The Loud Whisper Takeover
Featuring interviews with actors, stunts, dancers, filmmakers, action movie directors, athletes, Krav Maga teachers, acting coaches, and more.
Epic tales of changemakers, authentic personal stories, and top tips about the industry, the podcast is a treasure of knowledge helping storytellers of all kinds on their own journeys, and inspiring people to take action upon their own dreams.
Ever heard your inner voice getting louder and louder, urging you towards a new path? When our inner guidance starts to become so loud, we can no longer ignore it, and we MUST take action... This is often a time when life changes direction drastically. We are literally being called to take that leap of faith, make that phone call, write that script, make that film in other words, time to embrace our wildest dreams, shift gear, and grow exponentially.
Let's dive into the art of listening courageously to our inner compass. Because every one of us is destined to live a grand story and adventure while walking on planet Earth!
Headphones on, notebooks out, and buckle up!
Hosted by Cindy Claes.
The Loud Whisper Takeover
29: Comedy Screenwriter Sponsored by a Funeral Home
In this episode, comedy writer Sophie Estourgie (based in The Netherlands) shares her incredible story of winning a prestigious L.A. screenwriting competition and getting her script, “The B Word”, produced. Sophie reveals how a script she almost set aside, gathering dust, is now set to be produced in L.A., and she might even land one of the leading roles herself!
But that’s not all. Sophie is also working on a dark comedy titled “Somewhere Between Here and There”, about a ghost who shows up at her own wake. With a team of 8 actors, they are currently fundraising to bring this script to life—and they’ve even secured sponsorship - from a funeral home! (Yes, really!) Support their campaign by clicking the link in the description!
In this episode, host Cindy Claes and Sophie dive into writing, comedy, overcoming failures, and the process of turning ideas into reality - no matter the obstacles.
Whether you’re a writer, filmmaker, actor, or just someone who loves the behind-the-scenes magic of storytelling, this episode is filled with both practical insights and inspirational takeaways.
Crowdfunding link to support “Somewhere Between Here and There” and help bring this unique dark comedy to life:
https://www.voordekunst.nl/projecten/19048-somewhere-between-here-and-there-1
IG Short Film:
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Welcome to the Loud Whisper Takeover podcast. Today we will be talking about writing screenwriting. We will be talking about where the inspiration comes from, we will be talking where the challenges lay, and then, of course, we're also going to look at different genres. I personally am really bad at comedy, even though I always wanted to really be successful at it, so I invited today somebody that is really good at writing comedy dark comedy. She's also working on a new short in the Netherlands with a beautiful team of actors, so please welcome Sophie. Hi Sophie, how are you doing?
Speaker 2:Hi, cindy, I'm good. Thank you for having me on your pod, really excited to have you here.
Speaker 1:So can you perhaps just introduce yourself in a nutshell who you are as an artist and as a writer.
Speaker 2:Well, as an artist and a writer, they are the same thing for me. I am mostly a writer. I'm also an actor. I went to acting school about a year ago and before that I went to film school where I specialized in direction and writing, but I've really focused more on writing in the past couple of years, so that's really my main area of expertise.
Speaker 1:Can you tell us a little bit more about this new short that you are developing, which is called Somewhere Between here and there? By the way, guys, there will be a link in the show notes, because they are fundraising at the moment, so tell us more about this project. How did it come about and what are you working on now?
Speaker 2:So the new short is called Somewhere Between here and there, and it actually was created by a group of actors. We all went to acting school together and we were doing a scene group, a weekly scene group. We were doing scenes together just to keep the acting muscle alive and just to have fun really. And after about a year of that we were like, okay, I think we should. We think we should create something together because we feel like we have so many ideas and we each bring something to the table. Everybody has like something to add to it essentially.
Speaker 2:So we decided to make a short film. First we thought about doing a theater production, but we eventually settled on short film and we've been working on it for about three to four months. So we started really with the base of actors, which is mostly different from how other short films would start. They usually start with, well, a writer and maybe a director and a producer, but here we really started from the actors. And so the way we approached the story was also from a point of view of how can we make a story where we can fit eight people in, because we are with eight. It's quite a lot, it's quite a challenge. That's basically how it started. I wrote it. I had two co-writers, but I wrote the majority of the script and together we made the script that we're going to be shooting in about a month right now, and we're looking at a late 2025 release.
Speaker 1:So it's been very exciting so far, difficult and challenging, but in a good way we're going to talk about how sometimes, um, restrictions can also help creativity, because when I was speaking to the actors that you were working with, I heard, okay, that the script was written to give equal weight, or at least a big weight, to all the actors involved, and not that one would carry the whole story and everybody else would be an extra. So I think it's like a restriction as a writer, but also it can open up doors for a lot of creativity. So we're going to talk about that.
Speaker 1:I just want to bounce back on this thing, which is, for me, the center of a lot of our things as artists is that you were meeting with a bunch of friends, essentially to keep the muscle of acting alive. I am currently the ambassador of the actor's home for the Benelux house and we want to do that as well, to have like some sort of a little hub where we can keep the muscle alive. But I believe that this can also bring a stronger bond between people and this can create friendships. I'm totally in that spirit of friendships. First, that you know that we want to do something together. First, because as artists, sometimes you cannot wait until you have all, all, all, all, all the ideal fundings in place.
Speaker 2:I agree with what you're saying. Like community is everything, I think, especially in this business. But I think even before we started this short film, we were already a very close group. We did the whole acting diploma thing together, which was a full year, so we already spent a lot of time together. So it really just started out, for me at least, as a way of like I want to keep seeing you guys and stay in in this kind of mindset with you guys.
Speaker 2:So we thought of the scene group as a way to keep bringing us together and I feel like that just even doing the scenes leaving the short film aside for a second really just really brought us together already in such a way that this short film just felt like the like next natural step for us and I think it will continue to grow.
Speaker 2:I mean, we were shooting pictures the other day for the poster and there's just this constant sense of like we're doing this together. It's crazy, like two years ago we didn't know anybody and now we're doing this together and we know everything about each other and we spend so much time together but it's going so well and we're bringing in exactly the type of energy that everyone needs. So I think it's really the base of this movie, like it would never been able to exist if we'd done this with eight strangers. I think it's so easy for things to fall out or for people to have other expectations, but for us it was just so clear from the start what we can expect from each other, how everyone works, that it really has made the collaboration easy so you say there is this strong sense of we are doing this together.
Speaker 1:Am I right in saying that every single person, every single actor, is actually also putting something else on the table? Like somebody is taking on a bit of production, somebody is I don't know doing makeup or finding a makeup artist, or has everybody a little bit more responsibilities within this production, or not at all?
Speaker 2:Yeah, no, this is correct. We decided from the beginning, like we have limited resources, so everyone's going to have to give something extra. So I wrote most of the script and I'm also doing set design. But there's indeed two producers. Two of the girls in the group are producers. Somebody is directing. We have, uh, even the silly things like taking care of the food, taking care of transportation, outfits. We have a, like a, a costume person. So everyone is chipping in in a way which has been really nice, and it just it alleviates the workload immensely when you have eight people to. You know, uh, to break it down.
Speaker 1:So now let's dive into you as a writer. So you actually won a competition in los angeles, yes, I did tell me more about that. So what did you win the competition for? What was? How did it feel to win as well a competition like in los angeles you based in the n Netherlands, like it's a big thing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely. It was really crazy and also really random, which the best things in my life really are very random. But I written a script really just before we started the short film, so around December, january. We were like okay, let's make a short film together. And I want to say, maybe two or three weeks earlier I'd written a different script with the full intention of making that. I was going to be like this is going to be in 2025. I'm going to make this script, I'm going to produce it or whatever. I had no idea what all the details were going to be like, but I just I had it on paper and I wanted to do something with it.
Speaker 2:This group was saying we want to make a short film together. I was like, well, obviously I want to be in on that too. So I'm going to join you guys and I'm going to put this other script on hold. There will be another time for it. And actually somebody in my acting group she read it, she gave me feedback on it and then she tagged me in this, this, this poster, the story on Instagram from Heavy Shovel Productions, which is a production company based in Los Angeles, and she said said, they're doing a script competition and you can hand in your script. It has to be a short film script and if you win, they will produce it. This came out of nowhere. She knew the production company. She'd been following them on Instagram, so it was really just a divine timing in that sense, because everything aligned.
Speaker 2:They were looking for a script no longer than 15 pages. My script was exactly 15 pages. They were looking for comedies. My script was a comedy. They were looking for scripts which featured mostly females. My script had that as well and it had to take place in one of four locations the two locations in Los Angeles. There were two in New York as well, but the two in Los Angeles were either an art deco house or a diner, and my script took place at a diner. So I literally didn't have to change a single thing. I just kind of finalized it, I put a title on it and I sent it their way.
Speaker 2:And then, about two weeks later or so, I was looking through my spam and of course I had a message, an email from them already a week earlier that said congrats, you're part of the final three. They had already sent me two follow-up emails in that time like hello, are you there and please respond ASAP? I just caught it just in time. They were about to kind of go on with the competition when I responded oh my God, thank you, I'd love to be involved. And then there was a table read in Los Angeles where they would actually read my script aloud, with two other finalists the two other scripts were written by Americans and I joined that table read on Zoom at four in the morning.
Speaker 2:So that was a tough one, but really fun to see the script come to life. They had amazing actresses who really made it even funnier, honestly, than I had imagined it to be, and the audience there. There was audience that had been invited and they voted and I won. So that was the news came at like 6 am in the morning on a Saturday that I won the competition. So this means now that they're going to be producing this short and the production for that one is starting in, I think, september or around that time the later part of 2025 anyway. So, yeah, that was. It was a crazy ride, but it all happened in a very short time span as well, so it was kind of difficult to even grasp at certain points.
Speaker 1:Oh my God, I think it's like freaking phenomenal that not only you won a competition, but it's going to be produced, and in Los Angeles. So let me go to the first question I have for you, because as a writer, I have also looked at entering competitions, but most of these competitions are quite expensive. It's a bit like when you do a film festival circuit with your short film you have to pay to submit every time, but most of the screenplay competitions I've seen online are quite expensive. Did you have to pay for this one? Did you just say, well, I'm only going to choose one or two to submit it to? Or was it just the most random thing? Yeah, I submitted to one and let's see what happens? Or did you have a full strategy for the script?
Speaker 2:No, absolutely not. Like I said, I fully put it to the side because I wanted to focus fully on the short film that I'm making with the actor group now. So I wasn't doing anything with the script. It was really just gathering dust in my laptop. So this is the only one that I submitted it to. I did have to pay something. It was a very small amount I'm thinking $10 or $15 max. So for me it was fine to do that and I'd never submitted to anything like literally anything before. So it was a great introduction in that sense. But yeah, even as I was doing it, I was thinking like, okay, this is a very fun way to get your stuff out there. So I already had in my mind like, if this doesn't work, I'll maybe submit it to other things. But yeah, I never got that far in that sense, because this one already panned out successfully.
Speaker 1:It's going to be produced in LA. Are you going to be a part of what is happening next or is it absolutely in the hands of the producer and the director and everything else now? Will you be invited on set or will you only be invited once? Well, it's finished and edited and there is the premiere.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I spoke with the producers, with the production company. We had a small little production meeting in which we just basically laid out the plan of like okay, they're doing other things now, so production is going to start in the last part of 2025. And yeah, they were very open to me coming over there and not necessarily being part of the production behind the camera, but just being there seeing the works and meeting the people involved. Just being there seeing the works and meeting the people involved. And I will be auditioning for both the roles. There's two girls in the. The main characters are two girls. They're both around my age.
Speaker 2:The thing is is that I initially actually wrote the script literally for myself, because this goes pretty far back. But I had a conversation with one of my fellow actors from this acting group back in September of 2024. And we were both kind of struggling, like where do we go? How do we do this? How do we get ourselves in there? And he said to me he said, if you know nobody's going to offer you the perfect role, then write the perfect role for yourself. Just go out and do it and make it and see where you end up.
Speaker 2:And that's really what kickstarted everything, because that's when I started thinking of like, ok, I really would love to play a comedy role. I think I'm, like, as an actor, very strong in comedy, so I'd love to play a part in that. And so I wrote one of the roles in this short film specifically for myself. So when I had this production meeting with the production company, I expressed interest to also play one of the roles and they were very open to me auditioning not just for the one that I wrote for myself, but also for the other one, because, who knows, maybe it sticks. Of course, that's still all up in the air. I told them as well if you find another actress that is much better than I am, then there's absolutely no hard feelings. I want the best for the film. But even just getting the opportunity to audition for that is very fun. But yeah, for sure I'm going to go out there to see the whole shebang in action.
Speaker 1:I cross fingers that you get the role. Yeah, me too. It's quite funny that you're going to have to audition for the role as well, but yeah, it's part of the game. I would love to ask you now more questions about writing comedy in general. Something you said earlier on is there was a table read and then you said, oh, the ladies that were reading it made it even funnier. Yeah, so in your creative process you're writing a script, you're putting it on the side, so I'm guessing that nobody has read it for you at the time of submitting it. It's a comedy. You feel it's a good comedy, people are reading it. So when do you feel that the comedy is working? It's really in the writing process. It's not even like reading it loud. When do you feel that the comedy is really? You nailed it.
Speaker 2:Honestly, that was one of my biggest fears going into the table read. I was like what if no one finds it funny? That was one of the main things that I was constantly struggling with, because I knew that I thought it was funny. That's just the baseline, right. You write something that you think is funny, but then you know the next thing comes to will other people find it funny? And that's really difficult. You never really know if something will hit or not. So I, yeah, with full honesty, I sent it in not really knowing if other people were going to find it as funny as I did.
Speaker 2:But I do think that the actors are such a big part of comedy because you can have the funniest script ever and then a less than fortunate actor comes in and kills the script. In a sense it's possible. But it also works the other way around. You can have a not as funny script, but if you're a very skilled actor it can still be funny.
Speaker 2:But with, specifically, the table read in LA, I did feel, as I sent it in and they started doing the table read and the first few lines hit and people were laughing in the audience. It was kind of an instant where I was like, okay, it works, I've already almost heard enough. After the first page I was like I know it works. These actresses, they know the energy that I tried to put on the paper. They understand it.
Speaker 2:They're giving their all, they're not doing half-assed work and that's why I said I really think they made it even funnier because they were hitting the beats. It's a pretty quick script in that sense. The characters are really going back and forth in quite a fast pace and they really nailed that and I think that made it funnier. Just, yeah, just a joy to look at really. But if yeah, there's never a guarantee that it's going to be really funny until you see that audience react or you see an actor bring it to life have you ever written something thinking it was a comedy, and then actors are reading it or I don't know.
Speaker 1:There was some sort of yeah, you start playing around with it and actually it's not working at all.
Speaker 2:I actually have not had it that explicitly, but I went to film school right. So I made several short films there and comedy was never really my thing. I only started that like well, I don't want to say recently, but more in the later years I started going to comedy more, actually for the sole reason that I was thinking if I can get people to laugh, I can get away with really shitty filmmaking. That was really my thought as a student in school. I was like if the film is bad lighting, like ugly outfits and cheap locations, if I can get people to laugh, they might forget just about all of that. So that was really the first reason of why I got into it.
Speaker 2:But one of the short films I made in my last year of school was my first comedy and I look back on it now and I find it deeply unfunny. As I was writing it I thought it was working, but then you know, actually shooting it, it got way more serious vibe to it. The lines that maybe meant as sarcastic or witty were delivered in a more serious way, which is also fully on me because I was the director. So like I should have at that point gone in and been like, well, that's not really how I wrote it. I was a student, I didn't know any better, so in that sense I've definitely had that one movie. That was intended as a comedy. It ended up becoming a more serious drama.
Speaker 1:I'd like to go back to your analysis of why it wasn't funny. So you said maybe you made mistakes as a director. But do you think that at the core, if you had to look back at that script, was it a script problem? Do you think it was a wrong cast, you know, unexperienced director's problem, or was it actually the script you've written that didn't really come to life as something funny?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I do think it's a mix of more things. I do think also me as a director I made some some mistakes in that and because the actors I had then were actually, they were quite nice and they they did understand the vibe and the feel of the movie. But yeah, also just the dialogue. Dialogue is very difficult actually to really write properly. I even criticize and that's coming from me who I don't have that much experience under my belt, but often I see certain dialogue in even big movies and I just go really that doesn't sound natural at all.
Speaker 2:It's very hard to write very natural dialogue. I think a lot of writers struggle with that and in that movie, the one I made in school, I think the dialogue was a big part of that. It didn't feel very natural, it felt very much almost slapsticky at certain points and I think that's why it just didn't translate well. But I do think the core of the story was correct and was a good choice and it was right. Yeah, I think it really just came down to the final points of what the director does, the way that we shot it, the points in dialogue that weren't perfect. It was just really a mixture of many things in your personal life, are you a funny person?
Speaker 2:oh, that's interesting to answer. I don't know, I would say so I do think people people around me, have said to me that they find me funny. So there's there's that, I don't know. I think think I very deadpan sarcastic type of humor which works with some people doesn't work with others. So yeah, I'm in the middle, I don't know. I think I'm funny, but I'll leave it at that because I'm asking that?
Speaker 1:because I don't know if it's a true story or not. But Moliere, who's the French Shakespeare kind of thing, Apparently he always wanted to be really good at drama and he ended up always writing comedy and he felt like a failure because he couldn't step out of this comedy box. But he was good at it and I feel I'm a bit the opposite. I think I would have a sense of accomplishment if one day I could write something that really makes people laugh, Because one day I wrote it was actually a one woman show and it was meant to be a comedy and it was quite a long piece, and so one day I performed it and literally I kid you not I had one audience member after the other that just broke down crying.
Speaker 2:Oh.
Speaker 1:Like it was, so I would have thought so. It touched people very deeply. It was, it had impact, but it didn't have the impact that I thought it would have. Like literally, I saw people like melting on their chairs, like head in between their hands, crying because they were so touched by it.
Speaker 2:So that was my comedy career. That's great, don, even if you can elicit such a strong reaction from people. I mean, I still that's a win.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. Now my next question is what is, for you, a good recipe? If somebody was to come to you and say, hey, I'd love to write a script, here is my idea. How can I turn it into a comedy? How can I be a comedy writer? And what is the recipe? Because you said that also, as an actress, you feel that that is your forte. So what is for you the recipe of a good comedy actor, actress and a good comedy writer, or a good comedy script? What would be the recipe For script?
Speaker 2:writing. I don't think there is one specific recipe that has worked for me. I think there's many different ways of approaching it. I really am just very much motivated, or like I work in like bouts of creativity that kind of come out of nowhere and I really let those lead me. I know that the way that I work is not at least it doesn't feel conventional, but I think one of the most important things is to start small. Really with any script, this is not just even for comedies, but sometimes people have these ideas and they want to immediately think of the biggest picture there is and everything that comes in. But really what I do is to me the details tend to come first. Sometimes it's a location, or sometimes it's just one line of dialogue that I think of randomly when I'm just in the supermarket and that's where the entire story blooms from. So I don't try to get ahead of that by immediately jumping into the pit and thinking, okay, what's the message? Or like how's it going to? Okay, what's the message? Or like how's it going to end, or what's the arc. I leave all of that. That will find its way in there once you're writing. So, in terms of a recipe for comedy specifically. I've written a few comedies and my approach was different every time. But for just script writing in general, I would say, yeah, start small and focusing on the details is, I think, a strong way, because stories are the best when they're detailed. I do think in any way and as an actor, you said what the recipe is to be a good comedy actor. Yeah, that's interesting.
Speaker 2:I don't know why I say to myself that I think comedy is my strong suit. I didn't think it would be. It's just that the reactions that I've gotten from my year in acting school was that often when I was doing a piece, even when I was trying to be serious, people would laugh. People would think that I was trying to be funny, when I often wasn't. So that's the other side of the coin when you're trying to be serious and people think it's funny. But I found my way in that, I was like, okay, if people are going to laugh at me, then I might as well just go further in on that and make it my staple.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I think the most important thing is don't take yourself too seriously. I think comedy lives in being loose with it and letting it take many different forms. Comedy can be done in so many different ways, and surprise yourself with the many ways that are possible within comedy and don't stick to just one way that you think is funny, because, again, what other people think is funny might differ vastly from that. So be in tune with the audience with that, because they're the ones judging. They're either laughing or they're not. So I'd say, yeah, like, be loose with it, don't take it too seriously and watch the audience, observe the audience.
Speaker 1:Both as a writer and as an actress. Do you keep some sort of notebook where you keep noticing things in the street or at the supermarket and you're like, oh, that's funny, and you write it in a little notebook and you might start a script with something you saw or you overheard at a restaurant or whatever? Or is absolutely everything coming from your imagination?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I want to say about 95% is coming from my imagination. Most of the time, yeah, the things that I think of, they all just pop up in my head. It's not really ever things I overhear. I want to say, sometimes things I see on social media. To be honest, I'm a really just disgusting TikToker. Like I'm on TikTok just all the time. It's killing my brain. But I do get inspired from just because on TikTok you see so many different people, things on social media that you would never have been able to know like 10 years ago, like a day in the life of somebody living in Dubai. Like it's just all these crazy things that you see on there and that has inspired me a lot in the past.
Speaker 2:In terms of writing things down, I have a killer memory for some reason. I don't know where I got that from, but I remember quite literally almost everything that's ever happened to me, in both good and bad ways. So I yeah, I don't really write much down. I just I overthink it a lot. Sometimes stories are in my head for weeks, months before I write anything down. Sometimes I never write it down. There are stories in my head that I've thought of for years and I've just always been like you know, they're just in my head, but I don't find the motivation or the whatever to really put them down, because they're not there yet. They might need some more development. But it's a lot of brain work, it's a lot of thinking and thinking.
Speaker 1:So there is nothing in your work that is autobiographical. No. Another question I wanted to ask you as well in regards to comedy. Do you usually go to comedy that is written in the line, the response, the dialogue, or is it circumstantial? Or is it to do with character traits, or it really depends on what kind of film you're writing?
Speaker 2:I would say it's my comedy mostly comes forth in the dialogue. I do in a way, because it's also my type of humor, just in text and lines. Can you tell us a?
Speaker 1:little bit more about somewhere between here and there. What I heard is that something goes wrong during a funeral, so obviously you don't want to give any spoilers here, but what can you tell us about this particular short that you're creating with your collective? Now I can definitely give you a little peek on what it's about.
Speaker 2:It's about a wake, and it's a wake for a dead girl. Her name is Mia, she is roughly 26, 27, and she's passed away quite unexpectedly. The wake kicks off. It's quite chaotic, there's lots of people there Her boss is there, her ex is there, her sister is there, her cousins and she suddenly appears at her own wake. She comes from the bathroom upstairs and she's there in the middle of it, sort of as a ghost, but she looks like the everyday Mia. But Mia is not visible to everyone. Mia is only visible to four people in particular who still have some outstanding business with her. So that's her sister, her ex, her boss and also her best friend, and they all have something that is keeping Mia tethered to them and to Earth, and they have to figure out what's keeping her here and, yeah, in what way they can resolve it so that she can move on to the next plane of life.
Speaker 1:Where is the point of comedy for you anchored? Is it in healing, Because she's healing a certain amount of relationships? Is it in how people overreact? Is it in the human reactions and emotional responses to certain things that others do? Is it in our relationship to death Like? Where does the comedy come from in this particular piece?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, it's about death, you know, in its essence so it's a heavy subject and I tried to make it as light as possible Because while Mia is dead, she's also right there. So there's this fine line of the tragedy of a young person passing away and the silliness of her just being here now and she's complaining about silly things like why am I wearing a pink sweater? Like who thought to put me in a pink sweater? And why is this music playing. And she's complaining about silly things like why am I wearing a pink sweater? Like who thought to put me in a pink sweater? And why is this music playing? Like. And she's going after all these silly things and there's really no mention of how did she die and these heavier things that are usually associated with death and things that make it tragic.
Speaker 2:I steered away from those things and instead focused on the sillier things of awake of. You know that, like what I said, clothing choices, music choices, the people who were there, and also what you said in in the way that people around her react to it. You know the way that her boss reacts to seeing her and uh, and you know some people will react more in a heavy way of oh my god, you're here now and all the emotions that come with that. But there are also characters who don't even realize that Mia is actually showing up as a ghost. They're like so you faked your death, what's going on? Explain yourself. And so then it takes in kind of a different direction there. So you have all these different characters and they have all their own little quirks and they're all reacting in a different way.
Speaker 1:And I think there's there's definitely comedy in that too. Let's now talk about the restrictions you had as a writer I don't know if I need to call it restrictions or just the givens. So one of those elements was okay, we are a group of eight friends, let's write a short movie. But there was also this sense of okay, we don't want people to feel like they are an extra on set. How can we give weight to every character while still obviously having a lead character and stuff, but still give enough weight to everyone? How did you handle that as a writer?
Speaker 2:I was very difficult because, yeah, like, even when I started writing and I was like gosh, if I'd written the script because I like the idea, I was like if I'd done this just for myself, maybe I would have put in three main characters and that's it, made everybody else extras and just focused on a smaller little group. So right from the get-go I knew it was going to be quite difficult. We knew we didn't want to go over 20 minutes at the very max, and if you want everyone to be put on the same level, then that means everyone needs a similar kind of arc. They all need to have a little journey in there, and that was definitely a challenge. But I think in the end, what really helped is to make everything very small.
Speaker 2:I think what a lot of short films want to do especially when I went to film school, I saw this a lot with my fellow students is that people want to say a lot, they want to tell a big story and they're inspired by all these big movies that they watched growing up and they have big ideas in their heads and they tend to write stories that are just completely convoluted and just over the top, and I think that's the death of any short film. I think a short film works best if you keep things small. Because it's short, you can't do much within the time that you're given. So I really tried to apply that to all these characters. I was like, okay, they can all be there, because when you have a wake it's normal for many people to be there, so that's fine, but they cannot all have this fireworks moment at the end where they are a completely changed person. So I kept some of the arcs.
Speaker 2:Establishing an arc can be done with just one line and you can end it with just one line. In this movie specifically, it's about, for example, one character in the beginning says that she has she's not sure if she wants to date this person, and at the end, when Mia has given her the permission, so to speak, to go ahead with this person, she looks at him and they have this little moment together. We're like, okay, we can take it to the next step. Now. It's very short. It's only two lines of dialogue really that come down to it, that's, one is introduced in the beginning and the other is at the end. There is a look between two characters and that's it really, and I I try to implement that for most of the characters in the short just sorts bursts of character development that also leaves if you're wondering, where's it going to go now?
Speaker 1:What other restrictions did you work with to write the script? So obviously you had a cast that was already given and it was eight people. You said you wanted a short that was about 20 minutes. So you know, you sort of knew that there was a maximum duration. What were the other restrictions? Locations, I don't know Any other restrictions you can think of that were given to you when you started writing.
Speaker 2:Well, obviously, just the money. Money is always the first thought how are we going to pay for everything? Location was actually set pretty early on because we just needed a house and one of the actors in the group he had a home that his parents owned that we could use. So that was set pretty early on. But, of course, when we were looking at stories literally first week, what story were you going to tell? This is the first thing that you're thinking of, like, okay, we're not going to fly to Bali, we're not going to go to some tropical island, we can't do anything in public transport. No crazy things in terms of outfits or props or anything like that. I do think that one was helpful, in a sense, just to not get into any crazy stories If you already know from the beginning that they're going to be unrealistic and you're unable to really make that happen. Think for this one.
Speaker 2:The biggest one that we got stuck in in the beginning was getting a coffin. Some of us were like, oh, we'll never be able. We'll never be able to get a coffin. It'll be too. They're super expensive to rent. So that was definitely something that we considered, why we considered not doing this, this story, um, but you know, that's, that's the beauty of being with eight people there's already always somebody who knows somebody. So somebody in our acting group actually knows somebody with a funeral home, and they have lent us a coffin to use exactly the type of coffin we wanted as well. So that ended up just working out. But so, yeah, I think we were very aware of these potential restrictions before we even started writing, which really helped in the long run of just already writing a story that we knew was going to be possible to make. One location, a couple of props, eight actors nothing, much more than we need.
Speaker 1:There's already a lot of comedy, like you can just have a tagline sponsored by a funeral home. I know, yeah, yeah, it's great, right, it's great okay. So you found a coffin, uh, you're sponsored by a funeral home, so now you are crowdfunding with the team. Yes, just in summary, like, how much are you looking to fundraise and what are you going to use the money for?
Speaker 2:well, are looking. We have a fundraiser right now on Ford Gunst. That's a fundraising company here in the Netherlands and we've put our end goal at 5,500. We are more than halfway, so that's very good, and the costs are mostly going to be towards equipment, so lighting, camera, audio equipment, that kind of stuff and catering for cast and crew and transportation costs. The 5K is really the minimum amount we need and we as actors, we're all doing it because we're passionate about it, so we are not making any money off of that. It's really just all going into the movie. There's also some costumes and things that we've purchased. So, yeah, those are the main things.
Speaker 1:Just to wrap up this interview. What is your wildest dream for this short?
Speaker 2:Wow, I don't know. I've been thinking about it a little bit because, of course, at some point you start to wonder where are we going with this? I was sending this link for this crowdfund, this fundraiser, to everyone and I was getting this question. They were like oh so are we going to see this movie anywhere? What's going to happen with it? Really, honestly, the main thing I would love for it is to showcase the talent that we have in the acting group, and I'm not really thinking in these terms of, oh, I want it to be broadcasted here or I want it to win anything. I'm really just looking for a way that this movie is able to put us all on the radar and to give us all a good credit and to have something on my CV that I'm really proud of and that I think, accurately showcases all the talent that we have in the group. So that's my main thing, and I want everyone to just have a good time watching it, find it funny, but also heartbreaking in the same sentence. I think that's really the goal here.
Speaker 1:Well, in the show notes we will be putting the link towards the crowdfunder. Thank you so much, Sophie, for sharing all your artistry here on the podcast, and I can't wait to be updated and eventually see it.
Speaker 2:Yes, I will definitely send it over to you once it's done.
