289: An Evening with the Trouble Dolls

This is Jess Weixler and you are listening to Movie Meltdown. I should go higher with that. Hi, this is Jess Weixler and you are listening to Movie Meltdown. Too much? No, you can never do too much on this show.

It's showtime. The following feature has been rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America. It is intended for mature audiences and parental discretion is advised. Our nuclear reactor pumping out one million kilowatts of power. What's up and welcome to Movie Meltdown.

I'm Brian and in this episode we are coming to you live via digital recording from the IF Film Fest here in Louisville, Kentucky. And luckily this time we are joined by not one but two special guest co-hosts. We are glad to welcome back, no stranger to this show, our beloved Jess Weixler. And with her is an established actress herself, Miss Jennifer Prediger. Now these two are at the festival with their new film, Trouble Dolls.

But they're not just the stars of the film, they also very impressively wrote and directed the movie. So now let's go check in with Jess and Jennifer and hear how Jess has been exposing Jennifer to her hometown. And learn a little bit more about these two as well as how they came to create Trouble Dolls. All right, so we're back with our favorite, our adopted co-host. Favorite, yes.

Your beloved Jess. I mean, come on. I'll take beloved. We refer to you quite often, and it's usually the beloved Jess. It was the nut cheese that did it, isn't it?

Giving you a recipe for making cheese and cashews. Most of that. episode we did together we talked about nut cheese and she's again special special people she's very. Special Jess I don't know about this but I'm not going to make you talk about it now but I need to have a recipe for nut cheese or whatever we don't have to bore the people. She was supposed to bring it back she makes promises when you came back to town you like threw down the gauntlet you were like we're having a cheese off and like other people were going to make their version and there was going to be a taste test involved so. I have to stay somewhere that's not in a hotel.

They don't like you making cheese in the room? They won't let me make cheese in the mini bar anymore. Well, you just tell them you're Jess and they won't argue. Is that? I'm pretty sure you can pull that off.

I didn't even try. Is that very Midwestern to make cheese? Yes. Cheese and whiskey. Okay.

So you have been here before, but I will let you introduce your co-host, your co-director, your team. This is my brilliant, favorite, beloved Jennifer Perediger. My co-director, co-writer, co-star in crime for Trouble Dolls. Yes. Somehow I do see you guys as being troublesome.

We really are. We should probably be arrested or something. I don't know. It would be so much cooler if we actually got arrested. I feel like we honestly need to get it on our record so that we have some legitimacy.

So we could be real trouble dolls. Maybe tonight in Kentucky, in Louisville. We'll be in trouble. Yeah, when you see us at 2 a.m. It'll be true.

Along those trouble lines, I did want to ask, are you protecting your cloud persona? Cloud persona. Oh. Cloud persona. Secrets escape out.

You know. Are there things we're going to find out about you? I don't think I have a filthy cloud. A dark rain cloud. My filthy cloud is not for public consumption.

I don't want to see boring selfies, though. I want something really good. I want, like, see, here's shots of Jess, like, dealing arms. You know, I want something major. I want running a white slavery ring.

I want something hardcore. Pictures of her making nut cheese. That'll be what is on your phone. Me with a. 22 just shooting a bunch of cashews in the face, point blank, and you see them explode, and then I pulverize them with my fists and serve them for dinner.

It's like a super vegan version of Hannibal. It's hot. That'll be the real ugly secret that comes out. It's just shots of you eating a cheeseburger. And you're like, oh, my dark secret.

It's in the cloud. Who's not a vegan now? I can't show my face in the vegan restaurant ever again. Jenny's also vegetarian, I think. That's true.

That is true. But not big on the nut cheese. I don't feel like that's a popular thing to say in Kentucky, though. It is. It gets points against us, to be honest, because the barbecue here and the fried chicken.

The barbecue smells so good. But I make up for it in the drinking department. I'll drink so much bourbon, they'll forgive the lack of meat eating. They'll get all excited if there's bourbon. Kentucky, we drink enough bourbon to make up for it.

We do love some bourbon. They're crazy in this town for bourbon. But I think it depends on where you go. I think, again, the rest of the state, probably not so popular. Louisville's got a weird, like, I even know people from surrounding cities that are technically bigger than us, but they come here and they're like, wow, you guys have so many options for, like, vegan restaurants.

And we hit that little, like, Highlands, you know, Crescent Hill area where everything's kind of trendy. And then we've had people that sort of latch on to that stuff. So I think we've got more than most places of our size. Yeah. Louisville is to Kentucky the way Austin is to Texas.

It's its own separate... Well, I've tried to get us to secede for years now. I'm like, this Louisville thing, we need to separate ourselves from the rest of the state. Be our own little tiny state. At least our own state.

If not our own country, I mean. I think we should vote, yeah, be our own country. Most definitely. Be our own island. Just cut a little moat around us and call.

It an island. They say it's a bridge out there, but I hope they're just separating us from Indiana even more because... I mean, we really don't want to be attached, right? Oh, my God. I can't lose my Indiana people.

I'm sure you're very nice over. There, guys. Half of our cast is from Indiana, so I constantly talk smack about them. The Hoosiers jokes still fly free. That's kind of how this town operates.

Man. How far are we from Indiana right now? Things never change. Almost. Right on it.

Rock to throw at it. I mean, it's over there. People are making love across the Ohio River constantly. And at this point, we're all one. I told you.

I told you to stop hanging out in the parks like that. People are getting it on on the bridge. Did you ever date someone who lived in Indiana? Oh, the horrible secrets. Just because I didn't doesn't mean I wouldn't.

I haven't. I'm certainly guilty of that. You have? In fact, more than on this side, unfortunately. Dirty secrets all around.

Oh, man. Have you seen the new fancy walking bridge, though? The fancy walking bridge? No. The old train bridge that was just waiting to fall apart is now you can walk across it to the other side.

Really? It's pretty fancy. Jenny, I'm sorry we didn't do that today. She's really cheating. I didn't even know it was over here anymore.

You couldn't even find the water. Jess couldn't find the water. She was showing me around town. Water park. But she did take me to the Louisville Slugger Museum.

Now, you did get to see a giant baseball bat. I saw a huge baseball bat. She took my picture next to it. You can't really get it in is the problem. No, you can't.

They need to figure out a way to get you to shoot it from like a block. Down the street. Yeah, they need to have like some little thing on the sidewalk that says like optimal if you put it on the ground. And on 7th Street. I'm going to get a little slugger.

We got to get this worked out. Jess found me a discount slugger. They burned it wrong. Something was wrong with it, but we couldn't tell what was wrong with it. I mean, we're amateurs with baseball bats, but.

They're hardcore. It looked great. Yeah. We're definitely not. Even their messed up ones are nice.

Mm-hmm. We're happy with what we got. Yeah. Well, we've done the whole intro on you, Jess. I thought we'd throw it at her this time and get a little backstory, so...

Let's start at the very beginning, like I always like to do. And you won't have her weird hometown stories to tell. You've got to come up with your own. Okay. All right.

From early on, I like the little kid options. What did you see yourself growing up to be when you were a little kid? An astronaut, I think, was the first thing I remember. Space camp is still in your future. Totally always wanted to be weightless.

And that led to acting somehow. It went from astronaut to acting. It's all up the stars. for a while and then i i did i guess senator jennifer prediger always had a nice ring to it and then i worked on capitol hill a little bit and i was like. No It's not like we haven't had any actors turn politician. I don't feel like you made enough of an effort with astronaut, to be honest.

Thank you. I really didn't. Although now it really wouldn't do you any good because we don't have any spaceships anymore. Everyone's going to Mars soon anyway. We're going to live there.

You'd have to relocate to Russia and hitch a ride with them at this point. Yeah. So I guess what then... Once you got interested in acting, what steps did you take? Was it all just high school?

It's been a very strange, circuitous path. Because my parents really weren't very supportive of the idea of their daughter being an actor. Well, okay, the actor part, I can see that. There's no money there. No safe money.

Unless you make it big and you're Robert Downey Jr. You got to drink yourself for 20 years. Exactly. Whatever it takes. You were saying you have to get arrested.

You have to get a record. I want to invest in my career tonight. We're starting tonight. Whatever I have to do to build character to bring to the characters that I play. It's research.

It's all research. But, you know, I acted some in high school, went to college, did some plays and stuff. And then I ran away to L.A. when I was 21 and started, like, trying to make a go of it somehow, not knowing at all what I was doing. And I started taking classes at the Groundlink Theater, which is this great improv theater. But the thing that I did that, you know, was crazy was I kept going on auditions.

And I actually did a thing on The Man Show. Do you remember The Man Show? Even, I guess technically I'm a man, but I did not buy into most of the things that they were selling. I'm like, I get it, but I don't know. So how did you fit into The Man Show?

I got like a paid acting gig to go on the air at like 5.30 in the morning and just do whatever voices they wanted me to do, like play whatever character. And I just remember the first time I did it, and only time, they wanted me to be a teenage vampire so i was like okay i'm down with that and i get on you. Should add that to your list of astronaut teenage. Vampire first paid acting role teenage vampire um and then it just like it was so hyper sexualized and it i found i mean i think they were sort of doing it ironically but like for me at the time being like 21 it wasn't ironic like it was just kind of um It. Hadn't crested yet.

Yeah. It was like a little. Dehumanizing in a way. And I felt like a lot of things in LA were that way. And I didn't have an agent.

And I really didn't know how to like do stuff. So I went to graduate school in psychology. And I was doing like stand-up comedy. Anyway, long circuitous path. How cool that makes her though?

Graduate school, psychology. You're like, I don't need this acting stuff. But I'll do it. I didn't think I was. You have like worldly knowledge.

I had a... fun job where I was like a journalist for a while, like a video journalist. I got to travel worldwide. Worldly. For Vice. I wish.

That would have been so cool. But then I turned 30 and then I was like, I'm gonna die someday. And Tonight, from what I hear, I mean, based on your plans, I mean. We're thrown down. But at least I've done what I wanted to do, which is, you know, act and make movies.

Because that was the big, like, wake-up call. I was like, someday I'm going to drop dead. So I might as well do whatever the heck I want to do while I have time. That's a good reason. And it was a really foolish mistake to do that.

No, it's been really wonderful, but it's definitely a crazy path. It's always a surprise. Like, we didn't know we were... gonna make this movie we. Fell into our laps yeah we fell into its lap we just sort of we wrote it so fell into each other's laps. Of a month on almost a dare you know like a producer was like oh you know i like you guys if you guys can pull something together that's any good at all.

Like we'll do it super low bud, shoot it in like 15 days and, you know, make, you know, help you make it. And we were like, let's do it now. Last time you were here, you said you were working on directing. You said you had a story, but it wasn't this one. No, that one I hope to do next with the backdrop of people saying, oh, she can actually, she knows what it's like to make a movie.

And the other one I remember telling you is about my dad, which if you start on really precious material, I think it'll drive you crazy because it was, every day was like, what is going to happen? There's so many surprises that I think the second time around for both of us, like a first love, though maybe won't have that That like constant shock and awe, but we'll be steady and man. Yeah, it's like the second child. You just give birth so much easier. And then you don't pay attention to it anymore.

No. And you neglect it. And you ignore it because you love your first one. What are you talking about? Wait, are you a second child?

No. No, I'm commenting on my sister now. She's very bitter. You're the first. Are you the first child?

I'm the first, but what's funny is it's all about the baby. So both of us are just like, oh no, she's... The third one came along and stole everybody's thunder, so it's okay. Yeah, that sounds about right. It's always somebody else's fault.

Did you, were you, were there other kids in your family? I don't think we went into that. Oh, I'm an only. Oh. I'm an only child.

That seems about right. How about you? I'm a half only child, which sounds weird, but my parents split, so I'm my dad's only kid, and then my mom, so I have a half brother. That's interesting. But I think Jess and I kind of related to each other because of our, Only childness.

Yeah. There's that kind of similar quality. There's a lot. Of make-believe involved in being an only child. I mean, you have your friends from the neighborhood and then you have your imaginary friends.

I think they really set you up for, you know, continuing to. Pretend. They're always there for you, you know? Pretend. Pretend for the rest of your life.

Well, on and off, yeah. Yeah. Just expand. I do it every day. Just expanding on reality.

Sometimes it's just lying to myself. Fake friends until you make friends. Fake friends until you make friends. Yeah. Still work on them.

And work at it. They ate themselves sliding out of the bar. Silver and smooth Wrapping around my toes I was properly dressed Prepared for what you had to. Say Time out for a delicious snack in our sparkling refreshment building. Every item a fresh, appetizing taste treat.

Fresh popcorn, delicious and crisp, with or without butter. French fries, crisp and golden brown. Macadamia nut cheese. First quenching, refreshing ice cold drinks. He's street smart and steel hard.

He's a healer, a fixer. My name's T, baby. Wears $ 600 suits, drives a $ 10, 000 car, and he carries two guns, one to stop trouble and one to make trouble. He was born in the ghetto and raised in the streets. He's been a man since he was a kid, and trouble is this man's name.

You're a friend of Mr. T's. You can count on him. That's my baby. I'm good.

But if you're not, you can count yourself out. I couldn't be gonna damn who owns it or what color. Now you see that baby, I'll come back and see the you. You dig it? If you've got trouble, call T and leave a message.

Service is prompt, efficient, and deadly. We move in on Big's business and the money comes rolling in like waves on the shore. All we gotta do is get rid of Mr. T. T is on the streets right now!

One man, Chuck. He's just one man. Don't make him sound like a goddamn army. He has one edge, and that's his cool, but that's enough, baby, because he's thinking all the time, and if he wants your. Ass, he gets it.

Trouble man is mayhem. Rub him wrong, and he'll blow up in your face before you shoot my man, Abby. I didn't. You and Jimmy got to go away for a couple of days. Where do you want to go?

For what? What for? I got some trouble to handle. Yeah. This is Pete Cockrell.

I want to talk to Chalky. This is T. Chalky's dead. Now I'm coming to get your honky ass. If you're looking for trouble, look out, because trouble is here.

Trouble Man, you jive him, he'll wash you away. Hey guys, look what I've got. Check out these awesome earbuds I'm using right now. Look at that. That's wood right there.

That's actual wood. Why would you use wood to make technology? Because they're... It's like. They're steampunk.

Is steampunk really wood? I thought it was more of a brass thing. Well, you got to work the wood in to hold the brass together. These are the fancy high-end steampunk versions with a mic built in, mind you. But yeah, where would I get these you wonder?

Tweaked Audio. Way to pitch. You want to hear more, you say? TweakedAudio.com. Hey, they are available in three styles and seven colors only.

And they sound pretty damn good. I kind of forgot because I hadn't had my old pair in a while and I was using the knockoff crappy ones I bought at the store. And I got these and put them in. I was like, oh, shit, that's right. These are actually really good.

So they are professional. Quality earbuds, mind you. And, you know, noise reducing, compatible with your iPods and most phones, unless you have a dumb phone. You should really get a smartphone, not a dumb phone, right? So anyway, the basic rundown here, if you need yourself some earbuds, tweakedaudio.com.

And if you go there, there's a deal. There's a Meltdown deal. If you go, there's a discount code, and you put in Meltdown, you get 33% off and free shipping. You guys are excited, right? Yeah.

As well you should be. Tweakedaudio.com. Use the Meltdown code. That's all I'm saying. Hey guys, it's the repeater from the Tower of Technobabble, and we're getting ready to do our next show.

I thought it might be cool for you to look behind the scenes and see how the magic happens. In fact, Conduit is getting Towerbot ready. Right now as we speak. Want some music for your ears? Doo-Wop Shop makes it easy to rent for any event, business meeting, or special occasion.

From PA systems to karaoke machines to just about anything that makes noise, you can rent it from the Doo-Wop Shop. In Louisville, find them either at their Highland store at 1587 Bardstown Road or in the East End at 2915 South Hurstburn Parkway. And look for them online at doo-wop-shop.com. Doo-Wop Shop. We're serious about music.

And I realize. The blame is on me Cause I knew you were trouble. When you walked in This is Jess Weixler and Jennifer Prediger, and you're listening. To Movie Meltdown. Your last one was pretty epic.

She started high and then she went really low. Oh, I did it again. You kind of did. Weird, but I just joined it this time. That was fun.

It's part of your problem, you know, you haven't seen enough movies. All of life's. Riddles are answered in the movies. And now, on with the show. And why were you so cruel?

I was just. Trying to be alive. Okay, so we're heading back to the film fest here. But now we're also going to hear some of the Q & A that they did after the movie. Jess said it was okay to record their conversations.

And as I listened to it, I definitely wanted to work in some of it. Because not only do we learn more about the making of this particular film, but also I think some really interesting lessons about being an independent filmmaker... and even more interesting from the perspective of two first-time directors. So now we'll head to the Q & A with Jess and Jennifer, and you'll hear them talking with actor William Maypother, who was on hand running the Q & A. And then later we'll work in some more of my conversation with them as well. So now to the Q & A.

I'll keep quiet next time And fuck you, I'll keep quiet But I live in New York. It was a long circuitous path to get there and to be an actor, but Jess and I had the good fortune of working with the same director who showed me this wonderful movie she was in called Alexander the Last. And that was really the first time I saw Jess, and I just loved her. And I hoped someday we would be friends, and then we got really lucky. Super mutual, Jenny.

And then I was actually leaving New York for a little stint, and Jess was coming to New York to work on The Good Wife, which she's so great on. I love her so much. She just lights up that show. But she subletted my apartment. Thankfully, so I didn't have to pay double rent.

And I went and worked on another movie, and then I came back to New York, and we got to be roommates. And within a week of being roommates, we were like. to make something? Yeah! And then we just started writing. Can I pick this up a little?

Can I dive in? I know you're totally wanting to ask questions. No, go ahead. We had a producer friend who she had met through her boyfriend, a movie that he had worked on called Life of Crime, who was like, oh, you guys seem like fun and cool. You want to make an indie movie?

If you can write it. In a month and.... Then we'll go into production, and then you'll have like 14 days to shoot it. And so it was a bit of a dare, almost. You're like, all right.

For anybody out there who doesn't know, that is extraordinarily fast, to both write it and to shoot it. Yeah, and so we had to sort of model the script and the story structure on things. As a child, I used to weep in picture shots. LAUGHTER Yes, Withnail and I. That's one of my favorite movies.

Withnail and I. If anybody wants to see it, it's a fantastic British cult comedy. We sort of modeled this movie off of that. We both loved that movie weirdly, so that helped. But that movie got really panned in the beginning, and now it's like this loved, beloved movie, but I kind.

Of love knowing that people were like, this movie sucks. This is weird. George Harrison actually produced it, but We just tried to copy it. It's similar to that. We interwove that with The Odd Couple and Laverne and Shirley.

And Dumb and Dumber. We were kind of dumb in this movie. Super dumb. And we wanted to show the dynamic of codependent relationships where one is the narcissist and one is like, The cheerleader. The cheerleader.

And how those relationships, be it love relationships or friendships, how they get so out of tilt, even though there's real love there, they have to break because both people have to figure out how to be strong. So we wanted to explore the nature of codependent love and. What that means. But now that we've really experienced codependent love co-directing the movie, it would be really fun to see the follow-up because now we know so much Not that either one of us is the narcissist. We're both the narcissist together.

You never roomed together, correct? We did. Oh, you did for a while? We overlapped. And I did have a cat named Pigeon.

You can see where I'm heading with this. Talk about which aspects, if you're willing to, any individual moments or aspects of the film that you guys drew from your own lives. Cats. I was a broke-ass actor, first of all. Couldn't pay my electric bill.

No, not quite that bad yet. But I had a cat who, when Jess and I lived together, Jess is actually allergic to cats. And I had the most awesome cat, and his name was Pigeon. He was only six, and he had like, his heart was too big, which is really beautiful in a certain poetic way, and. He had a heart attack while we were together.

And I had to take him to the vet and put him down, and that. Was awful, and Jess went with me. It was awful. Also because I hated the cat, and I didn't treat the cat that poorly. No.

She actually appreciated him. I appreciated him enough, but I wouldn't touch him. She was only a good wife. She couldn't, like, break out in life. I get it.

I get it. The cat was really. But when Jenny was so attached to the cat, when the cat died, we were like, ah, this can help loop into the idea of having to let things go, let relationships go. And so the cat became this kind of magical theme for the movie. I think the cat made the movie possible.

I'm a weirdo, just like Olivia, my character. And I think my dead cat made this movie possible. So if you're looking for financing... Get a dead cat spirit to speak to rich people. And that's how you make a movie.

Sorry, it's that weird. It is, it's a weird thing. It's like, you've got to get so much money to just be foolish and believe in you. I mean, that's just kind of what happens. And, I mean, thankfully there are some rich people who are just foolish and believe in people.

And thank God. Thank God, because we got to do this crazy, wonderful thing together. With all of us. I mean, it was like a, I think it was a gift to everybody. Everybody enjoyed the process.

Even the people who shoved out the cash. Well, here was my acting question. I guess both of you, as you get into this, once you kind of hit that point where you decide you're serious and you want to get into it, when you get to that point, what do you think that you can bring to a role that maybe other people can't? I think every single person brings something that nobody else can. And I'm going to be super cheesy for a second, but just as no person is comparable, like some people look sort of alike, but we're all really snowflakes people.

I'm not sure if I'm buying this at all. But really, you can see... I'm going to use this just as a recent example. You see Hannibal played by one of the greatest actors of all time, one of the most revered performances of all time. Mads Mikkelsen, sure.

And then Mads Mikkelsen comes along and you're like, why is somebody else trying to play Hannibal? They're never going to live up to the hype of all the awards of, oh my God, why am I blanking? Anthony Hopkins. Anthony Hopkins. Jeez, that's embarrassing.

Of Anthony Hopkins. You'll never be Anthony Hopkins. He is Hannibal. Hannibal. And then Matt Mickelson comes along, completely reinvents the wheel and is brilliant in his own way.

And I think that's true about every single role. Somebody else can come in and if they commit fully and give their whole person to it, they will be just as fascinating, just have different aspects of who they are that are strong in the character. But very different. Because I don't know, there are some... Again, I've gone on about yours.

But I think there's some of the performances you've done that I don't think people could bring specifics of what you bring to it they could bring something else i guess but we don't. Like that well that's nice if people want to be picky and then pick me or jenny all right. So now it's a duel so now you must like defend yourself it's time for your rebuttal go. Pick us that's what we say pick us. Or watch Trouble Dolls, at least.

You don't have to pick us. It's just our movie. It's just 72 minutes of your life. Is that how long it is? 77.

77. A good time. Also, Will Forte and Megan Mullally and Jeffrey Tambor. We're a little more unknown, but the three of them, they're superstars. You had the inside track on most of that, right?

Because you kind of knew... at least your other main leads, and you started working them into the screenplay. Between the two of us, we were able to fan-doogle them. We pieced them together. They did us a solid, all of them. And anybody out there who has worked or wants to work on an independent film or knows anything about independent film knows how difficult it is to get actors who have value, recognizable names like Jeffrey, Megan, and Will.

So talk about how you got them involved. Had you worked with them before? Did you send a script to their agents or what? So what was really cool is that Jess had worked with Megan Mullally on a wonderful movie called Somebody Up There Likes Me. And then I had worked... with Will Forte and played his secretary in the movie called Life of Crime.

And so we had developed relationships with these amazing, iconic comedy actors. And actually, Megan said to Jess at one point while they were working together, if you ever do anything, I'll do it. So she gets her up. What's crazy is that there are so many people in TV. The film world has gotten very small.

And there's a lot less money in film now. And a lot less. Movies are being made for any substantial budget. But the TV world, this is like the golden era of television. And television is amazing right now.

But a lot of TV actors still want to do film, and there aren't that many opportunities. So you can call somebody like Megan Mullally, and if they're like, oh, we like. You, sure, I haven't done a movie in forever. This is the largest part she's ever had in a film, which is crazy. I mean, she's an iconic actress from Will & Grace and changed our culture in a huge way from what she did.

I mean, I think for many of us who watch Will & Grace, she was the best character. show but she you know wants a film career and amazingly enough us two you know neophytes got like tap into that desire for her and and this was sort of like the most kind of what is it dramedy it's not dramatic it's not comedic whatever that yeah so this is the most common dramatic role that. I think she's ever played. And the biggest role she's had in any film. Which is kind of nuts, knowing how talented and amazing she is and how successful she is. And Tambor and I just had the same agent.

He was like, oh, good. Her agent is, like, unrelenting, which is really cool. Now, had either of you directed at all before, like, even a short film or. Anything like that? I directed one other thing in my life.

At Walden Theater as a play. Like when I came back, it was ridiculous. And so this challenge for both of us being like, can you make a movie in 14 days? With training wheels. We were each other's training wheels.

Yeah, neither of us knowing what we were doing yet was like the perfect playground. Because you also had a friend when things went wrong and things went wrong constantly, just for the stress of all the time and us not knowing what we were doing yet. And it wound up. Being so much more meaningful than I had ever imagined. I mean, the issue of friendship, of course, matters.

So it wound up being like digging quite deep, I think, for both of us. We thought we were going to make just like a baller comedy, and then we were like, well. It's kind of melancholy. These friends break up. Yeah, so it wound up being.

A deeper subject matter than we, I think, originally intended. But with Nail and I, it's like that, too. It's very much like that. It ends like this. It's hysterical, and then it ends, well, you can see it.

One of the most difficult things that a lot of independent filmmakers have to go through, and you kind of mentioned in just a couple words, was fundraising. And talking to investors. And you said, I mean, if I recall, you made a mention, oh, you met some guy and he said, well, you should make a movie together or something. If you're able to talk about it, can. You talk about that aspect of the process, about having to fundraise or talk to investors or worry about finding money or anything?

This was like a miracle from the film gods, this movie. we met these producers who basically just loved us and said, you know, write something and we'll finance it. And it was someone I'd worked with on Life of Crime, which is this new Elmore Leonard movie. That my boyfriend directed, actually. Awesome. Please, publicize it.

Is it due? When's it due out? It's on Video On Demand. Jennifer Aniston is the star. There are amazing people in it.

Will Forte, Tim Robbins. The name again is? Most definitely, Life of Crime. Life of Crime. So these investors produced Life of Crime.

They financed Life of Crime. And thankfully, Jess and I were just in kind of a good orbit in that moment and with each other and they saw what we were up to and they really liked it and they liked us together and they thought we were a really interesting pair. And they said, you girls just go. I think also they had never produced anything on the ground before. They just financed it.

We realized while. We were shooting, everybody in the position they had, it was the first time they had ever been. Given that much power. And that's a movie in and of itself. It was fascinating.

But in a weird way, it made everybody want to rise to the occasion and prove they could do it. Like our producers had never produced before, and they really wanted to show they could do it. Our set designer had never been the head of set design before, and she killed it. No one had done anything. So it was a great opportunity for everyone.

That's why we could afford them. Everyone rose to the challenge and it was a really cool thing. And we knew when somebody says that to you, like, oh yeah, we really like you guys, let's. See what you can do. There's this small window of time that you have to cash in.

Strike while the iron is hot. Yeah, and we were like, we've got to write this so fast and get it to them now because in three months they're going. To have said that to 12 other people. So we just ran with it. And we spent every day with each other.

And Jess lived in Los Angeles and I lived in New York at a certain point. So we were, you know, even if we weren't in the same city, we were still together all day on the phone. We would just hear each other breathe. While we were writing, like we just spent so much time. Yeah.

Like, what are you writing now? Hold on, give me a minute, I have to finish. Talk about what your plan was for how you would co-direct and then how. It actually worked. I don't know that we had a plan, basically because we had so little time, because we just like, we speed wrote it and then we speed shot it. we were kind of in it, I mean, we were shooting 11 pages a day.

We would get like one or two takes of everything and have to move on. With Jeffrey Tambor. With people that we wanted to impress, because like Jeffrey and Will and Megan are so big and great. But they were game, and we just kind of did everything together. We would whisper in each other's ears and decide what to say so that we weren't contradicting.

Each other out loud. just in each other's ears quietly. Yeah, we did a lot of, like, whispering, and then one of us would decide what to say to the group. Stop doing it that way. It's terrible. Jenny, don't whisper into the mic.

That's just so you know what it was like. It was so great. I mean, and I feel like our powers combined really drew a lot to the project that, like, we wouldn't have probably gotten on our own, so it was really cool to see, like, what we were each like together able to like magnetize to it and it just was so much fun to like be like oh. My god it was really fun to make something with a friend yeah I think if you're going I think directing can be such a lonely thing editing can be such a lonely thing and to have a friend like right by your side through it all made it made it a process that was for lack of a better word more than bearable exciting yeah yeah. Wasn't something that there were moments of clashing on creative decisions?

No. Never. I'm not buying that either. Just once. Just one time.

The bruises faded around my neck. Yeah. Save the drama for the screen, Jess. We had our moments. We had some really funny moments.

Amazing moments in movie making history. Can I tell it? I think you should. Um, So there was like this moment. Can I say the F word here?

No, please do. Okay, so there's a moment in the screenplay where one character says to the other, get the fuck out of my face. No, shut your fucking, oh wait. I think it was like. I want you to shut your fucking face.

I want you to shut your fucking face. Something like that. And then Jess and I were having like a disagreement. We were like racing down the street in New York and I like quoted the line verbatim at her in a fit of phrase. You know what's amazing though is it's my.

Line in the movie. She looks at me and we're in a fight and she's like, I want you to shut your fucking face. And I was like, that's my line. I wrote that one anyway. Just stealing my stuff.

I stole your line in a fight. You really sold it though. I know. I really delivered on that one. It's so funny to think about that now though.

And I feel like we're like the better, all the better for it. Like we've become such good friends because we can weather a storm together too. And now we just laugh about that stuff because it's so funny. Yeah. I imagine that's what saves a lot of relationships is if you have a similar enough sense of humor.

Yeah. Because shit's going to hit the fan with anyone. Definitely. Especially being packed together. I mean, as much as you had to log in to write and direct and get this done and be co-stars.

We were attached. A lot of time. I have some more questions, but at this point, if anybody wants to chime in with one, please raise your hand. Okay, go ahead. I'm curious about the artwork.

How did you find the artist? Did you tell them what you wanted, or just throw it loose? One of our close friends is an eccentric artist, kind of like Nicole, who had this weird. I don't know if you saw in the apartment. Like, all the hands filled with sand going down the ladder.

I think she called that thing, like, the masses. Like she was very serious and like her titles are all quite pretentious. But they meant something. What did you call it? I called it latex misunderstanding.

But we let her. Just sort of take over and work with our set designer who hadn't been the head person before. And just let them go to town and talk with them. About, like, oh, we want this to be about, like, letting things go, ephemerality, riding on sand, riding on. Water, all things pass.

And so we tried to make every single thing a theme of that. Like, although some of them, like the dripping popsicles, we thought it would be, like, the dripping, but we're like. Fine, it's just popsicles hanging there, but they look cool. And our friend Amber, she really did a cool thing because she tried to embody. Jess's character.

And really created art from a character perspective instead of from her own. Perspective, which I think was a new thing for her. And I think she really enjoyed it, and it was really cool. I mean, even working with costume designers was a similar thing, where the costume designer sort of dives down into who the characters are and thinks about how they would be feeling emotionally and why they would wear a certain thing. You know, my character was very comfort-based, and so she wore a lot of, like, comfort clothing, and we would talk about the emotionality behind that.

So I think a lot of that went into the art of Nicole, too, and it was really cool that our. Friend who's an artist, like, took on this persona. It was fascinating directing for the first time, knowing really what a collaboration it all is. That what gets on the screen, I mean... Directing is really just sort of like trying to put the right people together and time management and making sure that everybody knows what each scene is sort of supposed to be about.

But just finding the right cast in the crew that was involved and letting everybody feel like they were doing what they wanted to do. Yeah, it was like an honor to sort of have people make things and give them to us for no money. It was really sweet. Because there are like a million creative decisions that go into making a movie, like from the earrings you see on a character to how their hair is to what their makeup's like to what their clothes is like to what's on the walls. And it's so many variables that it just, like, it's so much to think about.

So to have so many people, like, in the milieu with us that we're all thinking about Trying to occupy the same mind space that we were in and bring these characters to life was really a cool thing. Here's one. Another issue that a lot of filmmakers have is getting permission. One place that's famously difficult to get permission to shoot is on and in the New York subway. So I suspect there may be a story.

Ah, I just saw the cock in the eyebrows. There's a story there. We had permission to do everything. All of it was legal, and there are no problems with what we did. I think we told an interviewer right before we came up here tonight that we were going to get arrested before the end of the night to, like, raise our cred.

Because after you have, like, a record, you're so much cooler. So let's just go on record that was illegal. Okay. We just went into the subway with backpacks and most of those people were not with us. We stationed a few people.

And a huge Arri Alexa camera, which is an amazing kind of big, you know, like really noticeable camera. You don't hide it under your coat. No. They like pulled it out of a double bag. I'm sure people thought we were going to like pull out a big weapon or something.

It looked like an Uzi. He suddenly just hoisted it up and like put it in the middle of the train. And I really did do that on the subway in New York multiple times, much to Jess's chagrin, I'm sure. But it was. I've always wanted to do that.

I've always wanted to get up and talk to people. Because there are people, I don't know if you've been to New York, but there are always people that are like, excuse me, ladies and gentlemen. And then they have a whole spiel. So I wanted to make it a spiel about humanity. And those guys that were dancing, we always wanted dancers in the subway, but our producers were like, look, this is already illegal.

We can't pull this off. We aren't going to get dancers. Sorry, you don't get Not all your dreams come true. Yes, suckers. We show up, and there are guys dancing while we're there.

And there are people that are pinching each other. No, there are people that our producer had seen earlier in the day working out at a jungle gym in the city. So our producer had connected. With the same guys who were flipping from the bars and the subway like four hours before. In a dark part of town.

She had seen them in a different part of the world that day. It was just like the film gods again smiled down on us and made this weird thing that we both wanted possible. And then there you go. We suddenly have people. And we approached them and we were like, hey, can we give you 60 bucks to like hang out with us?

And it's like hour and a half as we go up and down and we're gone. All right. Well, we'll wrap up here. I guess tell people where to find your movie. What's the best way for them to go out and get it?

Well, eventually it will be on VOD. iTunes. Stuff like that. Maybe Netflix. Maybe a few theaters. We're still waiting for all that stuff to come together.

We're going to work out the details. We'll drive it over to your house. Just Google Trouble Dolls whenever you feel like it. As often as possible. Or follow us on Twitter and we'll totally let you know when either our friends are doing awesome things or when we think you're doing awesome things.

I just randomly write to you and tell you when I saw you somewhere. I'm like, yep, watching Good Wife. There she is again. And I love the favorite button. We pass the word along.

Thank you, Brian. Thank you for joining us. Thanks for having us. That was awesome. I love Louisville.

We did it. Thank you. Has she been telling you the right way to say it? For like years now, she's been telling me that. I was like, you're wrong.

All right. Well, that about wraps things up here. I did want to give a big thank you to IF Film Fest and everyone at the Louisville Film Society for letting us record this and several more upcoming segments during the festival. They put together a terrific lineup of films and it has been great to work with them. For more on their organization and what they have in the works, go to louisvillefilm.org and seek out Trouble Dolls.

It's not just a fun movie, it's got moments that are so damned hilarious, I almost injured myself laughing. There was a scene, Jess is running around delivering one of the most hilarious performances in the adorable way that only Jess can. And then Jennifer is there, just the rock. She is just ignoring her and delivering these great lines. It's an amazing scene.

You'll know it when you see it. It sort of defines that half of the movie. So yes, definitely check it out. It's fun, but along the way, as they said, there's some surprisingly poignant moments. So I urge you to go find it, check it out.

And then, as they said, go find them on Twitter and then tell them you heard about the movie on Movie Meltdown. All right, well, thanks to the Film Fest and Jess and Jennifer. Okay, enough with the thank yous already. Thank you for nothing. Oh, no, wait.

I'm just rolling into our closing song, which is also the closing song for the movie provided by Elizabeth and the Catapult. Otherwise, that about does it. We will return next time. Same geek feed. Thanks for listening.

Thank you for everything. Thank you for nothing. My brother, there is no in-between. Never one without the other I may not know anything But I think I'm onto something For every door opening There's another one slowly closing Thank you for loving me Thank you for leaving Thank you for promising And then promptly forgetting. For the gifts.

That were given Just to be taken for granted Studied indifference Can't turn to careless Once disenchanted With a glass that was filled Then just as easily broken Thank you for everything And thank you for nothing Mmm Thank you for trusting me and then biting the bullet Thank you for laughing out loud even when you. Don't mean it. They say hurting is growing if you believe when. You say it. So I'll just keep saying it Thank you, thank you I'll just keep saying it Thank you, thank you I'll just keep saying it Thank.

You, thank you I'll just. Keep saying it Thank you, thank you Thank you for everything Thank you for nothing at all Thank you for nothing. Thank you for nothing at all. It's not legal to tell this story. This is not legal.

This story is. Not going to be on this list. Keep it in Louisville. Do not tell anyone about it. It would be so much cooler if we actually got arrested.

I feel like we honestly need to get it on our record so that we have some legitimacy. So we could be real trouble dolls. Yeah. Maybe tonight. This episode is a production of Movie Meltdown, produced and edited by The Oddity Studios, with the opening.

Music performed by The Empires. For more on how to sponsor or support the show, email producer at moviemeltdown.com. Talk hard!