PAGE A8, KEIZERTIMES, NOVEMBER 2, 2018
PROSPECT,
continued from Page A1
police scanner
primary antagonists, Ezra.
In the run up to wide
release, Prospect was receiving
glowing reviews, but it’s been a
long road to get to this point.
In 2012, Earl and Caldwell
put together a crowd-funding
campaign to fi lm Prospect as a
short fi lm that could be used
to pitch a feature-length movie.
The pair started with a goal of
$18,000 and closed it out with
more than $21,000 in pledges.
Prospect, the short fi lm, focused
more on the father-daughter
relationship that ended up as
the jumping off point for the
feature.
“The short fi lm was written
as its own independent thing.
We probably should have
written the feature fi lm fi rst
and cut it down but we didn’t
realize it at the time,” Earl said,
laughing at the circumstances
in retrospect.
Crowd-funding the short
fi lm also put Earl and Caldwell
in touch with a number of
volunteers who helped produce
it. The short debuted at SXSW
in 2014.
“Then it took three years
after that to fi nd the funding
for the feature-length movie,”
Earl said. “We wrote a feature
script and rewrote that, then
we had more concept art made.
After getting the green light,
we kind of had to fi gure out
how to make the full-length
movie on the fl y.”
Earl never attended fi lm
school, his only actual fi lm
instructor is still Heimerdinger,
but he stuck with his dream of
making movies even when he
wasn’t embracing it completely.
After high school, he studied
literature at Seattle Pacifi c
University and graduated
in the depths of The Great
Recession. To pay his bills, he
started entering contests to
fi lm commercials and earned
enough credibility to launch
his own production company,
Shep Films, and begin fi nancing
projects of his own.
It was likely that work ethic
that inspired Jay Duplass to take
part in the Prospect feature
fi lm.
“In college, I watched
the Duplass (Jay and Mark)
brothers really closely because
they were the guys making
movies and getting them into
Sundance for almost nothing.
They were the masters of indie
fi lmmaking,” Earl said.
Submitted
McNary High School alum Zeek Earl crawls around the set of a spaceship on the set of his fi rst
feature fi lm with co-director and co-writer Chris Caldwell (on the left).
Earl said he and Caldwell
got the chance to Skype with
Jay and pitch him a role in the
movie, but it ended up being
more of a conversation about
indie fi lmmaking than a job
interview.
“I think he’d already made
up his mind because he was
attracted to the vibe of what we
were doing and connected with
that,” Earl said.
Landing Pedro Pascal for the
role of Ezra also proved easier
than expected.
“We were huge fans of him
from Game of Thrones and he
combines charm and menace
in a way that few people can
pull off. Fortunately, he really
responded to the script. His
character has a lot of original
vernacular and a fanciful way of
talking that was challenging. He
described it more like acting in
a Shakespeare play than fi lming
a movie once he was on set,”
Earl said.
Earl credited Caldwell
with being the “master of
dialogue” in the pair’s creative
relationship, Earl said his main
focus was in the worldbuilding
and visual aspects.
An uncredited character in
the movie is the setting itself,
Washington’s Hoh Rainforest, a
place with lush greens, hanging
mosses and heavy moisture
that casts an otherworldly and
ethereal spell on visitors. Given
the natural beauty, Earl and
Caldwell committed to using
as much natural lighting as
they could, which led to other
lessons in time management.
“When we pitched the fi lm,
we fought for a greater number
of days in pre-production and
actual fi lming. We had seven
months of production design
and 40 shooting days, which is
about twice what the average
movie gets,” he said. “Every day
is a numbers game of getting as
much time as possible to shoot.
I think we got better as we
went along, but there were days
when we only got half the time
we had planned for. We made a
lot of mistakes, but we had the
time to fi gure stuff out.”
With his fi rst feature in the
can, Earl and Caldwell’s time
in L.A. this week was spent
promoting Prospect and working
on the duo’s next projects. The
strength of Prospect earned
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them a series development
deal with Amazon and they are
currently working on the pilot.
Their next feature is also in the
writing stages, another sci-fi
fi lm set on a fully-automated
farm in the near future with
only a few people left. They are
pitching it as rural cyberpunk.
“We never set out to be sci-
fi fi lmmakers, but we’re at a
place where there is a demand
for it and it’s a space where you
can play around with big ideas,”
Earl said.
Looking back at how far he’s
already traveled, Earl still fi nds it
hard to fathom.
“I took fi lm appreciation
from Jason Heimerdinger
because I thought it would
be an easy class where I could
sit around and watch movies.
Instead, I learned to appreciate
fi lm and got totally bitten by
that bug,” Earl said. “Being able
to bring this fi lm back home,
and have Jason there to talk
about it … it’s so cool.”
MONDAY, OCT. 22
THURSDAY, OCT. 25
8:15 a.m. - Arrest for criminal
trespass in the 5000 block of Riv-
er Road N.
12:28 a.m. - Arrest on warrant at
the intersection of River Road N
and Promenade Way N.
6:30 p.m. - Arrest on warrant in
the 5000 block of River Road N.
6:53 p.m. - Theft from vehicle
in the 1000 block of Chemawa
Road N.
8:37 p.m. - Theft in the 5000
block of River Road N.
10 p.m. - Unlawful entry into a
vehicle and theft in the 500 block
of Dennis Lane N.
10:35 p.m. - Arrest on warrant in
the 400o block of River Road N.
6 a.m. - Arrest for criminal tres-
passing in the 5000 block of Wit-
tenberg Lane NE.
7:38 a.m. - Failure to preform
duties of a driver when property
is damaged in the 6000 block of
14th Avenue NE.
10:43 a.m. - Arrest on warrant for
the unlawful possession of meth-
amphetamine in the 4000 block
of River Road N.
1:14 p.m. - Criminal mischief in
the 1000 block of Rock Ledge
Drive NE.
10:30 p.m. - Arrest for driving
under the infl uence and illegal
possession of methamphetamine
and heroin at the intersection of
Stadium Drive NE and Chemawa
Road NE.
10:54 p.m. - Arrest on warrant
in the 6000 block of Ulali Drive
NE.
TUESDAY, OCT. 23
1:02 a.m. - Motor vehicle theft
in the 5000 block of River Road
N.
1:20 a.m. - Criminal trespassing
at the 700 block of Lockhaven
Drive NE.
11:40 p.m. - Arrest on warrant in
the 3000 block of Cherry Avenue
NE.
11:54 p.m. - Theft at the inter-
section of Bailey Road NE and
Chemawa Road NE.
WEDNESDAY, OCT. 24
9:30 a.m. - Criminal trespass in
the 1000 block of Moneda Ave-
nue N.
2:50 p.m. - Failure to preform
duties of a driver when proper-
ty is damaged at the intersection
on River Road N and Lockhaven
Drive N.
3 p.m. - Theft under false pretens-
es in the 200 block of McNary
Heights Drive N.
10 p.m. - Arrest on warrant for
disorderly conduct in the 3000
block of Partridge Lane NE.
10:47 p.m. - Shoplifting in the
4000 block of River Road N.
FRIDAY, OCT. 26
12:25 a.m. - Minor in possession
of marijuana in the 1000 block
of Chemawa Road N.
12 p.m. - Theft from vehicle in
the 5000 block of Island Shores
Way N.
6:33 p.m. - Arrest for driving un-
der the infl uence and traffi c acci-
dent in the 3000 block of River
Road N.
7:20 p.m. - Arrest for stalking and
burglary in the 4000 block of Ver-
da Lane NE.
7:45 p.m. - Criminal trespassing
in the 5000 block of Patrick Lane
NE.
10:38 p.m. - Arrest on warrant at
the intersection of River Road N
and Menlo Drive N.
11 p.m. - Arrest for the interfer-
ing with a police offi cer at the in-
tersection of River Road N and
Menlo Drive N.
SATURDAY, OCT. 27
1:10 a.m. - Arrest on warrant at
the intersection of Cherry Ave-
nue NE and Alder Drive NE.
2:05 a.m. - Arrest for assault in
the 700 block of Plymouth Drive
NE.
4:00 a.m. - Arrest for criminal
mischief in the 1000 block of
Clearview Avenue NE.
9:00 a.m. - Failure to preform
driver duties when property is
damaged in the 4000 block of
River Road N.
12:37 p.m. - Arrest for the unlaw-
ful possession of methamphet-
amine in the 5000 block of River
Road N.