Episode 144: talk w/ filmmaker RJ Collins and Acteess Nicky Whelan!

0:01 We've got three bodies in two months. Catch this serial killer before he does it again. Three bodies this month? Maybe he's just getting sloppy. How do you know it's a he? Never assume. This is the new transfer from Tulsa. Detective Waters, homicide. Good luck. Thank you. Ricky McCullum was found dead yesterday. What? I don't suppose you've heard of a website. It's called Secrets 666. No. My roommate, Vanessa Perkins, she was on that website, and she's been missing for three days. How do you know Vanessa? Sex Addicts Anonymous.

0:42 Hello, police. Everybody in there? I just saw that. Love it, cause. Love it. We've been partners, say, 12 years, right? Didn't feel right. Come on, man. Get on your game. He might be in danger. Whoever's responsible is still at large. He's definitely a copycat, whatever you're gonna do. Cutting heads off his victims, mannequins, that all sounds sexual. I created a fake profile that might lead us to our guy. We need all the help we can get. I got a bad feeling about this guy. Elise! She's in trouble affairs. She's unpredictable. Look what I found in your closet back there. I have never seen that in my life, I swear.

1:29 Why didn't you tell me so that I could protect you? You might hear some bad things about daddy. You gotta know they're not true. Music.

2:12 Hey hey what's up rj hey welcome to the show uh we are uncle dad talks i'm uncle dad and with me as always is that handsome man right there and that's mike hampton mike say hello handsome man where what are you talking about it's rj obviously rj's the right right yes hey no no no you guys what a better way to start an interview to challenge each other who's more handsome Yeah. Is that the Lafayette, Louisiana or what is that? That is. That is correct. Talking about my hat there. I think my third feature when I was in my young 20s, we shot a movie in Ashton, Oregon and Lafayette. And all the producers were from and the director were from Lafayette. It was a cool experience.

2:53 Oh, wow. That's fun. You know, I'm glad you mentioned that. Yeah, I grew up in Lafayette. And, you know, one of the things when I first saw the title of the movie that we're talking about, Crested City, Obviously, my mind went right to New Orleans. Yeah. This film is actually shot in Arkansas, yeah? Yes, yeah. No. So funny enough, with the Crescent City title, Rich, the writer, and I, we were doing a movie out in Ukraine in 2019. We were talking about serial killers and like he was doing a bunch of research and telling me some creepy stories about little things they were doing and things they would hide. and then we went down to shoot Grand Isle with Nick Cage in Baton Rouge in 2019.

3:34 And that's where we came up with the name, but we found there's a Crescent City in California. And so in Little Rock, we wanted to make it a fictitious town outside of Little Rock. So we didn't kind of like freak out any neighborhoods or communities by doing this movie there. So that was kind of why we kept it that way. I love that. I think, you know, I'm just going to be, you know, me and Mike, like, to be honest, and when we were, we were initially talking about this project here, he was very excited about that. He was like, oh, it's New Orleans. Awesome. But you know what? Arkansas is just as cool, man. Arkansas is just as cool, I would say, right? We all agree. I love them both, man. And they know they both work. So yeah, it doesn't know I'm not taking any sides on that. Smart. I love both states.

4:17 So I am curious, you know, we're talking about serial killers and whatnot you know i kind of want to ask you hopefully this is not a weird question to ask somebody but what are your top three serial killers that inspired you for this. Wow um you know i don't know if i want to like say names because we did a lot of research on a lot of them and i don't know if i get in trouble but it's all public domain you know news yeah Yeah, what are your top three worst human beings? There you go. Well, there's one guy. No, I mean, look, I would say that it's a combination of many of them.

4:57 There was, one of them was the I-70 Strangler that motivated a little bit of things. But we kind of pulled from different serial killers. But the mannequin side of this was definitely motivated by the I-70 Strangler from the 80s and 90s. And it was really creepy the research that we did on all of them so i just don't know if there's like certain clearances or whatever you need to get when you see these certain things but let's put it this way it's it's i didn't i was blown away when we got into the minds of these people and it's like it's fascinating and that's why you know i love 90s thrillers like that that time frame was phenomenal and i love how you constantly are questioning who the killer is all the way to the end. And that's what we did here.

5:45 And you don't know which gender it is. We kind of keep it open all the way to the end. You just kind of back and forth, back and forth. And, you know, it was very motivated. Tony Scott, I love the way he colors his films and his music. And, you know, David Fincher is phenomenal with that. And those are kind of like two guys that I really, and Denny even was, he's phenomenal. But it was kind of like Prisoners, Zodiac, True Detective, all those movies kind of crammed into this. It felt like a lot of those pieces were from there. Yeah. The shots that you have with the mannequins, like there is something about a dark room and a light, a flashlight shining on a mannequin in a dark room where it obviously shouldn't be. It's definitely creepy. So you definitely captured that.

6:27 So like when you're doing that stuff and you're, you know, there's obviously a lot of sexy stuff going on in the story here too. The juxtaposition of those two things, like you did a really great job of tying those two things together. Other well thank you yeah like i said it's kind of the good versus evil in this movie right and the temptations of life right so we all have our lives but you all you have a decision to make every single day whether you're going to go the other way or the you know the right way and so we kind of use that and then kind of combined it in with a a whirlwind of people that could be the could be the suspect and the killer but yeah it does have that kind of like i said so it's kind of that's kind of my homage to the 90s thrillers by kind of the little things we added like that And that was part of the writer, Rich Ronette. He's phenomenal.

7:13 So we kind of, you know, he really came up with a lot of the story. And well, he wrote the script. So it's fun. I love that you bring up the 90s. One of our favorite things to talk about is the 90s aesthetic of film. And so one of those icons of the 90s is legendary actor Bruce Willis. Yeah. And so I'm curious, did you ever have the opportunity, we always like to ask everybody this, did you have the opportunity ever to work with him in the past? Or would you be like to in the future if you could, of course? Oh, God. I tried. Believe me. We tried to cast him a few times. Man, I love Bruce. I mean, I mean, Moonlighting, come on. I mean, Moonlighting, I was obsessed with that TV show.

7:56 And I mean, come on, Die Hard. Actually, you know, it's funny. Die Hard's one of the movies I watched in the theater, and I was thinking to myself, like, wow, I want to make movies. I loved it. I just loved the way it made me feel. I didn't know if it was because I wanted to be an actor or what, but funny enough, after I did acting as a kid, I kind of realized that I loved making movies, but the acting side of it wasn't really what I wanted to do. Because when I was on set, I was watching the people in the background, what they were doing. And I loved the director and the producers and everybody was there. And I was fascinated by it. Even the DP and the film crew, I was like, this is cool. I want to do that. So I stopped acting. I did a smaller role where I was like a one-day player, pretty much like a feature background playing the young Gary Sinise in a movie.

8:38 And I watched Paul Cervino directing and I'm like, I have to do this eventually. Eventually but i was like you know i'm going to produce i'm going to you know work myself up earn the credits learn the business better over years and finally my 40s i decided to go for it i love that mike yeah no it's great i mean i mean we always try to find a way to wedge bruce willison because you know i he's like my favorite all time and i have a tattoo of him on my arm oh wow you know you really went for it that's awesome i mean look six cents i mean god there's just i can name out so many movies of his. I agree. It's like he's amazing. Look, I was like, I don't really get, like... Weird or kind of nervous around any actors but bruce would be one al pacino and bruce willis and you know even alec i was a little nervous when i did my first zoom call with him and then we had a great talk though right away and you know we just really had a good vibe going from the minute we started talking and he asked me what what he wanted what i what i wanted from him and how i saw the story and i told him and then he was like great so we really hit it off and he's He's, you know, Alec and Terrence, all of them, like they're phenomenal actors, you know, Oscar nominated, phenomenal actors.

9:50 And it was great to just vibe with them and just have a fun time. And you never know until you get into the trenches of people how it's going to go. Yeah, I love that. We do have to wrap up here, but before we do, what is the one thing you hope our audience gets from watching this film? Well, I hope they go on a nice journey on this one. And I just love the twists and turns. And I just, you know, these kinds of movies where you don't know who the killer is all the way to the end is great because you hook the audience in. So our goal was to keep an audience from the beginning all the way to the end. And I feel like with this film, we did that. I love that. Yeah, so everybody go, please go check out Crest in the City coming out very soon. Thank you so much, RJ. Thank you, everybody. And we'll be right back after this. Thanks, guys.

10:30 Hi there, this is Dave Mandel. I'd like to think you know me as a writer for Seinfeld and Curb Your Enthusiasm or Veep or even Eurotrip or, I don't know, the dictator or clerks but you probably know me from cat and the hat oh well uh anyway you're listening to uncle dad talks all right uncle dad and mike are returned or have returned have returned from uh hanging out with rj collins the filmmaker behind crescent city now mike for those who didn't really know what i was referencing can you tell them the story as to why we accepted this interview. Yeah, I mean, we're going to talk about it a bit with RJ very briefly.

11:13 But, you know, anytime I think anyone hears Crescent City, you know, in the United States, I think the first thing people think about is New Orleans because that's the most famous nickname that it has other than the Big Easy, because it's shaped like a crescent moon along the Mississippi River. So, obviously, me being the New Orleans man that I am, I was very excited to talk about a movie. Having to do with the crescent city but it's not and that's okay it's still a great film. It's still a great film and also arkansas mike have you been to arkansas and honestly i've driven through arkansas a couple times i hear it's pretty beautiful like i really i really have heard it's beautiful over there yeah i mean that's the thing with the south man it's just you know the it's very lush and you know the humidity and the amount of rain that it gets uh you know, We spent a lot of our time in California where the hills are very brown.

12:07 You don't see that out in the South. So yeah, it is. It's beautiful. Awesome. Yeah, I think whenever we do these interviews, and I want to shout out to Annie always for helping us out with some of the best interviews we can get from Lionsgate. And one of my things that we do is I always try my best, both of us try our best to make sure the content is fresh for you guys listening. And I think one of those things I want to point out there is I hope you guys all appreciate that we try to make sure that we don't ask the same questions all the time and sometimes we do like bruce willis but that's okay so i just want to throw it out there if you guys have any suggestions as to what we can change for our like if there's something you guys want to hear specific please email me at uncle dad uncle dad talks i would love to see if we can make it more for the for the audience what do you think mike yeah i mean if anyone has listened to our show consistently they know that we always wedge certain questions in there one of those being about bruce willis just because i'm i still have an obsession with him yeah and it's just funny to us and hopefully it becomes funny to the people listening and it seems like the guests always get a kick out of it but yeah if there's uh if there's anything that the listeners want us to wedge into a conversation that may or may not fit or may be interesting let us know yeah let us know yeah we We want to make it more involved with the audience because this is our show, but it's your show, too.

13:31 So, Mike, you won't be here for the next interview we're partaking in, but we are going to be interviewing Nikki Whelan, who is one of the lead actresses in this film. Nikki Whelan, you can be honest, are you familiar with her as an actress? Yes. Other than watching her in this film, I can't think of what else. But you should tell me. I will tell you. But before I tell you that, a fun fact, everybody, for people watching Crescent City is that it stars the son of another 90s icon. Nicolas Cage. That's right. It stars Weston Cage. Now, that really surprised me because I'm like, wow, he kind of like doesn't look like his son, but he shares his father's intensity, right?

14:12 Because Nicolas Cage has that in certain intensity, right? Would you agree with that? I don't know what you're talking about. That's so weird. I'm being sarcastic. Okay. You got me against that because I see video, but... Yeah. Yeah, and there's a lot of great actors also in this film. We got Terrence Howard. We got Alec Baldwin. But yeah, I'm sad I missed the Nikki part of the interview. You she's beautiful and i wouldn't mind seeing her on screen here but you enjoy that part of the show i certainly will and nikki whelan is a lot of unique movies one of those movies i wanted to point out is actually one of my favorites it's one of my guilty pleasures and it's called the binge have you heard of that movie yes but just in case our audience hasn't maybe just say a quick note about that the binge is basically the concept of what's that movie where everybody kills each other one day the purge it's like the purge right but instead of them banning all murder whatever and one day you can do it in this universe they ban all drugs all alcohol all whatever forever but on one day you can do all the drugs you want all the all the alcohol you want like if you haven't seen this movie you really should watch it because it's a wild ride And she is in that movie and she plays the pun isher.

15:38 Sounds like every day of my normal life. Oh man. I'm being sarcastic again. Sarcasm does exist here. And on that note, I will be right back with our interview with Nikki Whelan. But before we go, be sure to follow us on Instagram at uncle dad talks. And of course, follow Mike and Mike Hampton art, Mike, do you have any shows you want to promote real quick that you'll be at? Shows that I will be at? I don't know. No. No. Okay. Yeah. All right. Sorry, everybody. You won't be able to see Mike. I don't think. But you will see me at GalaxyCon San Jose. I'll be somewhere binging.

16:24 You probably will be, to be honest, and I'll be sure to post pictures of that. But you can find me at GalaxyCon San Jose, and that'll be the weekend of August 16th, 17th and 18th at the San Jose Convention Center. And I'll be hanging out with my Uncle Dad's gear. And if you see me, please say hello. Who knows, you might even get a special gift. But thank you guys so much, and we'll be right back with Nikki Whelan. Hello, Nikki Whelan. It is such an honor and a pleasure to be speaking with you. I have to tell you this right out the gate, you're responsible for two of my favorite films of all time, and that's The Flood. Yeah, I love The Flood, and I love Maneater as well. I'm very into that. Oh my goodness! So thank you for that. There you go!

17:06 I love those kind of films obviously this is very different than that but but you know what uh anytime i can shout out movies like that i'm so excited so first and foremost just when we get into this discussion of this movie for you as an actress how much different was it you know in this role versus the other roles you've been in every single job i do is so left of center you know i I go from comedy to drama to action as, you know, from those movies you're talking about to this. They're so different. The experiences are completely different, especially because some of those were shot in Hawaii, Thailand, and now I'm in Little Rock, Arkansas. You know what I mean? Yeah.

17:47 They're just so different and every experience is really interesting and I take away so much. In this particular movie, obviously, I'm surrounded by some unbelievable actors, Isai Morales and Terrence Howard and Alec Baldwin. I mean, you've got award-winning powerhouse men that have done incredible things in their career. So I'm now in the mix with them making a movie in this random little town of lovely people and we're doing a thriller and it's a lot of emotion. We got a short period of time to shoot it and so there's there's a lot happening and you sort of have to be able to pivot really quickly emotionally and go let's go we're in this let's go we've got this time and to think that the the chemistry between esai and terence is really incredible on and off screen they really have to have their own thing they're so funny together and, rj our director did a great job of sort of bringing us all together and immediately making the set a very safe, great place to be in and to be super creative.

18:46 And there's a lot of emotions and a lot of stuff happening. And we just all really took care of each other. It was really lovely. I love that. And I think too, like when you talk about locations of where you filmed, Little Rock is probably one of the most unique locations in the aspect that it's probably not the most exciting. And I know it's mean that in a bad way, but what did you guys do for fun in Little Rock? Well, when we had, we had a big long weekend off and all of us and everyone's families flew in and kids went out and got a big um rental couple rental sort of airbnb places and we went to this crystal farm where they you dig for crystals and all the kids and had a ball it really felt like a big school camp and it was so lovely you know when you spend time in those towns obviously as a movie production you get taken care of very well and you eat at the best restaurants in town but the locals that worked on the movie were so lovely I'm still in contact with all the make-up team, the most wonderful women.

19:40 Some people flew in from LA too, but great little town, would happily go back there and shoot. And you've got to go there and experience it. Look, they're not always, they don't always feel like home, but you certainly get to experience being on a movie, what it feels like to live there because you're there for a chunk of time and, you know, you've got to go to the local CVS and get your stuff, you know what I mean? So it's like you kind of get to live in the 60s a minute it with a little extra treatment special treatment because you're in the movie so yeah random locations beautiful neighborhoods i really enjoyed it it was very hot shooting there very hot yeah a little stuff yeah in the action scenes in the movie we're like driven with sweat i'm like so you know there's a lot but great experience and just really loved everyone on this i love that and i think you're talking about the film and the cast you have so much talent in this film, was that ever an intimidation of the sense of like, man, I got to work against, you know, not against, but with Terrence Howard, Alec Baldwin, how was that feeling like?

20:40 You know, it's giving them all the credit, to be honest with you, because they are the powerhouses. They are the ones with the huge backgrounds and incredible award-winning actors. And so, yeah, you think to yourself, oh my goodness, I'm stepping into this space. But you would never know with how they treat you. You are an absolute equal on set working opposite them. They protect you, give you space, allow you freedom to do everything you need to do. You know why they are who they are. Because after working with them, you get it. And they're really incredibly gracious, humble men, especially with their backgrounds and supporting you. So, yes, there is a sense of like, oh, my goodness, I'm walking.

21:20 And everyone's energy is different. And you're managing it very quickly, walking onto a set, boom, it's all four of us in the office. You know, there's moments where I'm like, oh, my goodness, get your shit together. You know what I mean? But everyone's laughing, having a good time, and we're all showing up and we all want it to look good. So everyone's got their best foot forward and is helping each other find our way you know in a very short period of time so i don't know everyone's so cool this was a cool movie this was a cool like we had so many laughs on this movie and i have such fond memories of it so yeah it's interesting you say that too because you know it's like it is a very serious film but you could tell that everybody had a lot of for me when i watch film i can always feel that energy like i feel like i'm kind of empathic about that where it's like oh i can feel that everybody's having a great time and you could see that on screen so what i'm curious too is when you initially got the script so what attracted you to be a part of this film well i'd always i'd worked with raja rj our director i call him raja he's a very dear friend of mine 17 years ago on a movie that he had produced and he was always looking for something for us to do together so when this came about i obviously always wanted to work with him jacqueline's a very complicated big character character.

22:32 She's a tomboy. She's badass. You know, I like that stuff. It's my vibe. It's my jam. Like let's throw it. And now it's very emotional. She's got a lot of layers. Like who, it's a, who did it kind of movie thriller and I'm surrounded by bosses. So yeah, it's pretty easy. Yes. For me. Awesome. And you know, we're talking about like getting into the characters. What do you have to do for yourself to like connect to that? Like, okay, I like these attributes, but how do I really become this character? You know, with such little preparation time and short shooting time, it's really, for me, I just must always be present. Being present allows things to be authentic and allows me to stay in the moment of what's happening.

23:15 It kind of sounds cheesy, but it's the truth. It's the same in life. You just stay in the moment and the reality of what's happening. I know who Jacqueline is. That's the fun of playing a character over a period of time you get to know the character you start realizing what she enjoys to do and it's weird you develop the second sense of who this woman is after you've been living her and that's the the joy of getting to act and be it first couple days are always hard because we're trying to find our food it's like the first day of school you don't know who's who and how to and but these movies are shot in two and a half weeks so you got to pivot quickly and adapt quickly that in itself is its own art form we're all just trying to figure it out life is so quick everything is so quick it's like keep up or fall off so you know just jump on board and and be vulnerable enough to allow you know allow some truth to come out in these moments and be safe enough to let them sort of play out you know i love that And I think being present, too, is also in our form in itself, because I've had challenges with that just in my personal life in general.

24:21 And then I'm learning more and more to just to be present, because sometimes I think we also often think about how do we how do we fix whatever problems happening instead of being in the moment? But really, reality is that problem is still going to be there, whether we're here or not. Right. Like we need to focus on the product of the hand and then we can worry about that problem later. So what I'm curious is, was there what was probably the most challenging scene for you to film as an actress? I don't know if you'd say challenging, but I think there's moments, there's a couple of moments where Jacqueline is at home and we had such little time to shoot them and she was very emotional. And trying to, I literally got 20 minutes to shoot this scene and I'm like, where am I, you know, I don't know.

25:02 Just trying to find in such a, you know, real life emotions can, things will happen and jolters into tears instantly. Other things that happen over time, you know, it's just, they're challenging because you're trying to be authentic and bring, you want your audience to feel stuff. You want them to fight for you that you want them to keep the screen, this movie on and care. So I just try and it's when I'm by myself and I've got to get very emotional, I need a minute and they don't usually give me a minute. So I'm like, damn it. Where are we pulling this from? You know, some actors can just do it like that. And it depends on any day because as a human, some days we feel great and I don't feel like crying today.

25:46 So you're going to have to dig deep. You know, that's, they're the challenges, you know, to stay, to bring up an emotion that's maybe been suppressed and you're feeling really good. Okay awesome well we have to wrap up here but before we do what is the thing that you hope the audience takes away from the film you know it's a lot of people have been saying it's got a little bit of a 90s vibe to it when some of the best thrillers were ever made you know i hope they kind of watch it with that kind of it's fun it's one of those fun movies that you just kind of who did it you really have no idea there's so much going on there's so many surprises and shocks along the way and I don't know it's just it's a good fun watch it's a little dark a little sexy so I just I think I really think people hopefully take that away from it and see that it's got a bit of a 90s energy to it which people love I love that and my last thing to say about the flood real fast is I hope that you and Cassandra and Dean will do more movies in the future we will I love him and his wife are my favorite people I have full contact with them I love them so me too okay awesome awesome thank you so much i absolutely appreciate it everybody go please go please see crest in the city when it comes out very soon thank you again nikki william for your time i appreciate it thanks love thank you.