Was I Insane?

Why I Toured With My Films And Books

I get asked a lot, how did my Independent Distribution/Tours begin? What was I thinking and why did I do it?

I cover this in some of the books I’ve written but let me give you a condensed version over the next few weeks.

First and foremost I was broke and heavily in debt! I had no money coming in from any of my work and I was trying to figure out how to make a go of it with my own films. I had distribution screenings, but basically no one wanted to take a chance on me no matter how good my films were.

I had a great track record with film festivals. Audiences loved my work, and most of the distributors liked my films, they just didn’t want to commit to buying and distributing them. Neither I nor my cast were famous so they were at a loss on how to market my work. (Don’t get me started on the other “unknowns” they had taken chances on in the past…)

I believed in myself and the work. And I was naive enough to believe I could make this work. I mean, how tough could touring be? As it turned out a lot tougher, and rewarding than I could ever have imagined.

I had experimented with a few week long tours around various parts of the country. They had gone well and I made some money and audiences really liked my films. I set my sights on doing a two-month tour across the country. My original booking approach consisted of art house theaters, media art centers, colleges, and universities.

When I started touring seriously I had three features, eight short films, and a couple of documentaries that I wanted to get seen.

Who Are You?

The first roadblock I ran into was, “Who are you?” and “Why should we book you?” Which were valid questions. Since no one knew much about me and my films I put together a couple paragraphs about my films and me as a director. I also included my work as Gus Van Sant’s Sound Designer.

The Van Sant connection opened doors and got people interested. Once I got their attention I knew I had to deliver. My screenings and lectures had to be good, so I worked on my presentations.

Side Note – I really hated/feared getting up in front of people and speaking so I knew I was going to have to overcome that right away if I was going to have any success.

Making Money

People were reluctant to pay me much with a couple of exceptions. The most notable being a company that distributes porn (via satellite) to hotel rooms all across the country. If you wish to know more about that adventure I’ll write about that one for next week. Or you can pick up a copy of my book, Road Dog.

For this first tour I put together twenty-five dates with too many down days in between. My plan was to continue booking while I was on the road. That was partially successful. I agreed to a bunch of gigs for free, plus room and board, to establish myself, which ended up ended up biting me in the ass later. Yes I played a "free gig" at the Wreck Room, a bar in Fort Worth. I didn't sell any DVDs but had a lot of beers bought for me…

What I didn’t know was that colleges, universities, and even some media art centers told me to invoice them after I had done my speaking engagement or workshop. I was rarely paid at the time, and even after submitting an invoice I was paid 30 days after they received it.

I Need Merchandise

Because of my early short tours, I knew I had to support myself on the road with merchandise sales. Most companies want money up front, or on delivery, when it came to making DVD’s and t-shirts. (This was before I had any books to sell.)

I found a local Portland company who believed in me so they fronted one thousand blank DVDs and cases so I could burn them myself. Which I did. One DVD at a time. On an old computer. Each DVD took roughly 20 minutes to burn. I printed labels on the blank DVD’s with a printer I had. You can imagine all of the ink cartridges I went through on a thousand DVDs.

An employee/manager at my local copy shop gave me huge discounts on the covers for the DVDs which I had to trim by hand to fit in the boxes one at a time.

My living room and dining room were crammed with DVDs and boxes in various stages of being completed. All of this took fourteen solid days working sixteen hours a day at home.

A Borrowed Truck and Canopy

For a reliable car I borrowed a pick-up truck from my father and a canopy from a friend. That became the first tour vehicle. The DVDs took up so much space in the back of the truck there wasn’t room for anything else, so my clothes, cooler, and food rode up in the cab with me. It was tight.

Running on very little sleep, I left town on that first day later than I had planned.

I spent my first night on the road staying with friends in Boise. Over dinner I got really drunk on wine (a combination lack of sleep and frayed nerves as I was about to do something really scary) and backed into a mail box. I didn't do any damage but the next morning I felt like shit. Not a promising start.

I had no idea how this was all going to work, but it needed to.

In my pocket was enough money to get to my first stop, Boulder, Colorado. If I didn't make money there the tour was over. I literally didn't have enough money to get me to my next stop, or to get back home. I had to deliver.

Naively, I still had no idea that most of the places I had booked wouldn’t pay me until much later…

In the next installment I’ll write about my first few tour stops, including teaching an audio workshop at a company that distributes porn.

Thanks for reading. Have a great week.

Don’t Let The Bastards Get To You!

Please Support Independent Artists! Even the crazy ones.

If you want to check out any of my books, films, or Angry Filmmaker merchandise head on over to my website. www.angryfilmmaker.com

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