keep in mind, we had little money, a crew of three, last minute auditions, and not a damn clue.  It was decided we would build the city set in Stickney Auditorium.  This is the auditorium where all the DSU plays were held.  It took some doing but Josh was able to reserve the auditorium for about a week over Christmas break.  Immediately after the break a play was starting production so this was our one and only shot.  If a director were to put his/her mind to it, and with a competent cast and crew, a 50 page script could be shot in a week, especially if a majority of it is to be shot on the same set.  The problem with Scrooge was... well, everything.

Auditions were advertised a week in advance and we had a fairly good turnout considering.  The script wasn't done at the time so we had people read from a real retelling of A Christmas Carol.  Almost all the positions were filled the first evening and everything seemed to be going fine.  Due to certain positions not being filled it was decided that Josh would play the main role as Scrooge.  We figured we'd fill the remaining positions as time went along.  Once auditions were over the set was constructed in three days with only three people.  This was like a Christmas miracle because none of us had any experience in set building.  But to be completely honest we didn't do that bad of a job.  The set consisted of four buildings slightly descending into the background.  The center of the stage was made up of a green screen (and I use that term lightly) which would be taken care of in post production.  The green screen was a bunch of florescent green pieces of paper purchased atWalmart and duct taped together.  Yes, you read that right.  By the time it was all over, we could have as easily went and bought an actual professional green screen for the kind of money we invested in freaking paper.  And to answer your next question: no, the damn thing didn't make chroma keying easy.

Like Inhabitance Bad, the movie had absolutely no schedule.  Why we didn't learn the first time is beyond me but this cut our cast in half.  When we would call people and say "hey, can you come film this evening?!", it's hard to believe they didn't hang up on us.  One by one people lost faith in the project and silently dropped out and by the time we had realized this, it was too late.  Of course at the time Josh and I were outraged by this, but looking back, wow, I would've dropped out too if I were casted for that abomination.  With all this going on we had to rely on friends to fill in the main gaps.  Enter Justin Huber (Lilredhead Studios' Bruce Campbell) and Nate Kostelecky (a big hairy guy).

Scrooge (Josh Nichols) tries to become friends with Bob Crachit (Justin Huber).

Justin Huber had the honor of playing Bob Crachit.  Although Justin didn't have too many scenes shot, he did get tackled by Scrooge in one of the final scenes of the movie.  Justin is the guy you throw into the movie if you need something dangerous done.  As I said he's the Bruce Campbell of our films so if you need someone to get hit by a train, Justin's your man.  Nate on the other hand got to play the part of the Ghost of Christmas Present.  This scene, is without a doubt, the best part of the film.  As stated earlier, the Ghost of Christmas Present was naked in our version of this holiday classic.  Not only is Nate a good actor, but his physical appearance fit the role perfectly.  To take it up a few notches we smeared vegetable oil all over Nate to make him greasy looking.  He then wore shorts and everything was shot from his waist up to insinuate he was indeed naked.  Several shots were needed because Josh kept laughing every time he would look at Nate, let alone having to clutch Nate's "greasy golden locks".

For a while things seemed to be going along OK.  Sure, half the cast dropped, but we covered it for the most part.  Random arguments broke out between Josh and I on various issues, but thing were patched up over a box of Little Caesar's pizza.  But then something happened.  Something so horrible that it will go down in history as one of the worst things ever.  The movie had two main musical numbers in it, one at the beginning and one at the end.  The beginning number was to open the movie, with the townspeople happily singing and dancing about the coming of Christmas.  Throughout the number you see various shots of Scrooge (not ever seeing his face) and right at the end of the number Scrooge enters the town square and shouts "bah hum bug!" and everyone scatters.  Josh was put in charge of coming up with lyrics and creating a dance for this scene.  After salvaging and gathering the remaining cast members for this opening, the horribleness began.  I will admit that due to there being no prior rehearsals, things were a lot worse.  But for some reason, these people simply could not get the dance down.  I will also be the first to admit that I have a temper (note the arguments between Josh and I).  However, I rarely show it in public and will either blow up when I'm alone or walk it off.  This wasn't the case for this particular night.  After about 20 runthroughs without filming, these people were simply not getting it.  It's not like the dance was hard or anything and after each screw up I started to get more angry.  When we were about to film finally, one of the actors yelled out that her friend ran out to make a phone call and we had to wait.  I was so enraged by all that was happening I shouted "well then I guess she's out of the fucking movie, get to your god damned position right now!".  The missing actor did finally show up but expressing my anger in public like that is a practice I don't tend to follow.  Furthermore, taking it out on someone else was definitely not the right thing either.  The rest of the night was a complete disaster and nothing was salvageable after the shoot.  I think the worst part of all was that Ken Haught, the DSU Filmmakers' advisor, sat and watched the train wreck unfold.  It was embarrassing.  As I sat in the seating area and gazed at the stage, it was right then and there that I knew this project would not succeed.

Things continued to go downhill from the musical number.  Our actor pool was exhausted which made us push scheduling back, scenes were poorly filmed, and one by one sacrifices to the script and production values were made.  Each day Josh and I would arrive on set earlier and go home later.  Not to mention this was all taking place over the course of Christmas break, the most precious of times for college students.  Nerves were frayed and emotions were running high.  We had about three days left on set to get this thing done and only about 35% of it was complete.  With the horrible display that was the opening number, we nixed the whole beginning in favor of a more subtle display.  It was going to simply involve Scrooge walking through the snowy streets to get to his house.  However, we still needed an ending.  And so one evening when all the actors left, Josh, Brandon Pelling, and myself created the finale out of thin air.  Josh came up with the lyrics on the spot and we choreographed it as we went along.  After all that we had been through, this was the first time we actually had fun with the project.  We forgot all about the other problems and focused on having fun.  Creatively speaking the song wasn't the best thing ever, but it was one of the best scenes in the whole movie.  Another highlight was when I had to play Big Red and get into a fight with Scrooge.  It was a last minute thing for me to play this bully but it was fun.  The only problem I had with the school scenes were everything was in a modern setting.  But again, due to our limitations, we had no choice.  But even with these light hearted moments easing things, reality slowly crept back in.

I remember one night, after all the actors went home, I sat outside of the auditorium over viewing all the footage we had done on my laptop.  Brandon and Josh were seated on the opposite sides of me.  I kept saying how things weren't looking good.  I think I was trying to hint towards shutting down the production and just forgetting about it.  Josh on the other hand had different ideas and was determined to get this thing to the Fargo Film Festival by late January.  This, since being the editor, put more strain on me and I remember going home that night feeling horrible.  Two days later, when the final day of our reservation in Stickney hit, I completely dropped a bomb on the project and the rocky relationship between Josh and I.

My mom's back went out.  I have to stay here for a while and help her out", I said to Josh over the phone as I laid in bed.  The last day arrived and we had planned to film some more stuff before ripping the set down.  However, after enduring three weeks of little sleep, stressed over the editing and looking over the poorly filmed footage, I was done.  I knew that no matter what we did on that final day, nothing could save this damned movie.  I didn't want to argue about it, for I knew Josh wanted this thing done so badly.  All I wanted to do was sleep and sleep I did.  As noon rolled around I strolled into Stickney.  Josh had taken the entire set down all by himself.  I slowly walked to the front row of the seating area and sat down.  Josh sat down next to me and we stared at the now empty stage.  When Josh found out about my little lie he wasn't too thrilled for he could have stayed in bed too.  After a long discussion we decided to no longer make Scrooge a major priority for the DSU Filmmakers.  But that didn't mean we were done yet.

In late January the last production day commenced.  We set up the poorly tattered paper green screen in a classroom and did some shots, such as the Ghost of Christmas Future scenes.  The only thing I really remember about this was getting mad at myself for how bad the project was and this rubbed off on the actors and crew.  I remember the sister of one of the actors' approached me and told me how I was a bad director because of my attitude and that I was making everyone feel bad.  She was right.  And it wasn't just this day, the whole duration of the project I was a bad director.  I let my personal feelings get in the way of things and in return my directing and interpersonal skills took a beating.  I should have never taken on the project in the first place when I had such big doubts to begin with.  About two months later, discussions of Scrooge ceased and it disappeared out of the collective minds of the DSU Filmmakers.

Scrooge, simply put, was a complete and utter disaster.  It was a sign that things needed to change if the DSU Filmmakers Organization was going to succeed.  Furthermore, it proved that we were just college students who were not yet ready to take on such huge projects.  This ideology in return, lead to a movement of shorter and successful films.  Scrooge may have gotten further into production than Inhabitance Bad but it took a greater toll on everyone involved.  But the important thing is that we don't dwell on the past but learn from it.  And that is exactly what Josh and I did.  From here on out things improved greatly, leading to such projects as Sabers, Our Friend Puberty, Roomies, and the recent hit Walk'n with Walken.  But if there is one main thing to be learned from all this, it's that to never take your Christmas break for granted.  It only comes once a year you know.

I added a compilation of raw footage of Scrooge to the site just for this article (and in honor of the holiday season!). 

• Click here to view Part 1
• Click here to view Part 2

Lots of this footage has never been viewed outside of the people involved with the project.  Watch and learn... this is how NOT to make a quality movie.

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