“They’re not here for you, they’re here for Sarsaparilla Sam.”
INT. 2nd GRADE CLASSROOM-2007
"You need to understand that you are not in a position to make those decisions, I am.”
Rubrics are a creative death sentence. Even as a pint sized second grader, I knew this to be true. Mind you, I had just skipped first grade, so I was the height of my academic powers clearly.
Every few weeks my second grade teacher would assign our class to write a journal entry addressed to our parents that recounted the activities from the previous weeks. As far as I can remember, there were no limitations on the activities that we could include. That all changed the week we visited the aquarium. Rather than having the freedom to write what I wanted for that week, our teacher informed our class that we’d be copying a pre-written entry that she had transcribed on the board detailing our trip to the aquarium.
A devastating blow.
I hadn’t even seen that part of the aquarium! Why would I be tasked with writing about something I didn’t even experience…
After writing authentically about my lived aquarium experience, my teacher swiftly corrected me and tasked me with writing the entry again. This time, copying her pre-written entry exactly how she wrote it.
EXT. THE FORUM SHOPPING MALL- CARLSBAD, CA- 2017
“That show that I wrote is good… I know it is.”
“Without the use of dialogue or voiceover, make a film that is less than two minutes long about a character making a difficult and dramatic decision. Show that the character is pulled in two different directions at an emotional level, visualize their process of consideration, and show that they make a decision.”
When senior year of high school came around, I felt as if I’d hit my stride as a storyteller. My ideas for short films were more ambitious and increasingly personal. Though it had just been a year since I’d been gifted my first camera, I was slowly coming into my own as a filmmaker. My 17 year old brain was reeling with ideas: an astronaut stranded on a desert planet with no way home, the devil incarnate tempting a sleazy motel owner into selling his own soul, and ironically, a legendary cowboy facing down “the meanest vaquero” in town (not the last cowboy character I’d write, obviously).
My films were written quickly and shot cheaply. Ideas seemed to flow freely from my mind.
Total creative freedom.
So when I read the guidelines for Chapman University’s film school application, I was thrown for a loop. What a boring premise for a short film, I thought. Given my lack of enthusiasm immediately upon reading that prompt, I had a sneaking feeling that my chances of admission to my first choice for college were slim. Despite this, I halted editing on my neo-noir hitman thriller and took a break from writing my magnum opus, a tale of “good and evil” set in a post-apocalyptic wasteland (spoiler alert: it was actually purgatory all along!) and thrust myself into writing my most uninspired film yet, “Easy Money”.
The film centered on a homeless man, played by my muse, John Young (the DeNiro to my Scorsese, at that time). While begging on a sidewalk, a rich man (played by yours truly) drops his wallet in front of John. His character discovers that the wallet is full of cash! What will he do with this newfound freedom? Perhaps he could buy new clothes, purchase a BMW, ride up and down an elevator while throwing money in the air? Or, could he return the wallet to the owner and receive recognition for his honest deed? John chose the latter, and returns his wallet to the rich man who promptly offers him not an award for being the world’s greatest citizen, as John fantasized about earlier in the film, but instead, a firm handshake. With no recognition and no BMW, John returns slowly to his sidewalk, his head down in shame.
When I received my rejection letter from Chapman a few weeks later, I felt like John’s character. Dreams crushed and head hung low. I so desperately wished that I was able to submit work I had produced previously which would have better demonstrated my creative voice.
Full transparency, I absolutely understand the necessity for prompts like this and I can agree that an individual can express even more creativity when given certain restrictions! (Take it from someone who is currently employed as an admissions counselor who reads applications for work… word limits and prompts on college essays are a GOOD THING!) While I still found ways to infuse this short film with “Griff-isms” (trademark pending), it felt tedious and incredibly impersonal.
INT. SOUTHWEST AIRLINES AIRPLANE-PARK CITY, UTAH- JANUARY 31, 2020
“You mean no one told you what to draw? You drew this all by yourself?”
One of the coolest opportunities I had while at Biola’s Film School was attending Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah during my sophomore year. Being surrounded by both seasoned and aspiring filmmakers was just what I needed after a discouraging past few months.
I was deep into production on my latest short film. Until the End of Time, inspired by my love for The Twilight Zone and Black Mirror, was my biggest project yet, with a whopping budget of $750 and a crew of over (wait for it… are you sitting down?) 15 students! If it wasn’t clear to me by now, gone were the days when my ideas only required 3 friends from Drama club, a small Nikon DSLR camera, and a cheap shotgun mic. As my ideas grew in ambition, so did the necessity for better equipment, more crew members, and a more focused approach to directing.
This was not an easy transition for me to make…
Despite writing and directing what I still believe to be one of my best short films, I found myself increasingly frustrated with the “technical side” of film production. Juggling different schedules for cast and crew, cutting shots that I knew for sure would be possible to complete on set, and having to compromise on locations or shot setups for sake of completing on time amounted to my disillusionment with filmmaking and the creative process in general.
If only we had gotten that dolly shot that I dreamed of getting… if this just looked a little better… I just wish I could’ve… why couldn’t we…
Looking out the window on my flight back to Biola from Sundance, I was feeling both incredibly inspired from the festival and terribly anxious, as I was scheduled to shoot another scene for Until the End of Time just hours after I landed.
What if I could have full creative freedom? No restrictions, no permits, no forms to fill out in order to rent camera equipment. What would that even look like?
Out of my frustration and inspiration, I began brainstorming. Reusing two abandoned film ideas (the first of which centering on a man made out of clay performing for an audience until his little clay body falls apart and the second of which showcasing an animatronic that was displaced from his theme park, attempting to find a way back home), I began drafting the first ideas for Under Refurbishment.
An animatronic… ummmm… clown… wizard… what would be funniest… aha, cowboy!
An animatronic cowboy at a Western themed entertainment center struggles to maintain his creative freedom.
INT. GRIFFIN’S APARTMENT, ORANGE COUNTY, CA- DECEMBER 30, 2023
“You think they’re gonna like it?”
I’ve lived with Under Refurbishment close to 4 years at this point now. It has proven to be the most difficult, time consuming, annoying, gratifying, personal, silly, sentimental, creative, and rootinest tootinest short film I have ever created (for an oral history on the production of the short film itself, check out this podcast.) This film is authentically me, through and through.
The characters, the costume design, the sets, the props, the colors, the camera angles, the dialogue, the editing, the hair and makeup design, the sound design, and the original score (all of which were brilliantly brought to life by my very good friends and fellow filmmakers, W. Graham Skinner, Katelyn Moger-Wagner, Karen Corbett, Melody Eilts, Annabel White-Regier, Kylee Faloni, Isabelle Thompson, Hunter Tate, Grace Hahs, Hannah Milligan, Ashley Logue, Lauren Good, Luke Montgomery, Ethan Montgomery, Grant Reed, Rawleigh Grove, and the incomparable Holly Chang, to name just a few) were all a clear expression of who I am creatively.
After a successful film festival run, the film is now ready to be released online publicly. I am thrilled for audiences to watch it for the first time or revisit it. I hope you can relate to Sarsaparilla Sam as he earnestly pursues creative freedom. Or find inspiration in the kindness and friendship displayed by Buford and June. Or maybe you can even take something away from Gil Grimley (for what it’s worth, running a successful pizza chain is hard work!)
All in all, I am still understanding and learning how to best display my creative gifts.
I firmly believe that I am created to create.
How I go about stewarding those gifts and discerning where my identity lies as a creative person is still something I’m wrestling with (and fuel for future projects, stay tuned, wink wink), but let this film serve as a reminder that creative freedom and self-expression is something worth striving for.
Creating and using our God-given gifts is the most human thing that we can do.
Even if you are an animatronic cowboy.
