LOCAL DIRECTORS GRAPPLE WITH PROVIDING SAFE SETS
Hollywood has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, and productions that were due to start filming in 2020 have been put on hold indefinitely as the country waits through the pandemic. For smaller productions helmed by local filmmakers, though, the cameras are starting to roll again, albeit very, very carefully.
Jeremy Sumrall is a horror writer and director. His most recent film, “Pickaxe,” was an oldschool slasher flick starring a bevy of bloody and often nude Houstonians. It reached number 18 on the Amazon horror DVD charts, which Sumrall considers a success.
“I love what people like (director) Ari Aster do, but that’s not the sort of film I make,” says Sumrall. “I make barf-bag films. I call it Texploitation.”
In March, he was supposed to start filming “Vixen With a Vendetta,” a bloody revenge film. The outbreak made assembling a crew difficult, considering a reluctance to travel, financial concerns and the danger of infection. Sumrall decided that now was the time to improve himself in the name of safety.
He started by taking a course from Safe Sets International and receiving certification. The course covered basic infectious control protocols, such as social distancing, masks, proper PPE and disinfecting. In addition, Sumrall began taking online courses that enabled him to be his own crew, learning what he would normally have to hire a small army to do.
“The last thing I wanted to do is expose people to any nastiness,” says Sumrall. “If there’s any exposure, you need to quarantine before I will consider having you on set.”
With his new skills, he is planning a small shoot involving just a couple of actors, himself and a single assistant. He is also cutting filming days down from 15 hours to seven. Though he feels he can’t make a feature in this environment, he can put together a proof of concept trailer for “Vixen” to keep interest in film alive and attract investors.
“We can’t become a dystopia,” he says. “We have all that fiction to teach us what not to do. We have to keep making movies.”
Another Houston horror luminary is on the same page. Julin Jean is a former scream queen turned head of her own production company, FoxForce. Indeed, she and Sumrall worked together on 2009 Houston horror classic “Sweatshop.”
Right now, Jean is making ends meet with smaller projects. She just started working on a book trailer for Houston author Shina Reynold’s young-adult fantasy novel “A Light in the Sky.” It’s required some ingenuity.
“One of the issues we’ve found in outside shoots is the humidity,” she says. “We wear face shields and masks, but we keep having to run to the bathroom to clean them up.”
Social distancing has been a headache for her. There is a love story to film, and safety concerns have led to a lot of reaction shots from a distance. Monitoring social distancing has been a chore as well, since movie sets are naturally chummy places. She finds herself verbally separating people a lot.
On top of that is the loss of the connections that collaboration brings. She can no longer physically go to prop shops and browse for ideas, and Zoom production meetings just do not have the same oomph.
“You want people to feel safe on set so they can fully express their art,” she says. “You don’t want them wondering if they’re going to get coronavirus. That shows up in scenes.”
Like Sumrall, she wants to get back to features. Her current project is also a horror movie, “Vicky’s Killer Vacation.” Jean is not worried as much about the outdoor shoots when it comes to the pandemic, but she is ready with some inventive ideas to still be safe when production starts in January.
“We wanted to do all in studio for an art-house look, but now I’m considering building everything outside to keep the air circulating,” she says. “Texas has some wideopen spaces. We have some property in Halletsville. It’s quiet out there.… I think we can do this safely.”