When a group of high schoolers have to attend Saturday School they must work together to overcome their differences in over to survive when students end up missing.
The concept of Throwing Stones derives from the sociologist theory on broken windows. A broken window is left unfixed in a neighborhood; it signals to that community it's acceptable for that type of behavior to take place.
These ideas compound until the neighborhood becomes decayed and unable to achieve its past grander. Now apply the theory to schools and replace broken windows with broken students, and now you have one hell of horror ride as the antagonist eliminates the unacceptable element that walk the halls of Blair High School.
We caught up with Co-Writer/Co-Director, Bart Van Bemmel, to talk about the project.
Horror News Network: How did you come up with the concept for Throwing Stones?
Bart Van Bemmel: Co-Writer/Co-Director Jason Wheeler and myself always used to talk about how certain kids in school always seemed to get away with everything. And all the other kids and teachers knew it. Eventually many of the teachers stopped even caring because they knew that the administration didn't have their backs or wouldn’t support them if they had a concern with a student in class because they were the star football player or something. After all – often times Friday Night Lights and playing football is WAY more important in high school then to teach your child character values, responsibility, and the curriculum. And of course the star football player knew he ran the school and got away with everything, and soon the other football players thought they should be able to get away with being tardy, talking back to teachers, challenging parents to fights in the parking lot, and treating everyone else like crap. But what we saw wasn't just about football players. Many thought the Admin didn’t want to deal with the “Helicopter Parents” that would swoop in and save their kids knowing their child made a poor decision and were clearly in the wrong because they thought it made them look like bad parents. So the Admin just swept all the problems under the rug knowing the parents run things. HOWEVER, there’s a whole other side to this that many don't even see. When Admin and teachers stop caring – then they aren’t making those crucial emotional deposits with the kids in their classes. What if the teachers took the time to get to know these kids and find out why they are the way they are? So who's really to blame here? The kids or the teachers and Admin? I don't care what school kids go to or what the socioeconomics of their neighborhood happen to be. ALL kids have some kind of issues and for good reason. And this led us to the whole BROKEN WINDOW THEORY that you mentioned above. The kids are the broken windows and by all means they need to be fixed, right? From a certain point of view. But we wanted a Breakfast Club the horror kind of story rather than a Dangerous Minds kind of feel. First we wrote the screenplay version. Then we decided to make the web series version that is loosely based on the feature because we're both big fans of this new fast-growing medium. Plus there hasn’t been many teen horror web series out there. But we’d certainly welcome someone wanting to make the feature out of Throwing Stones – no doubt!
Horror News Network: What was the collaboration process like between you and Jason Wheeler?
Bart Van Bemmel: When ever you collaborate with anyone you have to be able to handle it when someone might either disagree with you, have a better idea than you, when to fight for something you believe in, and how to communicate this together as a team. And you have to be able balance your different schedules to make the writing process work. And on top of that - then you have to ask yourselves: Who gets a crack at is first and lays the blueprint for the foundation? Who adds their fairy dust to punch it up? Should we start together by sitting down next to each other on lap tops and spitball ideas as one person types? Every project is different for us and how method to our madness. It's funny, because so many writers have asked us how we do it as a team because they could never do it, and we tell them this is the only way we know! I know how Jason thinks, and he could tell you the same for me.
Horror News Network: Who are the actors involved in this film?
Bart Van Bemmel: Throwing Stones has an amazing cast! We have Lynn Andrews from MTV's High School Stories who plays Dontrelle the FOOTBALL STAR. So much of series revolves around his character. Then we have Cherami Leigh who’s known from her roles in films like The Mist, HBO's Temple Grandin, and Fast Food Nation who plays Robyn the tough NEW GIRL. Look for her this coming Monday night on the new NBC show Chase! There's Lindsay Seidel who played the lead role of Emily the outcast in the Lionsgate hit The Final that's had a run on the SyFy Channel in October. She plays Rachel the SOCIAL CLIMBER in Stones. Rebekah Kennedy plays Chrissy the school WHORE that has some upcoming horrors about to come out (Blood is Blood, House Hunting) and Nic Cage's Season of the Witch. Chad Cox plays the sinister ASSISTANT PRINCIPAL Mr. Beckett. He’s so talented! He was one of the stars of the movie Powder, the TV series Weird Science, he's been on ER, Spin City, 7th Heaven, the new Fox hit The Good Guys, and about a billion other things. He also did the MUSICAL SCORE for the web series. We have Kayla Carlyle who plays Staci the CLASS PRESIDENT bitch. She's the girl zip tied and gagged on the metal grid gate in the trailer! She's one of the voices on the animated series Bamboo Blade and starred the Indie horror flick From the Dark. Then we have a lot of up and coming talent that might be newbies to the film/web series world, but aren't strangers to the stage or commercials. Tom Hamlett plays Tad the JESUS CRISPY. Spencer Harlan plays Asher the RICH KID. Brina Palencia from Dragon Ball Z Kai plays Finley the FOLLOWER student in the video yearbooks. Jon Christie and Rachel Verret play Jackson and Paige - the two JOURNALISM STUDENTS who create the video yearbook project for Blair High. When Blair High's journalism class set out to make a video yearbook for the school, who would have known that Mr. Beckett would have used them as his homework to not only confirm the "Broken Windows" of Blair, but to also find some new ones that were not yet on his radar. Jackson and Paige' journalism project basically gift-wrapped Blair High's doom. These video yearbooks are designed so that the audience can learn a little more about the characters before the web series is launched.
Horror News Network: How long did shooting the episodes take?
Bart Van Bemmel: We shot Stones over a (3) day period in the sweltering August heat of Texas with no A/C at two different schools. It was like 108 outside and 102 inside or something. But NOTHING fazed our cast and crew! The heat only brought more intensity to the performances. We had two units going at the same time so it the shooting process could have been longer. Even though each episode is only 3 minutes long and there's (8) of them, it takes every bit of three days to shoot the 24 minutes of footage and the video yearbooks.
Horror News Network: What was most challenging about shooting this series?
Bart Van Bemmel: So far the most challenging part of the series has been the editing process. We originally set out to make (5) episodes, and then we decided to make it a 8-part series instead with shorter episodes. But it's all coming along quite nicely. Many of the episodes have been shipped off for sound design as we speak.
Horror News Network: What can we expect in terms of blood and guts from this series?
Bart Van Bemmel: I don't want to spoil anything for anyone, but I'll say this: Sometimes the best horror movies rely on the psychological elements and what's heard and not seen. But even with that said - sometimes it's nice to see someone get gutted.
Horror News Network: When these (8) episodes finish up would you consider doing more Throwing Stones episodes?
Bart Van Bemmel: These (8) episodes are designed so that just when you get to know these kids and all hell breaks loose, the series will leave you hanging. We created the series with a Season 2 in mind. And the cast and crew are already to start shooting Season 2! Hello sponsors!?!
Horror News Network: Where can our readers find out more about Throwing Stones?
Bart Van Bemmel: We have lots of places you can go to find out more about Stones - from video yearbooks that will slowly be unlocked as we gear up for the release of the series, to finding out where we are in post-pro, to reading any press we may have received, and more. We have a whole new official site that the talented Alex Kinter built, but in the meantime you can hit up some of these places:
Web Site: www.throwingstoneswebseries.com
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/pages/Throwing-Stones-the-web-series/141275835885389
Production Blog: http://www.throwingstoneswebseries.blogspot.com
Horror News Network: In closing, what would you like to say about Throwing Stones?
Bart Van Bemmel: Not only do we have a great cast on Stones, but we also have an amazing crew! Without them none of this would have been possible. We have Steadicam Operator David McGill (The Faculty, Harold and Kumar: Escape from Guantanmo Bay), Sound Designer David Rosenblad (Suburban Nightmare, HBO Films Living & Dying, American Nightmare), Colorist Omar Godinez (I Spit on your Grave), First Assistant Director Rick Carey that has done most of Jon Keeyes' films, Cinematographer Kingslea Bueltel who DP's the upcoming ABC paranormal show Ghost Breakers and she Second-AC's The Fox Show The Good Guys, Assistant Editor Sam Crutsinger (The Ant Bully).
Also, GINORMOUS THANK YOU to The Horror News Network for wanting to cover our web series! The series should launch in December. Right now we're talking with several interested sites who want to host the series. More news to come!
Horror News Network: Thank you for your time, Bart. Comment on this interview here or on our forum. |
