Friday night at 9
Houston actor Don Swayze is one ornery outlaw in WorldFest Western, Heathens &Thieves
Don Swayze steals the show in Heathers & Thieves.Photo by Barry Gutierrez/Heathens & Thieves
Heathers & Thieves, an unabashedly retro Western, premieres Friday night atWorldFest/Houston International Film Festival.Photo by Barry Gutierrez/Heathens & Thieves
A scene from Heathers & Thieves.Photo by Barry Guiterrez/Heathens and Thieves
When indie filmmakers Megan Peterson and John Douglas Sinclair set out to co-direct Heathens & Thieves — the unabashedly retro Western premiering Friday at WorldFest/Houston International Film Festival — they heard the same warning from many different film industry professionals: Nobody makes money making Westerns anymore.
But they stuck to their guns anyway.
“Yes,” says Sinclair, “it’s true that when we started out, there was a perception that Westerns didn’t have much market value. But you know what? When you try to chase the market, you can wind up at the end of the wave anyway.”
“And besides,” Peterson adds, “we thought there was a market out there for Westerns. It’s just a matter of being able to reach it.”
The filmmakers are hoping every Western fan in and around Houston will stampede to the AMC Studio 30 when Heathens & Thieves screens there at 9 pm Friday.
Which is precisely what they were aiming to do when they entered their film into a Texas film festival in the first place. The filmmakers are hoping every Western fan in and around Houston will stampede to the AMC Studio 30 when Heathens & Thieves screens there at 9 pm Friday.
So what’s it all about? In Northern California during the post-Civil War era, two men — Saul (Andrew Simpson), a twentysomething drifter, and Bill (Richard Doyle), his older sidekick — hear rumors about stolen gold supposedly hidden on the remote ranch of two Chinese settlers. So Saul rides out to the spread and seeks work as a farm hand from Zhen (Boyuen) and his wife Kun Hua (Gwendoline Yeo). The plan: While Bill waits nearby, Saul will gain the couple’s confidence – so he can swipe their gold.
Unfortunately, other people have heard the same rumors about the purloined treasure. Even more unfortunately, one of those people is Sherman Rutherford (H-Town native Don Swayze, younger brother of Patrick Swayze), an ornery outlaw who always travels with very bad companions.
When Peterson and Sinclair called a couple days ago to talk about Heathens & Thieves — which they’ll be on hand to present Friday at WorldFest — much of the conversation focused on the hometown boy in their cast.
CultureMap: With all due respect to the other fine actors in your film – Don Swayze appears to be enjoying himself more than anyone else on screen.
John Douglas Sinclair: Yeah, Don came whole-heartedly into the role. He’s a very physical actor.
Megan Peterson: That was very true at the audition. See, he came in to read with Gwendolyn Yeo, because they’d known each other beforehand.
JDS: She actually brought him into the project for us.
MP: That’s right. When she first read the script, she said, “I’ve got to introduce you guys to Don Swayze.” And when he came in, well, they were already getting physical during the read – throwing each other around the room, basically. We just looked at each other and said, “Oh, my God!” Because it was so much fun. And it brought everything to life.
And when Don came in, suddenly, Sherman made sense, with all the words and everything. And once he was cast, we never heard those comments again. Because the role fit him so well.
Early on, when people would read the script, they would say things like, “Sherman talks too much.” But that’s who Sherman is. He’s this guy who kind of promotes himself, and turns himself into this sort of larger than life figure in his own mind.
And when Don came in, suddenly, Sherman made sense, with all the words and everything. And once he was cast, we never heard those comments again. Because the role fit him so well.
JDS: Early on, our [director of photography] told us that she’d never worked with an actor who loved the camera as much as Don, and who the camera in turn loved back. He knows where it is at all times, and exactly where he needs to be. He’s just got a natural instinct for it. And that made her job sort of super-easy when it came to shooting him.
CM: The production values in Heathens & Thieves are quite impressive for an indie film with a limited budget. What was the most challenging part of making the movie?
JDS: The obvious answer would be, the scene where the bunkhouse explodes. Just in terms of sheer technical considerations. And worry.
MP: And also the fact that once we blew up that bunkhouse, there was no going back. Like, if it turned out that we needed pick-up shots of the bunkhouse – well, sorry, it went up in smoke.
JDS: When we actually did the scene, I remember, Megan and the camera operator were behind this Plexiglas thing, and just about everybody else was hiding in the barn, safely. They had to. But I was out there in the open, on this flatbed truck. And I had this grip standing next to me with a block of wood, ready, in case some of the debris would rain down on the camera. If something looked like it was going to fall on it, he was going to bat it away with the block of wood.
CM: Sounds like this guy might come in handy on other films.
MP: [Laughs] Yeah, I thought it might be a good idea to have someone standing next to me with a block of wood all the time I’m directing. To deal with debris, actors – whatever might be the problem.
