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Some of the best nights of my life were being had in parking lots.
A lot is riding on the album.
It also features cameos from comedy favorites includingSarah Sherman,Jeremy and Rajat, andEdy Modica.
(The two note that the films brief run time puts it just shy ofDumbo.)
After a festival run, its available now onOMalleys YouTube channel.
Howd the project come about?
We went and we shot it, and then we just didnt like what we shot.
He watched it and he was laughing a lot, and he cut together a ten-minute short.
At what point, then, did what you had shot start to actually feel like a feature?
You cant really make a mistake.
Theres no wrong character choice.
So we thought it would make sense for our characters to be a little combative.
I wanted to ask about the period-piece element.
Why specifically 2009, and how did that start opening up other ideas?
I havent seen a brimmed beanie in a while.C.O.
Its a huge mistake we cant make again.
How manyDark Knightreferences are in the movie?
I cant remember any.C.O.:None.
D.S.:Zero.
We talked about how these guys wouldnt have bought the newest camera in 2009. :I made this video in 2018 and bought a DV cam for it.
Its called Teens Save the Mall.
I just went to a dead mall.
Danny, what was it like co-directing this with Conner, who often directs his own stuff?D.S.
:Danny was directing in character too.
Its such a small cast and crew that everybody has jokes in this movie.
The whole time, we didnt really know what we were making.
I have an internet thing, I look like I planned this.But no.
Now youre making a feature film for the first time.C.O.
:We got close, yeah.
You got to 56 minutes, at least.C.O.
:Yeah, I mean,Dumbos like, what, 60 minutes?
:We said we want to make almost oneDumbo.
:Yeah, theres five minutes ofDumbothat sucks.
Rap Worlds such a fun movie to watch with an audience.
It struck me that it could become a midnight movie that just plays occasionally at rep houses forever.
Have you guys had that experience of watching it with audiences?C.O.
:Yeah, that really affected our editing process.
I use this word positively, but its so stupid.
Its really, really dumb.
We would cut it together, and wed imagine somebody at, like, Sundance having to watch it.
Like,Theyre gonna hate it.
Theyre gonna send the FBI to arrest us.
Its weird to watch a movie that you wouldve downloaded on LimeWire at BAM.
You might miss some jokes because people are laughing over the joke that happened half a second before that.
So he did it.
I feel like if the movie stopped for a second, it would just fall apart.
Its a funny reveal that Conners character is 32 years old.
Was that always the case, or just something you improvised?C.O.
We wanted to capture that.
But yeah, we wanted that age difference.
:There were 70 hours of footage that Jack watched all of.
:It was Amazing Grace, but they changed the lyrics to like, Amazing Dave.
But 95 percent is Jacks initial cut.
What do you think Paul Schrader would think of this movie?D.S.
:I think hed say its transcendental cinema.
:[Holds up a book of Paul Schraders screenplays.]
A lot easier than watching his movies is reading the scripts.
Its cerebral I go into Cerebro.
I was asking jokingly, but there is an element of Schrader in there.C.O.
But I was like,I wonder if we could get Schrader to moderate one of these.
:Hes asking for people to bother him.
Hesgiving away his couch on Facebook.
:I think about thatvideo he made on the High Linea lot.
People have tagged me in it.
What are we doing next?
Thats why this movie is an odd length and shot on DVs.
Those are the correct choices at those moments and the most funny.
But Schraders the king.
Howd you go about writing those?C.O.
:In Jacks defense, he had ten songs, or at least concepts.
John Gandolfini Is My Favorite Actor, Positive School Shooting … C.O.
:Positive School Shooting was mine.
What was the concept there?C.O.
:Reverse of a school shooting.
Going in and enlightening these kids that these teachers are poisoning their minds.
Shooting a diamond bullet of information into a students head to make them more alive.
:Like the kid that yells at the teacher.
:That was Jack off the dome.
:When did Gaddafi get overthrown?
Nobody talks about how Gaddafi wrote a thing calledThe Green Bookand then that movie won an Oscar.
Has any of us seenGreen Book?
It could be mentioned in there for all we know.C.O.
:Ive seenGreen Bookon YouTube Shorts.
Has anyone from Tobyhanna seenRap World?
How do they think you did on capturing it authentically?D.S.
:Someone from nearby there informed us during a Q&A that we mispronounce it, and itsToby-hannah.
Theres something … C.O.
:Its the Paris nearest to Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania.
Is that still true now that youve put out a low-budget feature?
Whats next for you guys?C.O.
:Im writing a couple of things.
One would be a really expensive movie, and then another one would be below a million.
I go back and forth on which one I see actually being able to happen.
Same thing with Jack or Eric.
That base-level collaboration is what really is most exciting, and that generally is something thats incredibly low-budget.
So theyre just these cooks who never leave the base and just make food for the U.S. military.
:Conners given me such agency as an editor and director and helped me grow that.
I want to continue working with Conner on whatever hes got going on, and then have
C.O.
:Danny, stick around after Chris takes off.
I got to talk to you for a second.