Auteur CLE Director Johnny Wu

Johnny Wu wears many hats: President of the Organization of Chinese Americans of Greater Cleveland; owner of the production company Media Design Imaging; independent film director; founder of the IndieClub, Cleveland's own indie film society; patriotic Clevelander. He has produced, directed and edited dozens of feature-length and short films, videos and promotional pieces. His most successful production to date, the comic book spoof A Joker's Card, was shot entirely in Cleveland with a loyal local cast and crew, and has been shown at countless festivals worldwide. It will be followed in 2007 by The Rapture, the sci-fi feature film Johnny's fans have been anxiously awaiting.

As a frequent co-star of Johnny's films, I thought it was high time he got to bask in the spotlight. We met at over hot chocolate at Truffles one Sunday afternoon to talk about how the martial arts influence him as a director, the untapped well of Cleveland cinematic talent, and why we all love working with him.

Cool Cleveland: I don't really know a lot about you personally, even though I've known you for almost three years now. I don't really know anything about--
Johnny Wu: Me?

Yeah! Tell me a little about where you grew up, what things were like when you were a kid, your parents...
That's gonna be long story!

My interviews are very conversational; you know how I am, I just like to blah blah blah all the time. So just talk.
Well, I was born here in Cleveland. My father was a diplomat, so we traveled a lot. The last country I stayed was Panama. I stayed there for about sixteen years, and I learned Spanish, and I go to school there. I decided to get out under my father's shadow, so I came back here to Cleveland and start on my own. In 1998, I met Greg Petusky. We decided to start MDI, which is Media Design Imaging; it's a video production company. Our first movie was Twisted, a feature film, shot in 16mm, and we had Sean Faris--he's kind of big now, and he's Hollywood. That was his first movie experience, and he got so inspired about the movie industry he moved to LA right after we finished shooting. And he survived, which is good.

From there on, we did lots more short films, lots of stuff. I was starting to realize that I need to get my name out there, so I started to write lots of email out to people. That kind of created a buzz. Then when I started working with an organization called Hollywood Charity. They sent me out to LA, so I was communicating with publicists, Rogers and Cowen, PMK and Lee Solters-three of the biggest ones in LA right now. Got to meet a lot of celebrities, got to understand how to publicize, how to market. One thing they always say is that you don't use the word hype, you always use the word buzz. They hate the word hype, hype somehow makes it look fake; buzz is more like something realistic. So they tell me lots of story, like Lee Solters, he used to represent Liz Taylor and Michael Jackson and Frank Sinatra. [H]e tells all the stories about how he deal with them, how Frank Sinatra was very punctual and a pain in the ass--that's what he said! So you get to learn a lot. When I came back (to Cleveland), I did more PR stuff, marketing stuff, and concentrated on my short films. The one that got very, very successful was The Chase. We shot in the freight elevator, we had wire work--first time in Cleveland, and we were the first who were actually experimenting with it. And did so well, we decided that, now let's go to the next project, which is A Joker's Card, which is where you got involved. That did very well as well, so we decided that after that is the feature, which is The Rapture. So far right now, we've been creating lots of buzz, which is good.

Let's talk about A Joker's Card. The genesis of the idea for that--comic books. What's your interest in that genre?
Well, I always love comic books and anime-style cartoons. So one day, Dave (Milam) and Kyle (Znamanek) were sitting in my house watching Cartoon Network. We were just talking about comic books, Superman, Batman and Robin. Then we decided, why don't we just do a comic book comedy? How about, make it like they have sons? Like Robin's son is gay, and Batman's son is blind, Superman's son would be a midget... that's how the idea came about, and then I decided to study more about the comic book background, went to DC Comics website and read a little more. Because of Dave and Kyle, their personality, we start talking about who else can fit the role. So David (Levy) came on board, and then it was like, we need a Poison Ivy's daughter role. You know, Poison Ivy's very sexy, and she's not very talkative, so we wanted her daughter to be talkative. And David's like, (snaps his fingers) "I know! Here's Dana!" So you came on board and played the role. So, when I was writing the whole script, I was using everybody's real-life personality as my guidance. And so that's how A Joker's Card came about.

Because this is a fan film, we are not allowed to sell it. But then the more we got into the production, the more we realized it's almost becoming parody. So we waited until we finished shooting it, edited it all together, put the music, everything else, send it to three different attorneys to look through it. They all said, "It is a parody, don't worry about it, you can make a dime if you really want to." DC Comics, Warner Brothers knew about this project, and they didn't say a word about it. They're only gonna go after you if you're making money off of the characters. But almost all the characters in the movie-except for two: Nightwing, and my character, Ekin Tzu-is totally new. Because we made a comedy, we got away with it.

But we did have some problem with some of the sci-fi conventions. They didn't want to play it because they deal with DC Comics, so if it fan film-related, they cannot play it. But other people love it. It won awards, and then Phil Gorn of WonderPhil Productions in LA saw it and he loves it. Right now he's trying to take that to every other place to see, to hopefully get distributed.

It went to a lot of film festivals. The majority of them were just being invited, 'cuz they saw it online and said we'd like to have a copy to play. I found out last month, the Outer Sci-fi gay and lesbian film festival in Austin, Texas, they play it twice in two years. Just because he (Tim Caswell, Outer's organizer) love it so much, and he showed it to sales representative from Indie-Pictures, which is a big distributor company, and another company called B-Side Entertainment. So he's been helping me push forward, too.

Cool. So, obviously the Internet has been very helpful to your career. Talk to me about that.
You have to look at it as a different medium. Internet, you have to use it in a way of spreading it through friendship or network. It's almost like chain letters. So when you become an Internet user, you go through different forums -- you know, tell them who you are, all of that. So then it builds you, your character. Then from there you say, "Oh, by the way, I got A Joker's Card available, check it out." People go and see it, and people will actually like it because they like you. If they don't like you, they usually will say, "Eh, the movie sucks." It's always that way. I gotta kind of know how to use the Internet for my advantage. And I also understand, in marketing perspective, the more people hear about your name, the more they think you are an expert. You could be the crappiest person in the world, you can be the really, no experience in the world, if you talk a lot... talk is cheap. People think that you're an expert. Okay, I do have something to back me up, so... (laughs)

You do. When I was in college, one of our projects was, we put the mass media on trial. We were talking about the Internet, and how anybody can put anything on there, and somebody'll find it and think, "Oh, well, this is true, this is fact," and there's nobody to stop them. That can be a good thing, and that can be a bad thing, but obviously for you it's a good thing, it's helpful. And there's lots of Internet celebrities now--not that you're one of those--
I'm not, no.

But there's lots of people out there who are just famous because of the Internet. They don't have anything else going for them other than people have downloaded them a million times.
Same thing with movie critics. Most of the movie critics are people who have seen lots of movies and think that they an expert. I mean, we not saying that all of them are like that, but some.

That's true, but I mean, that makes it more democratic in a lotta ways, because there are people who might not necessarily have a place--
Right, right.

--it's very easy for them to get out there.
Yeah.

Let's talk about The Rapture a little bit. It's not really a sequel to A Joker's Card, it's like a continuation, or it's just another story?
A different story. After the success of A Joker's Card we decided, let's do something different, something longer, something like [a] sequel. So I thought about it harder and realized, if we do a sequel based on A Joker's Card, we again doing something that not gonna make money. And I don't wanna go comedy route this time, I wanna go a little more serious. So how can we get around it? And the best thing to do is just create a new movie from zero, but instead in a sci-fi genre, because everybody loves the genre. And then moving forward the action-comic book perspective-now you opening your audience, including people who love sci-fi, people who like comic books, and people who like action. So now those three ingredient will help sell the movie. And thanks to the Internet, I met a lot of filmmakers who make lots of different film in the past, who gave me a lots of insight about what sell, what doesn't sell. The bottom line is this: it doesn't matter about a story, it's a matter of what is visually enticing. If the movie have really, really bad plot, but it have great explosions, great gunfire, it will sell. Buyers, distributors, look for those kind of movie, because they can quickly get it rented out at Hollywood Video and Blockbuster. So with that perspective, I was like, let's go with sci-fi action-type.

When I approached Jim Geier, the co-writer for the movie, he was like, "Let's make it action-adventure film, put in a good story into it." We first thought about calling the movie Joker's Rapture, kinda to connect to A Joker's Card. But after sitting down talking about it, we're like, eh, get rid of the word joker, let's stay away from the Joker's Card. We'll bring some of the characters back, but we kind of imply it's related, but it's not really related. But we call it inspired-by A Joker's Card. We said, what kind of story should we write about? And I remembered, in 1999 I had a dream, and I talked to my then-partner about a movie, a biblical-type of movie, the end of the world, where the archangel is fighting a demon. So then we call it The Rapture because, the belief is, if you [are] Christian and the end of the world coming, people collapse--that's because the Rapture's coming. And then we decided put in where the angel was reborn as a human being, had to go through the suffering, and understand how it is. And if he die[s] before he turns bad, then he can become the archangel that save the world. And the demon will come, try to intercept him and try to make him evil before he dies. So there's a conflict between them.

Because of that story idea, I started to do lots of short film. The Chase was wire work-related, so I was experimenting to see how that could work out. A Joker's Card had fight sequences and stuff like that, and also CG. All of this was supposed to be preparing for The Rapture. So when Jim and I sat down and we talk about it, it was like, let's make the same concept, but let's get rid of biblical aspect of story, because then it make it too difficult for lots of people to digest. So we thought sci-fi. And then we started to have two characters: a guy with the wings, a guy with a tail. They are "brothers" because they were raised and created at the same time, and they were supposed to be working for the government as an experiment. One with the tail thinks that he's far inferior to the other one, so he thought he's a demon because of the tail. The one with the wings feel that he's an angel because he has wings, so now you have the mythology set up.

Sounds really deep. (laughs)
I think that's the whole idea. I like it, I like conflicts. If you see all my short films--the ones that you were involved with, A Joker's Card, Going Postal -- there's always a conflict between all, little by little.

How do you meet most of the people who are in your movies?
Friends. For The Rapture we did audition a bunch of people, but most of the cast and crew, some of them are good friends. I asked them to come back and help work with me. I guess because I have such a very easy work persona, people always like to come back and work with me.

I told you that before, that's why we all are with you all, whatever you want to do. That does make a big difference. Well, let's talk about the Cleveland independent film community and the IndieFilm Club.
Well, Cleveland film community is huge.

Absolutely. People don't really know what the hell goes on around here... there's so much here, and nobody takes advantage of it.
Yeah, that's something I sort of learn doing the IndieClub meetings. One time someone at the City Club was complaining there's no independent filmmakers' scene in Cleveland. I raised my voice because I was mad, I was really mad. I said, "Did you ever type in 'Cleveland indie filmmakers'? If you type in that, you will see a whole bunch listed, things going on in Cleveland." [The response was] "Oh, I didn't know."

"Well, you didn't try."
Yeah, that's the bottom line. But people like to complain because they lazy. Cleveland has a very strong resource of talent. How do you tap into this talent? I have worked with a lot of people here in Cleveland. David Litz, I worked with Adam White--these are professional filmmakers. I worked with Robert Banks, Naomi Hollander, Tiffany Laufer. It's there. The problem is, they are so busy with their own projects, they hardly are out there in the market saying, "Hey, I'm here, use me."

Exactly. They don't make it a community.
They don't make it community, correct. So when I started in filmmaking in Cleveland, I decide first thing I want to do is promote myself. I did lots of promotion, showing lots of my short films all over the place. But I learned something about Cleveland while working with Hollywood Charities: they really sometimes have lack of support within your own community, and because everybody felt like outsourcing is better than whatever you have. Because they said that, if you are working for me, and I know you have certain talents, I probably ask you to do it, but you'd probably do it for free because I know you, you have worked with me already. Because of that perspective, lots of good talent's being covered up. So then when you hear lots of people outside the city saying, "Oh, I can do this and this, much better than what you can do," we believed it, you know? The saying the grass is always greener on the other side is never true. We have the talent here, we have people here that other people never realized we have here, because we always say that outside Cleveland is better than here. But it is here. I always show that there is a talent pool of people here, I mean, by the culture, by the diversity, by the community you have in this city. You should be tapping into the resources.

So the Cleveland independent film is the same way. It's here for you. And like, every other city, everybody wants to be a filmmaker. Because you got John Doe who thinks he's a greater filmmaker, they can do whatever they want to do, they don't want to listen to advice from others, they just go and do their stuff. Then they always expect other people will help them automatically, instead of you helping them first. Then nobody will believe in their project because they say, "Who do you think you are?" That kind of mentality. So it shut the door for professionals to come help you out, because they feel that they're wasting their time helping you, because they realize after talking to you, you have nothing to offer, you have no experience. So I started IndieClub because of that perspective. I wanted the people to network, socialize. The people who don't know anything about filmmaking get to meet other people who have better technique and expertise, to help each other out. We meet every month at the Hyacinth Lofts over on the east side. They very generous enough to let us use their place, and it's always been about sixty to eighty people attending. What we usually do is we offer anybody who wants to, who has made a film, who wants to be a filmmaker, who wants to meet, who wants to get involved with film, to come to see who these people are. We have a lot of people who come in find other people who have the same interest, and connect and make their own films. So networking is there. We also invite people to show their films, anything less than thirty minutes long, good or bad. And the only rule is I don't want people to give constructive criticism. If you want to give constructive criticism to filmmaker who shows his film, do it privately. Let them have their fifteen minutes of fame, or fifteen minutes to stink, whatever they want, and then, if you think the movie sucks, talk to them privately. You know, we are humans, we usually have a lot of pride in what we do, good or bad, we have pride. Shutting them down right in front of everybody else will make them feel like they don't want to come back any more. And unfortunately, we have a lot of members who get bored cuz they sick of looking at bad films, and they want to criticize. I said, "No, don't do it. If you want to do it, do another time. Or show your stuff that you are doing better than everybody else." But criticizing is stupid, it's ignorant. I mean, we all have our opinion... who can say your opinion is better than mine? So, because of that, we keep it very neutral, because I don't want to have to say, "I'm sorry that this person talked so bad about you," and that sort of thing.

You don't want politics and drama.
Keep the drama out of the club, that's the bottom line. We also have a mailing list: a Yahoo! group for all the filmmakers to join. We got about four hundred now on the mailing list. The Rapture was possible to be shot in thirteen days. It's a feature-length film, and usually it take about twenty-six days to shoot. We shot everything in thirteen, actually twelve days, shooting two different units. Because everyone who came to the IndieClub get to know me and realize they want to work together. I have track record to show that I can do it, and they believe in the project. First-time filmmakers, it is a little bit different. You had to help them out first, you had to go on and help them before they help you. You know, you have to give a little before you can get something, that's all that is.

Outreach is very important. Show them what we're doing, tell them who else is interested... cultivate.
Yeah, but that takes a lot of time, too, a lot of people don't realize. When you work together as a group, and everyone loves each other, eventually that will expand out to other prolific opportunities. I see them go out, and because they have worked with me, that happens. It's good. The goal is, elevate the skill and talent in Cleveland, so we don't have to go outside and outsource anywhere. And if the talent's here and people can recognize this talent, you don't need to go outside. Right now what the problem is, we have the talent but we're not being recognized.

It's a little bit different, Cleveland compared to LA and New York City. Over there, the pace is faster, there's so much competition going on, so people have to--

Everybody's doin' it out there.
Yeah, they have to compete or die. Here it's more relaxed; that's what I like about the city, it's more relaxed atmosphere. But yet, you got to do something unique, or something interesting, and get it out there, otherwise nobody will know you're doing it.

How has living in Cleveland influenced your filmmaking?
Cleveland has been the city where learning and experience as a filmmaker will benefit, due to the fact it is very artist-friendly and it has a vast resource available, like the IndieClub, the Neopal listings. A lot of opportunities are here, and once you hone your skill, you can continue making progress by shooting and utilizing the vast resources not only like talent, but the locations. Cleveland influences me because it is my city, and it is a city full of artist differences where I can learn and adapt my own style and knowledge.

As a filmmaker connecting and collaborating is essential to the success of a film- making process. Everything in town has been easily obtained, people are nice, property owners are very keen in helping artist to strive for their dreams, and businesses are willing to lend a hand quicker than other cities would. There is less red tape you need to go through to make a movie in town. After The Rapture was shot and we needed additional help, everyone was there to help out, they cared and made the film part of their own creation. That's what Cleveland is so great about, we embrace each other.

What are your long-term goals as an independent filmmaker? Will you stay in Cleveland forever?
Long term goal-to make noise, in sense of making films and enjoying them, while challenging myself and bringing out the interesting part of Cleveland to the rest of the country. I would love to live here forever; hopefully Cleveland will love to keep me here.

Why don't we talk a little bit about the martial arts, and what role that plays in your life. I know it's included in some of your films.
Martial arts has been part of my life, because it was passed down from father to son 2,800 years ago. When I was a kid, I hated learning it, because my father would force me to do it. But now I appreciate it because it taught be to be a little more disciplined, give me a clear mind to understand what to do, and not to be jumping to the gun and do things I want to do, but rather, look at it different perspective. It seemed to make me become more like analytical person. Martial arts give you some discipline, and help you health-wise, and keep me grounded. The thing my father always would tell me is, "You will never know if someone will be better-skilled than you are. And even if you have two person of the same skill standing, fighting each other, the reason why we lose is not because of skill level, but because of outside influences, outside forces. Environment will make you lose the fight." So it's like, if you sit there and fight against another Johnny Wu, you know, you both think alike, you both do things the same way, you both have the same trick, which is gonna win? It might be, if one standing in front of the sun, the sunlight will be shining into your eyes and you can't see, and that can be the moment that you can lose the fight. Or just the environment itself is not helping you to win the fight. So because of that, it keep me grounded, knowing what am I, who am I, how to do it, and just move on from there. The martial has played a lot in my life because of that, and taught discipline and responsibilities. I also get less angry than most people most of the time.

Yeah, that's what I've always said about you. You're much calmer than most people in general, and certainly much more calm than I am. How do you use that when you're on a film set?
Oh, a lot! I usually don't blow up with anybody. I will get mad, I will get very frustrated and walk out, and then come back in and get all calm. But The Rapture probably had the worst nightmare I have ever encountered in my life. Everything that can go wrong, went wrong, and for no apparent reason. But then, you know, we got through. There's many, many times I [could] scream and say, "You're fired, you bastard!" You know, scream, but then it force you to have more tolerance of what's going on. I think it's helping more and more, and I guess age helps, too. When I was younger, I would use martial arts and do every stupid thing I can do, you know, fight with people, show them I can be better than they are. But then you realize it's not worth it. And the older you get, the more you think ahead.

Whose movies do you admire?
Steven Spielberg. I love every movie he does. I think the first one that got me so hooked on his film is Empire of the Sun. It's so cinematic, and it is about the point of view of a kid who got stuck in China, and trying to get out. It was done so well, and after that movie, I just got very, very much involved. I used to love Kevin Smith, but then I found out a little bit about his personality, and I decided to stay away from him. I heard so much about he's a little bit difficult to deal with. He can make the best film in the world, but if your personality and character is not good enough, I would never be able to say that I can use you as a model. It's just because I don't wanna be a great filmmaker and show people the stuff I do, yet I am a crappy person in real life. So Robert Rodriguez became a very good influence on me. It's not because he did El Mariachi for $7,000, you know? That's totally a myth. I saw every Spy Kids movie that he made, and I saw the behind-the-scene and realized how he was such a loving father, and how he is with everybody else involved. How he was willing to show everybody the cool toys he has. It was cool. It makes you realize, this is a guy who knows where he came from, and this is a guy who's a good model because he did everything by himself. And then when he did all those movies, he limited himself how much money he can spend, and when he spend less, he'd return the money to the investors. So he's the kind of person you want as model, follow his footsteps, because he will teach you to become a better person... not a better filmmaker, a better person, which makes you a better filmmaker.

Yeah, that's an interesting perspective on that. I like that.
Martial arts have a lot to do with that. (laughs)

Yes, I would imagine it does. Anything else you're working on besides just The Rapture? What's your next project gonna be after that?
Right now, there's the Ohio SportsTime TV show that I've been working every week. We also preparing for the next feature for next December. It's gonna be a thriller/horror -type of movie. Kyle and Jim Geier are gonna write a script, and I'm gonna be directing it.

So do you have a general idea of what it's gonna be, or are you just gonna wait and see what they write?
Yeah, they have to finish the script first. We'll see what happens. But The Rapture 's gonna take a lotsa time (to edit) because there's too much CG involved. I'm hoping we can have it premiere on the same day we had for A Joker's Card. Do it at a theatre, and then have an after-hour party at Peter Sampson's new office. Then we have a couple surprise guests coming in town.

That's going to be a good time. Is there anything else that you want to leave our readers with?
I think, as a filmmaker, do your best to learn, to challenge yourself, and be yourself. Don't just do it because you wanna be rich and famous, but do it because you wanna learn the craft as an art. Just keep going forward, and eventually fame will come, but you don't want to rush to get in there because the more you rush, the worse it gets. I'm not sitting here talking to you because I was a starting filmmaker, it's because you have heard of me since 1998. It builds up over time for me to become a name that people have heard of. In the future, that help me advance my opportunities further. Lots of people who start, they just wanna rush, because they feel that they cannot wait.

That's where the patience comes in. It's very difficult.
It's difficult, and I didn't have patience back then, I feel like I can't do it, I can't do it. But it shows that the more patient I get, the more opportunity I have. I always thank God for that.

You can see the trailer for The Rapture, the entire short film A Joker's Card, and get information on the IndieClub at http://www.mdifilm.com/index.html. Check out MDI's MySpace at http://www.myspace.com/mdifilms. Join Cleveland IndieClub Monthly Meeting's by visiting http://www.clevelandindieclub.com.

From Cool Cleveland Contributor Dana Aritonovich mrsgrohl1ATyahoo.com

(:divend:)