Eryc Tramonn is an independent filmmaker whose latest movie Loners is now in release. We had the chance to talk with him about his career and the film. Here’s what he had to say.
Hello Eryc. I like to kick off interviews with a few fun questions so let’s start with telling me how you got into the movie making business and what were your biggest influences.
I first became interested in filmmaking before I even understood that there was a movie industry. My great aunt had a Super 8 camera, and like many filmmakers, I became enthralled with the mechanism of filmmaking at a really early age. My parents would often take me to see films, which lead to some pretty intense imprinting at a very early age — from Star Wars to Scanners to Friday the 13th — you name it and my parents were willing to take me. Plus, growing up in small town Lake Charles, Louisiana there wasn’t too much else to do for escapism back then.
After exploring transportation design at the Art Center College of Design, and briefly considering a career in medicine, I opted to attend the University of Southern California Cinematic Arts program. There I met my classmate and friend Tyson Turrou.
READ MORE: Our Full Review of Eryc Tramonn’s Black Comedy Loners
Give me three words to describe your directing style.
Technical, orchestrated, yet improvisational
If you took me to a movie with one of its stars or crew members, which film would we be watching and who would be sitting with us?
I feel like I might like to see something with (Stanley) Kubrick, or (Terry) Gilliam. They have consistently been the filmmakers I have admired for their approach and command over the storytelling process. Like many filmmakers, one of my favorite films of all time is Apocalypse Now, so sitting with (Francis Ford) Coppola and getting a play-by-play would be surreal.
Recommend a movie you would want readers to put at the top of their watch list and tell us why.
Wages of Fear and/or Alphaville would be great classic pieces of cinema to watch. Often I feel modern audiences think older films are bereft of interesting concepts, but in actuality these stories often inform present day approaches and storytellers.
Your latest movie is a black comedy called Loners about a society where people who like to be alone are monitored by the government as being potential initiators of mass violence. Tell me how the story came about and how you came to be involved in the project.
The project came about as a result of a writing contest author Neil McGowan entered, and subsequently produced as a stage play called Lone-Anon. My USC classmate Tyson Turrou invited me to watch the play, and asked if I would consider helping adapt it as a feature film concept.
I liked the potential the narrative and characterizations possessed, and it was inline with many of the films, and concepts, I deemed interesting from an exploratory standpoint. Although we started the project long before the current political climate, many of the themes have proven eerily prescient.
Was this always a comedy or were there times when it felt like it could be a serious satire?
This is a really tough question because I felt we had to be very careful when skating the line surrounding the situations examined in Loners. My goal was to encourage dialog girding the dire state of society’s handling of mass shootings and their perpetrators, but to do so in a disarming and comedic way. Not an easy task. And I did not want the narrative to dissipate to a bipartisan debate on gun laws.
As such, I was drawing influence from films such as Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove, or the comedic tonality of Mike Judge films, and literary work such as Bridge on the River Kwai and Catch 22. I was looking at the narrative as an abstract commentary on authoritarianism and how an ostensibly democratic society can quickly dissolve, but all couched within the confines of a traditional chamber play.
It seems not easy to make a comedy that ostensibly hovers around a recurring tragedy, yet you and writer Neil McGowan manage to keep it very well balanced. Was that something of a concern while filming?
As mentioned, the thought that the message could be misunderstood or miscommunicated was of paramount concern to me as a filmmaker. I racked my brain to ensure the tonality would be correctly achieved, and in large part used our soundscape and score to reinforce the narrative’s absurdity. I care very deeply about my fellow humans, and the last thing I would want is to be inadvertently perceived as tone deaf, or otherwise insensitive. Granted, I am sure I will be perceived as such irrespective — this was an extremely difficult situation to balance.
You guys poke a lot of fun at a number of social, political, and movie tropes and I really found it fun to see them play out. Was all of this rigidly written or was there a lot of improv and organic growth as the movie was being filmed?
Tonally, I was mirroring films I felt were analogous to Loners’ underlying considerations. The core idea was suggested in McGowan’s screenplay, but Neil gave me carte blanche to make the material mine. And as I sat with the characters and situations for extremely long periods, I began to add flourishes and nuance that hopefully helped structure and define the narrative.
How was managing such a large ensemble cast, keeping every character relevant with their limited screen time?
Yes, managing such a large ensemble case was very difficult. Awesome that you picked up on that. Simply getting coverage for such a large cast proved nearly impossible given the timeframe in which I needed to capture it all. I attempted to craft a true ensemble piece, but ultimately arrive at a clear protagonist as the story arc proceeded toward its resolution.
My editor Lauren Sorofman and I literally spent months (if not years) locked in a room attempting to hit all the story beats, use available footage captured during principal, and mete equal amounts of screen time for each of the characters. I was really adamant about ensuring screen time was divided equally because I wanted to be fair, and also not place more import on one personality type over another. As a character study, I wanted to get deeper into each of the characterizations, but there was a balancing act that had to be reached to ensure a manageable runtime, and to adequately cover the situation. Films such (Georg) Lucas’ American Graffiti was very effective in its use of ensemble casting, and thus served as a model for what could be achieved given Loners large cast.
I’m not sure if it’s something you’re planning, but it felt like the ending left room for a sequel. Any interest in revisiting these characters and seeing what happens next?
During the process of editorial, I became convinced that the narrative would lend to a much larger storyscape. Whether we set this up as a sequel, or an episodic, I am really interested to see to what is transpiring in the world surrounding the events depicted with our first group of loner subjects. There are definitely others.
Speaking of what’s next, anything you can tell our readers to be on the lookout for?
I have been challenged by longtime friends, director Andre Ovredal (Autopsy of Jane Doe, Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark) and screenwriter Norman Lesperance (Mortal), to complete a proof-of-concept in the horror/fantasy realm. So my team is currently in pre-production for that project and planning to capture during summer 2019. I am in the process of designing a really cool previz workflow that is tuned to independent production, and which will likely exist at the core of my films moving forward.
Eryc, it’s been great getting to know you. I wish you good luck with Loners and hope our paths cross again.
Thank you so much for your interest and willingness to speak with me.