Posted in: Exclusive, Horror, Interview, Movies | Tagged: Colin Krawchuk, Dread Central, Epic Pictures, interview, Lelia Symington, The Jester

The Jester Director Colin Krawchuk on Expanding Shorts to Feature Film

Writer and director Colin Krawchuk talks to Bleeding Cool about his feature debut in Epic Pictures & Dread's horror thriller The Jester.

When Colin Krawchuk originally conceived of The Jester, he never intended it to go beyond his three shorts released over three years since his first was released in 2016. The opportunity came knocking when Epic Pictures saw its potential to develop into a feature film. Krawchuk spoke to Bleeding Cool about his journey to reinvent The Jester, working with creative partner Michael Sheffield, who also plays the title character and casting. The film follows a malevolent being known as The Jester terrorizing a small town's inhabitants on Halloween night, including two estranged sisters who must come together to find a way to defeat this evil entity.

The Jester: Krawchuk's Journey from Shorts to Feature Film

Bleeding Cool: When you got to work on 'The Jester,' it initially developed as a series of shorts. Can you tell me about the process of how the film became a reality?
Krawchuk: We made the push for it back in 2016, and it was part of our yearly tradition to make a horror short film every October. For some reason, that first 'The Jester' short blew up. We decided to make another one the following year. After that, it was all anybody wanted to see. We tried to wrap it up with the third one, and a couple of years later, I got a phone call from an Epic [Pictures] executive wanting to turn 'The Jester' into a feature film. It was a crazy opportunity and terrifying at the same time.

You've been directing shorts for a while. What is the most challenging part of making that leap into the feature?
You are dealing with specific time and budget constraints. It's interesting because you technically have more money and time in the films than when you're making the short films independently. There is no deadline other than those that you set for yourself. When you're making a short, you can say, "We didn't get this, and we can come back next month and do it." When you're making the feature, they tell you, "All right, you have 14 days to shoot this feature film." You don't have time, and everybody else's schedules are built around this time frame that had been set. If you don't get it, like we didn't get several things for our film, you must figure it out. Otherwise, you don't get to return next month and get it again.

With the resources at hand, when you came to cast and crew, did you retain anyone who worked with you on the shorts, or was it a fresh start for 'The Jester?'
In a lot of aspects, it started from square one. Luckily, I got to work with Mike Sheffield, who played The Jester in the shorts and was my writing partner for everything I've made. I got to work on the treatment for the story with Mike and work with him as the character himself. I wouldn't have been able to make this film without him. I'm so thankful that got to happen.

As a creative partner, how does Mike complement your talent?
The biggest benefit to having a creative partner like Mike is having somebody creative whom you can completely trust their opinion, especially when trying to come up with ideas for a treatment for a movie. If you're working by yourself, a lot of times you wonder if something is going to work. If I'm making something with Mike and he says, "This idea is terrible," it doesn't hurt my feelings because I know the idea wasn't good, and I trust that. We can do the same, so it helps us focus on what works about specific things, throw out things when they don't work, and not waste time. I'm trying to make an idea work that clearly isn't. It's good to have somebody who aligns creatively like that. That's not something that I've found often.

What are the influences that helped become the characters of the film?
This was subconscious. I wasn't intentionally thinking of anything specific when making the characters. Honestly, what influenced us the most was the mask we found in Walgreens. We built the character's look off that mask, and they built the character's performance off of the suit. There are many things that we pull from. You can even compare Pennywise, Freddy Krueger, or any of those kinds of things here and there. We never reference any of that stuff. When we were on set, we tried to figure out what the personality of the character is and how that personality affects his actions.

Given the horror trends, there's always a potentially expanding narrative with the subject. Was there any serious discussion of long-term plans with 'The Jester?'
If you're talking about when we made the shorts, do we have plans for where we ended up now? No, we did not. The original 'Jester' was answered: what if we made up an urban legend as a short film? 'The Jester' was initially made for the short film structure. Once you get enough people to see it, the question starts: "This could be the thing that gets us into the feature film and breaks us into that arena. What would a feature film based on 'The Jester look like?" We never overthought about it. It wasn't something we thought would work like The Jester character was made for the shorts. We could sustain a 90-minute feature film, so we were focused on turning The Jester into a feature. When you get the phone call that says, "Do you want to make 'The Jester' a feature film?" You say, "Yes." It was a challenge for us to figure out how to take the essence of the short film and make it feel like it's from the same family, but it is an entirely different story.

Can you tell me about the cast and how they made it work?
Much of the cast were locals from Frederick, Maryland, where we shot. I was most worried about the two sister characters because they are the ones that, if they're not cast correctly, the film won't work. 'The Jester' would work because Mike plays the title role, so I wasn't worried about it. We didn't cast the sisters until late in the process, and it took a couple of months for me to remotely receive the self-tapes and auditions from sites where I wrote play characters because I'm based in Florida. All the pre-production for this is done remotely. When I was sent Lelia Symington's audition for Emma, I knew she was it. She has toughness and aggression, but she also has the woundedness of that character that I wanted to convey. I'm happy with the cast in this movie, especially the leads.

Was there any sequence that stood out that you're proud of?
From a writing perspective, I'm proud of the bar scene between the two sisters, played by Lelia and Delaney White (Jocelyn), because I've never written a lengthy dialog scene. There's a monologue from Emma, which was the first I wrote; developing that scene and then watching the actors bring it to life was an exciting and validating experience. It was a chance for those characters to interact and the audience to learn about them on screen. My favorite Jester scene is where Emma calls her mom, and The Jester walks up the stairs toward her. I like that scene because it's upsetting and a new thing we had not seen The Jester do before. He is communicating through this weird other voice over the phone, and Emma has to listen to her mom, the only person she trusts. It's a satisfying and disturbing thing.

Dread Central's & Epic's The Jester is available on demand and digital.

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