#52 Producing a Micro Budget Film | Geoff Quan

Don’t budget for distribution when producing a micro budget film.

Geoff Quan, Original Independent Films at Netflix, shares why you shouldn’t budget for distribution and instead focus on making a high quality film. Geoff’s resume includes Light of My Life , Blindspotting, and the Netflix biopic, Barry.

Watch to learn how to improve your next micro budget film.

Key Points:

1:20 – How he got started
3:22 – Why producing
4:52 – What union is he apart of

Skip to: 05:33 Distributing first film

11:40 – First big projects
15:30 – C9:45 – What he looks for in projects
11:17 – Why is he in the industry

Skip to: 12:22 Working with the right people

28:11 – Networking with crew
31:16 – Favorite Gear
38:42 – Something going wrong14:48 – What went wrong on a micro budget film
18:27 – Difference working with non actors and big name actors
22:05 – Flawed System

Skip to: 24:40 Finding the right people to help sell your film

427:40 – Working with a publicist

Skip to: 31:04 How much should you budget for publicists and distrubtion

33:01 – Favorite Gear
35:19 – Future of indie filmmaking

Full Transcript:

Geoff Quan (00:00):
…these cars started going by all the time and what we started to figure out was that there were these like stick up crews and they were looking at our lights and our cameras and all this stuff, and they would just go by and case us. And this wasn’t the first time. [inaudible 00:00:13] were the only thing shooting in, I think probably the only thing shooting in Philly this summer. So everyone knew about this little film. I think I ended up up calling 911 more times in that night than I’ve called them ever in my life collectively. I think I called them six times.

Tanya Musgrave (00:28):
Welcome to The Practical Filmmaker, an educational podcast brought to you by the Filmmaker Institute and Sundance Film Festival, where industry professionals talk nuts and bolts and the steps they took to find their success today. On today’s show, indie film producer, Geoff Quan, talks about the indie space as the director of production management for the original indie film team at Netflix. Find the full transcripts and more at thepracticalfilmmaker.com. I’m your host, Tanya Musgrave. And today we have Indy producer, Geoff Quan. A director of production management for the original indie film team at Netflix who’s works include Casey Affleck, Light of My Life. 6 Balloons, blind spotting, which premiered at Sundance in 2018 and Netflix biopic drama Barry. Welcome to the show.

Geoff Quan (01:10):
Hi Tanya. Thanks for having me.

Tanya Musgrave (01:11):
Geoff. You’ve got eight features under your belt. Now I want to take you back fresh out of film school, or even what got you into film school. How did you get where you are today?

Geoff Quan (01:20):
So you did mention, I went to film school. I was at Columbia, I got my MFA there, started production in New York, in the New York indie film scene, bopping around trying to taking a lot of production, survival jobs. So I was doing this thing at the time where I would take like production gigs on bigger things that, [PAing 00:01:38] coordinating. But at the same time, I was trying to get my experience as a producer, as a capital [inaudible 00:01:44] creative producer. And so to start off with, I took a couple of tiny micro budget features and those were the first things that I made as a producer. I mean, there were two of them where it was like $100000 in the camp. Just absolutely tiny, like the sort of thing where you benefited from not knowing what you don’t know.

Tanya Musgrave (01:59):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (02:01):
It was the kind of thing where I was my own location manager and I was my own accountant and I was my own first AD just stuff where you didn’t have it. And it kind of like only later as I got into my career, I was like, “Oh right, there’s, a person for that. Or there’s even a department for that thing.” But from there, what ended up happening because I had to do all of those things. I was working on these tiny features that were incredibly under resourced. And so having to pick up all of these practical skills along the way to make those things happen, I started getting approach to be a production manager, a wine producer on these other movies. So I was like, oh, you have these very sort of practical pieces.

Geoff Quan (02:35):
And that led me to other movies where I was learning as a production manager in this idea of having this skillset where I could learn a lot, take on bigger projects that have presented bigger challenges where the problems themselves were not just a function of that we had absolutely no money, right. Because not that, that’s not challenging, but at a certain point that became sort of variations on a theme almost where it’s like, okay, you just have no money desire, you solve this or you have [inaudible 00:02:59] borrow and steal for whatever. So how do you solve this? [inaudible 00:03:02] with a little bit of money. Yeah. Which means probably, a bigger sort of creative palette, you’re telling different types of stories that have different types of requirements. How do you then solve that stuff? And that led me down the path of production management line producing and eventually getting back to producing, it was kind of this full circle sort of thing.

Tanya Musgrave (03:21):
Yeah. Why have you gravitated towards producing another role? Did you always gravitate towards producing?

Geoff Quan (03:30):
I did. And it was an interest. I think it really in process and in team building, I liked understanding how to make something, something that was really complex and complicated and with a lot of moving parts and had this, also this real interest in, when you put teams of people together, what is that alchemy that happens when you have an incredible team, right?

Tanya Musgrave (03:50):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (03:51):
That sometimes it’s a little bit of magic and a little bit of luck and circumstances. You also have to work really hard at it because great teams don’t just happen. I come from a completely different field prior to film. So I was working in design and got this interest there, right? Because I was working with large design teams. It was sort of the wrong format for me, like the wrong medium in terms of the actual work. But knew enough about myself and what I would really derive sort of satisfaction pleasure from and not to say, okay, well if the wrong thing, but I like this process thing that spoke to me as what I eventually learned was like, oh, that’s producing.

Tanya Musgrave (04:27):
You mentioned micro budget features. And now you’ve gotten up to features that can actually handle a crew and a cast and-

Geoff Quan (04:37):
Sure.

Tanya Musgrave (04:37):
…I mean you have top build cast and I mean like fantastic talent there as you grew as a producer did you have to, I mean, like for instance, did you have to be part of a union? Is it still all technically like indie? Are you part of the union?

Geoff Quan (04:51):
So I’m part of the Director’s Guild. So within the Directors Guild, obviously there is the director. Yeah. But it’s also, what’s called the director’s team, which consists of a unit production manager first ad, second ad, second second. And depending a couple of other positions, depending on where you are. I got in as a UPM on a movie called Ride, which was directed by Helen Hunt. It was a surfing movie that we shot in LA once you get beyond a certain point, most movies tend to be in the Guild. And so it was a way for me to continue to grow and participate in bigger more complex movies and stories.

Tanya Musgrave (05:24):
Yeah. A huge bit of filmmaking that always seems to be a mystery is distribution.

Geoff Quan (05:29):
Sure.

Tanya Musgrave (05:29):
I would love to know about the first film, your first film that you sold.

Geoff Quan (05:33):
I mean, so the two micro budget films we did, we did sell sort of in bits and pieces. It was also-

Tanya Musgrave (05:43):
Bits and pieces. Expound on that.

Geoff Quan (05:44):
Those things, they were really little made with virtually no stars, a first time director. So there wasn’t a lot in there to say, we’re going to pitch this and somehow it’s going to, the pitch was not like, hey, great commercial success, right?

Tanya Musgrave (05:56):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (05:56):
But to say that these films represented authentic experiences that for the… If you could connect them to the right eyes, there were going to be people interested in them. And often what that meant for us was that we were having to go and say, “We’re going to go to a two particular platforms and sell out particular pieces of rights for that stuff whether it’s by territory.” Or say, “This is all going to Amazon Prime is an example or not Apple TV, but sort of the previous version when it was all through iTunes.” Right? That sort of stuff. So that’s what I mean by bits and pieces where it, wasn’t the sort of thing where we were not getting the studio pay day where somebody is like, “I’m going to take all rights in all territories in perpetuity throughout the known universe.”

Geoff Quan (06:34):
We were not so lucky in that way. I think much more typical of the stories you don’t often hear was that we had to go do that gradually over time and try to build out a distribution plan with the idea of saying, there’s value in the story, but how do we convince people to come find it out? And part of it was, I think also has been in the last 10 years, there’s really been this glut of content. So in some ways like how you even just find the audience, right? Because it’s all there and there’s seemingly ever increasing numbers of titles and content defines, but how do you then cut through and be like, how does an audience member find you? Right? And then how do you convince them to be like, “I’m going to rent that.” Or “I’m going to buy it.”

Tanya Musgrave (07:13):
So, I mean, you mentioned in the last 10 years, there’s been a whole slew of changes within the industry. What did you learn in that space? For instance, like the first film that you sold versus the first film that you sold maybe to a streaming platform or was the first one already on a streaming platform?

Geoff Quan (07:31):
They were already on streaming platforms when we sold them. The difference is partly is the model now in some ways, right? If you look at where most viewers are now they’re in these subscription based models, whether it’s Netflix or you’re on HBO Max or Apple TV, or one of those right. Where it’s like, the transaction is like is a time based one. I have a monthly subscription that renews, versus a single transaction, it more akin to a movie ticket, right.

Geoff Quan (07:58):
Which was what sort of the old digital model was, it’s like, I’m going to rent this movie, but instead of getting a video cassette or a DVD, it comes to me as a digital file that I have to watch in the next 48 hours. That sort of thing. And I think with that there, certainly, so much about the ecosystem has grown and it’s sophistication of how, what’s on those platforms, how it’s merchandised to you, just the experience of watching those things in that environment. That’s all radically changed in the last 10 years.

Tanya Musgrave (08:27):
You had mentioned before that 6 Balloons was one of the first wave. We were chatting before we actually started recording, but the 6 Balloons-

Geoff Quan (08:37):
Secrets.

Tanya Musgrave (08:37):
Secrets. Well, I’m about to like tell the secret, I guess. It’s not really a secret.

Geoff Quan (08:41):
No.

Tanya Musgrave (08:41):
6 Balloons was one of the first you said [cashlow 00:08:45] films of Netflix’s indie department. It was how you came to Netflix.

Geoff Quan (08:50):
I was working as an independent producer, line producer for 10 years. And this sort of from the end of film school to where when I started at Netflix and I’ve been here for about four years. As part of that, I ended up making two films for the team that I now work for. One of them is 6 Balloons, which you mentioned. And at the time Netflix before, they’re now known for all of their original content, but there was a time period in which they were the idea of being in a digital space. The streaming space was really new. And so they were looking to build the [inaudible 00:09:17] they would license and acquire titles. And at a certain point they flipped that or started to experiment with, well, what would it be like if we made our own? And so 6 Balloons was one of this first wave of independent features that Netflix cashflow produced. And so they, I was hired in to help make that film for them.

Tanya Musgrave (09:36):
Knowing what you do now, even as a filmmaker, how does all of your experience inform what you look for in projects, for you as a filmmaker?

Geoff Quan (09:44):
Part of what I had always set out to do, and I feel very fortunate to have done, whether it’s the films that I’ve produced or the things I’ve gotten to help make while at Netflix is just the variety diversity of that. As a filmmaker, as a producer of color, I feel like, there’s a responsibility there to be telling stories that reflect what our world looks like. And I think fair to say that for a long time, in at least American cinema, that’s not always been the case.

Geoff Quan (10:10):
And part of what I’ve loved about being a producer is that there have been incredible, authentic, original stories that if I was in a different role, I would not be the right voice to tell that story. But I see the role as a producer sometimes to be the facilitator. And to say that I can do that and so I think one of the things that I look at with that is that when I look at material, it’s always about the authenticity of the voice, the authenticity of the story. And oftentimes it’s led me to be able to participate in really incredible projects where we may not have seen that before, but if I can bring my skillset to that, then that feels like that’s my contribution. So something like Blindspotting is a good example of this.

Tanya Musgrave (10:47):
Yeah. One of the things that I have always been curious about whenever I talk to somebody and you know, it’s a hard industry. There always a why, like, why is it? What is your passion about specifically, what is it that keeps you in this particular industry? And I’ve always wondered like, hey, is it inclusion of voices? That kind of thing and passion. So maybe that’s my next question. What is your why?

Geoff Quan (11:14):
I think certainly it’s part of it is what we already talked about a little bit is that inclusion is that diversity is, I remember watching things growing up where having very specific moments of seeing what I felt like was reflection of the life I knew and the family I had and the culture I come from on screen because it didn’t happen that often.

Tanya Musgrave (11:35):
Right.

Geoff Quan (11:35):
I think that’s-

Tanya Musgrave (11:35):
I know them.

Geoff Quan (11:36):
…totally part of, yeah. I’m sure.

Tanya Musgrave (11:37):
I get that.

Geoff Quan (11:39):
I think that’s been part of it. I think also partly I like the puzzle, right? I think as a producer, there is the puzzle of having to go out and figure out something that’s ambitious and challenging and just being like, oh, I haven’t done that before. And I want to do something I haven’t done before and be challenged in that way. Let me go figure that out. Which I think is both like the really rewarding part of it sometimes can also be a big, incredibly daunting part of it too.

Tanya Musgrave (11:59):
Yeah. The learning process, there’s a lot that goes wrong. That’s how we actually learn, so.

Geoff Quan (12:05):
I think honestly those are the best lessons, right? Because those are ones you never forget you do it wrong ones. Oh, I’m not doing it that way ever again. It was too painful or too expensive or both.

Tanya Musgrave (12:17):
Well, all right. So tell me some things about what went wrong, what lessons have you learned the hard way?

Geoff Quan (12:23):
Oh man. I mean, it’s like where to begin.

Tanya Musgrave (12:28):
Which breath of air.

Geoff Quan (12:31):
I think one of the things that I’ve learned and been reminded of over and over again is there’s the challenge of how you pick a project, right? Which we’ve talked about a little bit sometimes. So many factors that can go into that decision, whether it’s economics like, hey, this helps me pay my rent or helps me save towards my next project or whatever that is, right?

Tanya Musgrave (12:48):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (12:49):
There’s this idea of opportunity where might lead, whether it’s networking into something or something you feel like has got potential, maybe you’re learning something, but there’s lots of different factors in how you rank order that stuff. A good example is getting a project where like, hey, I could take a really big thing and be somebody’s assistant or a junior member of that team, or I could take a much smaller thing, but have a much more senior role. How do you stack those two things up against each other, right?

Tanya Musgrave (13:18):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (13:19):
And what I kind of learned the hard way I made the mistake of picking material over people and it was this sort of thing where I picked a few projects early on in my career where the people that I was working with, we were not the right fit for each other. And as much on me as it was on them, right? We had different working styles. We had different communication styles. We had different conflict resolution styles, which are a huge part of film making.

Tanya Musgrave (13:44):
Oh my stars. Yes.

Geoff Quan (13:46):
Because I also think that when you make films, everyone can be polite on their best behavior for a coffee, or that first main greet. But when you make movies with each other, you see each other more than you see your families, right?

Tanya Musgrave (13:59):
Oh yeah.

Geoff Quan (13:59):
And at some point that polite facade, it’s too much work to keep it up all the time. And I think everyone defaults to who they are in terms of like, this is how I deal with conflict, this is what I’m like when I’m stressed or I’m tired or I’m hungry or whatever.

Tanya Musgrave (14:14):
Yeah. True.

Geoff Quan (14:15):
And if you don’t vibe with that other person that way, if you’re not compatible, that’s not a great fit, right?

Tanya Musgrave (14:22):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (14:22):
I did the thing where I ignored some of that stuff and picked, I was like, I love this material or man, I love the idea of working with this person. The lesson there was like the material on the projects will change people in my view, at least less so, right? And so it’s like, you have to find the right people because this stuff is really hard even when you’re making it with people that you love and trust, right?

Tanya Musgrave (14:47):
Yes.

Geoff Quan (14:48):
You take that away and it gets infinitely more challenging.

Tanya Musgrave (14:52):
How about a specific story when something went wrong either as a producer because I helped produce a micro budget feature this summer and my stars, you want to talk about the things that went wrong? I mean, her job as producer is to deal with the stuff that goes wrong. So I mean, yes, there is a lot, but if there’s a particularly juicy story of something that went wrong to make every listener feel better about their life.

Geoff Quan (15:23):
Okay. So I will tell a story from one of those micro budget features.

Tanya Musgrave (15:29):
Okay. All right.

Geoff Quan (15:29):
So one of the very first features I made is this my [inaudible 00:15:31] feature set in the punk rock scene in Philadelphia. Prior to this, I knew nothing about the punk rock scene in Philadelphia, but like thrash underground bands, hosting parties in the basements of real houses stuff. And for $100000 as you can imagine, we made it for no money I slept in the house that was the main set, like on an inflated mattress that deflated every night and would go to sleep above the ground and wake up on a thin layer, rubber that was on the ground, it’s every night, kind of thing.

Geoff Quan (16:01):
I mean, it was a really tough physical shoot, myself included in this like a barely professional crew, non-professional actors, just understaffed and under run. In Philly at the time and some of the places we were, which was supposed to be real authentic was not the safest place. So we were shooting in some tougher neighborhoods. And on the last night of the shoot, we ended up at a home base in a warehouse conversion was sort of a anomalous, a sound stage, but really was just a big converted warehouse and shooting overnight. Our little crew was made up mostly of like crew that was just a year out of undergrad kind of think some of them were still in college. We had a couple of interns that are just out of high school kind of thing.

Geoff Quan (16:42):
Incredibly young, no security, which is where I’m going with the strip, but we’re outside shooting or one of our only night scenes, these cars started going by all the time. And what we started to figure out was that there were these stick up crews and they were looking at our lights and our cameras and all this stuff, and they would just go by and case us, right? And this wasn’t the first time, we were the only thing shooting in, I think probably the only thing shooting in Philly this summer. So everyone knew about this little film. I think I ended up calling 911 more times in that night that I’ve called them ever in my life, like collectively, I think I called them six times.

Tanya Musgrave (17:18):
What?

Geoff Quan (17:20):
They kept coming for us and we didn’t know. And look, this sounds horrible. It was our last night had to finish the movie kind of thing.

Tanya Musgrave (17:30):
Oh my gosh.

Geoff Quan (17:32):
Yeah. It got to the point where at some point I found we ourselves on the roof of the sound stage, the quote sound stage, peering over the roof, watching the minivans with the 15-year-olds kids that had guns and were going to take what they wanted from us.

Tanya Musgrave (17:47):
Oh my gosh. Oh my stars. And then you just didn’t go to sleep. There’s no point for the mattress anymore because you’re still asleep.

Geoff Quan (17:53):
No. Look, at some point we stopped and waited for the sun to come up and had to wait for the sun to come up before we could walk out of the building. It’s not dark out, everyone else was going to bed, we are safe. We can be [inaudible 00:18:07].

Tanya Musgrave (18:08):
No I wouldn’t have slept. My adrenaline would be going so much. No, absolutely not.

Geoff Quan (18:12):
No.

Tanya Musgrave (18:12):
Oh my word. So you had mentioned that it was a pretty young crew, non actors that actually leads into one of the listener questions-

Geoff Quan (18:23):
Sure.

Tanya Musgrave (18:23):
…from our Instagram at practical filmmaker. I’d like to hear lessons you learned at the pivot point between working with non actors and then big name actors for top build cast.

Geoff Quan (18:32):
It’s a really good one. I mean, because I’ve even had projects in the middle between that, where I had a couple of projects where we cast a mix. I made a movie with a director named Justin Tipping it was called Kicks. It was about sort of being sneaker heads in school. And it was a mix of non-professional actors and professional actors. It was sort of intentional, we were shooting up in the Bay Area, which is where I grew up and wanted to really represent in some ways to get back to the neighborhoods in which we were shooting a little bit. And that was partly was connecting with the community and providing some opportunities and that there were these vibrant artistic communities there in these neighborhoods that had a lot of challenges.

Geoff Quan (19:12):
So we paired everyone up to part of the cast was professional, part of the cast was non-professional. And the challenge that obviously was to know where and how to arrange them and coordinate them, knowing that those actors were coming at with drastically different styles and drastically different training. But how do you make that them feel cohesive and it’s not like, oh, this is the scene where I’m watching a non actor versus now watching it and real actor and having jar people. So we had to do a lot of, how do you connect them and make it feel organic. For the non actors was like, how do you make sure that they’re doing something within their range, knowing that don’t have necessarily have the training, but they have something that raw authentic thing. And on the flip side it was taking professional actors and inserting them into this and also saying, okay, well we don’t want to call you out either. Because you feel like you’re not real to this world.

Tanya Musgrave (19:58):
Yeah. Maybe like non SAG actors, like the actors that, I mean they might be professional actors, but for instance, those who are producing for an extreme micro budget feature that they’re not going to have anybody you’ve actually heard of.

Geoff Quan (20:14):
Right.

Tanya Musgrave (20:15):
Versus landing an actor that people have heard of. I think they’re talking about that pinpoint.

Geoff Quan (20:21):
In some ways it’s having those actors of note. I think what you’re talking about, it opens a lot of doors and there’s such opportunity that can come with that because it pulls attention and spot light and focus to a film, not only when the film was done, but frankly, when the film was being made, right? Like in some ways having those people on it gives it this stamp of approval, right? Where it’s like, oh if so and so is thinks it’s good enough that they’re going to participate in this then that somebody’s like, oh, well that I describe it as that thing of like, no one wants to be the first one in the pool, right?

Geoff Quan (20:53):
So suddenly you get a big name in there and everyone’s like, oh, well they’re doing. I’m going to jump in too because I like this thing or I think I’m not worried that there’s going to be something weird. The flip side of that sometimes is that there is a lot of opportunity cost and I don’t mean that in a bad way. But it just in terms of like, for those that are looking and at that point where they’re making that transition it’s more like you just have to be ready for it to know because suddenly to have those professional actors means in some ways you really are running a professional set. And so all of those other pieces that come with it, the support teams, the crew to make that happen, the cost obviously that comes with those teams and with the perks that often big actors need to do their work. So it’s deceptive and that sometimes you’re like, oh man, I got this person. I’ve made it or I’ve done this thing. It’s a little, it can be like the tip of the iceberg. If that makes sense.

Tanya Musgrave (21:43):
Say filmmakers have this thing now they need to get people to see this thing.

Geoff Quan (21:49):
Sure.

Tanya Musgrave (21:50):
Like, I’ve got this film, what’s your best advice for filmmakers and where to position themselves. Like one of the things that a previous guest had mentioned, and when he was dealing with all of his distribution stuff, he was just like, sometimes it’s a really flawed model to make the thing first take the thing to festivals and hope that you’ll get distribution from those festivals.

Geoff Quan (22:11):
It’s incredibly flawed.

Tanya Musgrave (22:13):
Yes. Why? Why is it flawed and what do they do differently then?

Geoff Quan (22:18):
If you think about it just from like the statistical like an odd standpoint, right? First, you got to make the thing [inaudible 00:22:24] as you said, which is hard enough. Making the thing to me is like, you have to get all of these miracles to line up at the same time, right? You have the actors that get you your equity or you have the equity that gets your actors and you get your locations and your permits and your, all and on and on. Those things can’t happen, like, oh, the first one happened in January and the next one happened in March and maybe the next one in August, right? They all have to happen at the exact same time for you to do anything with it, right? So that’s the first set.

Geoff Quan (22:51):
And then you do that and then you have to get into those festivals where you actually, at least in US cinema and American cinema, you can actually go sell the thing, right? Which is it’s on a huge list, right? You’re talking Sundance, obviously you’re talking [southby 00:23:04] there’s not a lot of that stuff that happens in that way. So then you have to like scrape, so you going to make it, then you got to win the lottery to get into the festival where you can sell it. And then you got to win the lottery again because you sold it, right? So it’s like this it’s like hitting concentric bulls eyes.

Tanya Musgrave (23:21):
Yes.

Geoff Quan (23:22):
In a wind storm stating like-

Tanya Musgrave (23:24):
In different galaxies.

Geoff Quan (23:25):
Right. Exactly. A couple galaxies away, right. So it’s just really hard to do and it’s not a sustainable business model, right? In a way that you can say for filmmakers to have as a sustainable career, you have to say, ” I look what I do with my first one, because it helps me get to my next one.” And so if you’re saying okay, if I’m making my first project and the only way I get to my second one is to sell the first one at a festival that I was lucky enough to get into that I was lucky enough to get a distributor that somehow makes my investors whole. It’s chancy.

Tanya Musgrave (23:55):
What is the correct way to go? I mean, because I think I had talked to, he was a sales agent and it was the first sales agent that I had ever talked to in my life because I was just like, “Oh, I don’t know how any of this works because-

Geoff Quan (24:08):
Sure.

Tanya Musgrave (24:09):
…what you learn in film school is how to make the thing.” You know?

Geoff Quan (24:12):
Yeah, totally.

Tanya Musgrave (24:12):
So you’re just like, “I have it, right? Now what?”

Geoff Quan (24:16):
I’m done, I won.

Tanya Musgrave (24:18):
Yay. So I’ve got that lottery and we’ve got it-

Geoff Quan (24:21):
Sure.

Tanya Musgrave (24:21):
…we got in luck. What would be your advice though for people, for where to go after that? So particular resources that you know of that like, oh hey, these people, there are certain roles that actually specifically will help you with this. And I don’t even know what those roles would be.

Geoff Quan (24:40):
Yeah. I think you already mentioned one that, having a sales agent, even just thinking of the life cycle of a film, right? And all the people that touch it at various points in its life, a sales agent is at a very particular point in its life in terms of like it’s been made it now needs to get to audiences visa via distributor, right. And that is their expertise and practice and passions that they do that piece of it.

Tanya Musgrave (25:04):
They do that piece.

Geoff Quan (25:05):
So I’ve been in the case and I know most of film have been in that place where suddenly you’ve you find yourself at that moment and there’s so much information and there’s a lot of fear and trepidation about you’re supposed to do this, you’re not supposed to do that. It’s like the worry is that, those people obviously have to make money, the sales agents and those businesses, their businesses, they need to make their own money. And so sometimes I’m not going to spend that. There’s a reason you do and there’s a reason they charge you for those things. And so I think that’s part of it is to actually have those folks. Another piece of that too, is also to have a publicist, right?

Tanya Musgrave (25:36):
Interesting.

Geoff Quan (25:37):
And again, it depends on what you’re after and where you are. But again, going back to the comment of like how to just create awareness around your title, that it exists, let alone it’s interesting and here’s what it’s about and here’s why you might want to go see it, right?

Tanya Musgrave (25:50):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (25:50):
Again, there’s experts. That is their core practice. If you ask a filmmaker what their film is about and why they want to make it, that’s not necessarily the same answer as what the publicist will say. This is why it will appeal to people, right? I made a movie several years ago called Obvious Child. It’s a comedy and there there’s an abortion in it. That’s the main crux, Jenny Slate is the star. She breaks up with her boyfriend, loses her job and gets pregnant and then is contemplating an abortion, right? And it’s a romantic comedy based around those set of circumstances. And when we were making the movie, it’s interesting just to watch how we had to change how we talked about it. When we were making the movie, we were so concerned that, again, not a lot of resources, were asking for a lot of favors and help and for people to chip in what they could.

Geoff Quan (26:36):
And there was a worry that if it became sort of too hot button or was perceived to be too hot button, people would pull away. We didn’t talk about abortion at all, cut to a 824 buys it out of Sundance on the one sheet it’s like a romantic comedy about abortion. That was the pitch, right? It was a complete 180. So there was this idea of like, functionally what do we need to talk about? But 824 and obviously that team and saying, okay, well we’re the people selling the movie now, this is how we’re going to talk about.

Geoff Quan (27:06):
So it’s just that thing of like, there can be in that case, it’s very specific in terms of our concern, but it can also be really hard when you live and breathe a film for years to then be like, “What do I have and how do I talk about it in a way that everyone else is going to be able to approach it.” Right? Because there’s that moment too, where a film, if it does the thing you want it to do, it’s not yours anymore. It leaves you and it becomes everyone else’s so they have to be able to enter it on their own. And so like having that publicist to say, well, here are the points of entry.

Tanya Musgrave (27:36):
Yeah. Okay. About that publicist, the filmmaker that I just interviewed, he worked with a publicist for the first time ever. What do you look for in a good publicist and where do you find them? Because is it like you just Google, hey, publicist, but is it a specific, because they’re entertainment lawyers, right? They’re like there are lawyers specifically for this business, right?

Geoff Quan (27:59):
Sure.

Tanya Musgrave (27:59):
More like obviously.

Geoff Quan (28:00):
No, there are specifically film publicists too in that the same way, they’re all publicists, but they’re some that do the specific thing. Oh hey you want to find somebody who’s actually really genuinely interested in your film, right? Because if their job is to essentially go out and pitch your film and sell your film, you just do better when you have people that actually like what they’re talking about, right? And that goes for when you make films too, you ideally some do it for the paycheck, I get that. If you have people that are really passionate about what you’re doing, I think that shows up in the work and you don’t always get it. But I think like if you can, it’s a nice to have certainly.

Geoff Quan (28:34):
Knowing the space where that your film might fit in. So one of the micro budget features that I made when I was first starting Korean American story, the writer director was Korean American and his entire cast was. And so we needed somebody who knew that Korean American sort of Asian American publication space, right? Like there were certainly incredible publicists who were really good at what they did, but that they lacked that specific knowledge that was about the film and where that might have find audiences, readers who were going to be interested in being like, oh, I heard about the school title. Sometimes it can be specific.

Tanya Musgrave (29:08):
What are some red flags that you would look for?

Geoff Quan (29:12):
Oh, that’s a good question.

Tanya Musgrave (29:14):
Or even just like, if I could break down weaknesses of artists, it would be a lot.

Geoff Quan (29:19):
Oh, now this will be interesting. Let’s go.

Tanya Musgrave (29:22):
But it’s like, it’s basically everything that I feel like producers are good at, you know what I mean? Like breaking down the black and white, defining the bottom line and defining what that is. But also, the black and white, when you actually have to come to sign it, I mean, a lot of artists are just like, sure, I’ll sign this. They have no idea what they just signed.

Geoff Quan (29:43):
Sure.

Tanya Musgrave (29:43):
We talked a little bit about distribution and all that fun stuff, but publicists, that’s a new kind of area in vain that, I want to say, I guess seems like almost a luxury at the micro budget level, like to deal with the publicists, they’re just like, “We don’t budget for that, have enough budget to get this thing made.” So-

Geoff Quan (30:04):
Totally.

Tanya Musgrave (30:04):
…you got that.

Geoff Quan (30:05):
Yeah. It’s been a while since I’ve signed a publicist contract. So I’m trying to think back a little bit, but I think part of it too, is really to define what the goals are, right? Of that sort of that can be broken into how many placements, if that makes sense. Like where-

Tanya Musgrave (30:21):
Oh, okay.

Geoff Quan (30:21):
…are you seeking to place the story, right?

Tanya Musgrave (30:23):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (30:24):
Is it going to be The New York Times and-

Tanya Musgrave (30:28):
Variety.

Geoff Quan (30:28):
Variety or is it trades? There’s a whole thing about trades, like Variety, Hollywood reporter deadline. Is it sort of general interests kind of reading something like The New York Times and social media is another, and that can also be a specialty too, right? So I think it’s a little bit of like being able to talk with people, get their assessment of your project and then where they think the audience might be and going from there. But then I think also then defining the scope of that. The idea is that if you could sign somebody up to do this, but unless they’re actually putting it out into the world, you can pay for something that you’re not really get it.

Tanya Musgrave (31:02):
How much of the budget should you reserve for that process?

Geoff Quan (31:09):
I’m of the opinion. And I think you probably get a lot of different answers on this. I don’t think you reserve anything, at least in the making of it, right?

Tanya Musgrave (31:17):
Really?

Geoff Quan (31:18):
I don’t think so.

Tanya Musgrave (31:19):
Really? Nothing for distribution and publicist.

Geoff Quan (31:22):
Well.

Tanya Musgrave (31:23):
Then what do you do? What do you do after that?

Geoff Quan (31:26):
Well, it’s built on this idea that what you’re looking to do is make the best film you can, right? Like put what you have into the movie-

Tanya Musgrave (31:37):
Oh okay. I got you.

Geoff Quan (31:39):
So if you think of it in a different way, and this is something that comes up all the time right now with COVID, right? Is that, I’ve had lots of conversations with filmmakers and producers, how much of my budget should I save for COVID. And there’s like, well, how do you know in some places like, well, you don’t, right? The idea is like, you’re trying to, especially if you’re looking to able to then make a sale, you want to give yourself the best shot is to make the best movie possible, right? The other stuff, not to say that you won’t have to pay for a publicist or you won’t have to pay for it to figure out, have people to help you distribute the movie. But in some ways it doesn’t matter if the movie itself is good, the better your film is, the more opportunities will be open.

Tanya Musgrave (32:21):
Put all of your resources into what’s actually shown on screen and then you’ll be [inaudible 00:32:27].

Geoff Quan (32:27):
Right. If I’m having to make a trade off to say, “Oh, I need to protect for a publicist.” But it means I can’t have something that will add value in scope to my [inaudible 00:32:36].

Tanya Musgrave (32:35):
Means that I can’t have this actor.

Geoff Quan (32:37):
I can’t have this actor or I have to lose a day of shooting that’s not equivalent, but you know what I mean? Like that kind of thing. Choose the thing that makes your movie bigger and better, you deal with the other part later, you’ll have to, but if you don’t have a movie that people don’t want to be involved with, because it’s not what you hoped it to be-

Tanya Musgrave (32:55):
Up to par.

Geoff Quan (32:56):
…then you’re stuck.

Tanya Musgrave (32:57):
Yeah. That makes a lot out of sense. What gear or gadget is an old reliable for you or resource something that you keep on going back to?

Geoff Quan (33:05):
I mean, resource, I use IMDbPro every day, all day. I’m sure that’s probably been talked about a lot, but in terms of having the encyclopedia of the industry in terms of reference, in terms of being able to figure out who people are and where they’re coming from, their experience to me is like an invaluable tool. I think going along with that, the resources, frankly, like the biggest resources is my network, right? And that sounds silly, but the idea of filmmaking, there’s so much to know.

Geoff Quan (33:33):
And so having other people that, whose opinions are trust and that sort of thing, you can go to, whether it’s like, hey, you’ve worked with this person and you know how to get, connect me to the person that knows this person or that thing. Or just like, hey, I need that gut check. Or, I’m going to bounce this off you. It’s not terribly cutting edge or cool. Like in a way, like, it’s super old fashioned, right? In that way. But it’s that thing of like, it’s all people when it comes down to this.

Tanya Musgrave (33:59):
100% and probably one of the more unique answers that I’ve had to this in the network that is not something that anybody has ever answered before. That’s awesome.

Geoff Quan (34:08):
The thing I have from having made all these movies is I have all those people that I’ve worked with and you find the people they’re people that I call and I’m still in touch with, from those movies, that I’ve made years ago because we have become a resource for each other.

Tanya Musgrave (34:21):
Absolutely. For the revolutionizing, how you work then, is that also, I mean, no, I’m going to ask for your resource. Now your favorite new school, how you revolutionize your work, the newest resources.

Geoff Quan (34:38):
So many of the tools I have that enable remote work now, I think there were versions of this stuff more than two years ago, but really has come into the [four 00:34:45] now. So remote watching feeds from set, remote dailies, this kind of stuff that I feel like has allowed the level of collaboration where we previously were like, I don’t know I have to get into the room and do it with you in person. And there’s a lot of that now that I think it really has only there are tools and necessity it has allowed us to continue to make movies since March of 2020. But that’s all stuff that’s been figured out on the fly.

Tanya Musgrave (35:14):
So wrapping up, what questions should I have asked you?

Geoff Quan (35:17):
Where is indie film going next? Right? I think that’s such an interesting question of which I don’t don’t know the answer to.

Tanya Musgrave (35:24):
Come on.

Geoff Quan (35:24):
There’s been such momentous change, right? Just in terms of going back to what you’re first asking about what the distribution places like all of these places, there are whole lot of places that didn’t exist as places for distribution even a few years ago, right? The place I work for, a lot of the other streaming services now that a lot of them are attached to legacy studios but that model of saying, I can push something out and it goes everywhere in the world to anybody, who’s got a subscription that’s relatively new. It’s deceptive because it’s so ubiquitous is, right? At the indie level, what is that doing at distribution further on when you’re more into the studio side.

Geoff Quan (36:05):
All of that stuff creates interesting ideas about upstream or downstream opportunity. Like that the ecosystem is all affected by itself. The marketplace is really changed just even Sundance having to be virtual. If you listen to Sundance talk about that where they’re like, “Hey, we’ve had more people subscribe and be able to attend Sundance in the last few years virtually that we’ve ever had come in the door in Park City.” Right? And what does that do in terms of the democratization of audiences and consumption, right? You don’t have to be able to pay to get on the plane to get to a condo in Park City and like that whole thing, right?

Tanya Musgrave (36:40):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (36:41):
So I think it’s this really interesting moment of transition.

Tanya Musgrave (36:45):
Besides all of these different streaming platforms. You have new opportunities even in social media too, because I get the [quibi 00:36:55] didn’t go very far-

Geoff Quan (36:56):
Sure. Yes.

Tanya Musgrave (36:59):
…but I remember seeing trailers and what have you on TikTok and I’m just like, man, when is it going to be that there’s going to be a Netflix sponsored series that is totally shot for TikTok or something. Because they used to do that for some things on Instagram, and WB had done this web series and they were trying all the short form content and wondering where it was going to go, but yeah, with quibi I mean like that I was thinking like, oh yeah, that’s what’s going to take off right there.

Geoff Quan (37:35):
Right. Who knew? One thing that’s interesting though, is that with the old styles of how content was shown you had to fit really prescriptive formats, right? You were 120 minute feature. You were 60 minute dramatic episode or a 30 minute Sitcom episode, right?

Tanya Musgrave (37:53):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (37:54):
And if you weren’t those things that wasn’t your story, you were kind of stuck, right? Or even within that, right? Like if you were going to be on TV, well you better have 22 episodes or 24 episodes or whatever the network standard was to say, you got a season of something. Right, now it’s like, okay, I’ve got my series is six episodes or my series is eight episodes. Or if you even watch the stuff that’s on streaming now or it’s like, okay, but this episode is 53 minutes and the next episode is an hour and five minutes, right?

Tanya Musgrave (38:22):
Yeah.

Geoff Quan (38:22):
There’s so much more flexibility to be like, okay, what is your story? And what does it actually mean?

Tanya Musgrave (38:30):
And I feel like that’s actually freeing for an artist to be like, we’re not constrained by 30 minute or 50 minute, or what have you. Thank you so much, this has been amazing. Thanks so much for sharing your insight. We really appreciate it.

Geoff Quan (38:41):
Totally. Of course. My pleasure.

Tanya Musgrave (38:42):
If you enjoyed this interview, follow us right here and on Instagram, ask us questions and check out more episodes at thepracticalfilmmaker.com be well and God bless. We’ll see you next time on The Practical Filmmaker.