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- [00:00]
Randy Unger
Hey, I'm Randy Unger, New York City's go to Film enthusiast. Every week, I dive deep into the world of cinema with special guests from the New York City film scene. Whether I'm interviewing industry insiders or comparing the latest releases, there's always something for every movie lover. Join me as I explore the magic of film and discover what makes these movies unforgettable.
- [00:21]
Brandon Bassam
Under the Radar is brought to you by Magnitude Jewelry. Add a tube to match your attitude. Patent pending Interchange Genuine gemstone and Crystal EMF Protection Jewelry. For more information, please visit magnitudejewelry.com gemgirl or call 718-268-6634.
- [00:45]
Randy Unger
Hey, guys. I'm Randy Unger, and this is a special edition of Unger the Radar. Bringing movies and people together one frame at a time. And with me tonight, I have acclaimed filmmaker and Troma royalty, Mr. Brandon Bassam.
- [01:00]
Brandon Bassam
Bassam, you said it, right. Hey, you're one of the few people to say it right. Congratulations.
- [01:03]
Randy Unger
Thank you. So I'm a little biased tonight because I was actually in your film Bring on the Damned. And I was an extra on that. And it was wonderful. It was so much fun. You run a great ship and I was so happy to be a part of it, even though you can only see a sliver of my forehead. But it was still fun.
- [01:21]
Brandon Bassam
Still, it's a sliver. Every sliver counts. There's no small slivers that slivers on IMDb.
- [01:26]
Randy Unger
So I thank you for that. So let's just jump right in. How did this all begin for you? What was the origin story of you? What was the beginning of your career? I know you were a writer with ucb. I know you're a teacher with them now, and you're also a filmmaker, a writer, director. So how did it all begin? What was the fascination? What was the genesis?
- [01:49]
Brandon Bassam
Well, it has to go. I mean, I'm from Florida originally. And somewhere, I don't want to get too detailed the backstory. But I got into Mr. Show, the sketch Comedy show, Bobby David Cross.
- [02:03]
Randy Unger
Right.
- [02:03]
Brandon Bassam
I didn't know what I was doing in my life. I was like, I don't know. I'm gonna. What, am I gonna just put a gun in my mouth? And I found. I got a VHS tape of this is how Long Ago. It just had a couple random episodes on it.
- [02:14]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [02:15]
Brandon Bassam
And I loved it. And I watched over it. And I was always a fan of comedy and a huge fan of the Simpsons, Huge fan of SNL and all that stuff. But it never occurred to me to try to write anything like that. I was never like, one. I didn't think I could do it. But also, as much as I loved it, it never felt like me. That was the first. Like, this is what I would do if I was my writing. Like, this is me, this is my ideas. And so I got obsessed with it. And that's when I first started writing sketch comedy. And, you know, it was. I think I was like, ah, maybe I'll find those guys online and send it to them. And. And by. Once I finally wrote. So I finally found them, like, the show had already been canceled and by maybe like a year or more by that point. But I had no idea. Like, well, what do you do? How do you. It didn't seem like a feature feasible thing to get into writing or making movies or anything like that. But I was so obsessed with writing that I'm like, well, I gotta do something with these. And I started debating going to film school and things like that for a few classes. But around that time, the first consumer digital cameras came out. The GL and XL1s. Okay, and that's me. And my friends who worked at Blockbuster at the time were like, well, instead of film school, what if we just buy. Buy a camera ourselves and start making stuff smart. And so we got a camera. One of my friends got a bootleg copy of. I think we were using. Maybe we were using Premiere then or Final Cut and got a bootleg copy of that. Like, let's start making shorts. Start making sketch videos and stuff. And this is way before that was a thing. This is like the 90s still.
- [03:34]
Randy Unger
Oh, wow. Okay.
- [03:35]
Brandon Bassam
So this predates. There was nowhere to upload. We were uploading stuff to, like, sites. Used to have weird Internet sites that'd be like, here's a porn video. Here's like the video of the Winnebago man. Here's a snuff video. And then here's our comedy video, our commercial parody of Anthony. So it was that kind of world, but it was like, practice. It gave me, you know, I didn't. It wasn't like a realistic goal I was really gonna ever do it professionally, but it was something to do in our youth and we just kept doing it. And through there I met a few people and started to work on. I have NDAs on some things. I got, like, hired to write some real shitty stuff because there was a point where I was in Orlando where they filmed a couple things in Central Florida. And so people got the idea that Florida was gonna be the new Hollywood. And they're gonna move production there. And so which people were considering doing.
- [04:26]
Randy Unger
Okay, but then this is early 90s.
- [04:28]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah.
- [04:29]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [04:29]
Brandon Bassam
But then we're like, well, we should start charging Hollywood prices then. And then, like, well, that defeats the purpose of them coming to Florida to film. So they price themselves out and no production's really started. But we had a lot of. Florida has a lot of weird people. They have a lot of money. You can't figure out why. A lot of Tommy Wiseau types. And so I ran into a few of them that were like, we're gonna make a movie. And, like, since I had posted, had those couple videos out and they could find them, which was. Nobody was doing that really at the time, at least not that we knew of. I got paid gigs to, like, write screenplays for people and to write a TV show for somebody, which, again, the guy been fighting for a while. So I haven't heard from him in years. I'm sure he's not around, but he would see, I did sign an NDA with him of how much he sucked. I can tell you that off air. What a horrible experience or a funny experience. But I did a few of these things, and I tried to join some sketch groups and start some stuff then. And I was. And this is again moving into the early 2000s now. I was like, I'm gonna make a movie. That's what I want to do. And so I had written these scripts, but every time I tried to organize people into doing it, people like to talk about it when it's time to actually film.
- [05:34]
Randy Unger
They don't want to just do it.
- [05:35]
Brandon Bassam
We do one day, and then they quit or they never come back. A lot of film school guys talk about when it's time to actually film. Then excuses not to. Not to follow through on it. Well, because you have to put your money where your mouth is in. It's easy to talk about how good you are, and you actually have to show it. Then you realize, you know, it's a different animal. And so I couldn't find. And I had a few heartbreakers of like, we're gonna. Guys be organized to film some. We film two days and everybody bails. And I had just kind of given up. And around that time, I met my wife or my. You know, we were dating then, and she finished filming school, and she's like, let's get married. Like, let's just move to New York. And I was like, at that point, I'd kind of given up on it, but, like, fine, let's do it. And so we moved to New York in like, you know, the early mid-2000s.
- [06:12]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [06:13]
Brandon Bassam
And when we got here, I'd kind of given up on writing. I was kind of. We moved here for that. But I was kind of so like burned out and beaten down by that point. I kind of. This is the early days of like Friendster and my pre Facebook. So I was like trying to reach. Yeah, I was having all of them and I was trying to like, reach out. I moved here and I had all this film gear. So I'm like, well, I'll try to find local comedians. Maybe they want to film video. And most of them were just holes. Oh, really huge out. And I was like, ah, this is.
- [06:42]
Randy Unger
Like anyone you can mention or.
- [06:44]
Brandon Bassam
No, they're forgotten. These are people who did not make it. These are not. Yeah. These are people who are giving you the high hat. Who like, you really shouldn't be giving me the high hat. But. And a few. And I was kind of constantly going, my wife is a surprise for my birthday when we first meet assignment for classes at Upright Citizens Brigade to take sketch classes. And it's one of those things I thought, like, I'd like to do that. But back of my mind, like, ah, it's probably not worth. Probably a scam. It's probably some bitter old washout that's teaching the classes, which is what it is at some of the other theaters. But it didn't occur to me as people on their way up. And it didn't occur to me that I'd meet other people in class that I could start doing stuff with. And that's what happened. I went into the class and kind of, you know, immediately someone who became my writing partner for years and years was in my first class I took there and a couple other people we started, you know, when that class ended, we all kept doing sketch together. We took some more classes together and. And then I ended up making a house team Preston Brigade, where we were doing sketch shows every month.
- [07:37]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [07:37]
Brandon Bassam
And so I got into sketch and while I was there, I started filming lots of sketch videos. And I became kind of like one of the go to film guys there. Cause I had all my equipment, so I'd film shows, people needed video shot. Me and my partner Pete would shoot videos for them. And it got me kind of more entrenched and I started just writing a lot and we started. I made a lot of comedy videos.
- [07:54]
Randy Unger
So your wife gave you the gift of like a gift certificate to ucb. That's amazing. And that kind of just Opened so.
- [08:01]
Brandon Bassam
Many doors, and I probably wouldn't have signed up otherwise. I would have found excuses not to. I'm like, well, it's a present, and I'll go do this. And I was. And it recharged me because I got to be with people I thought were funny, you know, And I met a lot of good friends and a lot. And people I still work with today. And I didn't perform. I wrote sketch. I was a writer for the teams for several years, did tons of videos. Had a lot of Internet videos there and things like that. Many different sketch groups. And as the Internet comedy boom was winding down a little bit, when it became a little too corporate, Funny or Die kind of went under. And Facebook kind of changed their rules to where if you posted stuff, nobody could see your videos. It used to be like, you make a video, you put it online. If you have thousands of followers or subscribers, they would all see them. And then it got to where you'd post a video and, like, two people would be able to see it. I was like, well, this is going now. This is going nowhere. The video. The comedy video boom is done. But what I really wanted to do is make a movie. That's what I always wanted to do. That was always the dream. So I was debating, like, do we try to make a short first and then extended. I'm like, I'm gonna do it. Let's just make a movie. Let's just go for it. And I did try to hedge my bets a little bit. My first movie, Fear Town usa, is very sketch heavy, but it is a big ensemble piece. It's like five stories that kind of interconnect.
- [09:13]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [09:13]
Brandon Bassam
And that was done thinking, well, if we don't finish this, at least we can edit this into a handful of shorts, because they're different. Disconnect. They're kind of their own little storylines. And I got my friend Ray and a few other friends, and, like, everybody. Everybody from UCB has a ton of people. It's a whole team effort. It's like 80 people in the movie.
- [09:29]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [09:30]
Brandon Bassam
We made it for $10,000. Like, I want to make a movie. And we went to do it. And shockingly, that was a feature. Yes, feature films. Our first movie. Feature film. And we got it made and completed and turned out pretty well, considering. Didn't really know what we were doing. I mean, I'd done a lot of short videos, but shooting a whole feature is a different beast.
- [09:46]
Randy Unger
But at this point, were you involved with trauma or.
- [09:49]
Brandon Bassam
No? No. This is before Troma this is all me and my friend Ray, okay? We tried to, you know, we met with my other friend Ryan, who is a professional. He does commercials, he works on shows. He does everything correctly. Very like, you know, he has all the permits, all the. Everything is done by the book. And so we talk to him like, what do we need to make a movie? Because we're gonna do a Kickstarter. And we're like, what's the bare minimum? So he runs like, we have to do this, you have to do that. Here's all things you have to have. And immediately he had our budget up to like 70 grand. I'm like, or we can't do that. So instead, let's tell everybody to meet Saturday. We'll start filming stuff. We're just gonna, we're not gonna. We're just gonna go in. Kind of ignorance is bliss.
- [10:29]
Randy Unger
Like, let's do it.
- [10:31]
Brandon Bassam
Let's just be dumb to show up and try to film and see if it works. And it works because we like. So we did this early days of Kickstarter and I was thinking maybe we'll get, you know, we got like six grand. And then the rest I put on my credit card, which have only recently got my first two movies paid off from what I put on my credit card.
- [10:47]
Randy Unger
A true artist, I must say.
- [10:49]
Brandon Bassam
But we did it. We spent like a year working on it. And it turned out I was very happy with it. But as we were wrapping it up, because I spent a lot of time editing it and we started doing first screenings, I had a mini panic attack because I'd been very prolific. I was constantly writing, doing shows. I had done so many sketch videos and stuff. I'd done like 50 or something or 60 in a two year span. There's so many. And I was like, all I did this year was this movie. What if nobody likes it or doesn't work? And I was like, we need to do something quick. So we quickly, like, maybe we should try to do another movie real fast. But let's make it simple. Fairtown USA is kind of more big ensemble, but it's also kind of sprawling. It's kind of ambitious for your first movie. So let's pick a one location, like a Halloween thing, like a slumber party. So it's one location we could film a lot faster. What happened was we had that idea. So it's like July 1st.
- [11:40]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [11:42]
Brandon Bassam
And so I just reached out, hey, if anybody has a big house we could film in, could you maybe let you know. I was thinking this could take months or A year before we get to it immediately. My friend Khalid was like, my parents have a huge house along island. They're leaving at the end of the month for a couple weeks. Nice. Okay. So July 1st, we have this idea. August 1st, we're filming slashing.
- [12:00]
Randy Unger
Nice. Nice.
- [12:01]
Brandon Bassam
That's how quick I had to write it in like 10 days. I had to organize it, cast it, and get it all planned. And August 1st, we were filming and we shot that early. We shot it on August 1st. We did our first screening on Halloween of that year. It was again, one location, small group of actors. And we burned through it.
- [12:17]
Randy Unger
And I did see the slashing and the sequel. The first one. Yeah, that house definitely has character.
- [12:23]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah. As our friend, College house.
- [12:25]
Randy Unger
Yeah, it picked it very well, I must say.
- [12:26]
Brandon Bassam
Well, it picked because we'd had no other options. But it was a really great house. And it's like. And our friend owns it. So it's like we have full access. And his family's super accommodating. So we did that. So then, you know, we started filming 2013. Like in the summer, we started filming Feartown USA. By the end of 2014, we had two feature films done.
- [12:48]
Randy Unger
Nice.
- [12:48]
Brandon Bassam
And I had, you know, we'd done. We were doing local screenings in the backs of bars. And, you know, the UCB used to have a theater. We filmed. We would screen it there. Videology, the late, great videogy in Brooklyn.
- [12:59]
Randy Unger
Saloon in Jersey 13. Yeah, yeah. I was there for our screening of the. Yeah.
- [13:04]
Brandon Bassam
So we had, like. It was pretty good. So we had two done and pretty happy with it. And I started to finally put them online. I was trying to do it myself through like, Vimeo. And you try it in. But within a week of me posting those. And we had sent screeners to our copies of the movie to Troma. I was like, well, maybe we'll get them with Troma. And I had no connection to Troma other than I was a fan and knew them from. As a kid growing up with them. But I had no real interactions with them. But we sent off, you know, packaged up the movies and sent them off. We had just posted our movies on Vimeo. Been like a week. I got the package, came back in the mail. Ray had put the wrong postage on it. And it came back to you. And I was like, oh, man. Like, I already thought it was gonna be, like, it could be months before they ever get. If they ever look at it. And I didn't know Troma. I know how they operate at the time. They're actually very Easy to. To talk to. Yeah, sure. I was like, oh, no. That same day, hours later, John Brennan, who was Lloyd's assistant at the time, he was the music conductor for Joe Bob's drive in. Oh, cool. He messaged me on Facebook. He's like, hey, I watched your movie. I think he'd watched one of the Fear Town horse. I forget which one. And hey, would you be interested in talking to Troma about it? Because one of our actresses, Amber Nelson, had worked in a sketch group, Murderfist, who had performed at Tromafest. And so they all kind of knew it. So John's like, oh, I'll watch this movie, the Amber's. And then I'm like, well, yeah, I actually have two movies. So he went back and watched the other one. And he's like, they're both great. Why don't you come in and talk to Lloyd? I'm like, okay. And that's how I got involved. I went, met Lloyd and took a liking to me. And John really helped us push us through. And they started. They distributed the movies after that. They picked them up. We were off for a while. Then they got us on the different streaming sites like prime and stuff. They put it on Blu Ray for me. And they got a few screenings.
- [14:50]
Randy Unger
Flashing is on prime now. But the Slashing two was not. Unfortunately.
- [14:56]
Brandon Bassam
They come on and off. They're all on Tubi.
- [14:58]
Randy Unger
Yeah. And also obviously Troma now.
- [15:01]
Brandon Bassam
They're all on Troma now, which is the best place to see them. Because you're gonna make sure they're unedited and stuff. They have all been on Tubi. I believe they're all in Plex, although I never use plex. That's new. And they on prime, they come and go.
- [15:12]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [15:14]
Brandon Bassam
But they've distributed the first two movies for me. And that's how I got involved. And once I got involved through that, Lloyd took a shining to me. And again, John and a few other Justin Martell, a few other people, like, talked to Lloyd about having me write his new movie Shakespeare. Hashtag Shakespear Shitstorm. He's doing a. Disgusting. Thank you.
- [15:30]
Randy Unger
Very disgusting, but in a beautiful way.
- [15:33]
Brandon Bassam
So I got in to write that and that was great. I actually got to work with Lloyd. Lots of meetings with Lloyd. And that's how I got doing pretty well. And we worked on the script for a while. And then while they were filming that, I filmed the Slashing two, the final beginning, which I was filming it kind of on my own. And then we ran out of money completely. And then Troma came in and helped us finish it. So they like co produced it or officially produced that one. And then that was a few years ago. And then Bring on the Damned is the first movie they have 100% Troma. They produced that from start to finish. Michael and Lloyd took care of me from up front. And they guided us all the way from this 100% Troma.
- [16:07]
Randy Unger
And now you serve as writer, director, producer. Nice. And editor and everything else.
- [16:13]
Brandon Bassam
Color, grading, sound mixing.
- [16:16]
Randy Unger
That's crazy. But yeah, back to the slash thing. I love the style of it. It's kind of like a lower budget Halloween, which is awesome.
- [16:24]
Brandon Bassam
$6,000, very low budget.
- [16:26]
Randy Unger
Wow, that's awesome. So what inspired you? Like you have this obviously this independent filmmaker mindset. How do you get into that? How do you tap into that artistic view?
- [16:37]
Brandon Bassam
I just, I have always loved comedy and I loved movies, probably movies even before comedy. But comedy was just my kind of path to kind of get more into doing movies.
- [16:45]
Randy Unger
Right.
- [16:46]
Brandon Bassam
And I felt like comedy and horror when you had. It's more forgiving when you have no money. And what I did have was a lot of funny actors. So I'm like, we should lean into the comedy. Because the one thing we have, we have top notch. These are people who are going on and doing great comedy work. So that's big budget for us. We have big budget talent on no budget money. And just from doing shorts and stuff and other we did in the first couple Internet sketch videos we tried to do. I was just writing somebody else's direct was shooting them and editing them. And they did a bad job. And I was just like, ah, like I gotta, you know, my friend Pete, like we gotta do this ourselves.
- [17:23]
Randy Unger
So we want it done right, you know?
- [17:24]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah, we. So we started shooting, editing everything ourselves.
- [17:27]
Randy Unger
Cool.
- [17:27]
Brandon Bassam
And it's like, well, we had. It wasn't even like I was. I was even pretty off, you know, hands off about it. But it's just like, ah, you're just not. People don't finish stuff. They disappear. I'm like, I will. If I'm gonna start, I'm gonna finish it.
- [17:38]
Randy Unger
I hear that.
- [17:39]
Brandon Bassam
And the more I did that, the more confidence. And also I learned to like that stuff more. I never used to have like a very visual mind. That's why I was gonna be a writer. And directing like coming up shots and stuff just didn't seem like a thing that was in my wheelhouse. But then I started doing it more and I really fell in love with that.
- [17:53]
Randy Unger
Nice.
- [17:53]
Brandon Bassam
And with each project I've tried To expand it. That's been the part that interests me more than the writing anymore.
- [17:58]
Randy Unger
Is Feartown the first directorial effort?
- [18:01]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah, well, that's my first feature. I'd done, like I said, comedy videos and stuff. I directed those, but doing something kind of bigger. I never made like a. Like a long. Like a long or short film or anything. It was just like quick Internet videos.
- [18:12]
Randy Unger
Okay. Yeah.
- [18:12]
Brandon Bassam
And I directed the those and I directed some live shows too. So I started getting like a little bit more in the habit of it. But it was. That's the first one of. And as far as directing it, first movie, what it. It's like I learned that I could make a movie. There's nothing very cinematic about it. There's all things now if I watch, I'm like, oh, we could have done so much more. It's just really playing the camera. Find a funny angle and then have them. And it looked a lot like it was sketch background. It looks like sketches you'd see on stage because it's very, like, not a lot of camera moves, things like that.
- [18:42]
Randy Unger
Do you want to, like, graduate towards bigger budget stuff or you want to see.
- [18:48]
Brandon Bassam
No, I would like to. Well, bigger than I have right now. We're like, no budget. I mean, bring on the dam. Just 20 grand. That's my biggest budget. I definitely would like more. I would like to stay low budget. Like, you know, the half a mil to 2 mil, where it's low, but you can get it. You can do more adventurous stuff, which, I mean, is a fortune to me. But by movie standards, that's not that much. But I do not really. I mean, it would be. Probably be a cool experience to try to do one big budget movie. But that's not a role I would want to be in because I think you're creatively stifled.
- [19:16]
Randy Unger
True.
- [19:16]
Brandon Bassam
And you have to deal with too much. Yeah. It's just. That's not. I like. I like making stuff. I don't really. I mean, I would like the paycheck, but being like a professional comedy writer, like on a terrible show or directing movies that I don't have any interest in, that's not. I like the art, the artistic part of it.
- [19:33]
Randy Unger
Fair.
- [19:33]
Brandon Bassam
You know, wouldn't turn the money down.
- [19:35]
Randy Unger
Right.
- [19:35]
Brandon Bassam
But, like, if I ever got one of those jobs, it would just be to fund my own stuff after that.
- [19:40]
Randy Unger
I hear you.
- [19:40]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah.
- [19:41]
Randy Unger
You gotta balance it all, really. The art and the money. So bring on the damned. That's the main reason I asked you to come in tonight. Yeah. Again, I was involved with this wonderful film. It's very strange. Five segments, horror, comedy, anthology film. And each segment tells a very unique story. Kind of like a creep show. Tales from the Dark side, the movie type of way. What was it like for you starting the film? And what was it like handling each segment?
- [20:14]
Brandon Bassam
It was fun. It was a pretty good experience. Some of the slashings got stressful, and I would get stressed out on Bring on the Damned, but I was always pretty excited about it because it is five segments, each one done in a completely different style. It kept things from ever getting too boring. It was like, okay, we finished this. And one. It's also each segment, okay, we only need two more days. We finish this segment, it feels like you're accomplishing something. We're doing it segment by segment. It's like, all right, we got one down, we got two down. But it was like a recharge to do something in a completely different style. Okay, this next one's gonna be black and white, and we're gonna be handheld cameras. It's gonna be completely from the previous one. So that was, like, exciting. It got us to be more creative each time, kept recharging.
- [20:55]
Randy Unger
The.
- [20:55]
Brandon Bassam
Especially those of us that run most of the movie. We're swapping people in and out because it's five segments. We could do that. We were swapping crew out a lot of our DPs. We swapped out a few times just so because people have no money. So, like, our first dp, Mike Doyle for our first segment. Or Disco Inferno. Great guy, super professional. He gave us as much time as he could because he's got to make a living.
- [21:18]
Randy Unger
Sure.
- [21:18]
Brandon Bassam
And he shot Disco Inferno, which looks amazing, and he did a great job. But then he also, like, this is all I can give you guys. Gotcha, Gotcha. And then he gets to move on. And then we bring in. Then Nick Brigadier shot our second segment in order of shooting. Tiger Babe shoots our last segment. Right, right, right. He was able to give us a handful of days to shoot Tiger Babes. He's also a busy man. And then Dylan and Matt, who were actually on production almost all the way through, they swapped out on director of photography duties on the other three segments. But it was always something new. It's like, okay, we gotta. You know, we just did a noir thing now. Let's get a bunch of old shitty cameras and shoot a found footage thing. And it just kept things kind of fresh because there is like, you know, we're doing this for months, and it's like, you know, period of however long from the time we started till we were wrapping up, it was good to throw some new things in and also bringing in new actors. They come in excited to be there, and that helps. Some of the crew's been there every day, so we're getting a little tired, but, oh, they're so excited to be on set and they're having fun and, like, all right. This kind of recharges the rest of us a little bit, too.
- [22:23]
Randy Unger
That's cool. I think my favorite. You asked me after the screening what my favorite segment was.
- [22:28]
Brandon Bassam
Ask everybody that. Hate to put. There's no wrong answer. I'm just curious.
- [22:31]
Randy Unger
Yeah, I like all. Pretty much all of them, I think. But I think my favorite was the film noir Floating Alien in Black and White. Yeah, that was very different, very well made. And I forget the actor's name.
- [22:47]
Brandon Bassam
Johnny Ferry.
- [22:48]
Randy Unger
Yes. He's fantastic.
- [22:49]
Brandon Bassam
Johnny Ferry.
- [22:50]
Randy Unger
Very talented. Like a younger Bruce Willis. He really brought a lot to that scene, that segment. What was your favorite segment?
- [22:58]
Brandon Bassam
Actually, you know, I mean, kind of all of them when I'm watching them. Disco Inferno is our centerpiece that's intended to be our best. I put the most into Tiger Babes I've been working on for. And I'll describe parts I worked on, but Tiger Babes I worked on for a while. And that feels so personal to me because it's so silly and nobody else is gonna let me make that. But then also, the noir is. I'm glad you like that one. We know that's gonna be the more divisive one. It's gonna be the one that might be a little harder pill for people to swallow.
- [23:25]
Randy Unger
Yeah. That Floating Alien, I don't know, but just.
- [23:28]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah. Well, the others are all horror, and it's like. Well, it's noir and there's an alien. I can kind of rationalize why it should be in a horror anthology, but. So I have a lot of love for that, too. But then our first two segments were so fun to shoot that I have a lot of good memory when I'm watching them. I'm like, yeah, I do love them all. So I will fluctuate. But the noir feels like the middle child that needs more love. Yeah. So that one kind of goes. But the Tiger Babes is.
- [23:57]
Randy Unger
I think the more divisive one was the other black and white one with the. It's like a love triangle.
- [24:03]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah. Our French New Wave. Our Jules and Jim.
- [24:05]
Randy Unger
Yeah, that was there. But honestly, I think I could see each segment into its own feature. If you could just stretch out each One.
- [24:14]
Brandon Bassam
I mean they were mostly intended. These were scripts I'd had that I'm like, I'm never gonna get to do these. Why don't I put them all, cut them down to shorts and just put them all into one. Into one anthology. That way I get to do these ideas that I've always been kicking around in my head.
- [24:27]
Randy Unger
Nice. Was the Twilight Zone at all an.
- [24:30]
Brandon Bassam
Influence on this Twilight Zone? Not really. Oddly enough that was never really one that really crossed into. I mean I love Twilight Zone, but just not for this one. It never really crossed into it. It was more of. Well, even the anthologies weren't. Other than like creepshow. Anthologies in general weren't necessarily the inspiration. It was actually the individual genre movies were the inspiration.
- [24:51]
Randy Unger
Gotcha.
- [24:52]
Brandon Bassam
And I just found a way to justify them. And we use creepshow though. Cause I think it's the best of the anthologies as far as like, it doesn't do anything wrong because we watch. Me and my friend Minky watch so many anthologies and so many of them are just unwatchable. But it's like one okay segment, then the rest are terrible. It's really spotty. Or the connective tissue is more detracts more than it helps. It's like, ah, it's just kind of. I'd rather just watch the shorts. Why are you. Or trying to force things in and they trying to force them to fit some sort of unified thing. And it always like drags on. I'm like, no, ours are all segments are going to be the best they can be as individual segments. We will find a way. And it's not intrusive to tie them all together. Eventually we have a connective tissue to start with.
- [25:33]
Randy Unger
They're all self contained, their own little worlds. And it works. It works really well.
- [25:39]
Brandon Bassam
With each thing I've gotten more confidence and more excited to try new things.
- [25:42]
Randy Unger
And whatever scares you or makes you uncomfortable, then you do it because it'll make you stronger.
- [25:47]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah, sure. Well, also, it's like my friend pointed out, today I function on misery. I have to be miserable. It's part of my process. I was not consciously aware of that, but I'm like, yeah, you're right. I do kind of make myself miserable in order to get to where I need to go to make stuff.
- [26:02]
Randy Unger
I don't know if that's sad or inspiring.
- [26:05]
Brandon Bassam
It is what it is.
- [26:06]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [26:09]
Brandon Bassam
I think there's something to that. Why we were so. I hate being too happy or. I mean I. I stress a lot until we get to set. I'M a miserable wreck the days leading up to a shoot. I don't sleep at night. Once we get to set, though, I feel like I'm where I need to be. Like I'm not stressed because I'm doing what I need to do. There's that. I think it's in Full Metal Jacket where they explain Animal Mother. He's the finest man you'll ever see under fire. He just needs somebody to throw grenades at him every day. And he'll be who he needs. He'll be at his peak performance. And I feel like I need to be in the middle of a film set where. Where there's a million things for me to be at my peak performance. That's where I'm fully myself. I'm not in my head anymore. I'm solving problems. I'm like, thinking three moves ahead. Ten people are asking me stuff. And that's when I think I'm doing what I'm meant to do.
- [27:00]
Randy Unger
Gotcha now. Speaking of moving ahead, what's next for you? What's after Bring on the Damned? If you can divulge that information.
- [27:10]
Brandon Bassam
There's a couple things we're pitching that I probably can't talk about too much. I'm trying to get, like, you know, bigger budgety stuff.
- [27:17]
Randy Unger
Sure.
- [27:17]
Brandon Bassam
So one I won't talk about. Main thing we're definitely doing is it's another short that may be part of Bring on the Damn two. If we do a Bring on the Dam two. Yeah. But there's definitely a segment that we're gonna do first. Whether it becomes part of something else or Bring on the Damn two. We're definitely filming a new segment for that. More of a punk rock themed, like mashup with William Lustig's Maniac.
- [27:44]
Randy Unger
Okay.
- [27:45]
Brandon Bassam
Like, very gritty, dark New York. Like a serial killer turned loose in CBGB's type thing.
- [27:50]
Randy Unger
Sounds like Maniac Cop.
- [27:53]
Brandon Bassam
That's what we're kind of going for. We're going for that type of movie, but with, like, a new wave punk music background.
- [27:59]
Randy Unger
Throwing a little Return of the Living Dead in there.
- [28:01]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah.
- [28:01]
Randy Unger
Cool.
- [28:02]
Brandon Bassam
So that's something we're definitely making. And then I'm working now on a kind of Lovecraftian thing we might film late summer. That is a feature which I can't go into too many details on, but that's probably the next full feature that I know that I'm gonna probably shoot come hell or high water. We're trying to find funding for it and a legitimate budget, but if we get a budget, we'll do it if we don't. Well, we're gonna go out there with no money and we'll make it up. We'll figure out a way to do it for cheap.
- [28:27]
Randy Unger
But yeah, do what you can. So bring on the damned. I know you're doing the festival circuit right now. It's touring everywhere. You're screening it everywhere. How can people see it right now?
- [28:40]
Brandon Bassam
There's no way to see it right now. Okay. You can come April 5th to Smod Castle. You can check the Hands Across True America tour dates. There's several of them. A lot of Ohio, Winter Park, Florida, Texas, places like that. And then there are festivals waiting to hear back from. After the Smaud Castle screen, we'll probably set up more screenings in New York, but nothing is locked in yet. We're gonna see how that goes. And then, you know, follow us on social media and you'll see more screenings coming up. We probably won't be on a streamer until end of the year at least because we do want to do a lot of. We want to do a theater tour.
- [29:12]
Randy Unger
Nice.
- [29:12]
Brandon Bassam
You know, we still have to play the big. Gotta play LA or what exists. What's left of la. We want to go out there and.
- [29:18]
Randy Unger
Yeah, yeah. Call me Snake.
- [29:19]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah.
- [29:20]
Randy Unger
Brandon Bassam, I want to thank you so much for your time today.
- [29:23]
Brandon Bassam
Thank you for having me. I really appreciate it. Thank you for being in our movie.
- [29:26]
Randy Unger
Yeah, thank you. It was. It was a dream. I hope to be in more. And if you want to also check out other Troma films, just download the Troma now app and subscribe to that. So you can see all of the great films since for the past, what, 51 years now.
- [29:40]
Brandon Bassam
Yeah, it's most every Troma. But there's lots of stuff that's not even Troma May that's on there. Just some really great cult classics. And the first month is free. And other new movies Shakespeareform just appear on Troma Now. Finally.
- [29:52]
Randy Unger
Cool.
- [29:52]
Brandon Bassam
It's Lloyd's most recent movie. Although he has a new one he just filmed that they're working on, they're editing now. And other new Troma movies like Eating Miss Campbell by Liam Regan. And like I said, I believe Kill Dolly will be there in a few weeks.
- [30:05]
Randy Unger
Cool. And if you watch Shakespeare's Storm, make sure you're not eating while you watch it. So, Brandon, thank you so much.
- [30:12]
Brandon Bassam
The Storm is not false advertising.
- [30:14]
Randy Unger
Yes, it is exactly how it sounds. Brandon, thank you so much for your time. This is awesome. I'm Randy Younger. This has been under the radar, bringing movies and people together one frame at a time. We'll see you next time. Take care.