Expressing Love Through Shared Media

Truth This is The Tuth. I'm Jonathan Mitchell, and lately we've been releasing conversations in between episodes, talking with the writers about where these stories come from and the ideas inside them And today I'm talking with writer David Lloveband, who wrote midnight screening And this will be a spoiler filled conversation. It's really meant to be listened to after you heard the story So if you haven't, you'll want to go listen to it first And we'll talk with David after the break This interview will be available on the main feed for four weeks And after that, it'll be exclusively available on our premium feed, which is where we keep all of our interviews and bonus material. And that's also where you can listen to the show ad free Go to the truthpodcast that. supportingcast. f There's a link in the show notes. The summer months are starting, the weather is changing And so are my clothes. 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Law Supplies last ends june thirtieth turns at aka dot mS slash college Pc I first met David Blove Band last summer when he played the lead role in our story Operation Skill Shot which was written by Hunter Nelson And one day when we were recording a scene in my living room, David leans over to me and asks how he can write a story for the show. And that's how midnight screening was born He decided to base the setting of the story on a real theater in Brooklyn that offers a weekly midnight screening. And there's this theater in Brooklyn called Film Noir Cinema has one of those types of screenings that is like you go in, you don't know what is going to be playing and then the lights go down and you're You're like, oh who, I guess I'm watching like them or anything. Have you been to a lot of those screenings? I remember I discovered this place Kind of before like right before COVID So it wasn't open for a while. Then it came back and I've been back a few times since then It's a nice theater, kind of uncomfortable, but it is also like in experience in of itself and it's run by this old Polish man who is just obsessed with film. Yeah. and you had a character like him in your very earliest drafts of the story. He later became the Lewis character, right? Yeah. in the earlier draft of before it became the story it was, he was more of the like Stephen King's old man warning you not to go in the pet cemetery. He's kind of it was like that type of a figure. And we were all like, give me more of that. Yeah. and I eventually like changed I changed the story once like Once certain aspects of my life started like really dominating my thoughts and like occupied my time of like what I like what I had to be thinking about when I wasn't like trying to be a creative of like And mom'm getting sick and then that's all like I just I was like, I this lacks a plot, but I want to write something that's still set with this but like motivated by this feeling I mean, just the idea of like having so much footage of your parent to sif through, like, U my mom is a home shop was she was a jewelry designer in a home shopping network presenter. and my whole childhood was like taping my mom for her to watch when she comes back home. Oh wow Do you still have those tapes? There must they must be somewhere. My mom had like, I mean, there were like hundreds of them. They're just like so many. like just becausecause she wanted to watch to see how she was you know, and then she became like a very Um, Okay, which camera are we talking to now? now she was like a pro at like just studio presentation stuff. So it's just like, oh, she knows, she knows where the lighting is and she knows where the camera is. and it was really impressive to watch her as a child just like figure that out. Like she studied herself. She studied herself very diligently and my mom is a big She's still with us. I don't mean to use the past sense, but she doesn't do this stuff as much as she used to. but she was big in division boards. And she would like have lots of maps of like, this is what I'm doing and this is like what I'm taking from experience. and she was a very like on camera person There's also a lot of Lewis in that aspect of her. She's very on camera. She she was She's a performer. She was really like very if there was a camera on, like My dad was into like videotaping stuff when I was a kid. And if the camera was on her, she would like perform and she'd get me to perform and she would be like very, very she was like she was she's a big old ham. Yeah. Well, that's kind of like Lewis in the story Lewis is a ham. A little bit. It's not not that performative. She's like like I feel like I feel like I wrote Lewis with a little bit more of like I don't know I think my mom my mom just liked being goofy Yeah. And so how did you get from her as an inspiration to the story that you ended up with This one I wanted to write from like I think something I think something I really like honestly is is like a struggle as's my thing as a writer is like I have I kind of think of a setting first And then I try to picture what goes into that like you remember ever have you remember Mighty Max? Remember those toys? No. A the nineties? This was after my time. I This much this probably after your time, but when I was a kid, there was this British toy called Mighty Max and it became like a cartoon show. And it was this like sort of like it is like pooly poocket for boys. It was like this like Like you plastic little, um U like Frankstin Frankenstein's castle and you open it, there's like monsters and there's like all these trap doors and like little things. That's what I think of like when I think of when I think of a script is like I think of like what's the setting and then I try to put like all these different pieces inside. And with this one, I wanted to like I had the setting of this movie theater like a doll house. Yeah. it's like a essentially it's doll It's like so I' like how do I do this dollhouse? How do I do this like or Castle Grace skull? like all these different things? Like how do how do I fill this dollhouse in with all the things I want And in this case, I wanted the motivation to be what I wanted to work through in terms of what I was dealing in life every day with my mom of just like watching my mom is still with us, but her like, u she, you know She's getting sick all the time and getting like more and more progressively like less of the person that I grew up with. person that I attached a certain definition of love to. And then our relationship has changed where I I still love this This person I remember that I know is there somewhere but a lot of the light has left her eyes and a lot of the U the love that I have to show and like receive is different. Like she can't like sometimes like, you know, there are times where she'll forget my name or like what I looked like or like she'll think like I'm Dad. and Those are very difficult things to deal with. So I tried to like use that was the thing I tried to stuff the doll house with of like, how how can this feeling push the story. And I think at the end of the day, that's how I try to approach writing in general is how can I like whatever I'm obsessed with or whatever I'm like going through right now How can that be the engine that like I can fit into this dollhouse Yeah. That's an interesting way of thinking about it because you can if you especially if you I don't know, maybe if it describes you or not, but if you as a child ed stories out with dolls, you know because it gives you a language to use, a vocabulary to feel like I, you know, played Star Wars with my Star Wars figures when I was a kid., you know. I used to take my X Men action figures and make like movies on my dad's DV camera and like I can reenact this scene from Citizen Kane with Cyclaps and Wolverine So the story's kind of like a a love letter to this sort of film buff culture, you know, like There's like a certain types of people who really, really get into old films.. Do you feel like you're a part of that culture Yeah, definitely. I, um I've always been into movies. I would I'd like definitely consider myself like a film buff or like an obsessive in that way. It's just always been a part and I grew up going to those types of theaters. Like there's lots of them like when I was younger, there were a lot more of them F you grow up I grew up in we moved around a lot, but a little bit in Queens, a little bit in the Coney Island section of Brooklyn And then my mom and I lived in Manhattan like different places sporadically There's always a theater everywhere we went. So like there was always a place to like go that was different and new and had like a particular crowd Remember like when I was a kid, there was this place called the Beekman one two theater and that was like the very like U East sideide film buff of like older people who are just like still some some of them still carrying like old men carrying the Leonard Malton film guide and thenck like making notes on it like that type of stuff. So Do you remember was there like a movie that really got you into movies, you know? Was there like something you remember seeing and that just sort of stuck with you and you made you want to go back again and again I think movies have been part of my life since I could remember. like it's just some my parents were super into like they always had the TV on. There was always watch someone was always watching something Um, I think like I really got into parody as a kid, like classic movies through parody, like, you know, Naked Gun or The Simpsons or Muppet babies, anything like. So they would they would make references to other movies. They' be like doing parodies of genres that you weren't familiar with and saying like what is this about? And then you'd go and learn about it. Realizing that everything like in a lot of kids television, there's always references to things that are not for kids like Like pinky in the brain. Pinky in the brain is Maurice Lamarsh doing an impression of Wrston Wells as a little mouse. So that's like, okay, who's Wrson Wells? getting through that and seeing Citizen Kane I rememember watching that with my mom and being like completely blown away. All these influences that became important in my life were always through movies. In a moment, David will tell us about a film he once used to test a woman he was dating And I show them this movie, I will gauge their reaction and I'll be like, oh, this is a person like I would like to spend time with if they understand this. We'll learn what the movie was after the break And if you'd like to support the work we do and hear every episode ad free, you can join us at the truthpodcast. supportingcast. fm Your support directly helps us pay writers, actors, and production costs Go to the trruth podcast that supportingcast. fm. Starting or growing your own business can be intimidating and lonely at times Your to do list may feel endless with new tasks, and lists can easily begin to overrun your life. 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It can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a fifty page restoration block, or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks. Gemini and Chrome is here for it. Ready to make anything online makes sense? There's no place like Chrome. Check responssees setup required compatibility and availability varies eighteen plus I think there's something interesting about the character of Lewis in that he expresses his love through sharing films with other people You know, that's sort of his what he seems to take pleasure in and what he sees as his purpose is to kind of help other people maybe change the way another person sees themsel or the world through a film And I'm wondering, do you do you share that same Uh impulse to share things, you know? Are there films that you like to share with people I think it's the defining part of my personality is sharing films with other people. Like I think it's like a thing that I am known I make myself known to do. like I recommend movies to my friends all the time. I have like moovies going to movies with like it's it's definitely a way I express myself and like If I want if somebody important is in my life I've given them tests by showing them movies O I' at least like what kind of test would it be Like if I like if well, if I go if I go on a date and I show them this movie, I will gauge their reaction and I'll be like, o, this is a person I like I would like to spend time with if they understand this. Well, what's an example of a time when you like tested somebody with a movie and they either passed spectacularly or failed miserably Um, I haven't had an experience yet where someone's failed miserably where they just didn't get The thing I was trying to show them I think one of my most treasured experiences that I hold dearly is, um I was dating this person and we were up in the we were up in this house in Connecticut and it was very romantic. We were like, you know, it's just us and her dog And I was like, hey, do you want to see wateraters ship down which is like A movie that I treasure from when I was a child, It's a horrendously violent, like really dark. I've never seen it. It's very dark and scary.s like's like it's one of those cartoons can be very disturbing movies. but it's something I really hold dear in my heart as a movie from my childhood because it's about Warren of rabbits that has to find a new home once their home is destroyed by developers u by human developers building a condo And then they so they traversse the English countryside looking for a new home and U the mov we watch the movie, the movie ends and she goes, Oh my god. Can we watch that again? And we just put it on and watched it again all the way through. and I was like, oh, this is that's one of my favorite memories. I should just wash Watershhip down. I think it's really, really good. It's like one of my top ten favorite movies of all time. It's like, I I hope it's a lot of my a lot of movies of a very like ar particately curated list of one hundred movies that I consider the best of all time. It fluctuates very frequently, but like the top ten are usually ones that I've shared with my parents spepecifically my mom Watershhip Down is one with that I watched with my mom as a kid. It used to come on like around, you know, Passover Easter on TV becausecause it has a by rabbit. Yeah, it' just like the rabbit motif is like, okay, it's this time of the year. we'll air waterers ship down on a Saturday afternoon on WPIX. So I had the tape. We taped a lot of stuff as a kid. and that was another thing like satisfying hearing the episode is the passing of cassette tapes back and forth. 'causeuse that's such a familiar sound to me. And I was actually I don't know if this comes across, but I was trying to make it actually specifically the professional grade Oh It was one of those bigger machines that has like heavier mechanical parts and so it kind of takes a little It just makes a little bit chunkier sound. It makes sense for what he would for the equipment Lewis probably would have done He would have mastered it on a thicker VHS tape, a professional whichich also speaks to like because my dad used to be really into tech, but his Interest really stopped at Dave forefront of the digital age. Like once like didid like, o like The VCR technology was really his apex. was that that was when he was like, oh, wow, look at all this. And then like once things started scaling down into DVD's and stuff, he was like,, I don't want to learn a new thing. And I think that's what Lewis has in his mind too Yeah. of just like, I have my VCR. It works fine. L I don't wantan to get a new thing. Yeah. And so in the story, Hannah is sifting through all these tapes. And what do these tapes mean to her I Th think it means for Hannah, it's These are all She has left of him And in and in a way, like I'm sure when You know, I'm going to be looking at all the all the tapes of my mom. u, you know, selling her jewelry that she designed or like or even like even without take those out of the equation I still have her vision boards. I still have her collages She made calendars for everybody in the family ever since like Google Paint or like Microsoft Paint was invented. She was like always on like just making collages or different like art projects for people. And I'll always have those. But It seems like in the story Lewis is It's not just necessarily about having his memory, but the fact that his memory is the things she has of him are of him doing these commercials and and All he seemed to care about was his theater. And I think she felt a little neglected because of the attention he gave to her his theater over her And u and I think what the story is exploring is maybe the the difference between like how you might want a person to show their love and how they actually do show their love I think like yeah, because there's because I mean, there's so many stories of artists that are that we' Terrible dads that were just, which I don't think Lewis is necessarily a terrible dad. I think he's someone that is like I I think he's a loving father in his own way. He loves his family and loves his daughter and wants to expose her to this thing that he loves and is obsessed with That's one type of very valid real love. I mean, there's also like You know, um Eugene O'Neill was a neglectful dad Joseph Heller was a neglect was like these are all artists that are like working through something. And I think like when you do something that obsessively, no matter what it is, you're always working through something. And I don't think there's malicious intent behind it in the case of Lewis's character. but He's someone that didn't that has always been working through something and This is how he expresses it. This is how he Like, you know, Jackson Pollock was working through being an alcoholic and his and just so he just stabbed paint like he just stabbed his paintbrush and he made these paintings that people really connect with U same it' like same as any any painter you can think of that suffered most of them suffered from mental illness and most of them were trying to get through something like very obsessively trying to through something so that they could showh people like, see, this is what I experience all the time. Like I'm showing you this movie because this means something to me. I'm not showing this to just anybody. I'm showing this to my community. I'm showing this to my family. I want people that know me to see what I see when I look at that because that means that is love to me