Science vs Alternative Facts

                                                             

This post is part of Blog March 2017. This is a peaceful, but thoughtful movement that will run throughout the month of May. The purpose of this written march is to raise our voices against an administration that is hell-bent on stripping away all the hard won protection of our natural resources, air and water. The previous blog marcher before me was Max Mania on May 24 and the blog marcher following me is Pamela Means on May 26.

I don't know the girl who is holding this cool sign, but it's perfect for Blog March 2017. My post is about the fallacies on climate change that this administration is so eager to shove down our throats. Does science prove our use of outdated methods of energy brings us closer to extinction as a species? Find out after the jump.

Life with Fred & Lucy, Episode 38: Surviving Zombies

                                                           

 

Zombies can be downright scary, but most people love watching movies and television shows that feature those pesky little shuffling bags of rot. Did you ever wonder why they are so popular? I’ve heard the theory that zombies seem to be most popular when the economy is bad and vampires are the big hit when the economy is good. I don’t know how accurate this theory is, but it does make sense in a way. We love to be frightened and nothing can get that adrenalin moving like a hungry zombie coming over your way for a snack and, you’re the snack.

                                                                    

Vampires are usually portrayed as sexy and financially well to do, for example, True Blood, Twilight and, even An Interview with a Vampire. So sexy and rich might represent good times. On the other side of the coin, zombies are not sexy, there is no prospect of them earning money and, the people running for their lives definitely have no time to make a buck. Zombies represent a civilization that has collapsed. There is nothing but hopelessness as seen in the series, “The Walking Dead” and World War Z. But besides giving people nightmares, how are zombies and the fear of a zombie apocalypse a positive thing?

Survival

To understand why my father and mother and other people living from their generation were so end of days ready, we need to see what life was like when they were born. Fred was born in 1014 and Lucy in 1923. My father was three years old when World War 1 broke out. He and my mother were youngsters when the Great Depression hit.

                                                               

They would tell us stories of how families had to make the best of a horrid situation just to keep their families fed. If nothing else, the Great Depression left the people who lived through it with great survival skills. When you have nothing or you’ve lost everything, then you learn the real meaning of survival. You also get the full meaning of that old saying, “Only the strong survive.” Would we be able to do as well today?

Maybe, the people who are my age, yes I’m talking about us baby boomers, could survive a zombie apocalypse. After all, we had the better of two worlds. We picked up the survival tips from our parents and we benefitted from all the cool inventions that arrived on the scene due to the Space Program.

                                                                

Fred always preached that people should take responsibility for their own survival. He was witness to a nonfunctioning Government with the crash of 29. Life was hard, there were no jobs and people were starving. That’s something that stays with you. Thankfully, Roosevelt came into office and to the rescue. http://www.biography.com/people/franklin-d-roosevelt-9463381

Fred taught all four of his kids to be “street smart”, which leads me to Fred and Lucy’s Helpful Survival Techniques. My parents wanted their offspring ready for any emergency whether a blown out apocalypse with zombies, or an invasion  of the United States by the Communist Army. Fred was a survivor and he was practicing bugging in and out before there was even a Zombie Squad www.zombiesquad.org

                                                                  

I grew up learning to always be prepared for a disaster, but sometimes, you find yourself getting lazy and you say “What could happen” or “I’m sure the government can handle any problem that comes down the road.” Then Hurricane Katrina hit the gulf coast and we saw for ourselves that we could not count on government to rescue us. http://www.history.com/topics/hurricane-katrina Talk about an epiphany!  

How have zombies prepared us to survive? Shows like “The Walking Dead” and World War Z got us to think outside the box. The first thing that goes in any major crisis is communication. Do you have a CB radio in case the internet, television and radio are gone? Do you have enough fresh drinking water? What happens if there isn’t fresh water? Do you know how to make the water safe to drink? You can only last three days without water.
                                                   

Do you have enough canned food in your pantry to last for a week, two weeks? How would you heat the food? What about heat? Do you own a gas powered generator? Do you know how to keep warm if you had no heat for a week or more? Do you have an extra supply of necessary medicines? You will still need that blood pressure pill even during an apocalypse. What if you’re injured? Do you have a medical kit? Do you have weapons? I mean legal, licensed weapons to protect you from marauders?

                                                                 

My father taught us as children how to survive. He made the four of his children street smart and, we in turn, taught our children and grandchildren the same lesson. I think my father could have served as an advisor for “The Walking Dead” in fact, he thought of things the producers of the show had not.

Conclusion

I think all these zombie shows have played an important part in preparing people for any kind of emergency. There are now television shows that teach viewers how to be bonafide preppers aka survivors. Would we have bothered to be so ready if it weren’t for the zombies? I doubt it. So next time you see a television show or movie featuring zombies be sure to thank those pesky little bags or rot. They just may have saved your life.

                                                                          

Part Three of Steampunk Granny's Interview with Director/Actor Patrick Devaney

                                                                         

I saved the best for last on my interview with the very talented Patrick Devaney. Enjoy

Marie Gilbert: “When is the last season of the Zombie Hunters? I want people to know who read my blog.”

Patrick Devaney: “For the last season, the eleventh episode will come out in the summer and then the final one (Episode 12) will be filmed starting January 31, 2015, and probably will come out in January or February 2016 and, as always, it will be on public access all over the country. If people e-mail me or come they come to a show and they see us there, we have DVDs of all the different work that we do, all of it on DVD and any public appearance that we do, anyone can come to talk to us and get whatever they’d like to see.”

                                                                      

Marie Gilbert: “You’ll be at the film festival in New York this year?”

Patrick Devaney: “The New York Horror Show? Yes I’ll be there on Sunday only because we’ll be filming the other two days of the event.”

Marie Gilbert: “What are you showing at this event?”

                                                                 

Patrick Devaney: “I actually won’t be this year because I’m swamped with production of so many things and, this year they’ve asked me to be one of the judges of the film festival which is an enormous honor and I immediately said yes. Adam Ginsberg and LC Macabre, they told me that they wanted me to do this and as soon as I agreed, they informed me that I had 124 films I needed to watch and I said, “Oh, I understand, okay...that’s a lot, but I’m in!” They gave me and the other judges access to them all. The films are some of, especially the short films, they are some of best that I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Marie Gilbert: “Well I’m a big supporter of Independent Films because you’re allowed more freedom and you get better quality because you’re not tied to a big Hollywood studio and you have more of a say on film.”

Patrick Devaney: “I’m happy to hear that, and I’m all for it as well because you don’t have to follow a formula. A lot of the films that I see that are so successful and so brilliant, but they would never get off the drawing board in Hollywood because they didn’t follow a specific marketing formula that they can match to make money. I understand that it’s a business and they have shareholders and they have to make money and that’s how the big gears turn, but on the artistic side, it lacks much. That’s why I love Independent Films, especially Independent Short-form work,, which is my favorite to watch and some of the ideas that I’ve seen in the past six weeks is just amazing work. It’s so nice to see so many people doing such wonderful things.”

              Photo courtesy of photographer, John Sheehan                                              

Marie Gilbert: “One more question. You were in a band or you had your own band?”

Patrick Devaney: “Yes, and an interesting time with that. I was in a number of different bands on the New York circuit in the early to late 80’s. When Manny and Lindsay Serrano from Mass Grave Pictures told me they were looking to set Blood Slaughter Massacre in October of 1984, I was actually in a recording band at that exact point in time, and they asked me if I had any little demos to add to the film’s soundtrack. I not only had that but, the two guys that were in the band with me are both professional musicians today and one of them is in a very successful band that tours the world. I said to Manny and Lindsay “If I can schedule everyone together, they’ve actually agreed to re-record one of those songs for your movie.” So we got the band together twenty-eight years later and we re-recorded some of that music and it’s used it in the film. Blood Slaughter Massacre about to be released by Wild Eye Releasing this spring.

Also, you can talk to the crew from MGP too, if you want, because that movie is nutty and I’m even one of the characters in that too. I play Captain Bracken, the Chief of Police of the Town of Havenwood in the film.”

Marie Gilbert: “So when I see that movie, I’ll be listening to your music?”

Patrick Devaney: “There is a particularly gruesome death scene that you’ll be hearing our music during, yeah.”

Marie Gilbert: “Because of your busy schedule, do you have time to devote to your music?”

Patrick Devaney: “I really haven’t at all. I stopped performing over twenty years ago and just to get this one song together for their movie kind of re-sparked interest in it for me, but I kind of try to leave the work in the hands of the professionals. I know much better musicians than I am so I try to work with a lot of different people, like Charlie Maffia and Steve Montano, the two people I was speaking about earlier. The band we had was called ‘Romeo Penguin’, the band that did the work for Blood Slaughter Massacre.

I also work with a wonderful composer and arranger named Bernadette McCallion, who scores music for shows like The Shield and The Real World and many other major network shows, and she gives me the time to do my independent films as well, which is a godsend with her.

                                                                          

We’ve been friends for twenty-five years and she does this for a living and I get her hand-me-downs mostly, but with my film Aemorraghe, she actually did the score for it. It was all original music and, it’s amazing how everything tied in. She worked with Charlie and Steve from her studio as they worked in The Bastudio in Bayside, NY, on other original music as well as all the Foley. Bernadette also composed at home and then sent the themes over to them and then I would approve everything once they had it properly placed and mixed. Charlie also enlisted a beautiful track from a London-based producer named Vahn who recorded with a singer called Imonomi, and that was the icing on the cake for the soundtrack.  I could not have asked for a better sound team to work with, and that’s why I left it to them!

When you see the film, you’ll see how everything has come together for it. It’s one of the best-sounding Indie short films I’ve ever seen, and I can say that because I take no credit for that aspect of its production. I like to find the most talented person I know, and often, that isn’t me. So I say okay, who is the best for this, and can we get them? That’s what I like to do. Bring everyone in and let all their strengths shine and its one cohesive picture.”

Marie Gilbert: “If my readers want to see Zombie Hunters: City of the Dead, how would they find it?”

Patrick Devaney: “They can find it on Amazon Prime. They can download that or pick up DVD’s from Amazon. DVD copies might also still be for sale in stores like FYE, if you can still find them.

I want to add that for the people reading this: if they appreciate horror and Indie film the way we do, then they should go out to the festivals and go out to the conventions and talk to the people who make these films and support them.

A lot of times, you go to conventions and you’ll see the cast of “The Walking Dead” and you can spend 300 dollars to get a picture with them or, you can spend a fraction of that and pick up three or four Independent Films that you may get more from than a picture with a celebrity. The convention scene is drastically changing now where it’s focused on stardom and these photo ops, and what happens is the Independent producers come in and some of them are mortgaging their houses to make these films and selling them for ten dollars, but people just walk by them and say, ‘I can’t, I just spent one hundred and twenty-five dollars to meet Norman Reedus.’ (this is something that has actually been said to me, and more than once.)

                                                                  

People have different interests, and there’s nothing wrong with autograph collecting. But if people truly love Independent work: sci-fi, drama, horror or whatever, then it needs to be supported. If it’s really good, then people have to be told, “You know this film was exceptionally good.” This will encourage them to do more things and that’s how you keep art going because if not, then it’s just Hollywood and just Transformers movies and that’s all you’ll ever see. That would be a real shame. There should be room for both.”

Marie Gilbert: “Thank you, Patrick for being my guest. It was a pleasure talking and you have to thank Joe Parascand.”

Patrick Devaney: “The pleasure was mine. Thank you very much. Joe is awesome and in an industry that’s built on selfishness, he is the most open guy and the most selfless person who will put everyone ahead of him and equally promote everyone and he really takes cross-promotion to a whole new level. I love the guy as a person. I’ve known him for years, but just being able to work with him...I’m going to be directing him on January 17^th and January 31st in different scenes in for the last two episodes of Zombie Hunters.”

                                                                     

Marie Gilbert: “Tell Joe I said hello. You know Joe has referred a lot of people to me to interview and you are all nice, good people, who love and do top quality work. Thank you again, Patrick.

And to all my little zombie snacks out there, if you make it out to the New York Horror Show go looking for Patrick Devaney and tell him Steampunk Granny sent you

Part Two of Steampunk Granny's Interview of Director/Actor Patrick Devaney

                                                       

 

Hi, my little zombie snacks. I’m back with Part 2 of my interview of Director/ Actor Patrick Devaney where we learn more about the First Zombie series on television and Devaney’s character in Ryan Scott Webber’s Pretty Fine Things. Join me now as I learn more about the world of Independent Film

Marie Gilbert: “On your IMDb, it has you working with Ryan Scott Webber and Pretty Fine Things, and you are an actor in that film, right?”

Patrick Devaney: “Yes, I’m one of the leads and I play Thomas Banner, one of the three Banner brothers that are the main protagonists as well as the anti-heroes of the film. We are three brothers who are criminally insane in different ways and we come home because our dad’s health is failing, so it’s a very creepy story. We play psychopaths in it and I get to work with Joe Parascand, who I love working with. I’ve directed him before, I’ve acted with him and I love it, but I also get to work with Adam Ginsberg, who is just fantastic, so the three of us as the brothers in this movie... I hope everybody gets to see this because they are going to really enjoy it.”

                                           Patrick Devaney, Joe Parascand, Adam Ginsberg

                                                                  

Marie Gilbert: “Joe Parascand is in the film too? He’s the one that introduced me to you. He’s been very good at promoting people and he knows that anyone that he sends to me is someone that I’m excited to interview. I met Joe because of The Soulless. So...now you’re wrapping up on the Zombie Hunters: City of the Dead and I see in your bio that you do star in non-horror shows like Elementary, Law and Order, but is your love really for the horror films?”

Patrick Devaney: “I would say that up to a point, my love has always been for horror films and for sci-fi films. I find myself going more into the science fiction/fantasy realm of horrific things and my favorite director in the world is Guillermo Del Toro. I mean, I love Pan’s Labyrinth and could watch it every day, and the Hellboy movies. The things he comes up with, that dark fantasy and the science based fantasies? I love that, and I’ve been working more towards that.

My first move towards this, while we were doing the second season of Zombie Hunters, I made a short film called ‘Aemorraghe, which is a based on a story from Heavy Metal Magazine back in  1982 that I read as a teenager. I found the artist, an amazing illustrator named Caza, and got the rights to it and wrote, produced, and directed the film. It was shot by Mark Boutros and the crew from MGP, and stars Vivienne Cleary, an amazing actress that carried the weight of the film in ways I could never have even hoped for. But yes, it’s definitely the vein I want to go more into. It’s pure science fiction and science fantasy. It has some horrific elements to it in terms of theme, but overall it’s a positive film and yeah, it just got into its twenty-first film festival this year.”

Marie Gilbert: “Wow, alright.”

Patrick Devaney: “Yeah, I’m pretty happy with that.”

Marie Gilbert:  “I would want to see this.”

                                                                     

Patrick Devaney: “I’ll send you the link and the password for it and you can watch it online; the screener that the festivals watch.”

Marie Gilbert: “Okay and you have to let us know how it does at the festival. When is the festival?”

Patrick Devaney: “The next festival that we know it’s in will be the Patterson Film Festival this Spring. It’s already done twenty others since it premiered at the Macabre Faire Film Festival last January, and I’m waiting to hear from about forty other festivals it’s running for over the rest of its public run. We tried to book it in two-hundred-fifty of them. We got about a twelve percent acceptance rate, which is pretty good.”

Marie Gilbert: “I would say so. Now, what was the film that hooked you onto horror and science fiction as a child?”

Patrick Devaney: “Whenever I talk about this, I always blame my mom. When I was an infant, she would sit me up in front of the T.V. with her and watch the original Dark Shadows first run. As I was growing up, I would sit next to her and she would explain, ‘Okay, now that’s Barnabas and he’s a vampire and Angelique is a witch,” etc. And, what’s really cool is that I just got to meet Sharon Smyth who played Sarah Collins in the show! I got to tell her that story and that was very cool. She’s a wonderful lady and if you can meet her, she’s amazing. It started for me from there and for horror stuff, but the first movie I remember seeing on television that really scared the hell out of me was a T.V. movie called Let’s Scare Jessica to Death.”

Marie Gilbert: “I think I remember that one.”

Patrick Devaney: “It was a weird movie about vampires and had a very strange take on them and it scared the hell out of me. But, for the sci-fi stuff I grew up watching Star Trek even the first run Star Trek, and before Star Wars came out, there was a wonderful show that came out of England called Space 1999. It stared Martin Landau and Barbara Bain from Mission:Impossible and it was a beautiful science fiction show on BBC in 1975 and that hooked me into sci-fi instantly and then two years later, Star Wars came out and I was done, totally addicted. I was a nine year old kid watching Star Wars and saying, “Okay, I’m done. You can end it now, I’m good!”

So yeah, that strange combination of character-driven horror and over-the-top science-fiction, I always try to combine those two things and hopefully, I can be doing this for the rest of my life.”

Marie Gilbert: “You write a lot of the scripts, so you’re a writer, director, actor and producer, so what hat do you like to wear the most?”

Patrick Devaney: “Currently, I really enjoy being someone else for a while and, I enjoy acting in different things. I get to work at least one if not two days a week on different network television shows, mostly as background and sometimes featured roles, but mostly general background. I get to watch those kinds of crews again, and that helps me in being a director because now I can see what actors really need from their crews and their director. I’m really enjoying that a lot right now and also to be able to work with guys like Joe Parascand and Adam Ginsberg and to act with that level of ability; to work with those guys and bounce back and forth from them? That was just a total gift.

        Photo courtesy of photographer John Sheehan                                                       

But I really love doing it all. For example, I’m currently writing a web series that we will start filming in May with an upcoming producer named Lauren Loizidis.  We created this fictionalized version of Mastic, New York, called “Mastic PD”, where all these strange kinds of things go on and we are members of the police department and have to investigate them. This is a project based off characters from the Ormsby’s Cinema Insane universe, created by John Sheehan. I’ve been writing that with her for maybe three months, but she’s also one of the new Zombie Hunters, so it’s very interesting. I get to direct her in scenes, but she’s also my new writing partner. It’s an interesting dynamic where we are wearing different hats with each other now; a different way of doing it. But, I work some aspect of this every single day. I’m doing some kind of production every day and I do write every day, even if it’s just a note to myself saying ‘make sure you finish that story about the cop that did this…’. Yeah it’s a daily task, but I love it.”

I'll be stopping part two here, my little zombie snacks and returning on Tuesday with part three of my interview with Independent Director/ Actor Patrick Devaney. Don't be late. There is more to learn.

Part One of Steampunk Granny's interview with Patrick Devaney of Zombie Hunters: City of the Dead

                                                          

                                                       

Steampunk Granny has a guardian angel named Joe Parascand who tells me about some very talented people in Independent Films. Through these many interviews, I’ve made a lot of new friends, but it seemed that with the different interviews that I’d done about Independent Films, there was one name that kept coming up, Patrick Devaney. It was time for me to meet the creator of the first zombie show on television.

Marie Gilbert: “Thank you for taking the time to do this interview with me, Patrick. Why don’t we start off with you telling us a little bit about yourself, your acting, directing and am I right, producing?”

Patrick Devaney: “Yeah, I actually started out that way. I always wanted to do film work in general my whole life, but I kind of put that on pause because I was in the music industry for a while, then I was doing finance for a while. But at one of the places I worked at doing finance, we rented space out to the various Law and Order shows. And, I was selling them locations and at one point I was doing four different Law and Order’s several times a year, so they were a regular staple and I would watch them film and I watched this for years. The more I watched it the more I thought; you know I think we have enough people that we could do this.

We always wanted to see a zombie based T.V. series and there never was one, so we could wait the rest of our lives or we could make our own. I got a number of people together that had gone to film school and I asked them their advice and then got some other people together and asked if they would want to be in it and we started Zombie Hunters: City of the Dead. We came up with the idea in 2005 and it first aired in December of 2007, but the only outlet that we had was public access T.V. I had no contacts other than renting out space for L&O, so the only place we could get access was on public T.V. Since we started with one station in Queens, we’ve been on seventy-five stations across the nation since.”

                                                                          

                                                          

Marie Gilbert: “Wow, so Zombie Hunters: City of the Dead came out before The Walking Dead?”

Patrick Devaney: “Oh yes, we came out several years before The Walking Dead, actually. We were the very first broadcast zombie-based T.V. series in history. We were the very first ones ever on the air, the debut was in December 2007 with the pilot episode and it has been continuously on the air ever since in one way or another. It started out on Queens Public Access and it’s still running on Queens Public Access to this day.”

Marie Gilbert: “I did get to see the first episode of season one, so with Zombie Hunters are you using the same cast every season?”

Patrick Devaney: “We’ve made it pretty much consistent, I’ve been very lucky in that. If someone doesn’t die, they pretty much come back. We’re actually wrapping up the series this year. We’re filming the very last episode in 2015 and that’s going to wrap up the entire series and some of the people that were from the very first show and continuously with the show will be there at the very end and, we are even bringing back some of the zombies that were in the very first pilot episode.

We are bringing them back eight years later. I’ve already spoke to some of them and they were like, just let me know when! It started out just to see if we could do it and to date, we’ve had over four-hundred people work on the show.”

Marie Gilbert: “How many episodes do you have per season for the last eight years? In 2015, it will be eight years.”

Patrick Devaney: “The first season was eight episodes and the second season was going to be another eight, but we cut it down and are wrapping up the show on the twelfth episode. For a while we were averaging two or three episodes a year, and in later years since we had gone onto so many other film projects; to get one out a year has been a miracle. We realized that with so many projects going on right now, we had to shorten the series down and are ending in 2015. Yes, we are going with that, but it has been a continuous storyline and continuous characters and the entire series only takes place over the course of five months.”

Marie Gilbert: “Oh, okay.”

Patrick Devaney: “Yes, so in the storyline, this event happens and no one believes it at first. What we tried to do was show what if George Romero and John Russo’s original idea for Night of the Living Dead actually happened in New York City today. What would it be like? So that has always been the premise of the show. And what we thought was that in a city like New York, no one would believe it at first. If you saw things going on, you would just call the Cops. You wouldn’t think there were zombies. You would just think that they were crazy people or on drugs or whatever and, if the government actively covered it up, we go for almost a month before anyone in authority even admits that this is happening! So, it’s not worldwide and it starts in New Jersey and it spreads out from there, so...it’s a slow progression and most people still don’t buy it until it’s too late and by the time it’s too late; no one is prepared for it. That’s where we are right now and things have gotten horribly worse and no one is prepared except for us and, the end of the world is upon them.”

Marie Gilbert: “That is so interesting especially since it is taking place in the city because normally when you talk about a zombie apocalypse, they always say that the city is the worst place to stay. It’s better to go out to the countryside. But, your guys are staying in the city. How was staying in the city better for the characters?”

Patrick Devaney: “Well, we sat down and talked about this and I think that most people wouldn’t think to leave. I mean, I’ve lived in New York City for forty-six years and I couldn’t think of where else to go. I don’t have a house anywhere else and most of my family is still in the city.

I wouldn’t even know where to go, really. I think a lot of people in New York, most don’t have firearms and most get around by the train so what do you do? Do you rent a car and find a gun and try to go somewhere that you don’t know, or would you figure out maybe I’ll stay put and see what happens.

Unfortunately, we had that really happen when 9/11 occurred and most people did not flee the city. Most people stayed exactly where they were and if they had to get to Queens, they walked over the bridges. What we did was stay in the city not knowing what would happen next and knowing that the city was a target; we all stayed in the city and we all went to work two days later. So, I think that in any kind of emergency, people in a major city, until they see that it’s bad and the food runs out and the water stops and the gas runs out, they are going to stay put. So, our characters pretty much said, we’ve been lifelong New Yorkers and we have access to some guns and we know people where we can get more guns from. We’re going to stay put and that’s what we do until it’s really far too late.”

Marie Gilbert: “In a way, that does make sense. You stay where you’re comfortable and you know the area. Now you play Billy Cassidy in this series. Is he the main protagonist of the story? Is everything centered on Billy?”

Patrick Devaney: “He started out that way, but it’s quickly progressed that the real leader of the group, who has been holding it all together, is Paul Michael Bates, who is played by Christopher J. Murphy. He is also a fan-favorite and people really respond well to him.

Billy is kind of a jerk. He’s moody and he’s not very positive and the character of Bates is like, “Listen things are bad, but we got this by the ass,” to quote Dawn of the Dead, “We got this by the ass and we are fine.” Bates has readily become the fan-favorite, so you see in the series as it goes along that he’s started taking more of a leadership role, also because Billy kind of vanishes for a while and Bates has to deal with everything on his own. Eventually, Billy comes back into the fold and he’s changed. He’s different and when the series wraps up, you’ll see the changes in him. There are a few main characters like John Salazar, played by Rick Martinez, who is always there and he plays the voice of reason. He is the only person with military training. He is the person who holds things together on a much more non-emotional level and on practical level. We see the things that he goes through; he loses his entire family at one point so we see the different ways that the different characters progress and we’ve lost some along the way. Yeah, so anyone who has survived so far will be there at the end.”

     Photo courtesy of photographer John Sheehan                                                              

Marie Gilbert: “Besides working on Zombie Hunters that will end in 2015, do you see this series becoming a movie?”

Patrick Devaney: “It’s funny, people have asked me that before, but we don’t really see it becoming a movie only because we are finishing up the story completely at the end of the season with the last episode and we actually explain everything that goes on. We explain what the zombies are and where they come from and we do a big reveal for this. The fate of the characters may be up in the air and that is kind of left to the viewer, but what really happens is that we do finish the series properly and explain everything. We don’t leave a lot to conjecture, and it’s not going to just end abruptly.

But, like I said there are so many more projects that we are writing and producing and moving on towards; plus, most of my crew is made up of a company called Mass Grave Pictures and they have their own projects going on right now. They finished their first feature film called Blood Slaughter Massacre, and they are currently filming another one called In the Shadow of the Imp. So, it’s very creepy kind of horror stuff and they are all doing their own projects, so everyone is kind of spreading out from there. To keep this series going, I mean we’re all for working together, but there are so many projects to do.”

Okay, my little zombie snacks, we are going to end part one of this interview here and pick up with part two on Monday.

Pssst Have You Heard?? Roof Oasis is out!!!!

                    Grand Announcement!!!!

My apocalyptic/science fiction tale is out!!! You can buy Roof Oasis on Amazon, and Kindle. Check my calendar for upcoming book signings and you can purchase Roof Oasis on Amazon.com

                                         

How do you survive in a world controlled by a mad man? What if this dictator controlled the very food and water you needed to survive? When the use of bio-warfare inadvertently brings about the end of civilization, twins Michael and Lucy try to escape from the zombie horde, but their only salvation may lay with an old Victorian mirror in the attic of their family home…..

                                        

I’m sending a big hug to all my supporters for their patience and encouragement.

Steampunk Granny Chats with Actress Kaylin Iannone from The Soulless

                                                                      

 

Thanks to Joe Parascand who played Sgt. Benton in the film The Soulless, and Christopher Eilenstine, the director of The Soulless, I was introduced to one of the younger actresses on the set, Kaylin Iannone.

                                                                            

The Soulless is a story about the apocalypse, but with a new type of zombie and stars Jason Propst, Jennifer Teska, Michael Chartier and Jeff Caplan. Kaylin Iannone stars as Nicole Peterson at the age of twelve.

What’s it like for a young girl to be in a zombie movie and surrounded by the shuffling dead?  Find out with my interview with Kaylin and her mother, Kelly.

                                                                      

                                       Kaylin and Mom on set of Law and Order

Marie Gilbert: “How did Kaylin get started in acting?”

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “Kaylin was doing karate and was doing well with that and we went to watch a demonstration; a karate team. While we were there, there was a theatre company and they were doing a review of a show they were currently putting up. She was only six at the time.

So, we spoke to the owner of the theatre and we asked him what happens and how does this work and he told us to come out for auditions. I started following their webpage and we went over for the auditions for The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. Kaylin got a small part. She was a little forest animal in that first show. Kaylin started doing theatre from there. Kaylin loved it so much that my husband and I got her an acting coach just to help her audition better; never looking for anything to happen with it, but at the end of the session, the coach said, “I want her to see this manager.”

We met with Eileen DeNobile and Kaylin was signed up. Kaylin has done voice overs and has been on Law and Order, but it really started with stage and Kaylin has twenty one shows under her belt and she’s in rehearsals for her school play, The Little Mermaid and she is playing the part of Ursula. Kaylin is so excited about this part; she wanted it so bad.”

Marie Gilbert: “So Kaylin does more stage than film?”

Kelly Karaban Iannone: Yes, it keeps her busy. It gives her something to do and it’s with a nice group of kids. Even when she’s done shows with adults, it’s always a nice group of people. Kaylin can just as easily have a conversation with a four year old as she can with a sixty year old.

Neither one of my kids will ever be afraid to stand up in front of people and talk. I remember being their age having to do an oral report; I was sick to my stomach, but not Kaylin. She’s not afraid to talk in front of people. She started acting at six and can continue until she’s ninety-six; it’s a nice hobby.”

Marie Gilbert: “How did Eileen DeNobile help Kaylin get parts?”

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “She helped Kaylin get the voice over for the National Forestry Association and a speaking part on Law and Order.”

Marie Gilbert: “What was her part?”

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “She played the part of Tina, a student of a piano teacher who was accused of murder. The title of that episode was “Totem.”

Marie Gilbert: “Has Kaylin in other movies besides The Soulless?”

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “Kaylin and her younger sister, Carlee, just did a short called the Legend of Zeke. It’s like Frosty the Snowman meets the zombies. Ryan Scott Weber is the director of that.

Marie Gilbert: “I just did an interview on Ryan.”

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “Yes, I read it.”

Marie Gilbert: “How did she get the part for a zombie movie The Soulless?”

                                                                            

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “Well she had done some webisodes for Christopher Eilenstine and he liked her work. He was going to use Kaylin in another movie Dahkranon Rising falling, but that was put on hold and he approached us about The Soulless. Even though Kaylin and I would watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer together, I was concerned because Kaylin is not a scary movie kid. But she got to see how they put the zombies together and watched as they put on their makeup.

                                                                    

                                                                      

She saw the cast before and after makeup, and plus, Christopher explained the whole premise of the show to her and she liked being the heroine and kicking butt. There was this one part where the other little girl, Alexandria Gonzalez who plays Melisa was attacked…and it…was… very upsetting. The other girl’s mother and I had to leave the set during that scene; we could not watch it.

Marie Gilbert: “How did this scene affect Kaylin and Alexandria?”

                                                                      

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “It was rough, but Kaylin and Alexandria would get themselves in the mode. Kaylin did what she had to do and so did Alexandria. The two of them did an excellent job and you could see that they are friends and it showed in the movie. They are troopers and never complained.

Marie Gilbert: “What were the hours like while filming? Did it interfere with her schooling?”

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “No, Chris was always good about working around her schedule because Kaylin knows that school comes first. There were days we started early in the morning and worked until late and days that were really cold, but she had a great time.

Marie Gilbert: “How old is Kaylin?”

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “Kaylin is fourteen now, but when she started the movie she was only twelve. She’s five foot eight now, but when the movie began she was only five foot five.

Marie Gilbert: “The other actors were older than her. How did they relate to Kaylin?”

                                                                       

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “Jason Propst who played her father in the movie is like an older brother to her. That had a fantastic relationship. He’s moving to Colorado and I know Kaylin is going to be devastated when he does.

Marie Gilbert: “Before we get Kaylin on the conference call, what are your plans for her future as far as education?”

Kelly Karaban Iannone: “I just want her happy. If this is something she wants to do, then I’ll do what I can to help her, but my thing has always been about the acting that it’s a fantastic hobby, but it’s a hard life. You don’t have to be in front of the camera to be a star; she could do editing, teaching drama, video production, makeup like on Face Off.

 

Kelly calls Kaylin on a conference call

Marie Gilbert: “Hi Kaylin. I was chatting with your mom on her thoughts about your part in The Soulless and now I get to question you.”

Kaylin Iannone: “Hi.”

Marie Gilbert: “Kaylin which do you enjoy more, stage or film?”

Kaylin Iannone: “I love going on stage because you get one shot and one shot only because you don’t get to do takes over and over again, but then on film; you do get to do it over until you get it right. This is the first film that I’ve ever done, so I think that I’m going to start leaning towards film.”

 Marie Gilbert: “What was it like for you to be in a zombie movie? You started when you were twelve, so what was it like on that first day knowing that this was a scary movie?”

Kaylin Iannone: “Absolutely amazing. There were so many people there, and the makeup and the cameras, I said “I feel like a movie star and this is so cool.”

Marie Gilbert: “You weren’t frightened of anything?”

                                                                     

Kaylin Iannone: “No, because I saw their makeup being put on…otherwise I would have probably been scared.”

Marie Gilbert: “Would you consider doing more scary movies?”

Kaylin Iannone: “Absolutely!”

Marie Gilbert: “Is there any movie coming up or that is already out there that you would love to be a part of?”
Kaylin Iannone: “I was thinking I would love to do a movie like the Hunger Games trilogy.”

Marie Gilbert: “What about the stage? What stage show would you love to be the star?”
Kaylin Iannone: “Wicked, absolutely, hands down, Wicked.”

Marie Gilbert:  “Which character?”

Kaylin Iannone: “I would love to be Elphaba.”

Marie Gilbert: “Great show and great part. Kaylin, you’re fourteen years old. What are your plans for the future and what would you do if you didn’t stay with the theatre or films?”

Kaylin Iannone: “I’ve wanted to be a veterinarian since I was very little, so I would probably be a veterinarian.”

Marie Gilbert: “Is there any new parts in film or stage coming up for you?”

Kaylin Iannone: “Well I’ve got the part of Ursula in my school’s production of The Little Mermaid coming up.”

                                                                

Marie Gilbert: “How are you preparing for that part?”
Kaylin Iannone: I’m working with my vocal coach to be able to get out there with my voice and working on my lines.”

Marie Gilbert: “How will you play Ursula differently than Disney?”

Kaylin Iannone: “I would do it a little differently and I’ve been working on her walk.” Marie Gilbert: “When is the school play?”

Kaylin Iannone: “In March, the 26^th and 27^th.

Marie Gilbert: “Kaylin, we’ll end the interview, but I wanted to say that you are a very talented young lady and very pretty. I did get to view some of the scenes with you in The Soulless. You were great and I’m wishing you the best of luck and whatever career you choose, you have that winner attitude and that will get you through the toughest times. Thank you Kelly and Kaylin for taking the time to do this interview with me.”

Kelly and Kaylin Iannone: “We appreciate you interviewing us. Thank you.”

                                                            

There you have it my little zombie snacks. I really enjoyed speaking with Kaylin and her mother and I can’t wait until the movie is out. I’ll keep you all updated on when and where you’ll be able to see The Soulless. Remember this is not your run of the mill zombie movie. FORGET EVERYTHING YOU KNOW ABOUT THE LIVING DEAD...THE RULES HAVE CHANGED!

You can find Joe Parascand’s interview here and here, and Christopher Eilenstine’s interview here and here. Ryan Scott Weber’s interview is here.