Written for clapperltd.co.uk
CLAPPER: The film’s not realistic for the most part, yet the way you take the road trip narrative which usually in films is quite glamourous, whereas in Uncle Peckerhead it’s down and dirty and it shows that being on tour while it can be fun, can also be fairly gruesome. How did you ensure those aspects were portrayed realistically?
Matthew John Lawrence: I’m so glad you’ve noticed in film or in media in general the road life or being on tour is often glamourized, it’s certainly romanticised in my eyes. From having been in bands and my best friend Jeff who plays Max in the film and wrote all the music is a touring musician, the one thing we always talked about was that in those road trip narratives or in those tour movies is that nothing that actually happens on the road happens in those movies. I cannot tell you how many dickhead sound guys we would have to battle with or this idea that 23 hours a day you’re either bored or eyeing the gas gauge, hoping you can make it to the next town. So I wanted to make a movie that talked about those experiences my friend and I had had and never seen on film before, the film’s only been out a day but a bunch of our friends who are in bands watched the movie and express, “Oh my god, I played a tiny venue and we got paid two dollars, why would you even pay us it’s even more insulting”. That was one of the things as I was writing the script, I would reflect back on those stories and experiences from when I was in my twenties and even though the movie Is a completely surreal and batshit experience, I do want to ground it in what it is like to be a DIY touring band on the road for the first time or even in many cases the tenth time.
I think that works really well, because when you’re going for the comedic horror tone it helps to not have all of it be completely over the top, it makes the comedy more humorous because you’ve got the elements that are grounded. Following on from that, the gore scenes which are certainly a highlight in the film. How was it to film those scenes?
The one thing I would love to do is give a shout out to our FX guru Jared, what I was worried about writing the film was that I knew we were working with a microbudget and I was worried that we wouldn’t be able to execute many of the things that I had written in the script and we wouldn’t be able to bring that to life. Jared was really able to work with us and there was really nothing in the script that got cut out or that we would have to edit down because of budget concerns or lack of resources but he did an awesome job. When you’re shooting those scenes and you have no budget your butthole is puckered the entire time, you have one angle that you’re shooting it from and for many of those effects it’s one and one, you can’t afford to do eight face rips. So, you’re just hoping you can trust your camera department, who I trusted complicity, you hope you can trust the effects guys Jared and Sean, that everyone knows what they’re doing and if you can explain yourself and communicate exactly what you want to see, and you collaborate with them in how to get that done that they can do it. It’s crazy to see because you’re waiting for that one moment where it doesn’t work and the set just deflates, and luckily with all of those effect scenes the one and done actually worked. It’s super stressful but you have this moment of elation when it’s done, where you’re watching it on playback or over the camera man’s shoulder and you feel you’ve captured that lightening in a bottle.
Going back to the realism aspects, Jeff Riddle is credited as the writer of the music performed by DUH, which for me again helped aid in keeping the film grounded. The music is memorable and you can imagine listening to it outside of the film, how important was it to you from the beginning of the creation of the film to ensure the music was done in the right way?
Music is something that like for many of us is omnipresent in my life and I found that a lot of movies about bands, the bands suck and they don’t look like they are actually playing their instruments. This is just winning the lottery in terms of friendship and collaborators, when I first met Jeff I knew I had to put this guy in a movie, he was a friend of my brothers and we instantly hit it off at a party once, from there it was history. Jeff is an incredibly song writer and he has such a knack for melody and his lyricism isn’t pretentious or high-minded but it’s really kind of smart. I can’t describe it his music felt like it really embodied what I wanted DUH to be, which is this really joyful nihilistic band. So when it came to writing, the final song in the movie Is a song Jeff had written previously called ‘Trash Age’, and it lyrically totally fitted the end of the film and how I wanted to end the idea of Peckerhead. I asked Jeff if I could use it and he agreed, as well as wanting to write a fake EP for the band. So he started sending me these demo tracks and these were the first thing we used to excite people and encourage them to work at a discounted rate, and helped us enlist the help and services of people we wouldn’t normally be able to enlist. It was convincing people that this wasn’t an amateur operation, we have original really catchy music and a full fake record for this band and that was all Jeff.
Back to Peckerhead himself, to say he is an odd character is an understatement. He is your horror villain in the film, but the real surprise is that in some ways he is a hero. Yet on a flip of a dime he can go from loveable back into a great horror villain. How do you begin creating that character?
There were a bunch of things that went into that, one of those is the actor who played Peckerhead David Littleton is such an amazing actor that he can go between charisma and being this affable fun and friendly person, while as you said on a flip of a dime going into this menacing monstrous force, a lot of that is him. I always say the movie is a blood, shit and piss extravaganza, but really, I started writing it in 2017 because after Trump was elected in the United States there were a ton of these think pieces and editorials written about the reason why he won was due to the blue collars feeling that the world has left them behind and the felt forgotten. These people were like your uncles, and that is where the title comes from, these are the people that are fun, the guy you’re gonna have a beer with, the fun uncle, but now they’re willing to burn it all down because they feel they’re not being heard anymore. I found that really interesting as Peckerheard is with these kind of young kids, these progressive kids who have their lives ahead of them, he’s lives his life and he wants to be a part of it, and when it just doesn’t work out and his monstrous side prevents him from being able to exist in his world he’s ready to not only part ways but also wants to destroy it all. I didn’t want him to just be this one note evil character, I never like writing films where you just have the bad guy, David himself is such a likeable person and in casting I knew I loved this person and I couldn’t wait to play with the audience. You’re rooting for this guy and you want it to work and it’s so tough when that shift happens and he becomes beyond just the monster, he becomes this terrible person.
You’ve mentioned that Uncle Peckerhead is the kind of film you fell in love with when browsing the local video store, one that people talk about at school. Is there a film from your youth that you distinctly remember having that effect?
It should come as no surprise but when I think of the seminal video store rental that I had, but Evil Dead 2 blew my brain in terms of the sheer energy, it’s one of those things where you think, woah they can make movies like this? It felt unlike anything I had ever seen before. I cannot find any direct comparisons to Uncle Peckerhead but I remember the first time I saw Sleepaway Camp my brain exploded, being able to be so campy and so consistently odd, while certainly having some problematic sides to it now, I just remember that movie completely melting my brain, A Nightmare on Elm Stress 3: Dream Warriors broke it open. Like for many of us, the covers always drew us in but I always felt that horror got such a bad rap, it’s always considered to be this low brow genre or it’s not afforded the same respect some prestigious genres are, but I always feel that Horror has the capacity to tackles issues and themes that are so ahead of its time that you don’t see dramas doing until a decade later. Certainly horror has its own issues but it can serve as such a great platform to tell certain stories that you can’t tell in your typical drama or your typical straight comedies, I think that is my initial attraction to it.
You can tell that Evil Dead has some roots within your work, especially in your short film Larry Gone Demon in which a particular moment stood out as being heavily inspired by the franchise. Is there a specific gory scene from a film that sticks in your head?
I don’t know if its my favourite gore in terms of respecting the artistry of it, cause that’s another thing, I think it’s such an art form if it is done properly, but I remember the first time I saw A Nightmare on Elm Street 3 and two of the moments that really got me into practical effects are when he turns into the TV and smashes the girls face into the screen or when Patricia Arquette is being eaten by the huge Freddy head. I’ve always had a really active imagination and film is so great as hopefully with bigger budgets you can really see even more of the big ideas come to life. Certainly you can say it’s sick or depraved, but I am so tickled that someone thought of that idea and all these really talented creative and technical people came together to have a huge fucking head swallow a young girl, there’s something beautiful in that.
Going back to my first question, you compare being in a band on tour to making a film on a micro budget. What would you say some of the key challenges of making a film on a micro budget are?
It becomes so meta, and there are two ways I look at it. When you’re working on a micro budget everyone is wearing a dozen hats, on a typical set you have your one role, your role is important and you deserve the accolades you receive but on a microbudget film set, its not just me who is doing twelve things, it’s everyone. Our production designer was also doing wardrobe while also doing film producing and doing all the designs for the band. The guy who played Shiloh who is the other antagonist in the movie was our production manager, he’s my best friend, he’s also doing part of craft services as he’s cooking our food, I swear to god it’s crazy. So everyone is doing a million things, you have to have this trust, I’ve worked on big sets in my early twenties, and there’s certainly trust involved but it’s such a professional operation. When you’re only working with twelve other people behind that camera and you know everyone is stretched thin and working their ass off, there’s something in that, it sucks but you learn those are the people you’d go to war with. The other thing with microbudget filmmaking that is so crazy that makes it really meta is in the movie, Judy basically sells her soul to hopefully achieve her dream, and on set it wasn’t just me but a lot of us are doing this because we have a dream, we want the movie to take off and we want to make movies on a bigger level, hopefully not by begging/borrowing and stealing from her friends and family. But that’s what you’re doing on set, you’re asking your friends, your family for favours and when they give you the inch you take the mile. You feel like you’re always just pushing your limit in terms of what you can ask of people, you’re not really thinking about how it affects them, you know they love you and support you while wanting you to succeed, but often times you’re pushing what you should ask of people. Microbudget filmmaking is such great film-school, you learn a lot about people, but it certainly has its areas where it sucks, you don’t want to feel like you’re using people.
Speaking of doing a million things, you are working as a Writer/Director/Editor as well as many other things on top of that. Do you find being the editor especially makes the construction of the film easier? Are you constructing the film in your head as you are on set?
Editing is like a double-edged sword, I think if we had the budget I would love to work with an editor, when I’ve done that in the past it’s been a really good collaboration for me. Thankfully we knew we wouldn’t be able to afford an editor during principle photography, but it’s really helpful as since I know I am editing it you’re not just thinking about the film with a directors mind, you’re also thinking, okay most of that takes good I just need this line or this line, you’re watching it with editors eyes, you’re able to be a lot more economical in the way you’re doing your setups and your shoots. I think it’s tough when you’re actually editing the film as you’re so deep into it, and you’re projecting a lot of the experiences of the shoot onto the edit. Where as when you bring people in and they tell you how they feel about the footage, you think oh shit, they don’t know that my kid had a childhood, they’re just seeing the grown up. Editing it really helped on a film at this level, but I cannot wait to work with an editor, so I don’t have to work my ass off for 6 months immediately following principal photography.
Your upcoming film Larry Gone Demon is going to be an adaptation of the short film you made with the same name, as well as being the second instalment in the DUH trilogy. Was that always the plan to have this trilogy focussing on the band, or was that a concept that came about when making the film?
So I made this short film Larry Gone Demon, that was the first film where I felt I had confidence in my voice, that sounds so pretentious don’t worry I’ll beat my ass after this interview, but it was the first time I felt I wrote and directed confidently, I wasn’t always questioning my self during production. Once I had a handle on that I wrote a feature version of Larry Gone Demon but not with the exact same characters, I wrote it with the early incarnation of DUH in mind, and then a bunch of things happened, we were going to make that movie and we thought we had a house too shoot in who dropped out, all the shit that kind of goes wrong went wrong. So I got kinda burned on that and I didn’t want to pursue that for another couple years, so Uncle Peckerheard was the next thing where I was like, I wanna right something else and I still really liked the idea of the movie centring around a band and I thought maybe I’ll do this other idea of a band on tour and the real experience of a band on tour, and that’s where that came from. I never imagined when I first started writing it this being a trilogy, then with the ideas I’ve been developing it’s become this bigger idea, because I’ve always wanted to do this type of worldbuilding where a bunch of fictional bands live in this weird world. I’ve always been inspired by things like the Askewniverse with Kevin Smith, In a lot of my movies I’ll reference a certain person or a certain band will be on the t-shirt everyone is wearing or a certain poster, and doing something like that on a bigger scale is the dream.
I realise it is quite early days but what can we expect from the sequel? Is Peckerheard himself going to make a return in a future film, or is he being left for now?
I wanna bring him back so bad, without giving away a spoiler the movie does leave it open that there is room to bring back Peckerhead. The film is out on all VOD platforms in the US, but what was really great was we did a main cast reunion with Chet who played Judy, Ruby who played Mel, Jeff who played Max and David who played Peckerhead. We did it virtually but it was the first time all of us were together since shooting the movie, and it was so lovely we really kind of immediately clicked back in and I was just thinking, god I wanna work with these people again right now, everyone is so funny it’s like performing without performing it’s so effortless with those four. I have an idea that I wrote a treatment for a sequel, and now I think the next step is since I have the Larry Gone Demon script pretty much ready to go, should anyone want to give me money, I think the next script I’m gonna work on is an Uncle Peckerheard sequel.
You’ve mentioned in interviews in the past that you’re a huge Simpsons fan, so my last question to you is, what is your favourite Simpsons episode of all time?
Oh my god! It’s The Mysterious Voyage of Homer, when he takes the chilli pepper and he goes on his existential walk with the Cayote who is also Johnny Cash. I swear to god I was just watching Simpsons episodes; I stole my brothers Disney+ account just so I could binge Simpsons episodes. I forget the name of the episode but I love the one with Bart and the pet elephant, the one when Milhouse’s parents get divorced, that series I think hands down had the most impact on my humour, my sensibility, how I view the world. My wife hates this cause I will equate any experience I had to a moment on The Simpsons, it’s sad. I would say the first ten seasons had such a fundamental impact on my life, it helped me to meet friend from middle school to now, immediately when you meet someone who loves the show you get into it.
I would love to keep you and chat about The Simpsons all day, but I’ll let you go and relax. Thanks once again for doing this interview with CLAPPER today, it’s been an absolute pleasure.
It means so much that you watched the movie and took the time to talk to me, the movie is out on all US VOD platforms and if you love the film please talk about it, tweet at us, tell your friends or tell your mom, it’s a small film and we’re counting on word of mouth. This was a great interview thanks for doing such a good job and having such a great conversation.