Tanner Beard – Hellion

Q) What are the recent projects that you are working on?

A) The movie Hellion is the most recent project out. Being at Sundance Film Festival was a big deal to us. We do have a lot of other projects and it’s been a pretty busy year for us. We have about four movies coming out this year. We’re in production on a Christmas movie called Just Be Claus. We’re also doing an animated feature that we just started pre-production on and we’re very excited about that. That might be coming out in the next few months, depending on how everything goes. We’re really excited about everything in the works!

Q) For the movie Hellion, you are an Executive Producer and a cast member. What made you want to take on the double roles?

A) Some of our Executive Producers kind of made our Hitchcock moment a little fun in the movie. I think it got put out there that I had a much larger role than I did. I was actually shooting another movie a hundred miles away in Texas while this was going on. I made a cameo so I don’t want to take anything away from the stars of the movie. I had more of an Executive Producer role. If you look real closely, you can see the cameo though.

Q) What was it about the concept for the film that captured your interest?

A) My producing partner, Suzanne Weinert, knew Kat Candler who is the amazing writer and director. We had just dropped out of a movie that we had been working on throughout the year. She said to take a look at the script and Aaron Paul may or may not be attached. She said just look at it because we were looking for a project and they needed someone to kind of jump in immediately since Aaron had such a small window. By page twenty, I realized it was nothing I had ever seen before. It just had great indie written all over it, which was exactly what it was. I got the script and literally two weeks later they were shooting in Port Arthur and it happened that quick. Thank goodness Suzanne already had an report with Kat Candler, who is a teacher of film. It’s her passion project. It started off in as an indie script at the Sundance Institute and turned into a short film. For it to be a feature, it just was a no-brainer.

Q) What did you do to help aid the project?

A) We facilitated the financing and kind of grouped some people together. I kind of want to take credit for Josh Wiggins, but he was narrowed down to three or four people by the time I saw him. I wish we could take credit for saying we discovered him. There are going to be a lot of people who want to take credit for him. We did like him the best out of the tapes we saw and he actually flew out to Los Angeles to meet with Aaron Paul. Based off our discussion with Aaron, we decided he was more than perfect for the role.

Q) What was the most challenging aspect of making the movie?

A) Any time you are making an indie film, it is always super hard because they are not big budgeted movies and you want to put every dime on screen. It was a tremendous feet to get what you expect when you go sit down in a theater onto the screen. I have to credit the cast and everybody else for working what we call in the business “chicken scratch.” Aaron Paul, Juliette Lewis and a lot of the crew went way below their pay grade because they believed in this movie so much. I think the hardest part was trying to juggle numbers, the dollars and cents of it. People like Kelly Williams and Jonathan Duffy in parts and labor and we were lucky enough to get some film grants, which shaved our movie into keeping us on budget. The most challenging aspect was making it look worth more than we spent.

Q) For those unfamiliar with Hellion, please talk about the premise.

A) If you are really into movies that are great actors’ pieces, this is going to be right up your alley. It’s definitely a movie that I’ve never seen before. It juggles subject matter that I’ve never seen before. It’s about a dad with two young sons who is a widower and the kids have lost their mother. To see the dynamic way they juggle that and deal with that, makes the children act out which in turn makes the father’s life even harder. Aaron Paul said it best that it was just brutally honest on the page and I couldn’t agree with it more. It’s just something you haven’t seen before. I think audiences will respond to it, especially people who have had a similar upbringing or been in a similar situation.

Q) What was your most memorable moment from filming?

A) There is a moment where the younger son (Deke Garner) in the movie has a scene with Juliette Lewis. They are in the bathroom brushing their teeth and he tells her a joke, which was actually not scripted. This real reaction registers so well in the movie. I actually heard several people talking about it afterwards and it was always my favorite part when I saw it the first time. When I saw it in the film, it stuck with me. In fact, I was telling my own friends that joke! It’s just such a great moment that is one of those happy accidents.

Q) Will people be able to see the film in other festivals or on DVD in the near future?

A) We’re in talks with distribution companies and nothing is set in stone. I’m excited for it to hit the festival run. There are some great festivals coming up in the next three or four months and we just enjoy those because the whole festival circuit since it is a festival movie. We are in talks for distribution that we’re really excited about.

Q) You are a part of the social networking site Twitter. How important is social media to film promotion?

A) I think nowadays you have to have it. It’s the norm. If you don’t, I think you are then very much out of the loop. I am on Twitter and Instagram and even keeping up with social media is a huge deal. A lot of people don’t watch the news anymore. They just check their Twitter updates for immediate news when it happens.

Q) Is there anything else about the film that you want people to know?

A) I know there are a lot of “Breaking Bad” fans out there and I think they are going to be very excited to see Aaron Paul in such a different performance than they are used to. Juliette Lewis is amazing in this movie and there is some incredible young talent in the film. I think if anybody is looking for some fresh faces that Josh Wiggins, Deke Gardner, Dylan Cole and so many good young talented actors are in this. I think audiences are going to like fresh talents along with faces they are used to it.