Wellington Silver Screeners: Jason Stutter _{by Alessia Belsito-Riera}

In our Wellington Silver Screeners series, Alessia Belsito-Riera shines a spotlight on the movers and shakers working in the film capital of New Zealand.

“I was brought up Wainuiomata and at school – I think I must have been about 11 – a teacher put a camera in my hand and that was it,” Jason Stutter reminisces. “I loved it so much and whenever I had a chance to film anything in school, I was that person. Luckily, I had parents who were supportive when I was like, ‘I want to be a filmmaker’, because I don’t think even Peter Jackson was really known then, so it was kind of a strange thing to want to be!”

Now a true-blue writer, director, and editor with an arsenal of titles to his name, Stutter has come full circle as co-director with Tim van Dammen on Warren’s Vortex, which was filmed on location in Lower Hutt. In what was his first foray into the world of television, Stutter proclaims that he’s officially caught the TV bug.

With Warren’s Vortex currently streaming on TVNZ, Stutter and I embarked on a journey through the past, present, and future of how he made his dream of becoming a filmmaker a reality.

What have been some career highlights?

It probably sounds a bit corny, but my favourite thing is always working with actors. Any chance to make anything, I’m pretty happy. I’ve had some really fun things, like one of my short films, Careful with that Axe, had a few screenings where some of my film heroes out in the world watched it and said nice things. That same film played in the street in Mexico late at night and there were like 10,000 or more people in the street. Hearing them react to the film and yelping and screaming and laughing was pretty fun. Because most of my things are either comedy or action-based, they always are going for a reaction from the audience, so as long as you hear that, it’s always good.

How is TV different from film?

In film, things take a lot longer. For example, you might shoot two minutes a day. TV is a lot faster; we were doing maybe six minutes. You have to work faster, but I quite like that. You couldn’t always be second-guessing. There was a very well-written script, but at the same time, you’re trying to make it as funny as you can. It was really neat that we had to make fast decisions. Some of the stuff we shot, especially improvising, was really fun, which I think on film, unless you’ve got a really humungous budget, you don’t always have that luxury.

Tell me about Warren’s Vortex!

It’s set in Lower Hutt. Warren [Maaka Pohatu] is a very Kiwi dude, loves rugby and loves barbeques. His daughter Lucy [Louise Jiang] wants to travel and see the world. In the opening episode, she wants to go to Paris and he’s like, ‘What can you do in Paris that you can’t do in Lower Hutt?’ He’s very protective of his daughter, and a little bit nervous that she’s going to go into the world and that if she gets into trouble, he won’t be able to save her.

She’s been secretly vaping behind their backs, and he has a vortex that no one knows about in his shed, which he’s been using to put things in. Lucy goes in there to have a sneaky vape and gets sucked in. Being a dad myself, I love the dad jokes. Warren’s first thought is to go in after her, but first he writes a little note to his wife saying that Lucy’s fallen to the vortex, and, ‘PS she’s vaping. I told you she was vaping’! It’s always got its tongue very firmly in its cheek.

It will be exciting for locals to see their home turf on TV!

In one of the episodes I shot, there’s a family-friendly execution scene at the Naenae shops with a sign that says, ‘Please respect the execution wall’. I love that it’s really modern Kiwi. It doesn’t go back to anything tropey. It’s very now in its language and everything. The fact that it unapologetically says Lower Hutt, is hopefully what New Zealanders will dig.

Is it for all ages?

It is! One of the episodes has so many fart gags in it [laughs]. I was like, ‘Is this going to fly?’ but it totally did. I think 12-year-old Jason would love it just as much as the current version of me does. This is probably one of the first things I’ve made that my kids could actually come to cast and crew screening, and they really loved it. When you’re working on a thing you watch it over and over and over again; editor Alex [Boyd] and I found ourselves still giggling and laughing right up to the end.

How was it filming in your hometown?

Really fun. We did a big street scene in Lower Hutt where they’re doing battle against this Elon Musk-type character, who’s flying around in a big head – like you do – and the secret to beating this guy was playing the four-string Māori strum. So we got to shoot this amazing scene with a kapa haka group going down the street that sounded amazing. We had a lot of people just coming to hear it. It was an ‘only in New Zealand’ sort of thing. It was really nice weather for just about the whole shoot and we would have lunch on the front lawn of this one family’s house, and they would just come out and it was so relaxed. Everyone on the street seemed to really like having us there. When we were filming outside and you could hear people mowing their lawns. The locations guy could just ring up and the mower would stop, we’d film, and the lawnmower would start back up again. I shot a scene with Tanea Heke, who plays this character Auntie, and we went down the street to find a house we liked and just knocked on the door and they let us shoot there. Most of the houses on the street we filmed in at some stage. We built a little Warren’s Vortex community.

How would you describe Wellington’s film industry?

I think because we were making a local project everything just seemed very easy. People were excited by it; there wasn’t any pushback at all. Lower Hutt’s great because the parking is free! Avalon Studios, where we were based, have great stages and we’re really lucky to have them. The pool of talent in New Zealand is huge because they’ve all worked on big, big productions. The art direction on the show is done by the same person who worked on Blade Runner. So you’re working with incredible people.

What advice would you give someone trying to get into the industry?

The same advice I’d give anybody who wants to do anything. If it’s something you really want to do, you should do it. If your dream’s a big, lofty dream, you should go for it. I just kept making things and when people would say no, I would find another way of doing it. I’ve made six feature films now and they’ve all sold around the world and some of those films are the same ones that people would say, ‘That’s not going to sell’, so it’s quite fun to go, ‘Oh, look, it’s sold’. Avoid people who say you can’t do something. There you go, there’s my advice. Keep away from negative people, they cause cancer.

What’s next?

I’ve got a film that we shot about a year ago that we’re still trying to find a home for… which is very, very Kiwi [laughs]. Then, I’d love to do more television, especially here. The more local stuff the better, right? We all get better by doing more here. In the past it was always like, ‘Oh it’s from here’, but that’s gone. Flight of the Conchords and Taika [Waititi] and all those things have proven that people love stuff from here, from a real place. So maybe a crazy, time-warping comedy from Lower Hutt is just what the world needs.