Finding Victories in the Everyday: An Interview with 2023 SAGindie Fellow Ben Mulholland
Writer-Director and 2023 SAGindie Fellow Ben Mulholland (left) at the 2023 June Narrative Lab in Stowe, VT. Photo by Jesse Schloff.
Having just returned from the June Narrative Lab in Stowe, Vermont, to workshop his feature script The Lake Merritt Monster, Writer-Director and 2023 SAGindie Fellow Ben Mulholland is feeling reinvigorated and inspired. “The biggest thing was being in a community of like-minded artists and being creative within that space. That's invaluable…along with being in that environment. Stowe is beautiful, quiet, and scenic and I don't think I've watched a sunset in years. In the evenings, people were like, ‘Let's go dude.’ And I said no, I’m going to sit right here, enjoy the sunset, jot down a few things, read a book—you know, living life is so essential to being a filmmaker,” Mulholland described.
This is Mulholland’s first time participating in a Stowe Story Labs program, but it won’t be his last. He’s hoping to return next to a Writers Retreat. Having always heard of the Labs through other filmmakers, he finally decided to apply in 2022 and was awarded one of over a dozen fellowships offered by the Labs in partnership with sponsors: the SAGindie Fellowship. With the fellowship covering the fee to attend the Stowe Narrative Lab, among other perks, Mulholland took his script The Lake Merritt Monster to workshop, a long-standing project that he describes as “choosing him” over five years ago.
Mulholland explained, “I had four movies that I was pitching to a friend, and when I pitched that one she said, ‘That's the one.’ I didn't even want to do this movie, but another one. But I had enough people telling me that this movie needed to be made so I listened. And that's part of filmmaking and success, things come at you and you’ve got to pick and choose what you're gonna scoop up. And everywhere I've gone with that movie, it’s resonated with audiences.”
Ben in his mentor group with Stowe Mentor / Screenwriter (The Sound of Silence) Ben Nabors (center) at the 2023 June Narrative Lab in Stowe, VT. Photo by Jesse Schloff.
The Lake Merritt Monster is a coming-of-age, science fiction adventure film. The logline reads “when Ollie Henderson’s mother is attacked by a monster hiding in the depths of Lake Merritt, he sets out on a mission to find her—discovering instead a hidden network of monster hunters tasked with protecting Oakland from its own dark underbelly.” Well, I for one want to see the film.
Mulholland decided it was important to tell this story, and for the same reason it resonates with audiences: Audiences rarely see BIPOC main characters on a rollicking adventure. “That's why I made The Lake Merritt Monster, because I wanted to have kids who don't normally get to take that adventure in a movie [e.g., The Goonies], to be able to take that adventure. And for those of us who are in our thirties and forties who grew up in those times, it’s a wish fulfillment—we get a little bit of nostalgia, we get to go back and finally see this tale be told.”
But the process has had its challenges. In the script stage, Mulholland was told it was too ambitious, financially risky, not marketable, etc., so he decided to take matters into his own hands and made it into a short as a proof of concept, directing a cast and crew of over 100 people over a span of two years. Then, when submitting it to festivals, he faced another hurdle. “I've had problems programming the movie because I don't have some kind of like racial or poverty porn,” Mulholland explains. Which isn’t to say the film doesn’t address these topics, but at its crux is the need for collective heroes and Ollie’s growth and initiation into a Brave New World: Adulthood.
Mulholland certainly does like exploring difficult topics in his work, just not in the typically Hollywood way of trauma porn.
Much like the 2019 HBO series Watchmen, Mulholland uses science fiction to explore the discomfort of difficult topics. He also give audiences some separation from the material. “It's about how you tell it and what you have to say, not just the controversial things. Like what about life? What about the human condition? And that's the best kind of science fiction: what it can teach us about the human condition,” Mulholland stated.
Photo by Jesse Schloff.
But for Mulholland, his art is not just about what you have to say, but doing it without fear of failure or all the “right” resources. Mulholland’s advice for other aspiring filmmakers: “Go make your movies. Don't wait, even if you can only make five minutes of it or shoot it with a phone. We have to have room for grace, for fun, for imperfect work. You're making memories, you're making art as you go, even though it's not commercial. Because look at Van Gogh, Dali, or one of those big names. They just were doodling and now their doodles are worth millions of dollars. They would say, ‘That's a piece of crap. Why are you selling my doodle?’ So we need to give ourselves a break and realize the value in the small pieces of art we create every day.”
Interview by Marian D. Cook.
Marian D. Cook is a former journalist and a 2023 graduate of USC's MFA program in film and TV production. She graduated from Spring Hill College in 2019, Summa Cum Laude and with honors, with a BA in Journalism.
She's currently focused her talents on producing and editing strong, female-led stories and those that uplift her Latinx community. Her latest projects include Bad Hombrewood, a short documentary she produced and was directed by Guillermo Casarin, about Latinx representation in Hollywood, starring Phil Lord, Guillermo Del Toro, Lee Unkrich, Melissa Fumero, and a range of Latinx talent that demonstrate the beauty and diversity of the Latinx community, that won Best Student Documentary at the American Pavilion at the 2022 Cannes International Film Festival, was nominated for the 42nd College Television Awards, and has been selected for over 40 official film festivals across the globe including Santa Barbara and the Cleveland International Film Festival. She also produced Backlog, directed by Jacqueline E. Rosenthal and based on a true story, about one woman's story to end the national rape kit backlog, which was a Best Student Short Audience Award Winner at the Cleveland International Film Festival and was also an official selection of the American Pavilion's Emerging Filmmaker Showcase at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival.
Marian also just finished editing Renacer, directed by Jenniffer Gonzalez, about a Latina's journey post-abortion, which was a recipient of the The Annenberg Inclusion Initiative's AI2 Reproductive Rights Accelerator Award. Currently, she is editing Ximena Davis' Eclipse Chasers, which is set to premiere in December 2023. You can learn more here. Marian assists with all aspects of operations, writes for the newsletter, and assists with research and writing to support fundraising and communications about programs.