RUNNING ON EMPTY: Director Daniel André Talks About His New Offbeat Comedy

Introduction

In Running on Empty, Keir Gilchrist, Lucy Hale, Francesca Eastwood, and comic legend Jim Gaffigan star in a brilliantly quirky romantic comedy about celebrating life and living it to its fullest. Mortimer is an odd but clever young man living a lukewarm existence in California’s San Fernando Valley until he receives some life-changing news. Determined to make the most of every day, Mort sets out on a spirited quest to find meaning in his existence and discovers the girl of his dreams along the way.

Interview

Cinema Scholars’ own Glen Dower sat down with writer/director Daniel André to discuss his new offbeat comedy feature, Running on Empty. They discussed Daniel’s background in acting as well as this being his directorial debut, working with Lucy Hale, Keir Gilchrist, and legendary comedian Jim Gaffigan, and the challenges of balancing comedy with drama, among other topics.

Glen Dower:

Hey Mr. André, how are you doing, Sir?

Daniel André:

I’m good thanks!

Glen Dower:

We’re talking about your new film, Running On Empty, of which you are the writer and director. How far along the writing process did you think, ‘I’m having this as my directorial debut’?

Daniel André:

I think even before the writing process began! I grew up acting. I started acting when I was five, so I did it professionally for some time. I’ve worked in music but film is something I always knew was my calling. I was a 10-year-old kid who would make movies with the home camcorder and stuff like that. So I just felt I was finally at a point in my life where I was ready to dive into features. It was very intentional that I was going to direct it. So I think I knew it before the writing process even began.

Glen Dower:

Great. So you had everything in your mind’s eye storyboarded. For my readers, I’m trying to get a hook on the movie for them. And I came up with a sort of ‘urban Wes Anderson’ movie because we have the dysfunctional family, some shot composition, the attention to detail like Mort’s closet with his clothes lined up about it. But can you tell us what were your inspirations for some of the visuals and also the story?

Daniel André:

Yeah, I think for my first film, I could spend my entire life thinking about what is going to be my first film. I think it really just came down to wanting to pay homage to the films I grew up watching and loved. And a lot of those were sort of left-of-center outside-the-box films. A few are Martin Scorsese’s After Hours and Paul Thomas Anderson’s Punch Drunk Love. There were inspirations from Wes Anderson with a lot of the shots and some of the color and stuff like that. I wanted to focus on independent, outside-of-the-box filmmaking, which I loved watching growing up.

Glen Dower:

Let’s talk about the cast. We can start with Keir Gilchrist as Mort, and our readers probably know him best from It Follows. And this is a completely different performance from him. He really carries the movie. He’s withdrawn, like a loner, but you really care about him. Not just because of the situation, but his charisma. How did you come across Keir for the film?

Daniel André:

I was aware of Keir after It Follows, one of my favorite modern horror films. But a friend of mine, a casting director, when I was looking for Mort, she turned me on to Atypical. She said, watch Atypical. The second I watched it, I blew through two or three seasons at the time. I saw him and I was like, that’s Mort. And even though Mort is very different from the Sam character, his ability to fine-tune these quirky characters made the choice kind of apparent. Then he read the script and he connected with it. And the rest is history.

Glen Dower:

Great. And we have Lucy Hale as Kate. She’s just such a breath of fresh air in the movie, isn’t she? So even the color palette almost changes when she comes along and it just becomes just a bit of a joy. What was the case when you cast her? Did she walk into the room and you thought that was Kate? Or did you know about her from maybe Ragdoll or Pretty Little Liars?

Daniel André:

Actually, I didn’t. The casting director set up a meeting with us and we just kind of hit it off. And she’s just like you said, just a ray of sunshine. She’s also just a really awesome person. And that is a huge thing for me as well. You could have, you know, the biggest stars in the world if they’re not good people or problematic or diva-like or whatever, it can change the whole outcome of your film. Just across the board, she’s just such a great actor and such a great person, that it was just, it was obvious. And I was just really grateful that she wanted to be a part of it.

Glen Dower:

Then we have Jim Gaffigan as well. The I last saw of him was in Linoleum, which I loved, and had the pleasure of meeting the film’s director. And again, like Keir, completely different performance, but he pulled it off so well. In Linoleum, he’s so kind and endearing. And this, he’s just ‘the’ embarrassing uncle. He just says those atrocious and inappropriate things. So how did you arrive at Jim to play the character of Barry?

Daniel André:

Yeah, Jim. So I always loved Jim. He’s very well known in the US for his comedy, but I was also sort of watching what he was doing in acting. And I think the thing that drew me to him; was the more serious acting stuff that he’s been doing. When we met I was pleasantly surprised that Jim has a very methodical and very serious way of going about roles. And, you know, when we talked, he takes it to the level of seriousness as any actor method or not. It was surprising, but it was great! I think also to credit Jim, I think a lot of the script is there, but Jim at the same time gave us so much of himself in that character. And a lot of that just came from him.

Glen Dower:

All so great on their part. The story itself. It is a heightened reality where these people “live or die” by their death days. Did you see an advert for a company that did this thing? Do you think that would make a great movie? The whole concept itself of predicted death dates, you don’t go into it too much. I love that when people ask, Oh, how do you work this out? And the experts simply reply ‘It’s science’. That just really made me chuckle because it reminded me of the line from Anchorman.

Daniel André:

I think it stemmed from being the opposite of the mortician aspect, or what would be the strangest thing for a mortician to have to deal with all of a sudden; facing their mortality. I think it all came from that and then just kind of took off into this weird bizarre story. And it was also like you said, it’s not a science fiction movie and some people say it has, you know, science fiction elements, which I say ‘sure’, but I didn’t want to focus on that.

And so it was, it’s sort of just more of the catalyst, but I also find it the funniest that, you know, we didn’t have to spend 20 minutes or even 10 minutes going into the technology and how you have to do it. I think that was also very much inspired by some of Charlie Kaufman’s stuff. If you look at his films, there are always just these bombastic, weird science fiction, alternative universe things going on, but just in the background and the story is more focused on the characters, that’s what I was trying to do.

Glen Dower:

For sure. And I just want to ask you as a director and as a writer, I just find non-lethal traffic collisions really funny! So Mort gets hit off his bike and he gets hit by a van…that just made me laugh out loud. I don’t know why. Can you explain to me why you think that is too? And what does the anatomy of a scene look like when trying to get that timing just right?

Daniel André:

Yeah, that was by design of how the edit turned out in the film to where you see it more on the front end of the film. And then it kind of circles back, which I think ended up working out great. But yeah, scenes like that can be challenging, especially sort of on an independent level like this film. But I just, it’s funny you say that because when I saw the edit all put together and the VFX in there, it was a knee-jerk reaction to laugh!

And what’s funny is, I recalled my grandfather’s funeral when I was a kid, I remember that he was the first person close to me, who passed away. And when my mother, at 10 years old first told us, my first feeling was to laugh! And it was weird. Now, of course, I didn’t and I suppressed it. I thought, what the heck is wrong with me? And so I think that there’s this weird parallel or string that connects, you know, that just almost makes it a knee-jerk reaction. So we don’t have to deal with maybe the seriousness of the loss or the pain.

Glen Dower:

That’s very true. And just one thing I wanted to ask quickly Mort. Was Mort always Mort then he became a mortician or was he Mortician called Morty? How did you just arrive at that character?

Daniel André:

I wanted the film to have heart and to touch on serious subjects, but at the same time, to not be taken seriously and to not be taken too seriously. It was sort of the build of this caricature of a mortician named Mort who, you know, ‘Mort Mortensen, the Mortician’. So it was just a weird caricature of a mortician that I built. And I think Keir just inhabited that person and brought it to fruition.

Glen Dower:

Great. Mr. André, thank you so much for your time, and good luck with the movie. I will be encouraging all my readers to check it out!

Daniel André:

Thanks for having me. I appreciate it. Take care.

RUNNING ON EMPTY from Lionsgate opens NEXT WEEK in LOS ANGELES theaters from August 23 at The Lumiere, Beverly Hills, and on VOD nationwide on all major platforms in the US/Canada on August 27.

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