DEADHEADS is a “zombedy” that is sure to impress–pleasing both horror and action-adventure fans alike. Yup, you heard it first. Horror, meets comedy, meets action adventure!
DEADHEADS is a return to the great comedy/adventure films of the 80s like Back to the Future and the Goonies. The story follows two zombie slackers, Mike and Brent, who find themselves surprisingly reborn from the dead amid a disastrous zombie outbreak. After discovering an engagement ring in his coat pocket, Mike enlists his newfound zombie pal, Brent, to embark on a quest in search of his lost love.
What ensues is a hilarious cross country road trip as these two reformed flesh-eating pals hitchhike cross country as they are pursued by a team of zombie killin’ bounty hunters!
Written & Directed By: The Pierce Brothers – Brett Pierce & Drew T. Pierce
Produced By: Andy Drummond; Brett Pierce; Drew T. Pierce; Kevin Van Hagen
Interviews with:
Markus Taylor – Cheese
Drew T. Pierce – Co-Writer/Director
Michael McKiddy – Mike Kellerman
Kasey Bell – Rob
Natalie Victoria – Ellie Masterson
Saturday, October 15, 2011 at 3:30pm I met up with some of the cast and one-half of the writer/director brother duo of the indie film DEADHEADS at Mel’s Diner in Hollywood. Admittedly, I was pretty nervous. I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to meeting actors/actresses/directors no matter how famous or almost famous they are. The Deadheads cast/crew were more than obliging to this anxious Southern transplant. I only mention my Southern roots because when I get nervous (or tired or tipsy) my Southern accent tends to become more pronounced and severe…as if I just stepped off the Chattahoochee River Boat! Needless to say, these good folks knew immediately I wasn’t a California native but I’m definitely a California girl at heart!
We begin our conversation with Markus Taylor who plays ‘Cheese’ in the movie.
Judy: Ok, we are talking with Markus Taylor who plays Cheese. Tell us a little bit about your character.
Markus: Best described as the big lumbering zombie, the heart of the film; I’m like the little puppy dog who follows around Mike and Brent’s character…just constantly looking for their love and their acceptance.
Judy: How did this role come to you? Did you audition at all or did they…?
Markus: Yeah, I saw a posting on one of the acting websites that called for a zombie…
Judy (smile): And decided that was for you?
Markus: Well no, I was hesitant actually and then I saw the character’s name was “Cheese” and I was like, ‘I have to be this character.’
Judy: Yeah I mean who doesn’t want to play a guy named Cheese?
Markus: Right, exactly. So I ended up going in and auditioning. I put in my time, I rehearsed; I got everything ready for it. Went in there, and at the time I auditioned with this guy (to his left was Mike McKiddy) and I didn’t know he was the lead already but uh, that was a fun audition.
Judy: So what did you do to prepare for the role?
Markus: Um, basically in a nutshell it just boils down to like what his basic need was. When I read the scene, it was uh, actually I don’t think the scene is in the movie anymore, and we were traveling and we’re supposed to be in a certain situation, get pulled over and someone is talking to this guy (points to Mike) and in the meantime I’m like (inaudible) and someone is like, ‘No, no, Cheese stay.’ So I immediately, like anytime anyone says, ‘No. Stay,’ I automatically think of a dog. So I think that was my whole thing – just a matter of finding out what he (Cheese) wanted and what he needed and genuinely going after it and that’s what I did the entire time during the audition.
Judy: Have you watched a lot of zombie movies at all?
Markus: Not until…I had actually probably seen one.
Judy: Which one?
Markus: I saw Shaun of the Dead.
Judy: Ok.
Markus: Ok. And I was like, ‘This is mildly entertaining.’ And I watched it again and again and again and I thought it was funny but when I got the part I was instantly like dove into zombie films and there’s a stigma with those who don’t like zombie films that, or who have no interest in them, that they’re kind of absurd and goofy and silly and yes, they all are but that’s part of the charm of them, I think, and a lot of people don’t really grasp that. Or it’s like that’s why people love them is because of that fact. As one of my friends said, ‘It’s blood, guts, and T & A and that’s the best thing about them!’ And that’s a girl who told me that. I was doing some research and I actually found out there’s an actual survivor guide. There’s a zombie survival guide – a published book – that’s out there and I read that and that was cool. And then of course Zombieland came out which kinda went along…(inaudible) and that was cool, too.
Judy: Well, I, I, um, uh, I’m serious – I don’t watch zombie movies AT ALL. I mean I don’t even watch anything that remotely, not even a trailer or anything that has a zombie in it. The only trailer I’ve seen recently that has a zombie in it is this movie and Dylan Dog: Dead of Night…the guy…Sam Huntington… I love him, he’s in Being Human. He was a zombie but didn’t like a zombie so I was like ok, I can stomach that. But seriously I do not like zombies, so this movie has really, the trailer like totally changed my idea of maybe wanting to watch this (Deadheads) but I still can’t watch the other stuff…I can’t.
Markus: You haven’t even seen The Walking Dead?
Judy: I can’t.
Markus: Such an amazing show.
Judy: I can’t. I just…can’t. We have a reviewer who reviews the show for us on our site and I can’t even edit her reviews…I can’t.
Markus: Wow.
Judy: I can’t…I just…my brother traumatized me, tortured me. It was terrible. (My older brother forced me to watch the 1986 Night of the Living Dead. I still haven’t fully forgiven him to this day.)
Markus: Well, I play the big lumbering stereotypical zombie in this.
Judy (laughing): Yeah, so it’s a good thing we get you out of the way first.
Everyone laughs.
Drew Pierce (co-writer/director): But he’s the sweet zombie.
Judy: So when you follow his {Mike} character around, is it like…did you meet him immediately or how did your characters meet?
Markus: There’s a scene where another zombie orders an attack on this bar and they’re in the bar and they come out of the bar and you see me (Cheese) follow them away as they {Mike and Brent (Ross Kidder)} run away and he {Mike} falls asleep and when he wakes up, there’s me! And Ross who play’s Brent is playing with – playing fetch. So that’s how we meet.
Judy: So has it been fun…doing the film?
Markus: The film was a blast, yeah. It was long days, long hours, but I wouldn’t trade it for the world. It was an amazing experience; I was very fortunate and lucky to be a part of it.
Judy: So tomorrow night (Sun. 10/16/11) is the screening at Screamfest 2011. Where else have you screened the film?
Drew: We premiered it at Newport Beach Film Festival and it did really well there. They started us with one screening, we sold out that; got another screening; we sold out that; they gave us a third screening and they’ve never had three screenings for any movie before so …(inaudible) since then we’ve done a lot of big festivals overseas, like those have been the best for us. We just played Sitges in Spain; we all went to Fright Fest in London a month ago; we also played in Germany, Austria, and Vienna, and next we’re going to Austin Film Festival; the last couple of ones have been crazy!
Judy: That’s amazing! I feel really honored that you guys are sitting down talking to me. Like I said, I have just a small website but hoping to grow it with the help of my Southern charm.
Everyone was gracious and thanks me for coming out to interview them…but the fun’s not over.
Judy: So you’re (Markus) pretty tall; have people recognized you?
Markus: From what we’ve done and what we’ve screened, yeah, people like go, ‘Oh you were Cheese!’ And I’d go, ‘Yeah, that was me.’ And I love that, it’s a great thing. I will say this though, there are more and more tall men integrating into Hollywood.
We all talk about tall actors but the female counterparts are still five foot nothing wearing 17” heels.
Judy: So Drew, what inspired you to write this film?
Drew: I think we were just big fans of zombie movies; I mean, we saw Shaun of the Dead and we were really inspired, um, and I think that had something to do with it because those guys came to our hometown and were doing a tour with their movie and we already had this idea kind of in the back of our heads to make kind of like a buddy – road trip – zombie comedy. But we saw Edgar Wright and Simon Pegg and other cast from the movie {Shaun of the Dead} and they were like right where we wanted to be and we were like, ‘we have to get to work.’ So um we came up with this idea like what would happen, it’s funny you mentioned Night of the Living Dead, like at the end of the Night of Living Dead, if a couple of zombies woke up in a field and they were like, smart, and were normal and didn’t want to go munch on people, they wanted to go find out how they got there and what happened to them to get there and that was kind of like the original seed of an idea and started working on it from there and developing characters, developing Cheese’s character and all that and that’s where it came from.
Judy: So how long did it take you to write the film, with, you and your brother both wrote it together?
Drew: Yeah, we wrote it…well we were working on a bunch of different scripts so we wrote it over the course of probably like 2 ½ – 3 years, like on and off because we’d come back to it, work on for a while then work on another script um yeah and I think we were evening working on it, I mean, I think you have to, when you go into production because even when we were like shooting, we’d rewrite, these guys will tell ya, but we’d rewrite the day of shooting a lot of times. All of sudden there’s this clarity the day that you’re shooting something; you’re like – this dialogue here is not working. ‘Cause that fear that you’re going to shoot something that’s not going to be entertaining the day of you’re like ‘Oh my God, I know how to make it work’ ya know. There’s even one scene with Mike and Ross, where we kind of almost rewrote the entire scene the day of with Mike and Ross. They were kind of doing improv and we would throw in ideas and it was kind of like, uh, and I think it’s one of the funniest scenes in the movie which is something I usually like to prepare like crazy but it turned out and I’m really happy with it; it’s one of my favorite scenes in the movie.
Judy: I think improv is one of the best, I think, because when the actor like kind of feels something you should just kind of go with it because you never know what magic might happen or it could be like ‘that was really f***ing stupid, don’t do it again.’
Drew: I co-directed it with my brother and I always had this rule with every single scene, every scene has to be either funny, interesting, or dramatic; like one or some combination of those three things and if I can’t tell you what it is for that scene or what I really like about that scene, we have to rewrite it.
Judy: Where on location did you shoot most of the film?
Drew: In Michigan. We shot in I mean everywhere, all over Michigan. We just spent a couple of weeks driving around location scouting. I took my stepdad, who knows Michigan really well and we kind of drove around Holly, Detroit, Royal Oak…everywhere. We kind of did an 1½ hour radius in every location.
Judy: Where did you look to find your actors? Is everyone based out of LA who’s here {at the table}?
Drew: Yeah, well it’s kind of funny ‘cause we’re from Michigan, and our initial thing when you do a low budget movie you’re trying to save every penny you possibly can so we were like we should try to cast as many Michigan people as we possibly can. But, then you know we did a bunch of auditions back in Michigan, we spent about a year and a half ‘cause when we knew we were going into production we were like the hallmark of indie film is just terrible actors like most people cast just their friends and just like literally find the first one or two people that look the part and hire them. I think the thing Brett and I wanted to do was like find people who really, really fit the characters and have a sense for the script and can bring something to it, ya know. So we spent a 1 to 1 ½ yr doing auditions back in Michigan, doing auditions out here…but I’m so glad we took the time though to like go out of our way to be really picky about people um, I think Markus was one of the people that we actually um kind of resided on so quick because we’d only seen like a dozen ‘Cheese’s’ and he came in and he looked perfect and had that lovable quality to him where we were like, ‘That’s the guy!’ Mike – we kind of actually wrote the part for him because we had done stuff with him before.
Judy: Well you can tell, even in the trailer that you took time trying to find people who actually not only can fit the part but actually can act. Because sometimes you see trailers for indie films and you’re like ‘Really? How is this in any circuit at all?’
Drew: It’s a really sweet movie – that’s the big secret kind of about our movie um, that we’re almost nervous to say because you get a lot of zombie fanatics who are going to come see your movie and you don’t want to say, ‘It’s so sweet and the characters are so lovable,’ because that’s a big turn off for them. But the thing that’s great is that a lot of people that show up that aren’t, I mean zombie fans tend to like it, but people who show up that aren’t big zombie fans, they tend to like it even more because I think it’s totally not what they expected.
We talked about some random stuff as I got a fresh cup of coffee. I was exhausted from working late at my day job and a little nervous interviewing everyone. We talked about Drew’s father working on the special effects for the first Evil Dead film. Their house in Michigan, the basement was used in the film. Drew mentions his mother, whether on purpose or not, put their clothes in the creepy basement due to lack of space and each morning, Drew and his brother had to go into the dark, dank basement to get socks or other items of clothing. It was a pretty funny story. I must meet Drew’s mother!
After Markus Taylor had to leave to get to work, I continued my conversations with Drew Pierce, Michael (Mike) McKiddy, Kasey Bell, and Natalie Victoria (who graciously helped to facilitate this meeting with the cast/crew.)
Judy: Drew said the part was written with you in mind; so how did that make you feel? Did you still need to audition?
Mike: Brett Pierce came to me in (inaudible) said me and my brother are working on this really fun zombie movie and we’re thinking of you as we write it but, just keep that in mind, but you’ve really gotta win my brother {Drew} over ‘cause my brother’s dead set on this thing being perfect, ya know. And I uh, so I knew Brett better at the time and uh so I appreciated him coming to me with it and I was like, ‘Yeah, I just want to read it; let me read,’ so he sent me the script, a first draft and I remembering reading it thinking, ‘Yeah, I really want to be a part of this. This is amazing. This is a movie I’ve been wanting to do – finally something good.’
Judy: Now what year was this?
Mike: That was 2006 so for almost two and a half years I religiously bugged Brett going, ‘What going on with ‘Mike?’ Can I play it? Do I have it? Is it official yet? Is that for sure?’ and Brett would be like, ‘Ah, I don’t know…we’re writing it with you in mind but we’ll see.’ It was killing me and then auditions started and I read a lot.
Drew: Since he was our friend, we’d have him audition – against other ‘Mikes’ sometimes, so he knew that was the part we were considering him for so he’d have to read for Brent or listen to someone else read for his part. (laughing)
Mike: It was brutal, but I appreciate it. I’m glad it wasn’t just handed to me. I respect them for doing that. And I know they just wanted their movie to be the best it could be which was terrifying for me once I finally did get the part. It was like, ‘Oh, shit! Now I really have to deliver and can’t screw this up because I don’t want to ruin their movie. But it was hard to ruin because I feel like it was so well written and so and they compiled a great team so it was hard to screw up and I’m really, really proud of it…how it turned out.
Judy: So you obviously traveled from LA to Michigan, so how long was shooting?
Mike: I’m originally from Michigan so it was just an excuse to go back to Michigan and see old friends and get a feature film back in our hometown was pretty incredible. But it ended up being a three month shoot. It wasn’t intentionally gonna be a three month shoot but uh…
Drew: We had so many locations, like 30 locations, so anytime you have a new location, it’s whole another day of shooting and most indie features are shooting in 21 days.
Mike: And these guys are so ambitious and so positive that…when they would come to set, usually even on a big budget feature you get about 12 set-ups a day, and they would show up to set and be like, ‘Ok we got like 31 set-ups today.’ (laughter) It was a very ambitious project.
Judy: You can tell just by talking to you guys the passion you have for this project.
Drew: If you were to talk to most producers or directors out here trying to get a first time feature off the ground it rarely ever happens. It’s like they’ll be halfway through production and be like, ‘Oh we’re out of money so this isn’t going to get finished.’ So to finish something, it is a testament to the love and passion. I don’t think it would have ever gotten done had it not been for everybody’s drive and passion for it.
Judy: I always think indie films are kind of like high school football games; when the athletes are trying their best to get to the college level and then from college to the pros, you know, they have that hunger but then once you reach the pros something happens and they lose what they had before – that hunger and passion for the game. That’s one of the things I don’t like about the film industry today is that many actors are so dead set on trying to get so much money and it’s like well maybe if your acting was better you could get that money.
Drew/Mike: And it’s less focus on the content.
We discussed how some of the recent remakes like Footloose and The Thing have tanked at the box office because it was less focus on content and just about the fact the name of the film would possibly carry it to box office gold. But if the content isn’t there, people aren’t going to want to pay money to see them.
Judy: I think Deadheads is going to be one of those films you can watch over and over again and still find something new every single time you watch it.
Mike: Yeah and I think too when it’s not about the money and it’s about making something good because you believe in it that’s what indie films should be about.
Judy: And that’s where you’ll get your success because when you actually don’t give a shit about the money too much {and I know we all need to make money} and focus on putting out a good product, that’s where you can be successful and make money too.
Now we talk to Kasey Bell who plays ‘Rob’ in the film.
Judy: Tell us a little bit about your character.
Kasey: My character is uh, well, there’s a scene where they go to a high school reunion and Mike’s trying to find his love interest Ellie (played by Natalie Victoria) and he runs into me and he’s trying to get past me but I just want to reminisce with them and stuff and uh and I’m kind of that annoying guy. And everyone knows that person who thinks you’re better friends than you actually were so it’s kind of an easy one to do because everyone knows that character pretty well.
Judy: You’re all the people on Facebook that you knew in high school but not that well but then all of a sudden they hound you with friend requests.
Judy: So when you auditioned for the part, how many times did they make you audition?
Kasey: Well, that’s actually kind of a funny story. They had already gone back to Michigan to shoot and they’d realized they hadn’t cast that part yet. I had like auditioned for every role in the movie like 20 times and it just didn’t work, it was like nothing was really right for me and even I acknowledged that and I don’t know how you guys didn’t cast that part yet.
Judy: You’re from LA too right?
Kasey: I’m from Michigan as well {now living in LA}.
Drew: We had finally rewritten the scene, like totally reworked the character basically and found that he’d work for it.
Kasey: So they still made me audition of course. I had to go buy a video camera, tape my audition, send it to them. I’d overnight, it like cost me everything $400 and then um, but it was well worth it and they got it and uh they ended up casting me in it so it was pretty cool.
Judy: So after you auditioned and got the part and…
Kasey: I was freaked out about because it was a big investment for me because at the time I don’t think I had or maybe I had just gotten a job…sometimes we have jobs sometimes we don’t. So $400 to buy the camera and send out the tape was a lot of money ya know. So I was like, ‘Man, I better get this thing.’ And he could have messed with me a lot more than he did but he called me right away and said I did great and that I got it and I was so happy, which was a cool thing too because had they just not had me audition I would have wondered how serious they were about the movie. You know what I mean ‘cause like they weren’t giving their parts, I mean they did cast a lot of people they knew but it wasn’t …they didn’t give it away, you had to work…earn it.
Judy: Well that speaks volumes for how much passion you {Drew} have your project. You’re like…you’re not just going to leave it to chance and just have some chintsy people come in and like fuck up your movie.
Kasey, Drew and Brett actually all went to the same high school but didn’t know each other. They ended up living in the same apartment complex here in Los Angeles. The three are now all roommates. Serendipity. Kasey also works as a PA on the animated TV show ‘American Dad.’
We started talking off-the-cuff but then it got back to the subject of how long it took to actually shoot the film.
Drew: Initially it was going to be nine weeks but then realized they needed double the time to finish the film.
Ultimately everyone lost their jobs during filming but they didn’t mind – they believed in the project wholeheartedly. It’s a very motivating story!
Judy: So how did you {Drew} find Natalie?
Drew: We kind of went outside the box because we had done a lot of auditions in Michigan and LA and we hadn’t found anybody that we liked for Natalie or even for our funny guy Ross and some of our side characters. So we started, since it was a comedy, going to improv groups and a friend of ours had an acting class where they actually did scenes and she said there were a bunch of talented actors, they’re awesome. She told us to come on producers’ night. So we went to one of those nights and Natalie did a scene and it was actually her first time doing comedy and it was just really, really funny and she was really likeable and stuff so we wound up calling her in for auditions and had her go through a pretty rigorous audition process. We had her come in and audition like 2-3 times…
Natalie: Four. (laughs out loud)
Drew: Um, yeah, she just won out. We had auditioned a ton of ‘Natalies.’
Judy: Yeah I was going to ask you how many ‘Natalies’ did you audition?
Drew: Probably hundreds because there are so many actresses in this city {Los Angeles}. Long road of auditions but we were also trying to find people who fit the role to be honest. And it was also about getting a look that kind of works together with our whole cast. I mean I can’t tell you how many movies I’ve seen where the two lead guys look just alike or the lead guy and girl don’t look like they’d ever fit together in a million years so we were just trying to build our cast with just good actors, as well as a look too.
Now speaking to Natalie.
Judy: So when you auditioned, what did you do to kind of channel Ellie – did you have a process to try to figure out how you wanted to play her?
Natalie: I just wanted to make her as relatable as possible, you know. I was attracted to the project period because it was really funny but also like the character Ellie wasn’t just a throw-away in the script like typically it seems to be like in Hollywood because like the parts I’d get called out for were like ditzy sorority girl or hot girl or you know what I mean. And this was like a very cute, funny, klutzy, relatable girl and I just loved everything about it and so I tried to give her some sort of little personality so she just wasn’t like the girl that you know…because see I feel like the audience would have to relate to, after you get attached to Mike and Brent on this long journey with these awesome two guys, it’s like if she wasn’t going to be relatable at the end then I was basically going to be responsible for screwing up the whole movie.
Judy: Well yeah because obviously Mike and Brent have built up this girl who Mike’s in love with and trying to hunt her down and so they’ve built this person up so much and you don’t wanna be a let down.
Natalie: I just tried to make her as relatable as possible so that maybe other women could relate to her but that guys would still really like her, too.
Judy: Well you are very beautiful and your eyes…oh my gosh, they are so stunning! Just gorgeous! So when you played the part {of Ellie}, did you try to channel anything like maybe a softer side – I mean the movie is about zombies and it’s kind of creepy – so did you try to detach yourself from that aspect of it?
Natalie: I did. I just kind of thought the nicest girl next door that was somewhat relatable I could think of…like an younger Meg Ryan; which is funny because the scene that Drew and Brett saw me do at the actor’s studio was like a scene very similar to the orgasm scene in Harry Met Sally. But I didn’t want to channel anyone real {celebrity} but try to think in general.
Judy: Now you said you’re originally from Chicago, right?
Natalie: I am.
Judy: So you moved out here to LA then you all went to Michigan to shoot the film…so did you lose a job too?
Natalie: (laughs) Yeah, I was unemployed for like 11 months after I came back and that was tough but it was totally worth it in the end. We’re happy to support the film because we’re so proud of it.
Judy: So tomorrow (Sun Oct. 16. 2011) is the screening at Screamfest LA and how many other festivals are you going to after that?
Drew/Mike: There’s Austin, Toronto , Ft. Lauderdale, and East Lansing is what’s slated now.
Everyone is self-financed for the festivals – they pay their own way to go to as many festivals as they can – including the overseas festivals like London’s FrightFest.
Judy to All: It’s amazing to just listen to you guys and talk with you about it {the film}. I’m more than happy to promote this film on our site to our fans to get the word out! Thanks so much for taking the time to come meet with me. Thank you.
Many thanks to Natalie for getting the cast and Drew to this interview/meeting and a very special shout out to @RiverCityOtter for introducing me to Natalie via Twitter.
If you haven’t already, go check out this film! Support indie filmmakers!
Follow Deadheads cast on Twitter: @deadheadsmovie @natalietweet @michaelmckiddy @stretchmwt @kasemannn @DrewDraws
Like Deadheads on Facebook
L-R: Kasey Bell (Rob); Natalie Victoria (Ellie), me, Michael McKiddy (Mike), & Drew T. Pierce (Co-Writer/Co-Director)
Judy Manning
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