Pai Takavarasha speaks to actor Dexter Fletcher (Kick-Ass, Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels) on directing his first feature film, Wild Bill, acting and the film industry…
I heard that, as an actor, there’s a lot of waiting around – did that spur you to get into directing?
Well, there’s more waiting around when you haven’t really got any work, that’s when there’s even more waiting around but that’s when you’ve got to use your time productively innit, when you’re sitting at home at looking at the computer, you’re like, ‘maybe I could write something’. And I’ve always wanted to direct so that’s the more crucial time because on set you’ve got to be primed and ready there is a lot of waiting around but you gotta be ready to jump up and do it. So you’re kind of in the zone but the really difficult time is when you’re not engaged and how to keep yourself engaged and using that time productively and creatively I suppose.
Do you think that there isn’t a chance for young people to get to know the real film world inside out, the real work involved in being a director or producer for example?
No, no you’ve got to choose your moments obviously, but the fact is that, if you talk to anyone about what they do and what they love you’re gonna get a long and interesting conversation and film people are no different. You know, it’s just about choosing your moment. If their in the middle of setting up something, it might be a bad time but if you wanna pin down Alan Parker or, I dunno, me or anyone and start talking to them about a subject they care about; you’re probably gonna get quite a good response I would imagine. It’s not like tryna pin down someone who doesn’t wanna talk about it. People wanna talk about it because you learn so much even just talking about it, that’s why people get into conversations and dialogue. Festivals are important because it starts a dialogue and things start to come out of that and it’s all about meeting people, it’s like a community.
What was it like when you first started off acting, was it hard to find opportunities?
I started at such a young age, you see, so I was just like on sets as a kid anyway, like literally six years old so I was unaware of its difficulty. It’s difficult as you get older, you realise there are not always a lot of opportunities. It varies. Careers peak and fall, but it’s about getting active and passionate and going, ‘I’ll go out and make something happen, I’ll make a short film, I’ll do this, I’ll ask my mates to come and help me’ and it’s one of the few industries you can get in at the ground level and work your way up to the top you can start as a runner and end up head of the studio, you can do it. I worked on Misfits and the guy who directed it was a runner four years before that on a TV show that I did and he was directing misfits and I was like, all right.
That’s four years, that’s not a lot of time – it’s a lot of hard work but he was there. And so that’s a great thing about this industry, you can come in at GROUND LEVEL. It doesn’t matter who you are what your background is, you’re in there, BANG! You work hard, that’s it.
So the idea of Wild Bill, did it come to you straight away? What was the process?
I started with the characters really and that was kind of based on personal experience and then I talked to the co-writer and then he sort of set a story. It came together in bits and then it builds itself. It’s sort of interesting how it accumulates and becomes something. But it was being re-written right up to the last day of filming even during filming. There’s bits you’re re-writing and adapting but the core of the idea, the characters and the situation and the story that we’re telling, that was there and then all the detail is what comes to you as you’re doing it. That’s the exciting and interesting part, when the film’s actually being made.
As a successful actor, was it easier for you to make this film? How did you go about it?
Probably a little bit…not a great deal…a little bit. Because, it means the doors are slightly open already so people will listen to me. If I turn up and go, ‘Yeah I wanna make a film about brussel sprouts growing in the field’, you’d be like, ‘Great, you’ve still got to have a good story idea’. It’s just about the door being opened a bit but once you’re through you’ve gotta deliver you can’t just sort of rock up and go, ‘Hey, but I’m on telly’, because they’re gonna be like, ‘great but what can you do for me?’. So yeah initially I’d say it is. Making a film is difficult but, maybe that can work against me as well, ‘we know who you are’, do you know what I mean? Where as if you’re new and you go ‘no one knows nothing about me’… that’s exciting!
Wild Bill will be showing, plus Q&A with Dexter Fletcher, as part of the Future Film Festival on Sunday 19, February at the BFI Southbank. In cinemas March 30th.
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