Exclusive Interview: Manny Serrano (Theta States)
How did you first get into filmmaking and was your first experience what you dreamed it would be like?
I think I’ve always been enamored by the idea of filmmaking. When I was a kid, my friends and I made a sci-fi film, and our friend’s dad recorded it on his camera. He never showed it to us so I think he just pointed the camera to humor us. Then as teenagers we did what most teens in the 90’s did; we started a band. I wrote music for about 10 years or so with Ramon Inoa (who now does most of our soundtracks), never really going anywhere with it though, eventually realizing we had more ideas for music videos than we had songs to go with them.
Then, it was one day during Christmas/New Years week in 2005. A bunch of us were sitting around, and Louie Cortes (New Needle Productions) just had a video camera with him. Why, I have no idea, but we decided that day we were going to shoot a movie. We put together an idea and planned out some camera shots, then went into the basement, and spent a couple of hours shooting a found-footage movie about three guys who kidnap and torture a girl. It was terrible and most of the footage was unusable, so we cut it into a minute-long trailer.
Over the next few years we made a bunch of short films, creating the company Mass Grave Pictures, the most notable of which were more faux-trailers for a slasher film series, Blood Slaughter Massacre 1, 2, & 3. We started shooting a trailer for part 4, and decided we wanted to do a feature-length version. So in 2011, Louie Cortes and myself put together the script with my wife Lindsay Serrano and Ralph Merced, and I took on the role of director. We called in every favor we had, and went into production on Blood Slaughter Massacre, which premiered in 2013 and hit DVD in 2015.
THETA STATES (2017) has recently been released by VIPCO and BayView Entertainment. What can you tell us about this film without giving the movie away?
Theta States was my second feature film, we shot in 2015. The film is about Danny, who is a long-term insomniac. He goes to see Dr Z who gives him an experimental audio wave treatment, and while he can finally sleep, he is plagued by blackouts, hallucinations, and recurring nightmares.
We had just released our third feature film, Dark Tales From Channel X. We were repped by The Movie Agency and they got us a deal with BayView. The film was released in June 2022 and while talking to Peter (BayView Exec) about what happened with Theta States and the previous distributor, he asked me to send it to him so he could take a look. A week or so later he responded saying they’d re-release the film. and suddenly Theta States is being brought back to life! In anticipation of a (hopeful) re-release, we had started shooting some interviews and commentary tracks with Jay Kay of HorrorHound in early 2020, but the pandemic completely derailed all of that. When I signed the deal with BayView, I just pulled together what we had already shot and turned it into a 20-minute accompaniment on the dvd.
A major cult actress features in THETA STATES (2017), Erin Brown (aka Misty Mundae). Were you familiar with her previous work and how did you get Erin involved in this project?
My wife and I had been fans of Erin’s work for years, and I knew I wanted someone who was comfortable with sexuality for the role of Kelly. We debated a while about contacting her, and finally decided to go for it and I guess luck was on our side. Anyone who knows Erin knows that she never checks her Facebook, or much of her social media profiles honestly. But, the day I messaged her happened to be her birthday, and she was (I assume) checking birthday messages and stuff at the exact moment I sent the message, so she actually saw it. I sent her the script, she liked it, and that was it. We shot with her for the first time in Dec 2014 and she was incredible! It baffles me how she is not a bigger name because the level of professionalism and preparedness she brings to set is amazing, and she’s also great to work with.. very easy going, she brings ideas to her characters and adds in subtle changes between her takes, each one giving the scene a little something different.
You have worked on feature films and short films, what for you is the biggest difference on working on these projects?
The most obvious difference is scale, but that is beyond just the production itself.. When you’re doing a short film, the most difficult part is getting the audience to care about your characters in a few minutes, and by the time that happens the story is almost over. On the production aspect of it, you need to sell the world these characters live in very quickly. If you go high concept, then you’re talking lots of set pieces, costumes, visuals, colors, etc that all need to be done quickly, succinctly, and with no extra fat at all. But if you move too quickly, you can lose the audience.
With a feature, you have the time to spread all of it out, but timing is everything. Wait too long, or drag on a scene too much and you bore the audience. Short films can teach you the art of packing in details without overwhelming. So the biggest challenge in a feature is knowing when your story is told, and what is unnecessary. I think the length of your story is just as important as the story itself. Your film is delivered to the audience in a set length of time.. It’s an agreement with the audience that they will be told a story in a certain amount of time (as in, most people know how long the film is before they start watching) and if they feel you wasted some of that time, you can lose them.
Before The Walking Dead took the zombie genre to new heights you worked on Zombie Hunters: City Of The Dead a show that began in 2007. What was your experience on working on a series and where can people watch it?
We met the Zombie Hunter team, Pat Devaney, Christopher Murphy, and Michael Scardillo, at the Fangoria Weekend of Horrors in NYC 2008. We joined the team a while after that and it was probably some of the most fun I’ve ever had. Everyone was just kinda making it up as we all went along, and along the way we pulled off some of the largest shoots ever done on a no-budget horror. One of the shoots had a 50+ extra zombie hoard, and every one of them had makeup and fx applied. I think we had 5 makeup chairs, working like an assembly line for hours.. apply prosthetic, color, blend, blood, costume, and then into the holding area. We had long days, lots of scenes, almost always over the summer so it was always hot as hell, anywhere from 3-5 cameras running around.. It was insane, and knowing what we know now, those single day shoots would be 2-4 days each, easily. But that’s what it’s like making films with your friends.. It’s how the Night Of The Living Dead. Evil Dead, and Texas Chain Saw Massacre were filmed. It’s not the best model to follow, but it got done! Zombie Hunters: City Of The Dead was eventually released on DVD by Wild Eye Releasing, and was only one of two public access tv series to ever get full distribution WITHOUT being reshot or re-edited before release. I think the other was the Tom Green Show, and even that was redone by MTV eventually. That also helped get me in front of Wild Eye and eventually Blood Slaughter Massacre was released by them as well.
As a filmmaker you are tasked with many potential challenges not just on set but throughout the whole filmmaking journey. What for you is the biggest challenge?
To reiterate the previous question, the biggest challenge is not giving up on yourself. Keep working, keep writing, keep shooting.. If you love it, you can do it. There is no guarantee, in fact it is quite the long shot, that you will become a famous filmmaker, but that doesn’t mean you can’t be happy. If money and fame are what you’re looking for, go be a stockbroker and cause a scene at some big fancy billionaires gala. Much easier.
Robert Rodriguez says “every director has at least 10 bad films inside them” so I say make them your first ten. Make mistakes, learn from them, and then go out and make more mistakes, but never give up on yourself.
As you are a filmmaker and a writer I would imagine you are keeping a close eye on the current Writers Guild of America strike. What would you like to see happen during the discussions to stop the strikes?
Eat the rich.
What are your Top 3 thriller and Top 3 science fiction films from any decade?
My favorites kinda change as time goes on.. I have a few that are staples, and my favorites in any genre always lean toward horror, but asking at the moment…
Thriller: Kubricks’ Eyes Wide Shut, the 1972 Sleuth (though I enjoyed the remake, it was missing something), and Robert Altmans’ Images.
For any budding filmmakers out there, what is the best piece of advice that you could give them?
A funny story about the Zombie Hunters was that they humbled me without even knowing they had (I have since told them this story). In 2007, we were flipping channels and came across this zombie series on public access, and we caught the opening. We saw the credits, and we saw the same name multiple times.. Written by, Directed by, Produced by, Starring, even the production company had the guy’s last name, and I said to Lindsay something along the lines of “look at this guy.. has his name all over it, and even has the balls to cast himself in the lead role. No wonder they’re only on public access.”
After only a few years of making short films, we were already feeling a bit defeated and they changed our whole mindset.. They showed us that it was possible to make films your own way and find an audience, you just couldn’t give up on yourself. I will always be thankful to them for teaching me that the only thing standing in my way was myself.
Finally, what projects do you have coming up?
I don’t actually have anything specific lined up at the moment. I’m working on a remastering of Blood Slaughter Massacre, hoping to have it done in time for a 10-year re-release soon, and I’m currently gripping on a handful of different indie shorts. I’m also one of the co-hosts on the Haunted Hangover podcast.
Beyond that, we are pushing our current films, Theta States and Dark Tales From Channel X while workshopping the ideas for the next feature. Ideally we’ll be in production on feature #4 by this time next year.
