Interview: Scott Prendergast
For some filmmakers, Film Independent's Filmmaker Labs are a valuable boost to one day making the movie they want to make. For Scott Prendergast, those labs provided on-the-job training. The director of several acclaimed shorts, Prendergast participated in the Screenwriters' Lab just as he was finishing his first feature script for Kabluey; then the Producers' Lab when he was arranging the financing for the film; and finally, the Directors' Lab just as he was about to start shooting.

Making its world premiere at the 2007 Los Angeles Film Festival, Kabluey tells the story of Salman (played by Prendergast), a misfit who moves in with his depressed sister-in-law (Lisa Kudrow) and her out-of-control children after her husband is sent off to fight in Iraq. Salman's evenings are spent warding off his nephews' homicidal plots while he spends his days passing out flyers while wearing an enormous blue fuzzy costume that has no apparent eye-holes. Also starring Conchata Ferrell, Chris Parnell, and Christine Taylor, Kabluey heralds the arrival of a uniquely offbeat comic sensibility.

Weeks before the first public screening of his film, Prendergast talked about working with stars, working with kids, directing without clothes on, and why his ideal film is one where he does everything by himself.

For a first film, you were able to round up an incredible supporting cast.

Yeah, we got crazy lucky. It’s bizarre. When I went in, everyone told me, "Oh, it’s going to be so hard to do this, you’re trying to make this feature where you’re the writer-director-star. This never happens. You’re never gonna get that." And I said, "Well, you know, one of the ways we’ll do it is we’ll get a big star as the sister, the other lead, and an amazing array of star-studded names for these other parts." And when I went in to pitch the movie to Whitewater, I was talking out of my ass – "We’ll get big stars for ALL these parts!" – with all this confidence, and I had no idea what I was saying. So it was very lucky.

Tell me a little about your background. I know you trained with the Groundlings here in L.A.

I did improv in New York – in college, at Columbia – and then I moved out to L.A. I did the whole Groundlings program and quit before I got into the main company, and I went back to New York to do more experimental improv. And then I had a show in New York for about two years called UnMan, which was a parody of one-man shows, but it was all improvised. And while I was doing that, a guy from Good Machine, Anthony Bregman, saw my show and was like, "You should be making films. You’re improvising these whole shows every night." So he and I made a short film for like 60 bucks called Group Therapy. It was just a test. And then I just kept making short films. Basically, I was killing myself every night to do a live, all-improv show for two hours by myself. And then I would show the movie at the beginning of the show, and it got such a great reaction, and I was like, Why am I killing myself doing live theater? What I’ve always wanted to do is make movies, and once you make it, you have it forever!

So I kept making shorts, and then I got lucky – we had one at Sundance. And then a few of them were bought by the Sundance Channel. And then one was on Wholphin, the DVD from McSweeney’s, and then people kept telling me, "You’ve got to make a feature, you’re not getting anywhere in the world until you make a feature. Your career isn’t going to go anywhere!" And I’m like, "Uh...all right," so nervously I tried writing a feature. I was trying to teach myself. I had never studied filmmaking; I had never gone to film school or anything. I wrote a few features on my own, and they weren’t going very well, and finally, I decided, this is it, I have to do it. And I had this great idea that popped into my head one day, and I wrote it, and it worked.

Was directing something you saw as a necessary evil to give you the opportunity to act, or were you always interested in both acting and directing?

One of the reasons I quit the Groundlings is because Groundlings is all about who gets to be an actor. You move forward, and you get to be on a sitcom or you get to be on Saturday Night Live. And it just seemed like it was all about giving up control. You were just standing around waiting for someone to tell you, "Now you can perform in this." And I’ve never been a very good actor in other people’s material. I’m just not very good, I think, unless it’s something that I wanted to do, that I wrote. So really it just kind of goes hand in hand. That was the problem with the first screenplays that I wrote, which I never finished, was that I was trying to write these screenplays to sell. My management was like, "Write something and we’ll sell it to a studio," but they just weren’t going anywhere. Then I decided what I had to do was do what I did with my short films – I need to write something that I want to direct, that I want to star in, a story that I want to tell. It’s a project from me, for me, and that was what worked. It wasn’t like I did one in service of the other; it was just that was what I wanted to do – I wanted to write, direct, and star in stuff. I wanted to make these stories that I was going to be in, that was the whole agenda.

So you went through every single lab Film Independent offers. What were those experiences like and what results did you get out of them?

Two of my shorts were in the L.A. Film Festival, and when I was at the festival, I went to the Kodak Speed Dating and I met my agent there. That’s how I got my agent. So that was the first thing Film Independent did for me. And when I finally finished my script, I applied to the Screenwriters’ Lab, and Josh Welsh called me and said, "Have you ever thought about applying to Fast Track?" So I applied to Fast Track, I got into Fast Track, and that was...2005? 2004? I don’t even remember now. So I did the Fast Track program, and that was really helpful, in that for me it was the first time I went out in the world and said, "Oh, I have this feature script, I’m going to be making this movie." But then I did the Screenwriters’ Lab, and I was just very excited to be there. I was proud of myself that I had actually finished a feature and someone had recognized it and I got into this lab. The lab was really great in that it was like sitting around with people who had more experience than I did, including Jeff Stockwell, who was the leader. And hearing people talk about their process, how long it took them to write, what were they going to do with it, how were they going to go about it – it was just the association thing of hearing other people go through the same experience. "Oh yeah, wow, you did this too." It gives you that feeling of I’m not alone, I’m not crazy. Just hearing that other people had done it, that it was possible. Those first labs just gave me the feeling of "You can do this." Especially from Josh Welsh. Josh Welsh was always "You can make your feature. It’s not an impossible task." Because everyone I had talked to - everyone I had spoken to – was like, "You will never get a feature made as a writer, director, and star. You will never get it done. It will never happen." And Josh was like, "It’ll happen. You can do it."

And then I had a producer attached, and she applied to the Producers’ Lab, and then she couldn’t do it at the last minute. And because we were basically planning on raising the money independently and doing it on our own, I was going to be a producer on the film, so I replaced her and did the Producers’ Lab. And what was interesting about that was, the people in the Lab – I joke about this with Josh a lot – it’s like Goldilocks and the Three Bears. The Screenwriters’ Lab is all somewhat more reserved people, somewhat more quiet, who are the writers. Then you get to the Producers’ Lab and the people are all about numbers. "I want to buy this person’s soul and sell it for ten cents and make a profit!" It was all very business-business-business. And that lab was incredible. Shelby Stone was amazing, and she just talked us through every possible aspect of production. And I knew nothing about any of this and didn’t have any legitimate film experience; I’d never made a feature, I’d never gone to film school. I’ve never even worked on a feature. But it was that same thing of people saying, "It can be done. You can do it. This is how it happens. Here’s what you do." Very supporting and nurturing. And then actually we got the deal to make Kabluey while I was in the Producers’ Lab. So I would go in every night, and they’d be all, "OK, what’s the update?" And I’d say, "Well today this is what’s going on. We’re arguing about this in the contract. Today, they said this, this, and this." And I’d get the whole room to chime in on it. "Well that sounds shady to me," or "That sounds amazing!" or "Try and avoid that." I literally was going in with details from the contract in my hand, and asking [Lab Instructor] Shelby [Stone], "Can we talk about this for a minute?" So I got a lot of advice from the class on that.

And then I applied for the Directors’ Lab and I went into it just as the film was gearing up. I didn’t think I was going to be able to do the Directors’ Lab, because we were supposed to be shooting then, but then it got a little delayed, and then the delay was repealed and we started shooting a little earlier. So I didn’t get actually get to shoot my scene that they do in the Directors’ Lab, so I told Josh that the film is my actual scene, and he can bring it into class and they can critique it in the theater. One of the great things about that lab – and the attitude in that lab was completely different, like these artistic go-getters, "I’m gonna make my movie!" – we could ask [Lab Instructor] Greg Harrison (November) anything, he was incredible. One of the things we were asking Greg was, "What’s it like working with celebrities?" I, in particular, was very nervous about working with celebrities, not that we even had celebrities lined up at this time. We’d ask, "If you get a celebrity in your movie, are you allowed to talk to them? Can you give them direction? Can you speak to them?" We had had, in the Screenwriters’ Lab, a director come in and talk about one of his features that he directed, and he had a big star in it and said it was a nightmare. The star took over the film, rewrote it, changed everything, and the guy said he would never again work with a celebrity. And Greg was great – he had just worked with Courteney Cox and said, "She was great, she was so amazing, she was so helpful. They know it’s a small film; they want to work so hard." And then as the Lab was ending, we got Lisa, and I was all, "Oh my god! We got Lisa Kudrow!" So I was talking to Greg about that, and it was just really helpful.

I finished the script and I went to the Screenwriters’ Lab. And then I went to the Producer’s Lab, and while I’m in that we got a deal, so that helped me with that. And then as I was gearing up to direct the film, I went to the Directors’ Lab. So each lab came at the exact right moment. It was like crazy kismet. It just worked perfectly so that I got all this great advice as I was just about to go through that phase of the film.

So once the shoot finally happened, how many days did you have, and did it go smoothly?

We had originally, I think I was told 22 days, and in the end wound up with 28 days. Maybe 26. It was challenging in that we didn’t have a lot of money and we were in Texas. I think it was challenging in that way that a lot of first features are challenging. It was hard because I was the writer, the director, and the actor. I actually heard someone say once, in the production office, "OK, call the writer," because we needed to change locations and fix things and something had to be done to the script. And I was thinking, "I’M the writer! I have to this. But I have to be fitted for my costume!" But I had to do it; there was nobody else. It was a small production. So I ended up doing everything.

I didn’t have a dressing room or a trailer – they told me, "Well, we don’t really have anything for you, because we have all these celebrities and they have all the trailers." So I was like, "Well, that’s fine." And I wouldn’t have been able to go to a trailer anyway; I was always working. When there was down time, they’d be, "OK, now the director needs to go here and the actor needs to go here." And the thing the crew joked about was that I was always naked during the movie because I had to change my clothes in the street – literally! Like we’d be in the street and shoot some crane shot of me coming up to the house, and then they’d say, "OK, now we have to shoot the reverse, but you’re wearing a different outfit!" And we didn’t have time for me to run to a trailer, so I was literally standing in the street taking off my clothes, putting on my next costume change. I was naked all the time. And then when I would come to the set, they’d give me my costume but then didn’t have anywhere for me to change, so I was just sitting next to my director’s chair getting naked, putting my clothing on the director’s chair. And every single day, my clothing got lost. Every day, I lost all of my clothing. And at the end of the day, I’d be wandering around in my boxers saying, "Have you seen my clothing? Does anyone have any idea where my real clothing is?" They eventually assigned an intern to follow my clothes around.

Was it comfortable for you to be able to act and know there was someone else who could sign off on the takes?

Yeah. I was very involved behind the camera as well. We had a big group of people. The hardest part was when I was inside the big blue mascot costume, so I couldn’t see what was going on around me. What we would do is have a double who would get into the suit, we’d block the scene, I would help look at the framing and say, "OK, this is what we’re gonna do," and then I’d get into the suit and just trust that the cameraman knew what was going on. I didn’t have a monitor in the suit, and I couldn’t see what was going on. It was really tricky – in one scene when I’m riding on the bus, and I’m in the background, and in the foreground are two women on the bus and I wanted to watch their performances but I couldn’t because I was also in the shot. And we never had time for playback. So what I did was I had a monitor in my lap and you couldn’t see it because it’s hidden by this little bus wall. So I’m trying not to look directly at the monitor, but I have an earplug you can’t see, so I can hear the performances, and I’m watching the monitor.

So we get to watch you direct in this movie.

Yes, you are watching me direct.

I assume the mascot costume was always going to be a major expenditure in the budget. It’s almost like another character.

I was very definite about the mascot costume and what it was going to look like. I come from a background where I made films for $4,000 and I would do everything. So when it came to the costume, I was like, "Let’s get some fabric and start sewing!" And the producers were like, "OK, we’re going to hire someone real to do this." We found this amazing company in Brooklyn called Gepetto and they were great. The thing was, we didn’t even know if it was going to work. The whole thing was dicey. I kept saying, "I want the head to be HUGE." I just kept saying I wanted the head as big as possible. And then there was an issue that just went on for months, which was, "How is the person inside gonna see?" But I didn’t want to put a whole or an eye in the front of the suit, because the audience would look at it. I wanted it to be a blank face. So there was all this discussion of "Well, maybe we build a camera inside the suit and then put a monitor inside," but I just kept saying, "Put a little viewhole at the bottom so I can see my feet and I’ll be fine." Which did lead to me bumping into some things and falling into a ditch. But mostly it was OK.

There was a lot of discussion about the suit, and I had a very definitive idea. "The suit is baby blue. It’s fuzzy, like Kermit the Frog, but not as fuzzy as Cookie Monster. It has rounded hands and rounded legs." We had to pick the fabric and dye the fabric, and I had to go to Brooklyn several times for fittings. The head was originally going to be much bigger, but then we realized that if it was any bigger than it is, it wouldn’t be able to go through doorways. And there are several moments in the script, particularly the end, where he has to walk through doors. It’s as big as it can be.

You talked about the potential challenge of working with celebrities, but another minefield here was that you have two children playing prominent roles in the film. Was working with kids difficult?

The thing that’s hard about working with kids is not the kids themselves; it’s the legal guidelines for how many hours a kid can work. Again, when I went into the production deal, they were like, "Well this is going to be tricky because you have kids in the movie." And I said, "Oh, it’s not going to be that hard!" Of course, talking out of my ass again. I figured, we’ll cast twins, you can double up on the amount of time you have during the day. But it’s impossible to find twins. We cast the kids in Texas because we wanted them to be locals. It would be too expensive to bring them from L.A. because you need to bring a parent as well. We found two amazing kids and we looked for kids that didn’t have too much experience because we didn’t want them to be actor-y. And we also asked their parents not to rehearse them. We said, "Help them memorize their lines, but don’t have them act, don’t rehearse, don’t try to teach them," because you can tell when kids come in and their parents have given them this saccharine...they act like Shirley Temple. These kids were just very normal, they hadn’t had a lot of experience, they were great. I don’t think we had any delays or any problems with the kids whatsoever. The only challenge was there was always that time hanging over your head. “You lose the kids in an hour.” “You lose the kids in half an hour.” “You lose the kids in ten minutes.” There was always that deadline every day the kids worked of, “What time do we lose the kids? What do we have to do before they’re gone? What do we do?” So that was a challenge and of course you have to organize your entire shoot around them. Say we’re shooting a dinner table scene: We sit down, we have to shoot the master and then immediately shoot the kids out so that we could let them go. And as soon as they were gone, then we would shoot Lisa out. I was always the last one. Although Lisa always came back to do the other sides when I was doing my close-ups. But there were often times when it was me doing a scene by myself, because everyone else had been shot out and they all went home because we couldn’t afford to keep them. So it was me acting with the First A.D.

Are you working on a follow-up?

I’m writing a script called What’s Happened to Us? about something that happened to my mother. My mom and I had sort of an adventure: Right before Kabluey got made, my mother and I had to play detective for two weeks. So I’m writing that. And then also I’m writing a soap opera in which I play all the characters. Like Tales of the City meets The Tracey Ullmann Show. It’s basically me playing 20 different characters in a little soap opera about the apocalypse.

My whole life, the only person I had to answer to was me – I did these shorts on my own, I did comedy on my own. For two years, working with 11 producers, you get notes and you have to make all these committee decisions, so I thought I’d make something completely on my own. The producers were great, but I just want to go back to making a short film by myself in a room with one camera.

My partner said, “Find out if he’s gay, because those are the only men Lisa Kudrow works with.”

Yes, I am gay. [laughs] Although Lisa already has her gays, Don Roos and Dan Bucatinsky. I’m just a mild hanger-on in that coterie.

She has a whole gay mafia. And you are now made.

Yeah, hopefully. She is so great. She is the best person on the face of the earth. She is really, really phenomenal. When we got the deal, they said, “You can make this movie. And you can be the writer, director, and star, no problem. It’s fine, we’ll do that.” So it didn’t seem at the time that it was dependent on getting a big name in the movie. But they said, “We really want you to get a name for the role of the sister-in-law. You really need to get an actress of note to play this part.” And I think the producers thought – and I thought, my agent thought, everybody thought – that we would get a female star who would say, “Well, I’ll act opposite him, but he can’t direct it” or “He can direct it, but I’m not gonna act opposite him.” And because she’d be more powerful than me, the production would follow her. We just all worried that the star would come in and take away one of those roles for me, and I’d either cave or I wouldn’t and then the film would fall apart. And then Lisa literally just called me one day and said, “I read the script, I watched your short films, I trust you, I’ll do it.” She’s the reason I got to do all these things. And she’s so nice! So nice and so normal.

And I do love the shout-out to Mrs. Miniver.

Oh good! Very few people get that. When we were shooting the mailbox, Lisa saw it and said, “Miniver Wait, that makes me Mrs. Miniver.” And I said, “Yeah, it’s a reference to Mrs. Miniver. To the homefront.” And she’s all, "OK whatever...".

If you ever go to Mann’s Chinese Theater, there’s a plaque for a time capsule that was buried there at the premiere of Mrs. Miniver. I had never heard of that movie when I saw that plaque, so I went and rented it. It’s all about how the homefront is so noble, being at home, protecting the family during war! And then when I actually went through the homefront, with my sister-in-law, I realized, "Oh, it’s actually much different than that movie would have you believe."

So this story is based on your own experience?

My brother was in Iraq for a year and a half, and while he was there I went and stayed with my sister-in-law in Portland, Oregon. And she was falling apart, she was terrified. I mean the whole family was terrified – my parents were terrified, I was terrified, she was terrified, her parents were terrified. The kids were traumatized because their dad had just disappeared one day. One of them was one and a half, one of them was just three years old. And my brother just picked up and went away for a year and a half. It was terrifying. And the scene in the movie where they’re having dinner and watching the news, that was a real moment. And certain lines of dialogue – like Lisa saying, “I didn’t think I’d be a war bride.” – that’s right out of my sister-in-law’s mouth. So I stayed with her for two months and it was horrible, because my nephews were monsters, and it was just so bad it got to be comical. There was just screaming and crying, and my sister-in-law was in a catatonic state, not able to focus on what was going on, it was a terrible, terrible time. And then I wondered, “Hmm, I wonder how this could be even worse?”