writer/director/editor

The Editor: a man i despise.

Fun throwback here, The Editor was the first non-student narrative short film I ever made. I literally had no idea what I was doing, and even tried to produce it myself, which I recall being the hardest part of the whole process. We made this for $800! It for sure has the flavor of a first film, and I still kind of enjoy it for that very reason.

Huge thanks to Richard Riehle, who's beyond talented and forever humble. To Ted Chu, who both shot it and constantly told me what I was doing wrong. And to Charlie LeDuff, whose sharp and honest writing I'll always love.

Goodbye Shanghai

This was the second and final short film I made, before Caroline and Jackie. In a lot of ways, it's not as solid as my first short, but it's ambitious and I fell big.

I learned more through my mistakes on this project than anything I'd ever done before. The biggest thing I learned is how valuable acting is. I was super cocky going into this and thought I could evenly pair trained actors with non-actors, and just through my own brilliance then direct an even performance throughout. I was wrong. That said, I'm glad I failed a bit here because afterward I completely changed my priorities in regards to acting and how I deal with actors, and that shift is what lead to Caroline and Jackie.

Big shout out to Michael Ziming Ouyang and Shu Chou (producer and DP) because without them I literally would have been nothing but another bumbling American in China. This production was so ambitious, not to mention ambiguously illegal. I literally ended this trip by smuggling cans of Kodak film across the border with a forged government certificate labeling them as dailies from a Rolex commercial. And thank you to Ruth Surrey, for whom without none of it would be possible.

Shanghai: you crazy.