Now Feehan has taken on writing and directing duties for his own film, Beneath the Dark, the psychological thriller which hits DVD from IFC films on March 29th.
The movie stars Josh Stewart (TV's No Ordinary Family, Law Abiding Citizen), Jamie-Lynn Sigler (The Sopranos, Entourage), along with Chris Browning, Angela Featherstone, and Afemo Omilami in a psychological thriller where young couple Paul and Adrienne "Paul and Adrienne pull off the highway and into Roy's Motel and Cafe. This roadside artifact proves to be a strange and surreal place with an unsettling mix of travelers, who force our couple to discover the secret hidden between them and ultimately, the horrifying reality of their current situation." [IMD page].
Feehan was kind enough to spare a few minutes of his time to talk about the making of the film, as well as the challenges of moving from producing to jumping behind the camera for the first time, while also dishing on a pretty interesting project that's in the pipeline for him and his fellow producers.
ScreenAnarchy: Just to begin at the beginning, could you tell us what the genesis was for Beneath the Dark?
Chad Feehan: It started sort of out of frustration. You know, having produced All the Boys Love Mandy Lane and then subsequently getting another movie financed called Devil's Swing, I got frustrated dealing with the bottleneck nature of Hollywood and trying to get movies distributed much less movies made. And so I decided to sit down and write something that I could make on a dime that I could also direct.
And once I wrapped my mind around doing something low-budget, I began exploring different themes that were appealing to me. And one theme was that if you hurt somebody in your life, then that act doesn't end with that one person. That'll affect how that person interacts with people throughout the rest of their life.
You know, sort of on a base level, if you abuse a child, then that child grows up to abuse a child who grows up to abuse a child. To my mind, the originator of the act--the very first person who made that decision--is responsible for all of it.
So working that idea--that theme--I then began to explore different places [where] that sort of be expanded upon. And I was drawn to my love of both Psycho and The Shining, and decided to set it at an out-of-the-way motel.
ScreenAnarchy: As you say, the story had a real moral component to it. Without giving away too much of what happens in the movie, to what degree was there a religious component to that?
CF: You know, it's funny--there are religious undertones in the script. That being said, I'm probably the least religious guy that I know. I grew up with the absence of religion and I actually have quite strong views on the negative effects of religion. So, while I'm not surprised that people make that connection it's sort of ironic for me because I'm not a religious guy at all.
ScreenAnarchy: Looking at the character of Paul (Stewart), I was kind of torn watching the movie: I felt like he, to a certain degree, deserved the repercussions of his act. At the same time, it felt equally valid to say that he was terrorized into committing the original act that sets the plot in motion.
CF: That was the most difficult element of the script and of the actual shooting to get right. How far are we supposed to push a protagonist who is supposed to be our hero into doing something pretty disturbing and have him still be likeable in the audience's eyes? It was sort of a fine line to walk.
For me, I try to create a situation where you could understand how Paul made the decision that he did. Not necessarily be sympathetic towards it at all, but understand how he got to that place and made that decision.
All that being said, it was incredibly important to me to have him make a decision. And in my mind's eye, there's definitely a point in [the scene] where he decides to follow through with the act. And that decision is what condemns him to his [present] reality.
ScreenAnarchy: What drew you to Josh for the role of Paul?
CF: I've known Josh for a long, long time. I knew him sort of peripherally several years ago, [and] I'd met him several times. I knew that he was somebody that, a. had the chops to do the role--somebody that I admire in terms of his ability. But more importantly, he was somebody that I knew that I could trust and that I'd get along with and have a good experience with on my first venture with directing.
So it was a combination of both talent and having somebody that I knew I could rely on. And that being said, Josh is one of the nicest guys I've ever met, one of the hardest working guys I've ever met, [he] always goes above and beyond the call of duty.
Sometimes it gets him in trouble, I think, but he's a really good person.
ScreenAnarchy: You mention this being your first time behind the camera--were there any particular ways that the actors were able to ease you into the experience?
CF: Josh and Jamie were the first two actors that I worked with, and I was working with them pretty intensively for the first two weeks. And they're both incredibly giving and obviously experienced actors. For me it's not about--well, rehearsing on-set is great, [but] for me it's all about the discussions you have before you arrive on-set. And they were both incredibly accessible to me in terms of being able to talk about the characters, being able to talk about the emotional state of the characters and sort of tracking it through point A to point Z.
I had a lot of those conversations with both Josh and Jamie in prep. And once I was able to see them apply my ideas that we talked about in prep, on-set it then gave me a lot of confidence to go to Chris and Angie and Afemo and know that my ability to communicate what's inside my head translates, therefore [I] was able to do the same thing with them in a more limited space.
ScreenAnarchy: You mentioned Chris and Angie--and they were both phenomenal in the movie.
CF: Well, thank you. [laughs]
ScreenAnarchy: You're welcome. Just speaking about their performances and the relationship between those two character, what was the direction or the conversation you had to get the sense of distance and deterioration between this couple?
CF: Without getting too personal, a lot of times it's already something that the actor already has in their history and drawing a parallel between those past experiences and their own lives to see what the characters are going through. Chris and Angie were both good enough to share with me some of the trouble that they had in their lives up until that point. My job was to see the similarities and draw parallels between the experiences that they had and the experiences that the characters were having at the time.
Angie, for example, was drawing on this idea--especially in that scene in the bedroom where she's sort of chastising Chris [after] he walks in on her having an affair--[she was] drawing on this experience [where] when somebody is mad at you or disappointed in you, it's always a thousand times more painful and more hurtful if that person's incredibly controlled in their venom and perfectly controlled in their delivery. So, drawing this from her own personal experiences I was able to guide her in that direction which I think is one of the really good scenes in the movie, where she's basically telling Chris that he's nothing that she ever wanted in life. And the way that she delivers that is in a controlled fashion, which to me, what makes it so powerful. As opposed to yelling and screaming and flying off the handle and all that kind of stuff.
ScreenAnarchy: Has the whole experience made you more confident and more excited about getting behind the camera again?
CF: I'm incredibly anxious to do it again. I'm proud of the movie, and I accomplished what I set out to do, which was make an extraordinarily low-budget movie, then distribute it, and have it make money, which is where we're at.
That being said, there's definitely things--knowing now what I know--I would have done differently. And I'm anxious to have an opportunity to apply the things that I've learned for the next movie.
You know, it's kind of funny--I've produced a lot before this and producing's a very different beast from directing and writing. There's nothing to hide behind when you're writing and directing--there's no veil.
My sister's a mother of two and I'm really close with her, and some of the conversations I have with her, it's kind of like having a kid. And I know that that's cliché and you've heard that before but making a movie's like giving birth: when you're immediately done you're like "There's no way that I can do this again." But then, as time goes by, and the months pass, you get this instinct that "I have to go do it again, I have to make another movie."
And that's sort of where I'm at right now. Definitely hungry to get behind the camera again and give it another shot.
ScreenAnarchy: Are you circling any projects you can talk about right now?
CF: Yeah, I'm in development on a project called Beyond the Pale which is an adaptation of a novel titled Twilight by an author named William Gay. Stephen King named Twilight "The Best Book of 2007" is his yearly Entertainment Weekly article, ahead of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows, ahead of The Yiddish Policeman's Union, ahead of The Ghost.
We got really lucky to get this book--we got it during the writer's strike and tied it up. We're out now trying to raise financing for it. We've had some luck and we're getting closer and closer every day. Ideally, we'd like to shoot in November.
It's basically the story of a teenage boy--he's 18--and his older sister who's 21 named Tyler and Corrie, and they live in rural Tennessee in 1973. They live in this small town, and there sort of put upon and looked down upon in this small town. Corrie's desperate to escape to greener pastures and she concocts a plan with her brother to blackmail the local undertaker who's the wealthiest man in this small town. Their plan spirals wildly out of control when the undertaker hires the local strong-arm--who just got acquitted [for] murder--to get the evidence back. And Corrie and Tyler go on the run through rural Tennessee, a la Deliverance country, trying to escape this madman who's after them.
It's a coming-of-age story [and] it's a dark thriller, so it's much more straightforward than Beneath the Dark. I'm really excited about it.
ScreenAnarchy: And now for the requisite Mandy Lane question: any idea when we'll be closer to getting some kind of release for the movie stateside?
CF: The last I heard is that we're getting closer and closer every day. The guys that produced the movie with me and financed it, Occupant Films, are in the process of trying to acquire the rights back from--it's actually a firm in New York that the rights reverted to from Senator. And they're in the process of trying to get those back and hopefully we'll actually see it in the U.S. sometime soon.
You know, it's been a long, long journey, and nothing would make me happier than to see the movie come out. I actually started it as my thesis at AFI. The writer, Jacob Forman and the production designer Tom Hammock and I did it as our thesis together at AFI. We started working on it in 2003, then graduated and got it financed and were able to hire our friends that we graduated with to make the movie. It was obviously quite a journey from 2003 to 2006 when we sold it to the Weinstein Company, and after that it's been pretty trying.
So, I'm hopeful for happy endings.
Beneath the Dark hits DVD on March 29h.