Filmmaker Andrew Droz Palermo Discusses His First Narrative Feature ‘One & Two’
Sandra Miska
A native of Columbus, MO, director Andrew Droz Palermo came to prominence with his documentary “Rich Hill,” that took home the Grand Jury Prize at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival. Palermo’s first narrative film, “One & Two,” opened in Los Angeles on August 21. The director co-wrote the script for “One & Two,” a supernatural drama about a brother and sister who are abused by their father, with his childhood friend Neima Shahdadi.
Palermo, who also works as a cinematographer, recently spoke with Entertainment Voice about his creative process, influences, and what it is like to work closely with the Sundance Institute.
EV: Can you tell us a bit about your background and how you came to be a filmmaker?
Andrew Droz Palermo: I grew in mid-Missouri, and probably at about age 13 I verbally declared to a friend that I wanted to be a filmmaker. We watched a lot of films growing up together. I went to art school, and didn’t study film, but sorta found myself back at it after college, and since after college, I have been doing it fulltime. It’s the thing I love most.
EV: Do you live in L.A. now?
Andrew Droz Palermo: I do, yeah. I live on the East Side.
EV: You have a background in documentary filmmaking. How does this experience of making a narrative film compare to that?
Andrew Droz Palermo: They’re very similar. A lot of the things you learn in both, I think are implacable to each other, which is interesting. Before making “Rich Hill” I DPed on a number of features, so I’ve worked in narrative before. I wasn’t totally green to working in narrative. Yeah, I think there’s a real authenticity that you can, you know, in documentary, even, when someone is acting and they’re not being themselves, and I think that’s helpful to have that sort of bullshit meter that you can call out and stuff and try to really find what feels right. I think that’s definitely implacable to narrative, for sure.
EV: You co-wrote “One & Two” with your best friend from childhood. What was that process like?
Andrew Droz Palermo: It was great. We worked very collaboratively. I wrote sort of a very, very rough first draft and Neima came in and really helped me structure it, and helped with kind of pulling down all the influences that I was throwing into the soup and making sure that it all made sense and was cohesive. I think, the way I like to work, I’m not particularly – I don’t really enjoy just being in a room by myself. I prefer to verbalize something and talk to someone about it and bounce ideas, or certain scenes I might even just act something out or channel the character and just start talking. We would do some sort of [performance] stuff and, you know, just dictate from there. We kinda did a whole bunch of things; it was both of our very first film that we’d written, so it was a helpful learning experience for both of us.
EV: Do you think you’ll do another film together?
Andrew Droz Palermo: I’d love to. He’s a young dad now and is working and trying to offer stability for his family, so I don’t know how it will be time-wise for him, but I’d certainly welcome the idea, for sure.
EV: This project was developed at the Sundance Institute. Can you tell us a bit about that program?
Andrew Droz Palermo: Yes, so they have a number of different labs, and for “Rich Hill” I think I did three different labs. I did the Edit and Story Lab, we did the Producer’s Lab, and then this Catalyst Weekend. For narrative, they do the Writer’s Lab and the Director’s Lab and the Producer’s Lab, and this one went through the Producer’s Lab, which my producer, Kim Sherman, who, we were both living in Columbia, MO and I had made this music video there and had brought her own to help out. From there, we made a short together, and she said she’d really like to apply to the Sundance Labs and asked if I had any ideas or had any scripts that I was working on and that kinda charged me to put pen to paper and start working on this idea that I had that was sort of the catalyst for the first draft. From there, she went to Utah and I think was there for ten days and talked to her advisers and the other filmmakers about the script, and people offered advice. It was a really helpful experience and they gave us a small grant, which propelled us forward from there. …The Sundance Institute I can’t speak highly of enough. They’re wonderful people, just so helpful and nurturing, the least Hollywood people you’ll meet in L.A. They’re just such encouraging people, which is, you know, really helpful for when you’re in very vulnerable places, creative places.
EV: “One & Two” features a really great cast. How did you go about finding your actors?
Andrew Droz Palermo: Mainly through our casting team and through agencies. People would send names and I had a base list of people I was interested in. We talked to people on Skype and I met Elizabeth [Reaser] through Skype, and I actually met all four of them through Skype, which was kind of a weird experience… For “Rich Hill,” we employed our editor through Skype, so I was kind of comfortable with the idea of really taking a leap on someone just based off of Skype. The kids taped themselves and did a reading for me, and that was really helpful to understand how they might work, and Timothée [Chalamet]’s take was just incredible, so I knew he was the right person, and Kiernan [Shipka] has such a great energy to her, so positive, so I thought she would be just perfect for the role.
EV: At times this film has a creepy, M. Night Shyamalan feel. What films inspired you?
Andrew Droz Palermo: A number of different things. I really like this movie “Ordet,” it’s a Carl Dreyer film, and “Glen and Randa”… “Let the Right One In,” some of the talent in that I really liked, “The Assassination of Jesse James.” There’s this Jodie Foster film “Nell” that was kinda popular in the nineties, there’s some weird thread about that that I was kinda into. It’s kind of a lame movie, but there’s really some cool parts in it… “Night of the Hunter,” I really liked that film, and I think Daniel was really inspired by that film and that character.
EV: So what’s next for you?
Andrew Droz Palermo: Presently, I’m doing a commercial, doing commercial work while I’m finding the next script and figuring out what it’s going to be after a couple of different things and writing a little one the side, and hopefully will continue to DP movies, as well.
EV: Do you have any advice for aspiring filmmakers?
Andrew Droz Palermo: The biggest thing is just to do it. I think that’s the one thing that seems to get some people stuck, is they’re waiting for permission, or they’re waiting for the right crew, or they’re waiting for the money. You just gotta go around and do it in some way, any way you can do it, and do it again and again and again. I think that’s the only way you find your people and you get noticed, and you learn a lot by doing it. I don’t’ think you can learn a lot from your couch watching films. You learn how to be a filmmaker making them, I think.
“One & Two” is opens Aug. 21 in Los Angeles at the Area Cinema. It is available on VOD.