How Butch Maier Made a Full Length Romantic Comedy In Three States in Two Weeks or Vimooz Interview about “The Bride and The Grooms”

Posted by Robert Samardick on March 2, 2009 under Coming Soon, People | Comments are off for this article

Finally, it’s the big day. Your soon to be wife is walking down the aisle looking incredible. You’ve rented out the most expensive tux you could find and you feel like you’re going to throw up. Then you look to your left and see three other guys standing there. You ask if they’re friends of your wife. They respond that they are the grooms.

This is the premise for The Bride and the Grooms. Nice girl Taylor Green has mistakenly made three guy friends think they’re getting married to her so when she invites them to her wedding they get the wrong idea and began to prepare for the biggest day of their life. Director Butch Maier completed this no-budget rom-com and did it in true indie fashion. Interviewed actors in restaurants, had extras work for food and the dedicated crew was willing to dock their pay. Despite this, Maier somehow was able to create a full length film with a premise that’s crazier than it’s Hollywood counterparts. Maier tells Vimooz what Jennifer Garner has to do with it, why he’ s ready for a nap and how to get The Bride and the Grooms into a theater near you.

Really? Four grooms? How did you come up with the idea?

Writer/Director Butch Maier: While visiting my hometown of Charleston, W.Va., one Christmas Eve, I bumped into high school acquaintance Jennifer Garner, who would go on to win a Golden Globe for the television show “Alias.” She was just getting started in Hollywood, and I had just started writing scripts. I didn’t even think she would remember me, but she gave me a hug, and I told her I was going to write a screenplay for her one day. This movie is a result of that screenplay. I created themain character of Taylor Green specifically for Jennifer — she’s from Charleston, a ballerina (Garner took ballet), friends with a lot of guys, etc. One day just took too many days to get here, and she got a bit too famous, so I ended up making themovie myself. I spent the better part of my 20s misreading women’s signals. Mostly,it was that I wanted to date them, and they wanted to be friends. So I wondered whatit would look like if several guys miscommunicated with the same woman at the same time. I started with seven fraternity brothers and the title of “One Bride for Seven Brothers.” But the characters were underdeveloped, and it was just too difficult to suspend reality long enough for them to end up at the altar waiting for her. So I cut it down to five guys, developing the characters some more, and came up with a new title: “Engaged in Conversation.” I thought it was clever, but people I knew in Hollywood hated that title. I still couldn’t make the story work, so I eliminated one more guy and ended up with “The Bride & The Grooms.”

How crazy is the wedding going to be in the film? Have you taken anything from real-life wedding disasters?

Maier: As you can see in the trailer (on the movie’s Web site at thebrideandthegrooms.com), there are four guys jockeying for position at the altar. I have been a groomsman in several weddings, and I have attended several other weddings. I have yet to see two potential grooms at a wedding, much less four. I’d say that’s pretty crazy. So I didn’t take anything from a real-life wedding. I just listened to the characters as I was writing to find out what would happen.

What have been the best/worst reactions to the film? What is your “dream reaction” to the film?

Maier: We actually got a terrific reaction during the shoot. For the wedding scene, a church allowed us to set up cameras right after their Sunday service. So we had experienced extras who filled the pews, but we also had church members who stayed in their seats. None of them had read a word of the script. They just knew they were wedding guests in a movie. So we rolled the cameras, and the first take was their natural reactions to what was going on in the wedding scene. During a particularly tense moment, one of my actors says a funny line, and many of the wedding guests laughed loudly. That was a dream reaction. That was quite a rush. I kept their laughter in the movie.

How can viewers who like the movie help get it seen in more theaters?

Maier: They can contact their local indie-friendly theaters and ask for them to show it, tell them about the Web site — thebrideandthegrooms.com. The ideal situation is we find more non-chain theaters that have DVD projection and will split the ticket sales, 50/50. I can’t afford to four-wall (rent out) any more theaters. Tell the theaters to contact me at thebridemovie@yahoo.com or just tell me what theaters are out there. I’ve contacted hundreds upon hundreds of theaters around the country. We are up to 14 states — we just added South Dakota today — and several more are considering it by looking at screeners, including a theater in Alaska. That’s pretty cool for a little movie from Ohio.

Why is your film a “true indie”?

Maier: So many reasons. All of the actors and some of the crew worked for deferred pay. I auditioned actors in restaurants. Extras worked for food. We relied on restaurants to donate the food. Musicians donated the use of their songs. Then, just by looking at all my titles tells you how “indie” this movie is: I am the writer, director, producer, executive producer, casting director, location scout, storyboard artist, production designer, music supervisor, assistant cinematographer, editor, distributor and publicist. We made the movie for low-five-figures in 15 days — one scene last February in Akron when we needed snow and then 14 days in July — one day in Pittsburgh, three days in West Virginia and 10 days in Northeast Ohio. We made a feature-length romantic comedy with almost no money in three states in two weeks. Who does that? Well, we did.

Future projects/plans?

Maier: I will travel to several of the premieres, and then I plan on taking a very long nap. After that, I will be spending a lot more time with my wife and kids. The most expensive part of this movie was time away from my family.

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