Zach Cregger on Comedy and Horror, Swearing Off IP, Pitching J-Law, and Handling Hollywood Power

the town is presented by fan duel have you heard the news fan duel is now available everywhere and when we say everywhere we mean everywhere tallahassee florida el paso texas athens georgia madison wisconsin birmingham alabama all right you get the picture wherever you're watching whatever game you're fired up for fan duel is there to bring you closer to the action so make your picks and play wherever the games take you download the fan duel app to get started age and location restrictions apply product availability varies by market see fanduel.com for eligibility gambling problem call 1-800-GAMBLER critics agree possible love is a breathtaking new masterwork from director lee chang dong it's the winner of the grand jury prize at the venice film festival indie wire exclaims possible love is a heart-stopping stunner john do young gives a once in a century performance variety raves it's shimmering work from one of our greatest living directors and roger debert.com declares it's one of the best films of the year possible love directed by lee chang dong for your consideration now playing in select theaters and on netflix rated r under 17 not admitted without adult it is friday october 30th one of the most interesting and frankly maddening truths about the entertainment industry is that there's really no repeatable path to success it comes out of nowhere it starts and stops for reasons beyond it is the most interesting and frankly maddening one's control or understanding. It can take decades of failure and change overnight. And a relatively unknown sitcom actor can become one of the hottest genre filmmakers in town. That's what happened to Zach Kreger, who two decades ago was making comedy videos with a troupe called The Whitest Kids You Know. He actually had a show on the Fuse Network at one point. Then he worked pretty regularly as an actor on comedies you probably wouldn't remember. And then starting in 2022, he wrote and directed three bangers in a row, Barbarian, Weapons, and Resident Evil, which came out last month via Sony and has now grossed almost $400 million worldwide. Kreger's co-writing and producing a couple other projects, including an adaptation of the internet monster urban legend called Siren Head. But he's now got Jennifer Lawrence attached to star in his next movie as a director, a sci-fi space thriller called The Flood. I wanted to get Kreger on the show for a while, and we made it happen as part of our film school tour this week. This episode was recorded on Wednesday at Loyola Marymount in West LA. Thanks to them for hosting us. And today it's Zach Kreger and the winding road to becoming a modern horror auteur. From The Ringer and Puck, I'm Matt Bellany, and this is The Town. All right, so I wanted to start with this notion of comedy and horror, because we've seen it over and over now with Jordan Peele. We have Jerry Barker, who did a lot in the comedy world and had a huge hit with Obsession. What is it about the background in comedy that helped you or prepped you? Or is it completely random of a background to make this transition to genre filmmaking? It's not random. It's a very, very similar muscle set that you need to be effective with comedy and with horror. What you're doing is you're essentially trying to elicit a physiological response through timing and tone. And so that's what you're doing when you're trying to get a joke, and that's what you're doing when you're trying to get a scare. And so they both live or die by frames. They're both all about the buildup versus the payoff. And so I think that all of my time spent in the comedy trenches was me going to the gym for horror. It really is almost the exact same. Jordan has a great quote. I'm going to get it wrong, but it's something to the effect of the only difference between comedy and horror is the soundtrack. And I don't know if I totally agree with that, but I think he's close to. We're saying the same thing. It's funny because there are scenes in Weapons particularly that are funny, and that if you look at them from a different lens, they could have been comedic, and yet they're terrifying in the movie. Sure, like when you pull a woman's head to pieces, you know, that is hilarious. Or when you've got zombie children running through the living room of a house. A thin line. It's a thin line. Yeah, for sure. And it just feels like there is that through line. But when did you say to yourself, I think I'm going to be a filmmaker and focus on this particular area of filmmaking? Okay, so it was never a decision, right? So I love to write. For me, writing is just something that is cathartic. It's joyful. I would do it whether I could make a movie or not. You know, I think that's the secret sauce is when you're doing it, it's inside of you and you want to get it out. And if you're doing any art for yourself as the audience member, first and foremost, then I think you are on the righteous path. And so for me, you know, I was acting and I enjoy acting. I was having a, you know, a moderately successful career. That was my job. So I considered myself a success. But I knew that like it wasn't fulfilling me enough creatively. And so I found myself in my off time from acting, just just writing just for myself and and my creative tuning fork resonates the most with dark material. So it wasn't a pivot of like, what's what's going to help me get into the industry? It was a what's my favorite mood that I want to follow? You know, what's what is the story that is going to entertain me more than any other story? Those stories for me happen to be pretty, pretty dark stuff. I have always been fascinated. with dark things, you know, in the art. So whether it's, you know, dark music or or whatever, what have you, you know, that's just that's my center of gravity. So the only point I'm really trying to make is, you know, it's not a it was not a career consideration. I mean, because a cynic or someone focused on the business might say, well, if you like a lot of different things, why not focus on the genre that sells? Because there is a path for low budget horror movies and voices in the horror genre, genre, maybe in a way that there isn't for comedy these days. I can't argue with that. And I guess there are certain people who are maybe just as good at anything they're going to try their hand at. And so it would make sense for them to, you know, focus on a on a marketable genre. For me, that that just wasn't part of the equation. So you've been doing this a while by this. I mean, the entertainment business. Yeah. Now you are in the upper echelon. The doors have been open, the gates or whatever they call it. What has surprised you most about the upper levels of Hollywood now that you're getting those meetings and meeting those people and being courted by the very tops of the studios? What a question. It's a lot different than being on a sitcom. Yeah, no, for sure. For sure. You know, I don't know. I guess I guess for me, the thing that I spent so much of my career trying to get anybody to pay attention to me and give me any opportunity to write anything. And now that that that's not the case, I find myself spending a lot more energy trying to just make room for myself to be quiet and to pay attention to my my little inner candle of of inspiration, you know, and it's I guess it's a little difficult. You know, if I if I don't kind of keep my guard up, there could be a million things that will fill every hour of every day with things that are cool, but maybe are not the best thing for me to be paying attention to. And so I guess I never really realized how much energy you had to put into to being able to just relax. I believe that like hanging out on your couch or talking to your friends or going for a walk, listening to music, you know, just being a person is is valuable and for for for art, you know, and if I spent all my time thinking about my career and my bullshit, I think it would I think it would diminish me as an artist. And so. So I guess I guess the surprise is like how how much I need to be precious about my time wasting. So you're you're protective of your space is what you're saying. Yeah. But they say that that's a that's a flex. That's a that's an aspect of success is that fair enough to you. You don't go to them anymore. Fair enough. That's true. And and you're enjoying that. Yes. I don't know how to. Yes. Okay. What's next? Is the question of how you choose what you want to work on, because you had a ton of success off of two originals, Barbarian and Weapons. You chose to take on IP with Resident Evil. Now, it was somewhat dormant IP, but definitely a property. And I know that at Sony, they were even debating whether to make another Resident Evil movie. The last one did not do well. Obviously, when you became involved, that changed the entire equation. And they decided to do it. But are you wary of that? Are you wary of taking on IP and studio now? I'm making you nervous now after Resident Evil. So yeah, explain your thinking about that. Okay, so at the time, Roy Lee is my producers right over here. And we he we made Barbarian together. And we were in. We were in Sofia, Bulgaria. And I remember we were at dinner. And so I was making Barbarian so I had no clout whatsoever. It was a miracle that I got the four and a half million dollars to make to make that movie in Bulgaria. so I'm there and Roy's with me and he was asking me if there was any IP or sorry any video game that I would be interested in adapting into a movie and I was like god I think the only one would be like Resident Evil but like that's such a pie in the sky thing you know he had his phone out no I was calling no but he was very encouraging you know he was like if if you like that idea you should think about it so I kind of was thinking about it just in the background and Roy I don't remember if it was after I wrote Weapons or before that I kind of was like taking it seriously I think I'd I think I'd like Barbarian had just come out so I must have written Weapons already because I wrote Weapons while I was editing Barbarian and um and I had this idea I had the idea of a courier that's got to do the thing and it just felt to me so fun that it was like my experience of playing Resident Evil as opposed to trying to write anything in the world of the characters and trying to peg all of them and I was like I don't know I don't know I don't know the boxes that the games do I was like I could I could I could see myself throwing myself into this um if I did it my way and and I was also thinking I would never still they would never let me direct it so I kind of took the job to write it thinking like some other guy is gonna gonna do this and it was also sort of a vacation for me because I was writing at that time Flood which is gonna be my next movie we'll talk about that one okay and Flood was like a real hard movie to write because when you see it you'll understand it is a mind fuck and and so all right wait what do you mean by that we'll talk about it later we'll talk about it um and so the idea of kind of taking a a walk in the park and going and writing Resident Evil which was just a dude goes from point A to point B that movie I swear to god it felt like it was written in 15 hours I mean it was more but it felt like so easy and so fast which is a good thing by the way easy is good you know I feel like it's so it's so easy to treat and it's so ourselves that if we're not working really hard, we're doing something wrong. And I'm here to tell you, like, when you follow your joy and you feel like you have no friction and it's just flowing, then you're on the right track. Was weapons easy? No. No. No. Did you write weapons linearly and then screw it all up? Or did you write it that way? I wrote it the way that it is. But when I sat down to start writing weapons, I didn't know anything. I started and those kids had, you know, their problem, which was different originally. And I just started writing. And so then I kind of figured out maybe six pages in, oh, like, you know, I'll talk about the teacher first. And then as I was going with her, I was like, and then I'd talk about that angry dad. And then I could, it just kind of, I just started to see the shape, but I didn't outline. I just kind of wrote from beginning to end and it didn't work. It was a mess. But then I, then I go back and I put my, my thinking cap on and I try and like make it connect and make sense and, and not just be chaos. And that's, that's where it's hard. But that first draft was easy. That first vomit draft is, is, um, you know, a really beautiful, fun thing. It should be fun. How long do you go as a writer before you show it to someone? I will probably do two drafts, you know, get it, get it where it's like functional and readable and make sure it's not gaping holes in it. Um, so, you know, a couple drafts in. Yeah. And who's your sounding board? I have a few. Um, I have a few and they've changed over, over time. Um, but, um, some, some fancy people and some not fancy people. Okay. Yeah. Um, so you, you were saying about, uh, about the IP experience and how you wouldn't do that next or again, why not? I mean, never say never, but I think I, I think I was frustrated at the conversation around Resident Evil. And how much of the conversation really didn't have anything to do with the movie. What do you mean by that? It had everything to do with whether the movie was living up to the different standards that different fans of the games had, whether it was, you know, using the characters or not, or what did I get wrong in the lore? Or why is it, you know, it was just a lot about why isn't this like the source material or why is it good that it's not like the, all the conversation just felt like it was about not the movie. And I'm proud of the movie. I really loved the movie. And I, I just, I realized like I created, I should have known better going into it. I should have understood that that was going to be the case, but for some reason I was, I was a little shocked. There's pros and cons. It brings an audience, but it also brings expectations. Yeah. And that's kind of the trade-off. I mean, I asked this because from an industry perspective, obviously what the studios want, they want the auteur who is also willing to take on brands. Yeah. And bring their, their vision to something that is a little bit less risky than doing original films. Do you fear that if you focus on original films, that you may not get as many chances as you might if you're focusing on IP or does that not come into the fiction? I, I right now feel like I am playing with house money. I've already won. If I only get to make, and my attitude has to be, and it was with barbarian, it was with weapons and it was with resident evil and it will be for flood. Like this is, this is possibly the last time I'm going to be playing with house money. This is probably the last movie I'm ever going to make. And I'm lucky to be able to make it. And I'm going to swing for the fucking fences and I'm going to do everything inside of me. I'm going to pour it all out to make this as good as I am capable of making it. And whatever happens, you know, whether it makes a lot of money or no money, you know, like I just got to make sure I left it all on the court. And if that's the end, then I've had an amazing run. I really feel like that. I'm, I could be, I could be fine, you know? Well, you have Jennifer Lawrence starring in your next movie. That's pretty good. I agree. What was your pitch to her? I pitched her the movie. I got on a zoom with her and she didn't know anything about the movie. And, um, and I, I think she thought it was a general and, uh, she didn't realize that I was going to be like space. Are you an active pitcher? I mean, you're obviously an actor. Can you play all the parts and no, that would be insane. No, no, there are some that do that, but I'd love to meet them briefly. Okay. Um, yeah, no, I, you know, we got on a zoom and I kind of, I kind of told her the story and I think, I think I piqued her interest and then I sent her the script and then, and then we talked about it. Is it a bigger budget than you've been working with? I get a little bit. Yeah. It's not like radically more. Are you interested in a $200 million? I would hope not. You know? No, I would hope not. Why not? Why would that be like an appealing thing? Like, I hope I get to spend a lot more of somebody else's money. No, I mean, it's not just spending the money. It's the, what you can do with the money. You can do things in outer space that maybe visually you can't do on a $50 million budget there. And I'm not talking about as like a flex. This is more than, this is more than, more than that. Um, it's the biggest budget I've had. I'll say that, but it's not, it's not what you're talking about in the other end. No, the goal is not to make the biggest, most expensive movie. The goal is to tell the best story and, and ideally to tell the best story with as little money as possible. Um, for many reasons, financial, obviously, but, but also like, I do believe, and I shouldn't say this publicly, but I do believe that like, there are, there are benefits to having, um, constraints, you know, creative benefits to having constraints. You're going to get kicked out of the DGA. I know I'm fucking myself over. I can see myself on David. I need more money. And they're like, yeah, but, um, roll the tape. No, he said, strike it from the record. Jen is looking at me. Well, but stupid. I know. Shut it. Cut him off. Um, no, but I also do need the fucking money. Uh, but, but there is pressure. You talk about the pressures of IP. There is pressure that comes with that. You are now a summer movie director. And if you come out with a movie that is very expensive, the expectations are higher and the potential to not live up to them is there. Yeah. But that's every movie that's ever been made. And, you know, at a certain point you have to just, you have to just purge that from your mind and, and, and recognize that success and failure is not box office. Success is, do I love this story? And have I succeeded in bringing this, what I love about the story to the screen? When I watch weapons and barbarian, and when I watch resident evil, my, my biggest win is that I'm seeing the movie that was in my head when I was writing the movie. And that's the, what else can I do? That's all I can control. That's the only thing I can be proud of. Everything else is like, you know, the marketing can get you a big, big win, you know, and that's great. Or, or, or you could get fucked on your release date and some other movie comes and eats your lunch. And what does that mean? Your movie sucks? No. You know, so you just, you just can't think that way. Yeah. Why isn't comedy doing better than horror? You, you tell me, man. I mean, you're, I feel like these people could tell us, I don't know. I mean, I'll tell you the theories that, that comedy has been commoditized by the people go to YouTube and sites like that to find things that are funny and it doesn't feel theatrical and horror because of the visceral nature and the scares and the group element where you want to be in a theater being scared together. That is what is drawing people to theaters for horror. I don't know if I agree with that because I think a great comedy and you know, back in the day when great comedies would come out every few weeks, it was fun to be in a theater laughing with everyone. Yeah. It doesn't, it doesn't seem to be the case anymore. I don't disagree with you. I don't know the answer. Um, this guy was saying thumbs down when you were saying the internet thing. So no, So that's my only. Well, but you haven't made a comedy. Would you make one? A lot of people would say Resident Evil's a comedy. I don't know. Okay. Yeah. Well, but how has success changed your perception of what you want to do in your career and what is possible? God, I just don't know. I think I can't see the forest from the trees well enough to have a good answer for you on that. I think I try to be as focused on whatever project is next or that I'm in the midst of and let that be just, that's the thing. And I don't want to be a brand, you know? I don't want to be a giant producer, you know, who has a whole bevy of things. You produce stuff that you haven't. I have, I have, and there's, for sure, but that's not like part of my thinking. I just want to make one movie at a time and be proud of that movie, you know? I think that's probably my path. So if there were five Resident Evil movies that you just produced but didn't write or direct, you would be okay with that or not? I would want to have some hand in them. I can't help but have an idea for where that franchise, I'm calling it a franchise, where that could go, and so I certainly. You say franchise like it's a bad word. I don't know what to make of it. I don't know. Well, you're producing a weapons spinoff. That's a franchise. Yeah, okay, well, okay, fair enough. That's weird for me to think of weapons as a franchise. It is. We're going to get to know more about GLaDOS than we ever thought possible. That's true, okay. I asked this of Lord and Miller, the other night, and they had a good answer, so I'll ask you as well. What is the difference between good executives in the movie business and bad executives? I've been very lucky to have worked with pretty much overwhelmingly good executives. Okay, I'll give you an example. Nicole Brown, who I did Resident Evil with, was such a champion and such a cheerleader and really looked out to make sure that I had everything I needed. And yet, when there were things in the movie when we were watching one of the rough edits where she was able to tell me clearly what wasn't working and how to improve it in a way that didn't feel like we were opposing forces, but in a way of like, here's a collaborator, here's an ally, and we are aligned that we both want this movie to be as good as it can possibly be, and it was something that was helpful. It was helping me see things that I just couldn't see. And you took the notes? Yeah, I did, yeah. And it made the movie better. And so that is a wonderful thing. So someone who can present to you creative alternatives, I'll call them, in a way that feels cooperative as opposed to notes that can sometimes feel oppressive or diametrically opposed to what you're trying to do. Are there things the studio did to weapons that changed the movie or made it better? Believe it or not, no. On weapons, that was just kind of a joy ride all the way through. And that's just, it's a different movie. But no, the new line and the Warner Brothers folks were just kind of, they were nothing but accommodating. And not to say, I don't mean that to say that that wasn't the case. But it was a different movie. Do you think your experiences are, because it's just been a smooth process, or do you think Roy or others have been protecting you? That's a great question. If they have been, maybe they're so goddamn, I mean, they definitely do. But no, I've been blessed. He did make the Minecraft movie. So they, at Warner's at least, they owe him a lot of money. Yeah, sure. I'm curious for your perspective on actors. Okay. Because I found your movies to be particularly well cast. Thank you. When you sit down with actors, first of all, do you write with actors in mind? No. You don't? No. So when you're starting the process and you're working with your casting director, is it a light bulb that goes off and says, this person, tell everyone else to cancel? Yeah, sometimes. Or do you agonize between choices? Yeah, I can definitely agonize. And I can definitely have that light bulb moment. I'm not going to name any names or get into specifics. But like, you know, for example, I have parts left to cast on my next movie that I'm sure I did. But I'm just, it's not that I'm agonizing, but I'm just, I'm just collecting data and I'm looking over a lot of things. Agents should feel free to call Roy and just inundate him. They should not call and inundate me. That's what I will say. But there is, there is a role that also that like, you know, that there's like, that's the thing. And I'm not, I'm not fucking around. I'm not, I'm not exploring, you know? So it's, you know, it can go both ways. It can go both ways. Also, you know, on weapons, I lost my entire cast. You know, I had that whole movie cast. And the only person I didn't lose was Austin. But I lost, I lost, and that's an ensemble movie. So I thought I was done, dude. I did read that, yeah. I was devastated. And Austin hung tight for a year and kept the weight off. I don't know if you remember, he is gaunt in that movie and he stayed gaunt for a year waiting for us to get the green light. And so that's my dude. And so. You say that and obviously he's in Resident Evil. Yeah. Do you foresee? You having like a company of actors that recur in your movies? Some filmmakers are like that. Others like to bring in fresh faces. I mean, I kind of can't help it. I just love my actor so much. I like, it's such a bonding thing, you know? Like, and, and, you know, from, you know, Justin in Barbarian to everybody in weapons and, and, you know, Austin and I just like, it was a true love fest on, on Resident Evil. So yeah, I, I, I should be so lucky. He's probably more expensive now. That's not your problem. What's that Coppola Brando thing where Coppola was like so furious that he had to pay so much money for Apocalypse Now because he, he gave Brando his, whatever. Well, I feel like that's the case with a lot of filmmakers that are big. I mean, I'm sure, you know, if you talk to Jordan Peele and his actors are now much more expensive than they would have been. Sure. But that's a good thing. It's not your money. I want everyone to make more money. That's fine. The Amy Madigan. Yeah. Of it all. Yeah. Best. So was that a light bulb moment or was that a, it was a light bulb moment when I saw her face because I was, I was doing the thing, right? I was going through IMDb. I mean, this is what I do. I get on IMDb, not pro on IMDb. Wait, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. And I only, you don't have a pro. No, I do. I do. Okay. But I, but that's not helpful when I'm trying to find actors because for whatever reason, when I go on regular IMDb, there's all these lists and it's, they're always so funny. They're made by like, just, you know, regular fall, gorgeous, like the hottest boys of the year. And I'll just be like, all right, well, I am casting a young guy. Let's see the hottest boy there. I mean, but there are all these like, and they're all kind of of a kind. And so it's, it's helpful to go and like, let the, let the lists kind of troll those lists. Hottest boys list. I can't get enough. Yeah. You're going to, your cookies probably are telling you stuff. Yeah. Yeah. My wife is like, what is all this hottest boy? What is this? But it's funny you do that. I mean, it. Sure. But I, but I, I think where I was going with this, I was going through women that could fit the criteria. And I remember, I remember very clearly Amy's face coming up, like scrolling up on my feet and, and being like, fuck, that would, that would be perfect. And just cause I'd seen her do everything I needed already. And, and it was like, okay, this is thrilling. Let's, let's see if I can meet her. And how'd that meeting go? Great. What if I was like, Terrible. Terrible. You know, I had to pursue her three times. I had to sit and have dinner with her and her husband. It's funny. I knew, I just knew it was one of those things. I could just tell it was going to be right. And I was driving to go have, have lunch with her. And I'd not met her yet. We, I don't even think we'd spoken on the phone or whatever. And, um, and I was telling myself, Zach, do not offer her the role at lunch. Like no matter how good this goes, just, just like keep it cool. Why? Because you want to like, sometimes you want to keep it cool. Sometimes you can get swept up in the, the thrill of meeting somebody that you admire. And then you say something and then later, God forbid you change your mind. You know, you just want to, you just want to know. Right. And, um, and I swear to God, before the, before the entree hit the, hit the table, I was like, you, you gotta be in this movie. You gotta be, you're the best. Yeah. And I assume she said yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, that'd be funny if she said no. It took three weeks of you begging it. Yeah. Yeah. No. Do you follow? Industry news? Not really. I, it's funny how many filmmakers say that. Yeah. They just don't pay attention. Yeah. It's just easier. But then there are others who are obsessed with it all the time. And it doesn't necessarily mean they're better or worse filmmakers. Um, sometimes that stuff can help. Other times it feels odd that people are so obsessed with the business when that's not really their job. I mean, look, I don't want to act like I never do. Like, you know, my agent producer over here, we, we talk about. You know, we talk about it, but, um, I don't go and read the trades. Yeah. But I'm more like, I kind of know what's going on in like the horror space and, you know, like you follow the fan sites. No, not at all. Not, you're not. I don't even know what you're referring to. You know, there's a million horror fan sites. Trust me. They talk about you a lot. Okay. Well, now I'm going to dive in, but you're not a very online person and you would, you don't take any cues from what's being talked about in forums. or fan sites or any of that? I. don't even know where i would go to do that no god that's fascinating yeah it just feels like like so many filmmakers do that you write a lot yeah and there must be scripts in your drawer oh my god that i'm sure you've been in meetings where executives have said what do you got no really yeah there isn't a script in your drawer that you know i have a lot of scripts in my drawer i just have not been in a meeting where an exec is like what you know because um roy can we no it's because i don't talk to the i talk to roy and joe and we decide what we want to do and then that's what we that's what we present i'm yeah um i guess my question should be yeah are there movies in your drawer that you would like to make yes so the way that i write and i don't know if i encourage this or not if this if this feels exciting to you go for it if it doesn't don't but i don't outline i don't really think of the movie as a whole i sit down as a gasp and i just every film professor has been lying to you no no no no they're not they're not lying to you they're not lying to you i love um save the cat i love robert mckee i love that shit i think it's i think it's truth in a book so don't i'm not saying you know that there's no value there but for me i need to just sit down and just play and so i just play by just like i have this idea for for a scene let's go and i just start let my fingers lead before my brain can can get in the way and then i just try and entertain myself see if that blooms into something cool you don't know how many scripts i have that are like 30 pages and then i hit a dead end and i'm i'm dead and then i do another i get 50 pages and then it dies and i'm dead and and then sometimes you get lucky and you get a barbarian or you get a weapons where i can land the plane mostly i don't land the plane and one of my favorite things i've ever written by far is only 50 pages and i just don't know what to do you know and i'm still it's been years i'm still hoping i can figure out the back half of that thing because if i do i'll be just like the happiest boy in the world um but i that's my process i like that i because if i have taken money and pitched an outline and then i have to go and and write the outline it's just different because that that joy of discovery and that i can do whatever the fuck i want because this is free and if it's bad no one's ever going to read it that lets me be totally fearless well and no one's paying you to write it paying me i'm not wasting anything you're not going to take time you're not going to take a script assignment not anymore no i'm not and and so i love that i love the idea of like this is just my little precious time i put on my music i put weird lights on i like to do it at night and i'm just like spooking myself out and and if it doesn't work it doesn't matter you know what i mean that's the best and if it does work then like yay for me so yeah i i love that and i think that's like super healthy little kids coloring with crayons dude like that's the that's the zone that that i think is the best zone to be in what piece of advice do you wish someone had given you when you were young that your habits define you and that you know it's not about the one thing it's about consistency and i feel like if i had been um more mindful uh earlier i think who knows you know i don't really have a lot of living in the past but i just think i think i would have benefited from from being mindful so um to me that also you know i talk about this a lot tm transcendental meditation change your life change my life check it out there are centers all over the place you can learn a lot when did you get into that um i got into that in like 2017 or 18 so right around when you yeah because i wrote barbarian in 2018 i believe okay so you really credit that with with giving you a creative boost i think it did yeah for sure david lynch has a great book called catching the big fish read the book it's tiny you'll read it in two hours and what's his advice tm yeah i mean it's all about it's all about coffee and premium yeah and cigarettes um you know but it's all about i believe that the best art comes from your subconscious right and it's not it's not like i'm not gonna sit down and think a good movie out with my head i'm not maybe you will i i can't do that i have to let a good movie or a good story come from some place that i don't even understand you know chekhov talked about it like you know as an actor he's like you want to like snag these ideas from from god you know like we are an antenna a conduit and these ideas are not mine or yours if i didn't write weapons someone else would have written weapons i actually believe that and and it's and david lynch said it's like going down and catching the big fish you know you want to find these ideas that are out there and you want to be lucky enough and attuned enough and clean enough to be able to to get them and uh it's very woo-woo i don't know if it's true or not i just think it's better for me as an artist to believe it and so i choose to believe it and do you choose to believe it on set when people have ideas yes absolutely dude i i totally feel like spontaneity is wonderful you know by the time we're on set i have storyboarded and photo boarded and had a billion conversations about exactly how things are going to go and so if some dude or dudette has a crazy idea i am so thrilled to hear it you know you always want other people's ideas in there otherwise your movie's only as good as you're capable of doing i don't want to be the limit to my movie you know i want i want everyone working on the movie to improve to raise the roof you know so so that's why you want to surround yourself with people who who see the movie the way you see it and are talented and have ideas all right well this has been great thank you all for coming thank you so much appreciate it thank you to lmu for hosting us thank you to craig horlbeck for producing this episode thank you all for coming really appreciate it okay that's the show for today no call sheet i want to thank my guest zach craiger producer craig horlbeck our editor is jesse lopez and stefano sanchez i want to have a special shout out to lmu for hosting us and we'll see you next week you Bye.