Christine Weatherup – Bread and Butter

By starrymag | September 1, 2015

By: Michelle Rose Micor

 

 

I watched the trailer I’m absolutely in love with it and am so excited to watch Bread and Butter when it comes out! Can you give us a brief summary on the film?

Bread and Butter is what director Liz Manashil likes to call anti-romantic comedy. Some will probably call it a feminist romantic comedy, but it’s a coming of age story about Amelia who is nearly 30 and is finally blooming. She’s definitely late to the game, she doesn’t know how to drive, she’s never really had a boyfriend, and she’s just trying to figure things out.

 

How did you get involved with Bread and Butter?

Liz and I are both alumni of USC, we went at different times and didn’t know each other while we were there. Liz wrote this article for Indie Wire about how she was casting her feature and how frustrated she was about Hollywood and women being cookie cutter in Hollywood. In casting her film, she wanted to make a film about real woman, someone she could relate to and yet everyone she was being pitched was sort of the perfect size 0, very cookie cutter type of person and that’s opposite to the type of film she was trying to make. So she posted this article and sent it to the different alumni groups at USC, which I ended up reading the article through that and I was so moved by it because as an actor, that’s something that’s been hard for me. A lot of the feedback I’ve gotten in auditioning is, “You’re not quite this” or “You’re not the gorgeous lead but you’re not quirky enough to the best lead’s best friend, you fall between the two.” Which I thought, “Isn’t that most people?” so it was so refreshing to find a filmmaker who was passionate about that as I was and really wanted real authentic people.

So from there I emailed her and let her know I really appreciated her writing this article and by the way if there’s any role I’d be right for, I’d love to audition for you. But she was so receptive to it, so I auditioned and it obviously went very well and I’ve auditioned for her a few times before and I got the role! It was wonderful that I was able to connect with Liz and then this happened!

 

What was it like getting to play a bit of a quirky role?

It’s super fun. I mean the goal was to keep it really natural and grounded. We really wanted to have real people, part of what makes it that anti-romantic comedy is that it’s not having these perfect Hollywood types who just find love, because of course they’re perfect! But everyone in this world, nobody is perfect, everyone has their flaws and they’re all neurotic in their own way. I think that as an actor, playing something with characters who are so layered and complex is always enticing and exciting.

 

You got to work with some really great actors in the film, what was it like getting to work with them?

Oh my gosh, the best experience! I can’t even tell you! I had to pinch myself! I remember the day before we started shooting was the day that Bobby Moynihan flew in and I’ve been a fan of “Saturday Night Live” for a long time and have watched him on the show. Even when I herd that he was being considered for the role I was so excited! So when I was finally meeting him I remember walking to the restaurant where I met him, the director, and the producer and sort of feeling that weird feeling like you’re going on a date! [laughs] I felt like it was a weird blind date, I was just so excited! And I knew a lot about him from watching him on TV, but I feel like I was totally awkward in the first few minutes of meeting him. I was like I have to act cool, let him know that I’m excited, but I do want to be nice and it was finding that balance!

 

I know you do a lot of scenes with the actors who play your two love interests and your best friend but are there any other actors you wish you had more scenes with in the film?

The parents in the movie are played by Dawn Didawick and Harry Groener, who a lot of people know from “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” They were there for just the first two or three days of the shoot. It was sort of a quick shoot for them and they are just such lovely charming people and have worked for decades in the industry. It was neat working with them because they just had this wealth of experience in every medium and they’re just a hoot! They’re a real life married couple too so working with them together was super fun! But everybody was so lovely, I’d love to work with all of them again!

 

What do you hope audiences will take away from watching the movie?

The purpose of the film is that we’re sort of trained by watching romantic comedies because they sort of give us an unrealistic expectation and then you’re “of age” or in that dating world finally and you’re like, “This isn’t what I saw in the movie.” So the film is really all about Amelia coming to terms with loving who she is and not necessarily needing to find that love in a man, in the same way that often, romantic comedies say, “the man is the answer.” This film is more about her own personal growth so I hope that people watching it relate to that and think, “Oh I’m not the weirdo,” or “That’s okay! Other people go through that too!”

 

Do you have any favorite moments from filming?

There’s a scene, a few fantasy moments, where Amelia has sort of these fantasies and one of them I’ll say, involves pie. She goes on a date and orders pie and without saying too much, this was the very last shot on the very last day, pie gets in her hair. So we did the scene, it was amazing, the whole shoot’s lovely, it’s 2 in the morning, and I’ve got pie in my hair. So I get home, wash my hair, and go to bed. The next day’s the wrap party and so I decided to go get a blowout, something special for the wrap party. So the woman’s washing my hair and she asks me, “What kind of shampoo do you use?” [laughs] And then I had to explain to her, “Oh no…that’s just pie.” It wasn’t like there were pieces of pie in my hair but more like my hair had a real sheen look to it!

 

I know that you’ve worked on a web series before, how did you experience filming the movie differ from shooting “Squaresville?”

Out of college I was involved in web, partially because it was accessible, it was something that I could throw together with a bunch of my friends from school and we could put something up and see if it stuck. That was something I started doing right out of college. Since then I’ve worked on TV on pretty high-budget stuff, I’ve done a range of different budgets but in weird way, Indie filmmaking like Bread and Butter is a lot like doing a web series.

 

Our web series “Squaresville,” we shot the whole season over about 9 or 10 days and the whole season was about 100 pages. And most movies are about 100 pages as well, Bread and Butter was about 90ish pages too and we shot that in 16 days. Which for most features is a pretty rigorous and quick shoot. So in a lot of ways my experience with web and Indie filmmaking is very similar because it’s very run and gun. You don’t get to take many takes on anything but there’s an excitement in it, there’s a thrill in it. I think often times when people are involved in those projects it’s because they’re so passionate about the material. It creates a special environment and when you wrap people are like, “wait I want to do more!” It’s wonderful and infectious!

 

I think the exciting thing about both web and Indie filmmaking is that you’re answering to yourself in a lot of ways. Because you don’t have those crazy budgets and a studio’s backing, you get to make the thing you set out to make. You know there are always bumps along the road but you’re not answering to somebody else. It’s your vision, you get to shape unapologetically which is wonderful.

 

Going off of that, I know you have some writing and directing experience. I read that you are going to writing, directing, and starring in an upcoming short called K.I.A. (Killed in Action) can you tell us more about that?

Yes! It’s basically two main characters and the actor I’m going to be opposite is my lovely costar from Bread and Butter, Micah Hauptman! It’s funny because I started the idea around Bread and Butter and after we wrapped Micah and I were talking and I said I had this project and he said, “Why don’t you write that? Get on it, let’s make it!” So I wrote it and now I’m sort of in the pre-production phase of figuring everything out. It’s a period piece and set in 1948, I’m a sucker for period pieces and it’s sort of like a feminist take on the war film. I love period pieces and war films but so often the story of the woman is sort of neglected. Sometimes maybe you’ll see the woman struggling at home but it’s very one-dimensional, one female providing emotional strength for the protagonist male, but it made me wonder, “What’s the woman doing at home? What’s her story?”

 

So this is set post World War II and Micah plays the soldier who’s coming home and sort of is a trouble soldier who has, I suppose, undiagnosed PTSD, and he is meeting this widow of a soldier he fought with for the first time. So we’re gearing up for this, I’m really excited, we received a grant from the Puffin Foundation and are figuring out the rest of our financing, and then getting ready to shoot hopefully at the end of this year, beginning of next year!

 

That sounds amazing, are there any other upcoming projects to look out for?

I have another independent film that is just starting the festival route, called Echo Lake. It’s sort of a quarter-life crisis movie! I’m not the one in crisis in this movie so that’s refreshing! But the movie is about my boyfriend who is nearing 30, a struggling alcoholic, and struggling to sort of be an adult. His father passes away and he inherits his dad’s cabin and it’s about his growth over that period and him growing up and getting a new perspective on things after his father’s death.

 

 

Bread and Butter is available for VOD through Amazon and iTunes on September 1, 2015