As part of our ongoing Talking Bay 94 series, in addition to watching a screener link of Keep the Gaslight Burning (our review: here), we also talked with some of the creators of the film, including Dave and Lou Elsey (Co-Directors and Writers) and Don Bies (Producer) to put together a short oral history on how the project came together (as well as what they’re thinking of as their next project!)
This has been transcribed and edited, for clarity, grammar and brevity.
Don Bies: I had stayed in touch with Dave and Lou Elsey in the years since (Star Wars) Episode 3. A year ago, we were having dinner, talking about our love of film, as well as telling horror stories from movie sets.
Dave Elsey: None of us really expected that we were going to do this. All of us had on our mind to do a film and we all started saying, almost at the same time, that we wanted to make a movie. Don had said, “Well, that’s great … but we’ll need a script” and I happened to say, “Well, I’ve just written one!”
Don Bies: So I said, we can definitely put together a crew … let’s do it! Let’s shoot it!
Lou Elsey: We had been writing for a while and had also wanted to direct. This was going to be a calling card, something we could be passionate about and remind us of watching a scary movie as a kid. (It was) a subject that we loved and a good, clear story that was fun.
Dave Elsey: It’s an old school ghost story. When we first started writing, we really wanted to make something that felt like one segment of an anthology, with a beginning, middle and an end. Most shorts you watch are just an idea, a teaser. But we wanted this to feel like a full film.
So, we had this idea that we would adapt a story from Ronald Chetwynd-Hayes. When I was growing up in the seventies, you almost couldn’t pick up a ghost story book without it having a story written by R. Chetwynd-Hayes in it. He had a good sense of humor and his stories tended to be contemporary. And, if you’re trying to do a low-budget movie, it’s good to do it as a contemporary setting.
But, of course, the one that we loved was not contemporary but a period piece. It was the worst thing we could have possibly chosen but it was a great tale and we liked it right away. But, we thought, if you’re going to do a ghost story … why not embrace all the tropes that we like: the Victorian repression, a dark and stormy night, some period costumes …
Lou Elsey: It really does work, especially as a contrast for a low-budget horror film. Everything drops off into the darkness and has the audience wondering, “What is actually going on in there?” You can light it more artfully.
Dave Elsey: The great thing is that Lou is a costume designer and we knew that we could have a ghost in it. So when we suggested it to Don, he read the script and loved it and we decided that, in six weeks time, we’re going to shoot this film.
But first we had to cast it: it’s a very female-centric story and one of our great close friends, and neighbor, is Markie Post. We have great nights together where we would just watch period films. So I knew that she would love to do this, even though she had never done something like this before. So I did a quick Photoshop of her (and this is where it could have gone all end horribly). We knew that we wanted her to have a blind eye, rotten teeth and aged up …but Markie has never looked like that before. She always looks fantastic!
Lou Elsey: It’s a very different kind of character from what she would normally play. But when we showed her the design, she went full Mrs. Maxwell with the character. She loved wearing the makeup and the costume and said it really helped her with the character.
Don Bies: The Elsey’s are also really good friends with (Academy-Award-winner) Rick Baker. And they were like, “I bet we can get Rick to play the ghost in this movie.”
So they said asked and he said yes and we suddenly had a project!
Dave Elsey: We thought, “We need a ghost!” And so, who would be great in makeup … I’ll just ask Rick Baker and see if he wants to do it. And he said absolutely, straight away.
Don Bies: It was 63 days from when we came up with the idea to when we were shooting. I had been doing small projects on my own with different filmmakers in Northern California, so I was calling in cinematographers. “Hey I’ve got this project with Rick Baker and Markie Post” … so, of course, they said, “I’m in!”
We decided we would shoot it in Petaluma, where I live. MAC Cosmetics kindly donated makeup and artists (Dave and Lou couldn’t do the makeup, because they were directing). So we suddenly had a top-of-the-line project. At every step of the game it was upping itself.
Dave Elsey: It ended up actually being a Star Wars alumni production. After the two day shoot, we ended up needing a small amount of CG work done. We were friends with Phil Tippett, one of the greatest artists working in that field. So, we just called up Phil and this amateur film ended up having something like ten Oscars working on this film. This is ridiculous!
Now it is finished and we’re really proud of it. It was worth all the effort. Two days of shooting is an incredibly short amount of time, especially when you consider the makeup effects. It’s not our first rodeo and we figured, if we couldn’t do it, nobody could.
Don Bies: So we finished it in February and now it is out to 22 film festivals. And we heard from our first, the Berlin Film Festival, which will be at the end of June.
Lou Elsey: We’ve got a few more ideas. We’ll probably be working on another short. We’re addicted now! You go through every stage of making a film and then say, “Alright, let’s do it again!” It felt very natural, knowing everyone’s roles in the film industry. It makes it a lot easier to understand the storytelling and the team.
Dave Elsey: We couldn’t help but think about the characters and what happened before and after this. We want to take it further but we also have some much longer scripts that we want to do, some proper features.
Artistically, it was an amazingly satisfying project. Markie said it was “the way filmmaking should be done”, with the good vibe and the way we put it together.
Lou Elsey: It was such a great experience, asking all my friends to come and make a movie. And it didn’t feel like work! Something really great came out of it.
For more information and updates about the movie, check out KeeptheGaslightBurning.com or their Twitter account, Twitter.com/GaslightGhost. Here at Super Kaiju, we’re just so excited for more people to get to see it!
Thank you to Don, Dave and Lou for their time and passion. Stay tuned for full podcast interviews with them in the coming weeks!
