Chris Landon (Writer, Director, Producer) on Growing Up in Hollywood & Creating "Feel-Good Horror"

there's a little known part of Hollywood that most people are not aware of known as the audience test preview their book audience ology reveals this for the first time our podcast series Don't Kill the Messenger brings this book to life taking a peak behind the curtain and now join author and entertainment research expert Kevin getts receiving feedback can be tough especially in a creative field mean it's easy to stake it for criticism but learning to embrace it and knowing what truly matters helps filmmakers grow this is just one of the lessons that my guest today learned early in his career as the son of a very famous television actor Chris Landon grew up in the entertainment industry but built his career on his own first as a writer then as a director and producer Through The Years Chris has made a name for himself mostly in the horror genre especially in horror comedy his films include Happy death day happy death day to you freaky Paranormal Activity The Marked Ones and we have a ghost Chris I've had the pleasure of working with you I think through most of your audience test screenings and I am so thrilled for this conversation welcome thank you I am delighted and shocked and what and shocked to be here shocked I don't know I was like looking at all of your podcasts and I was like oh my God Elizabeth gaer like you got like this show and I was like why is he calling me well I tell you a bunch of reasons and mostly because you've been on a really great run of successful movies you had one that came out just a few weeks ago called hard eyes which we worked on together and I was really struck with the sort of the style of that movie I thought it was so well done and it had a real voice to it and I have watched you now I think since Disturbia and you were a writer you didn't direct that really come into your own film language and I think it's great and I'm really proud of you and excited that we've had that opportunity to sort of work together yeah I mean you're like the only person I want to see in that theater that's the truth let's go back which I like to do often to a young Chris Christopher were you born as Christian I was well my mom tried to have me born as a Christian but my Jewish father did not want a son named Christian Michael was my dad was Jewish yeah I didn't know that wow yeah he was Jewish and your mother was a rather devout Christian if I not she became one Post Yeah divorce and that has something to do with also your sexuality if I recall reading correctly which is you and I are both gay men and we came out probably at similar times in that sort of Colley time yeah that's right a little after yeah yeah but she wasn't your staunchest supporter not at all so what was that like cuz I know your parents divorced also right yeah I mean my parents divorced when I was very young I think they separated when I was about five and had one of those very like messy Hollywood divorces that took forever but you're the youngest of four children from the same parents but then you have a very big sort of Brady Bunch family yeah huge family but yeah coming out my mom it's funny she was not a religious person in fact she kind of post separation and divorce I called it like her Debbie Harry phase she was wild and crazy and then one day I remember distinctly she did not come home at dinner time and she was in town so we were expecting to have dinner with her and she didn't show and then she finally rolled in hours later and she had found God she was a born- again Christian because she had gone to get her nails done oh my God and she loaded on this manicurist and the manicurist was like you need Jesus now and took her straight to church and my mom came home we born again Christian and never looked back wow and it made our heads spin you must have been what 10 by then yeah I was probably about about 10 years old and and my sister and I both because we were really the only kids at home at that point my yeah so my older siblings were like out College age and so the two of us were like what the is happening like who is this person and it was something that we had to sort of adapt to where was your dad during this time he was around we lived with my dad on the weekends and my dad obviously found out about all of this and had his opinions about it but also knew better and stayed out of he remarried by that time he was remarried by then yeah so what was it like growing up with having such a famous Father Michael Landon of Little House in the prairie Fame and other shows as well he truly was a legendary actor mostly in television tell me about that I mean look there was sort of the private life that to us felt very normal because it's all you know when you're sort of born into that situation and most of our time we lived a fairly I would say sheltered or insulated life like we and it's very different now too because back then we didn't have social media and I just feel like celebrity was a different thing I think celebrity could be a more private thing back then yeah well People Protected you and it wasn't social media so people didn't know what you were up to it was more mysterious yeah there was more mysterious than like even at a young age like you know there was Paparazzi but it wasn't as aggressive as it has become over the years and yeah we just kind of had relatively normal lives in terms of hanging out and just doing normal stuff but the difference being when we went out it changed that's when you became painfully aare aware of how different things were for us and to be honest I didn't like it sure I didn't love it how was he with your sexuality I didn't have the chance to come out to him so he passed away when I was 16 of pancreatic pancreatic cancer got to remember that it was a big big and he was young he was very young and it was very fast cuz he was diagnosed in April and he died in July did he tell all your kids right away he told us right away he had been sick for a while but he was one of those people this good segue one of those people who refused to go to a doctor hated doctors yeah I mean listen the pancreatic is the hardest one to beat but he had warning signals a year before his diagnosis but he was a workaholic and he kept putting it off and then he started making excuses and thinking like he was diagnosing himself like it's ulcers and what about your stepmom was she being insistent or not I think she was trying as best someone has their mind made up yeah I mean my dad was hard person to move in One Direction or another he's very opinionated and very stubborn in his ways and so yeah by the time he actually went to a doctor because the pain was so great it was too late and you are a cancer survivor I am but unlike your dad I went to the doctor I'll say the story because this is really important I think I thank you by the way for sharing this because I usually don't go so early in the show at let's get deep ex into it let's go straight to cancer it's so fun in fact you had kidney cancer I understand it to be a some rare cancer and I was just telling you before we went on air that I had three friends that have been diagnosed within the last I don't know three years and I just find that so crazy yeah and what's scary about kidney cancer is that they call it a silent killer because often detect it's hard to detect and also by the time you feel symptoms it's usually because it has spread so it's a tricky one for your how did it present itself I got very lucky so I was about to go shoot we have a ghost for Netflix and I was about to leave and head to was so much fun by the way thank you and I was about to head to New Orleans and I was having lunch with my friend Robert horn and he had just come from his doctor and I was like oh my God I haven't had a physical in over a decade I literally just had that thought and I went I should go get a physical just because and so he gave me his doctor's info I went did the thing everything was F they did blood work and then I went to New Orleans I get a call from him in New Orleans and he says hey you have elevated liver enzymes now I had my gallbladder removed and sometimes when you don't have a gallbladder it spikes that number so I just told him don't worry about it this is normal for me I'm fine and this doctor was insistent he was like you are going I found a place for you to go in New Orleans it'll take you 5 Seconds to go in there and do it and so I popped in and had some tests done and then I was in my hotel room in New Orleans and I got an email from the hospital and I opened the email and it was like you have kidney cancer oh my God so my liver was fine I was right had you started shooting yet not yet cuz now you're in a different head space I am deep into prep and you know you have to be there for your whole cast and this is like the first big budget movie that I've ever made and so there's just an enormous amount of responsibility so much weight on did you first tell it was hard because it was like 6:00 a.m. in New Orleans and my husband was back in La so I text him first Cody call out to Cody Cody yeah so my husband Cody so I text him first and then he was the only person I wanted to talk to absolutely and I didn't want to panic anybody else or scare anybody else but the problem was it was 4:00 a.m. for him so I had like a solid 2hour period where I could just go down that awful Google Rabbit Hole of like am I going to die what is this anyways Mr horn saved your life Mr horn did save my life also you know amazing talent so what's funny is that like I immediately went into director mode and was like I'm taking care of this yeah absolutely wow and within less than two weeks it was out incredible I had surgery and had had a a partial nephrectomy which is when they remove part of your kidney and you're a Survivor yeah knock on wood but here's the thing isn't that great right I got very lucky and most people don't and so this is why now I go around preaching the gospel of vigilance it's incredible so cool of you to do because you don't know and so you've got to go and you've got to check your body you've got to do it even when you think everything is fine I work out five times a week I'm not a drinker I'm not a smoker I thought because your father had it that that would also present in some weird way an awareness you know you would think but it didn't because I also had this idea in my head that like I live healthier and also I really had convinced myself that I was sort of physically and genetically taking after my mother and everyone on her side of the family lives forever and everyone in my father side of the family all the men Die Young you're probably destined to live forever I hope so no I don't want to but anyways this is what I do I do tell people all the time please go and just get physicals get your blood work done you can go get message beautiful message not only are you moving people with your movies but you're moving people with your own personal story I want to move to loola marman you had a love for film growing up not a surprise you've shared in a number of interviews I understand that you snuck in your parents' bedroom and watched psycho when you were like a little boy and freaked out at the shower scene but that had to inform you it definitely sort of lit a fuse when did you decide consciously I want to go into the film business I don't know if it was like a conscious light bulb moment for me well you decided to go to film school I did I was obsessed my whole life with movies specifically horror films and again this was sort of a combo which I would say growing up in the industry being on set with my dad had a huge impact on me not because my tastes were specifically aligned with what he did I was interested in a very different thing but he was so happy and fulfilled at work and that was a really cool thing to he directed and produced yeah and wrote incredible and so it just had such a huge impact on me to watch one of your parents love their work I think it's really powerful and then as a another byproduct of my parents divorce was that my dad kind of like I don't know he like wanted to be the cool dad and the no rules dad because he had us on the weekends and I think he wanted to win the cool Parent Game and so he made my mom be the heavy I kind of at a young age just sort of got dropped down a well of Darkness right in terms of watching stuff that was wildly inappropriate for me to watch but my dad like we he just started letting my sister and I rent this is back in the day when we had video stores he let us just rent what we wanted there were very few off the table movies I can remember like two of them that he said you can't watch that um otherwise we just watched everything and it was all like this was the 80s and like the Heyday of really gra think he wanted to be a cool dad or or did he want to or did he want to just really expose you to culture into all sorts of things I mean it was a pretty narrow field of exposure because it was all horror he loved horror movies by the way he did he did so he watched a lot of them with us but you're a mashup guy I am a mashup guy how did you become that so again at an early age I was very interested in movies in general and I remember seeing I don't remember how old I was but I saw Terms of Endearment they had to pick me up off the floor on that one and I saw that movie somebody help myter the shot and so I saw that movie and then for a whole summer and I'm like I don't know 8 N I would watch that movie every single day while I was sitting in front of the TV building Legos and I was obsessed with it I cried I was so into it I loved how emotional it was how funny it was how real everybody felt in it and so that was sort of this weird balance of stuff that I was into very interesting because Jim Brooks I'm working with him now on yet another one of his he's such a genius I mean genius like the guy knows how to do exactly what you're talking about take us to the edge of almost like absurdity within the drama and find the funny in it yeah and that's a unique skill and you did that listen happy death day I mean some people could write it off as just a horror movie but the comedy in that and the irreverence and then in the second one is phenomenal thanks like I said for me it's like if I have a brand and it's interesting because I actually someone said this to me oh you make Feelgood horror and I thought that was really funny because they don't really necessarily belong together no I can understand why they would say that and I want to ask you about when you were in Loyola you did get a big break within School in in fact you decided to leave school yeah and much to my mother's Su grin well I'm sure so you had the Good Fortune of having a success at 20ish years old and then things didn't work out as well for you no they went to the and you moved to Texas didn't you I did I moved to Texas what were you hoping to find there give it up myself I think I was giving up but at that point I've been dropped by my agency so I'm in college I make a short film it gets seen by the right person I find myself with this very sudden kind of surprising and really bizarre gig because these producers approach me and I said we have this book called Another Day in Paradise and Larry Clark the director is attached he's a interesting super interesting guy and a lot of his work is pretty astounding but at the time I'm 19 and they say we don't have any money to pay you and we only have half the book so here's the offer you write half the script and if we like it we'll make deal and we'll figure out how to get you paid and if we don't like it tough move on you can say that to a 19y old absolutely to me I was like this is amazing it was a dream come true so I was like absolutely and so I just made sure that those first 60 Pages were the best Pages I've ever written at that time which was not a lot of time and so they were happy they officially hired me they made a deal and then the crazy part was the book was written by a guy named Eddie little and apparently the first half of the book he wrote Hi he was a a heroin addict oh yeah high high high high and so a lot of it was presented as fiction but it was very autobiographical and there's some dark in this book some scary and then the second half of the book he was writing from prison and so I'm waiting for the second half of the book to arrive and the second half arrives and I can't use it it's so strange like the what because it was so dark or because sense it just went off on in a whole different direction it didn't connect to the other part so then the producers are like well we can't use this so now you're going to have to make the rest up and then I'm thinking if this guy gets out of prison he's going to kill me he's going to find me and murder me so I'm terrified riding this second half but anyways it all did you ever get his Blessing by the way no I did not he sadly passed away he passed away a few days after he was released from prison oh boy he went right out and odid so any OD and he odid he did your the success of that again as so many things in this business is fleeting it was fleeting and so there was that moment where everyone was like I don't need School who's this 19-year-old who just wrote a movie and I did and I suddenly was like getting all these job offers and I took a couple of them right away and then I quit school cuz I told my mom I'm like I've made it is that a regret looking back it's not I don't regret good I'm not a regretter because everything has happened for a reason yeah you bet yeah you bet so I what if your kids come to you in their sophomore year and say Dad I'm leaving you're going to be okay with it I'll be okay with it good that's their life I think I go a little nuts first and then and then I you know I've had this debate with friends of ours and the reason for me is not because I'm so much about college although I really think it's important for your development absolutely but in company that I own we have a a blind hiring process so we don't look at names right because when the Dei initiatives came in right we decided we're going to really not be influenced for different jobs and different people's backgrounds or names so we took it off but what we had to do is come up with some criteria the first of course was a single typo or grammar error on the resume got you in the garbage we're a research company it's like no way detail oriented if you can't close the parentheses for example right the second was College if you didn't go to college you were in the garbage can now I could miss some real talent but how else you going to do it you've got to have criteria then of course it was the major and of course after that not necessarily after that was the school itself where did they go so all of those things have meaning in the profession that I'm in and for good reason you're competing against other people and I think it speaks to completion completing something right so I've asked that question a bunch of folks and and and many have left school had gone back at some point even just to say I finished the fraking thing yeah that makes sense for me it felt like a way station I was just kind of hanging out waiting to do what I wanted to do because you know I started making short films with my friends in high school oh you did yeah so I was already mom or dad give you a camera yep dad gave me a camera and I you asked for it I did you did ask I wanted it any of your other siblings in the business by the way a bunch or I shouldn't say a bunch but there's a few well I mean how many total do you have so there are eight of us total with the sort of halves and the steps sort of all together in the business I have my older brother Mike is a writer director producer as well and then my younger sister Jennifer Landon is an actress and she's on Yellowstone and she's awesome are you close with the whole bunch I am yeah we're a really tight-knit family that's so nice and holidays you get together oh yeah every holiday where do you live I live in Santa Barbara you love it up there I love it it's beautiful did you want to leave La for any particular reason was it for the kids it was for the kids it was definitely for the kids my husband and I we really felt like there was a simpler version of Life what does Cody do he works in healthcare Tech so it's a very different very different world but he's remote that's wonderful yeah he's based in San Francisco at least his company's based in San Francisco so that's a really easy jump from Santa Barbara S now yeah yeah so all of that worked out really well but yeah it just was like everything in La there was a point where it just felt like everything's a battle I didn't want my kids and I didn't want to live in my car like I felt that about New York that it was so hard to get somewhere yeah a to be is tough and when I got to La it was like that yeah and now I understand what you mean especially post fires and all of this stuff you have two kids yeah August and Bo August and Bo and do you let them watch horror movies hell no okay wait I should take that back that's so interesting so you're not a cool dad in other words no I'm figuring out what the Gateway stuff is the gateway drug so they have seen stuff when we come back we're going to talk to you about your film making style and all of your incredible success you've had we'll be back in a moment [Music] this March during multiple sclerosis awareness month we honor the strength of those living with Ms a disease that can take away Mobility Independence and dignity for me this battle is personal I founded the riget foundation in honor of my mother whose battle with Ms inspired me to help others facing the same struggles the foundation provides in home care and emergency chore service for those in need because no one should face this Journey alone visit retf foundation.org to donate or to learn more together we can bring care comfort and hope to those who need it [Music] most we're back with Chris Landon and Chris I want to ask you about your first break post fleeing LA to Texas right you wanted to be maybe a realtor right yeah I was just starting to study to get my estate license Nicks that idea you come back and you stumble into a hit called Disturbia tell us about that yeah so distribute was an idea that I had oh it came from your head yeah that was a good movie that was a big hit it was a big H and it really was about that next door well neighbor thing right absolutely it's no surprise and no secret that I am a huge Hitchcock fan love rear window for those of you who haven't seen rear window and I can imag shame run run to see it yeah it's brilliant Grace Kelly just crawling up on that fire escape or whatever oh my God I think she had so romantic too yeah but she had like a dress or a skirt on like God could anyone be sexier she was my God gorgeous and amazing so I was heading to a meeting I was on the 134 stuck in traffic and I was listening to there were talking about Martha Stewart on house arrest and that's where the idea came from I was like hm H if I were on house arrest what would I do would I just be going out of my mind and just one idea led to the next and then I thought oh what if it's a kid did you go home and write that night I did I did I wrote it down right away and then I banged out a draft pretty quickly and then I set the project up at Ivan wrightman's company and my dear friend Jackie Schaefer was instrumental in that happening she was at the time working with Ivan and Tom that's Ivan wman May rest in peace and Tom Pollock Also may he was the best the best so anyway it all happened really fast and then the movie got made and it was it Ian's company that did it yeah who directed it it was DJ Caruso oh my God I love that guy do you know I met DJ when he was I believe an assistant to John batam wow that many years ago that's crazy he had a wonderful career yeah absolutely right yeah I mean you caught that cool Essence in that movie lead to your directorial debut no the directorial debut was a whole random side thing and a fluke I actually did not have great aspirations to direct I really always thought I was just going to be a writer and that's where I was going to stay it was a lane I was happy and because also I a bit of an introvert which is really hard for me to digest because when you see me we're so gregarious together yeah I think I have a when you're comfortable with someone when I'm comfortable and I'm in a setting that's comfortable to me and that's why when I see you it's like oh thank God I have someone in my corner so I just thought no that's not for me and I'm just going to keep writing and a friend of mine this guy Orin seagull I had written this really weird script very bizarre script that kind of sort of came out of me it was like bile I had a lot of like weird angry angsty in me and I was like I'm gonna write my Angry Young angsty movie and so I did and it kind of got passed around wasn't horror movie was it no not at all it was Anthology it was like a you understand why I'm asking yeah yeah yeah yeah no it was just like a very bizarre black comedy dark as night that be something for Larry maybe yeah so I get a call for more and he's like hey you know I've been talking to these people in Louisiana with lots of money and they want to finance a movie happens and they said and they love your script and they said you can direct it if you want and up to that moment outside of dirting a couple short films had all but stopped thinking about that entirely and then suddenly I was like well wait a minute these people are going to give me $5 million to direct this thing I felt like I would be an idiot to say no so I was like this is a chance and so I made the movie It's called burning Palms it's very flawed film I learned a time you know I'm going to watch the movie now yes and you will be shocked and horrified and also like it's weird now because I've seen it since because my husband wanted to watch it and I felt like I was watching somebody else's work in a strange way because all those feelings are gone wow and so it was really surreal to watch it but I also got to work with Zoe salana she was in it oh man Rosman Pike oh no I had a stacked cast and luckily Zoe lives in my town and we still get to see each other all the time yeah she's amazing my God what a performance she's incredible and she's a genuinely good person my friend Robbie Bren are also a guest on this podcast she is very close with Zoe and I hear just the greatest things about her just the greatest a Zoe and Rosman Pike is is what an actress they're both incredible in the movie they're better than the direction they got no but I was learning a lot and that was the thing it was a trial by fire for me and so that was what really that was your directorial debut but but in between Disturbia and that yeah you had written several things cuz now you were yes I had written some stuff tough but only one other movie that got made it's funny everything really happened for me after and again it was another accidental thing which one Paranormal Activity Paranormal Activity was what number did you do I did two three four the spin-off and then another sort of weird spin-off after that Jason Blum and I worked on the very first one together and all of the other subsequent ones yeah I was with Jason the night he saw the original dance first no cuz that was Steven Schneider didn't Jason see it there Jason saw it at home at his house and he called me up because he and I had started to sort of become friendly I was just going to ask you how did you start with Jason and he knew that I was a Die Hard horror fan so he called me up and he was like buddy you know you gotta come over so I came over and it was Jason and I and we watched the movie and I think Steven was there I can't remember and the movie ended and I remember didn't have that that ending no different ending but I that was because of Steven Spielberg in large measure and Stacy Snider absolutely but I had absolute it like got into my stomach it was so good wasn't it and I was like holy I don't know I remember looking at Jason and I said I don't know what your involvement in this thing will be but you need to get in it cuz it's amazing and then I was shocked and horrified when I heard that they were planning to just remake it they bought it to they spent like I want 400 Grand or something like that to buy it with the intent to remake it not to distribute it and of course they went in and Jason asked for the screening we did the screening the numbers were quite good yeah but there was something at the end that wasn't altogether that sort of punctuation mark that was needed and that's when Steph I guess saw it as well as Stacy and they added that incredible ending and that boosted it so we just screened it again man all hell broke loose I was there for that first moment but the funny thing was I had nothing to do with the first movie and then I got a call from Ashley Brocks who runs screen gems now and Adam Goodman she was at Paramount yeah and she was my executive UND Disturbia and again she was like Chris loves horror movies so they called me up and they said we're going to do a round table with a bunch of writers because we've started to shoot the sequel and were having problems they had shut production down after about I think 8 days days Paranormal 2 and so they gave us like a document they didn't have a script they just had like I don't know what it was I guess just like a little sort of beat she beat sheet thing yeah and so I read it and then I watched an assembly of what they had shot and then I sat there at this round table with all these other like big writers and I just kind of felt out of place and again that social sort of awkwardness for me kind of came in so I sat there with my arms folded and then everybody was very like it's it's great yeah this is great it's going to be great and I just kept my head down and then finally Adam Goodman looked at me and goes Chris why are you scowling and I don't know why I said it but I looked up and I said because I think you're in trouble I love that Renegade baby and he looked at me I go it's not scary where are the scares where are the set pieces like where's this thing going like where's the mythology and in that moment I pitched him a sequence that's in the sequel there's this moment where Christy the mom gets ripped out of the nursery and dragged down the stairs and pulled into a basement and so everyone kind of got quiet and then the meeting ended and Adam walked over to me and he said will you go home and write that scene and I said sure So I did good man Adam yeah and that was the beginning of my involvement in it two great Executives by the way Adam and Ashley terrific but you didn't hold back and look how that another great lesson for Young Folks listening to this you know have a if you want a seat at the table lean in and and say what you need to say say exact but say it in an honest way yeah if you're just saying it to be heard that's not good right and I've been in those rooms too where you hear that kind of stuff and it's like yeah please we don't need yet another opinion it wasn't until well by the way in Disturbia did that give you enough money to come back to LA to say I should is that what happened there yeah I remember it's funny I was paid like I don't know scale did you get any gross points I was not no no no I didn't get any of that by the way I can tell you some really funny stories about all of this but residuals that was a different story cuz this was like oh you were wga then I was wga is that your first job was it the first one back in when you were 19 yeah that I joined the wwga back then but I had never gotten residuals before what's the first check you got how much was it it was big like what I mean I feel like I opened the check and it was like a $250,000 check W and I remember I stared at it I was standing at my mailbox outside my place staring for the longest time KN I had to keep rereading it and then I remember jumping up and down my block going back and forth just jumping up and down and my neighbors must have thought I was crazy when I was an actor I did the West Coast premiere of deluy Blues and I worked with an actor who was in Karate Kid the original Karate Kid and he was broke at that point in his life after Karate Kid he could not get a job in and he ran out of money couldn't pay his rent mail comes $27,000 check yeah I remember he said he fell to his knees as an actor doing a lot of commercials I'd get residual checks but man I I would call my manager every other day and say did the check come in yet did the so I kind of knew what I was getting but I love A Moment Like That opening a check for2 I couldn't believe it yeah it blew my mind and it enabled you to stay in the game I could just keep going I could just and here's an interesting thing because this has been a misconception that I have faced for the better part of my life which was people have always looked at me and said you had a famous father you had a rich father so you were always okay and what people don't know this is probably the first time I've ever even told anybody this but like when my dad passed away I guess it was probably just a month before he passed away he changed his will oh boy that was his decision to make but this idea that like I was sitting on some giant pile of inherited money is false but even if he hadn't changed his will the truth of the matter is people think that particularly actors are far richer than they actually are because now your father worked for years and years and so forth but unless they invested in real estate and other things right you know they will work for hires yeah and in the early days they didn't have residuals the way they have them now so I have very successful friends who have done quite well but they have to watch their finances you know it's just the fact so I appreciate you sharing that and also you are a self-made man you clearly are your parents kid and particular your dad's in many ways probably from the talent that was passed on to you but you found your own way right so now you're back in La we've got you back thank God and how do you find your way to happy death day because that was really another turning point for you now already you were involved with Jason Blum and Blum House yeah so we had done all the paranormals together after I finished working on that franchise I made another Paramount movie called the scouts Guide to the zombie apocalypse that was wild that was along like the cabin fever vein right and that's when you started playing with comedy in your horror yes it was the first horror comedy that I had made but the movie bombed why did it bomb well to be honest I think it was two factors one I think that people had sort of reached zombie saturation yeah I think the fatigue had settled but also this was way before covid Paramount had decided to test shortening the theatrical window and they used my movie as the guinea pig so they went you know to all the theater chains and every single one of them said go yourself no except AMC and so the movie only went only went to AMC by that point the marketing budget just imploded and so yeah so the movie never really had a fair shake or a chance and then I kind of found myself s in director jail because it was very pronounced in terms of my phone sto ringing no one was interested in hiring really happens yeah it does happen and the crazy thing was years before that I had been hired to rewrite a script called half to death and I remember I was writing for another director it was like a music video director and then the movie didn't get made it was a bummer because I was really proud of that script cuz it was a really fun script and so anyways after I'm in director's jail after scouts and one of the producers Angela manuso calls me we had lunch and she brought it up and she said it's such a shame that we never got to do half to death and then I said well what's going on with it and she said her other producing partner they were no longer Partners at the time but they were a long time ago I guess they were about to turn it into a like YouTube series I don't know I it was really strange and it sounded super small and I said could we stop that somehow cuz they were about to do it I was like I was like what Jason did by the way with the home video sale of Paranormal Activity oh that's so crazy yeah he stopped that it was going to go to stars or or something yeah it was just something weird like that and so I just said please please pause that and I went and I dug up the script and I read it and I was like this is so fun I can't believe we didn't make this so I sent it to Jason and I said just read this and it was like on a Friday and he called me on a Monday and said this is greenlit wow this is green lit he had already shared it with the studio what was the budget at that point 5 million MH which is what they were playing in yeah so we five or under yeah we made it for five and Universal distributed Universal distributed and I remember opening weekend we opened to 26 million I think it was and went on to gross like 100 I forget what it was 150 A5 million budget and that was definitely a massive Turning Point did they immediately Greenlight part two yes yeah like that weekend yeah oh yeah and I already or even before and I had already started working on track as soon as to see tracking yeah yeah yeah we knew but I was en counting my chickens and I knew what I wanted to make so you already started working on it huh I had the idea for the sequel when I was in post and so I kind of kept it to myself but then I started to share it as the momentum started building on the movie and so by the time the movie came out and was successful it was full steam ahead wow and that was your next movie and that was my next movie how long did it take you to write it before you shot it I don't know four weeks wow yeah I wrote it fast that's incredible yeah it was really fast yeah and then we were moving how did hard eyes get made because that was to me another as I said earlier like a really sort of unique Twist on the comedy added to the horror and I thought it had a just a fun quality to it so I was working with spy glass cuz I was supposed to direct Scream s and so while I was in just sort of dealing with them on that movie one of the executives there Chris Stone brought me a project they had called hard eyes he gave me the script and it was you know about a serial killer who murders couples and I thought like that's fun but I saw this opportunity to as I pitched it back to him I was like this could be like the most scary and violent romcom ever made and I loved that idea because I also apart from having a love of horror have grown up with sisters and have grown up watching romcoms and I've both in appreciation and also like I hate them at the same time you like really were right on that fine line of yeah cuz that work that romance actually work it works really well and this is a thing that I like to do and by the way for the record Josh Rubin directed that movie I wrote and produced but did not direct and he directed the out of that thing what did Josh do before he did werewolves Within scare me he's great did you find him my writing partner and I did yeah got it and who's your writing partner we have to call Michael Kennedy got it yeah Michael Kennedy and I wrote freaky together and we wrote hard eyes together so that was the goal to unpack all the tropes of a horror film of a slasher film but also a ronom but going back to what you said and I try to do this in everything that I do which is it's fine to sort of exist in these very heightened mashup kinds of movies but I always try to ground around the characters at least the central characters listen if you don't care about characters period full stop you have a very limited picture yeah and I don't think there's anything that you can tell me that would change that another words I don't think there's an example you can give me that's going to change that Alchemy yeah it's funny I was listening to your Elizabeth gaer episode on the way here and you said if it ain't on the page it ain't on the stage well she said it you said stealing it that's what it was but that's the truth she's right it is such just and it seems like it seems like Dum dumb obvious but it's not it's completely the truth totally and so when I when I was when I was working on the script that was sort of a drum I kept banging which was these these two people their love story while we're poking fun at wron coms This Love Story still has to be genuine it has to be real or this won't work totally it can't be too it can't be cynical and that's what I try to keep out of my stuff it's like I poke fun at a lot of because I think the world is funny but I also think that you still have to approach it with affection what's the greatest lesson you learned from a test screening an audience something that come to mind yeah there's two one is they are wildly intelligent and I think it's much smarter than a lot of people give audiences credit for because they have all grown up with movies they've all developed a cinematic language and so they understand things better than I think a lot of people think they have a short hand and so that's one thing and also and I learned this on Happy death day and you were there don't betray them don't betray the rules don't betray the rules you set up rules you stick with those rules I say it all the time it's a it's actually a very important lesson for filmmakers the audience will turn on you you can go as outrageous as you want by the way it has nothing to do with that but if you in the third act decide to change something yeah you know suddenly your superhero who has superhuman powers can walk through walls and hadn't had the ability to do that earlier you're betraying the rules this kind of hearkens back to my introduction to you today which was about criticism I think you've grown as a man as a professional to embrace that if someone is commenting on something it doesn't mean they don't like it right in fact they may like it a lot but they may feel betrayed by it uh you have learned to listen to criticism in a different way you absolutely I mean I think it's a very young mistake to not take criticism or to not be able to really hear it and not take it personally and by the way like I still sit through your focus group sitting on my hands because sometimes I want to strangle people well I think most recently I or someone member of the focus group got a finger the bird the bird yeah cuz sometimes you're just like oh come on man it was right there I'm looking at you going because I'm always got my I always have my eye on like the you all sitting be six rows behind the focus group I'm watching Chris I'm watching Jason I'm watching Cooper I'm watching what whoever it may be the studio at you know trying to take some cues because it's a dance and I'm always sensitive to know cuz you know sometimes someone will say the stupidest thing and you're like oh please sometimes you'll call them out which is my favorite thing but no that's when you laugh I see you laughing it's so good and that goes across the board like it's taken some time for me to also learn how to like getting Studio notes like don't be reactive you're all on the same team and more often than not in some way or another they're right what's the dumbest note you ever got oh God you got to have one that's just like are you kidding me I've gotten one that was like they have to be gay oh sure that one pisses me off yeah and I think it's stupid and what was your response no they don't have to be no the answer is no I'm not changing oh got it no they no they don't have to be I rolled right over no I mean that's the one thing that still pisses me off more than anything is that how much homophobia I still encounter in this business yeah that's incredible isn't it it really pisses because I think there's a perception still that the General Public has some kind of reticence and you and I both know cuz we've tested movies around the country right it's evolved completely it's really CH the same world before we break and I could stay all afternoon speaking with you Chris is I'd like to ask you about drop it's coming out soon yep drop drop drops April 11th tell us about it I call it my grown-up movie it's very modern day Hitchcock it's about a single mother who's sort of stepping back out into the world for the first time goes on a date and she starts getting weird airdrops from somebody in the room and they're kind of playful at first and she and her date make a game of it but then she gets one that says check your security cameras she goes on her phone and she finds that there's a gunman in her house holding her son hostage and she that is such a shitty pitch because it is so much more exciting than that it is an edge of your seat edge of your seat high octane Thriller I'm not kidding it is it is so C I'm not a no I'm being funny I've never sold a pitch now and you got a great cast by the way your lead she's phenomenal yeah Megan Fahy she's amazing and she's going to blow mins and then there's her son who is Jacob Robinson yeah you shot this in Ireland correct we Shot the movie in Dublin and Jacob did a really good job and he's a tiktock star he is you know he's Irish Jacob is very very good in the movie and so is the G that plays her sister yeah yeah yeah Violet Bean o she's great she's amazing Brandon scener is amazing he is he's on fire right now how did you see him in that 1923 is it I saw him on screen and I was like who is this guy and that was a big part of the draw he's so Charming he's obnoxiously handsome I wanted this date to be a sort of like fairy tale like wish fulfillment kind of thing where it's like that's the guy like exactly and plus what you did so defly in the movie is that all the people in the restaurant you're thinking are suspects so you had to cast this thing really well am I right yeah yeah it was fig you did it's very specific and even background people you know you want to cast suspicion on so like everyone was very that's what I'm talking yeah it was every single person in that room was handpicked and yeah we spent a lot of time trying to get that right but it was a blast making it wow I'm hoping Beyond hope that it's a big success last question is what's the biggest mistake you ever made and what did you learn from that I think the biggest one in the most Bas way which isn't any anything specific it's just being dishonest I think is the worst thing that you had been dishonest yeah and the thing you learned is there was not a good payoff no never never no you can't that's a dead end and I'm sure you teach it to your kids I try they good guys they're great they're amazing kids Chris Landon thank you so much for coming in and talking to me and to us and and this has been an absolute treat and I hope that I see you with the next one thanks Kevin thank you to our listeners I hope you enjoyed our interview today I encourage you to see heart eyes and the upcoming film drop for More film making and audience testing stories I invite you to check out my book Audiology at Amazon or through my website at Kevins 360.com you can also follow me on my social media next time on Don't Kill the Messenger I'll welcome veteran agent producer and legendary Studio executive Mike medavoy until then I'm Kevin GS and to you our listeners I appreciate you being part of the movie making process your opinions matter