AllCreative New York

Born and raised in Brooklyn NY, John Gray started making movies as a teenager and refined his craft at August Films in New York City before going on to develop a successful writing and directing career in Los Angeles. He penned an assortment of successful television films while developing his own scripts. Today he’s a much sought after director, writer and producer.

MM : With all due respect, you’re not exactly a household name…yet. Can you give everyone an idea of what you’ve been doing for say the last five years?

JG : From 2005 through 2010 I was lucky enough to have a television series on CBS called “Ghost Whisperer.” I wrote and directed that pilot, and then produced the series with my partners, while writing and directing many episodes as well. Then last year I made a small indie movie called “White Irish Drinkers,” and also just finished directing a movie for TNT called “HIDE” which airs Dec. 6th. And here we are now!

MM : So just before HIDE you made the independent feature WHITE IRISH DRINKERS using your own money. I thought the first rule of independent film-making is NOT using your own money?

JG : I wish someone had told me that sooner! Just kidding, I was aware that it was a crazy thing to do, but that movie was a real labor of love and a film I just felt I had to make. I took a hard look at how little I could actually make the movie for using all my years of experience and contacts within the industry, and figured out how much I could afford to lose and still stay afloat. It was a great experience, I’m really proud of the film and I would do it over again in a second!

MM : You just put the finishing touches on HIDE, which is set to debut this Tuesday, Dec. 6th at 9pm,  on TNT’s new series MYSTERY MOVIE NIGHT. Most of your experience involves shooting on film, but HIDE was shot with the Arri ALEXA. And I understand when you made WHITE IRISH DRINKERS it was the first time you had ever shot digitally. How is the digital experience as compared to shooting film?

JG : I loved shooting digitally. I had always been a sprockets guy; my TV series was one of the few shows left that still shot 35mm Neg. But on White Irish Drinkers it was very liberating; we were able to move much faster, and of course there were no stock or lab costs. I was very worried that the image would look too clean, especially for a gritty 70′s period movie; and my DP Seamus Tierney helped solve that by using 40 year old Cooke lenses which were actually manufactured in the 70′s!

MM : So you’ve shot with the RED camera and the Arri ALEXA. Any preference?

JG : For me it depends on the style of the movie. The ALEXA is so crisp and clean, it was perfect for the stylish, modern look I was after on HIDE, but would not have worked for White Irish Drinkers.

MM : You do your post on Avid. Have you worked with Final Cut, Lightworks, Premiere Pro?

photo credit : Skip Bolen

JG : I have not. Although I think I did a feature on the Lightworks back in the mid-nineties, and I remember being amazed at how fast it was. We could do a full days work in the cutting room and leave at 7pm. A 10 hour day! Felt like a vacation!

MM : A wise man once told me that the second you call action you compromise because no production can ever turn out exactly as you planned it. How was your overall experience on HIDE, or WHITE IRISH DRINKERS for that matter?

JG : The compromises happen much sooner than when you say action! Woody Allen used to say that during pre-production, there’d be a moment when huge trucks roll up and unload all the compromises. All you can do is prepare as much as possible. I really believe that is the key element of a successful shoot…as a director you have got to be totally prepared. It also helps when you have enough experience so that you can think on your feet, and make an instant shift when something isn’t working out or you suddenly don’t have access to the location you wanted or the remote head doesn’t work, or the actor is sick, or nobody knew that there was a battle of the bands at the high school next door to your ext. location…the key is to try and compromise in a way that doesn’t hurt your movie.

MM : So you got Stephen Lang, Karen Allen and Peter Riegert to sign up for WHITE IRISH DRINKERS. I’m guessing they weren’t in it for the money!

JG : Certainly not, given that SAG scale for this kind of low budget movie is about $900 a week! And here’s Lang coming off of Avatar, and Karen Allen’s last movie was Indiana Jones 4… but it is a credit to those actors and a testament to their commitment to their craft that they came on to this movie because they believed in the material and they felt they could do something meaningful even if it didn’t pay. They love the craft and they love movies.

MM : Did you utilize any social media to promote WHITE IRISH DRINKERS?

JG : Yes. My co-producer (and wife) Melissa Jo Peltier became an expert on Twitter, and really used that very well for promotion. She also designed our Facebook page (which has nearly 10,000 likes), and she did a lot of targeted advertising on Facebook, to Stephen Lang fans, Karen Allen fans, Irish groups, etc.

MM : When all is said and done, I think the most important thing is that the filmmaker can tell their story unencumbered by whatever technology they choose. Was that the case going from film to all digital?

JG : You’re exactly right. You can’t get hung up in the medium; you just need a story to tell and a passion to tell it. Certainly digital film-making frees you from many of the encumbrances of shooting on negative, but you still have to have storytelling skills and you need talented collaborators who believe in your project. It’s not enough just to go grab a tiny digital camera and try to make a movie on a whim; you still need to apply all the disciplines to make something that is worthy of an audience.