Tales From the Void - Behind the Scenes Podcast - Episode 05

From the silence,

from the darkness,

from your nightmares,

from the void

Tales from the Void

The Behind-the-Scenes Podcast.

Welcome back to the Tales from the Void Behind the Scenes podcast.

I'm David Cummings, host of the NoSleep Podcast and one of the executive producers of Tales from the Void.

Joining me on this episode are the two directors who brought us the middle two episodes of Tales from the Void.

Marty Goh, director of Carrie, and Francesco Losquiavo, director of Starlight.

And as I've mentioned previously, if you've not seen these two episodes, you might be presented with some spoilers in this podcast.

So watching Carrie and Starlight before listening to this would be the best way to experience them.

My first conversation is with Marty Goh.

Marty is a Filipina-American filmmaker who directed Black as Night for Blumhouse and Amazon as part of the Welcome to Blumhouse series.

She was nominated for an NAACP Directing Award for the film.

She also recently finished directing an adaptation of Anne Rules, A Rose for Her Grave.

Additionally, her short film Remittance was picked up for distribution by HBO after the film won the HBO Visionary Award.

Marty and I discussed the episode called Carrie and how this controversial subject matter spoke to her on a personal level, and how she sees its importance to drive open dialogue and discussion around this horrifying and polarizing subject.

In the second half, showrunner Francesco Losquiavo returns to discuss how he directed Starlight.

We delve into the themes of social media and influencer culture and discover how cialo films influence the style of Starlight.

And so, join me as we delve into the dark world of the Void.

Marty Goh, welcome to the Tales from the Void Behind the Scenes podcast.

We're delighted to speak with you today to discuss the episode you directed called Carrie, based on the story Pro-Life.

Thanks for being with us today, Marty.

Hi, Dave.

Thank you so much for having me.

Now, Marty, you have been in the entertainment industry for quite a while.

Some of your projects, you did a movie called A Rose for Her Grave, which is kind of based on a real-life crime.

You were involved in a project called Phobias, which is another horror anthology.

With a lot of your projects leaning towards kind of the darker thrillers and horror themes, I'm curious.

Tell us a little bit about how you got started in the industry and what it is about the darker genres like thrillers and horrors that kind of excite you in your creative ways.

Yeah, so I started out as an actress.

I was living in West Palm Beach, Florida, and I went completely against my parents' wishes and went the artistic way.

They're all in the medical field, but I was just always drawn to the arts and performing.

I went to a school, the arts, and majored in theater and just loved, loved, loved exploring human psyche and performing.

And as we all do, we've got some traumatic childhoods and being able to express myself through theater was the ultimate freedom to me.

And so then I decided to pursue that, but found that it was very, very difficult to find a career as an Asian American actress.

There were very, very limited roles.

And so I decided to apply to film school and I decided to create stories that really represented who I am for people who look like me.

And I, again, loved really delving into very dark subject matter to kind of figure out all my childhood dramas.

But also,

not only that, I loved horror specifically because you could push the boundaries.

A lot of the time, you know, we're living in this reality and we see what we see, but I've always been interested in what's beyond reality.

What are the things that we can't see?

And if we could see that on screen, what would that be?

And that kind of stuff has just always piqued my interest.

So that's why I've pursued horror.

Now, a lot going into true crime horror, which is very hot right now, but also fascinating to me as well.

But yeah.

And you mentioned being Asian American and a lot of your projects want to provide that, the more diversity and bringing in people that, you know, we're slowly in the entertainment industry starting to see on the screen.

It's not just the straight white people anymore.

And so did you feel that it was important to bring those types of people into even these darker themes like horror and those kind of concepts?

Absolutely.

You know, one of the horror films that I was able to create was called Black is Night, and we were able to have mostly an African-American cast, which I loved because you don't really see too many horror films with an all-black family.

You know, I've made tons of shorts with Asian Americans.

It's still pretty difficult to bring it into movies nowadays because, as you know, our industry is kind of struggling and a lot of times it really depends on the cast and they're always going to rely on people who have a proven track record and what that does is kind of stick us into a history of using the same people over and over.

But I'm still here to create those stories and even if I can put those people into my short films, I still hope for the opening of different types of people.

And I do think it is changing.

It's just a slower process.

And now you've been a part, of course, with Tales from the Void, and you direct the episode called Carrie, not to be confused with Stephen King's Carrie.

This is a woman carrying a baby.

It's based on the story by Grayson Groom called Pro-Life.

And I'm always fascinated to learn how directors like you got involved with Tales from the Void.

This one is very,

very sensitive for me because I grew up in a very, very extremist Catholic household.

Love you, mom.

And she's very, very pro-life.

And this story is very much challenging those ideas.

It's about a Christian couple who finds themselves pregnant and there is a serious birth defect, and there's a decision that has to be made and a lot of nightmares that are related to this.

And so this is a very, very personal subject to me and many women.

You know, when I first read the script, I actually had those very same nightmares and

have had to deal with a lot of similar things within it.

I'm not going to spoil the story, but it's very, very sensitive.

It's more true to life.

My palms are sweating right now because it is so sensitive, but it is very true to life, even though there are a lot of paranormal kind of things that happen within the story.

But this is a very important subject that I think definitely needs to be talked about, especially nowadays with what's happening in the United States and voices need to be heard.

And this is one of those opportunities where I feel like we haven't really seen this side very much told in this way.

And I think that seeing this story put on a platform like this is very exciting because it's not just ghosts and things like that, but a real issue that we're dealing with.

And so it's very important to me to get this message out.

Yeah, absolutely.

And as you mentioned, so you have a couple here who are pregnant and they are faced with this challenge where they have to balance their lives and with the life of their unborn child.

And I think that's the kind of tension and horror that is found in this story.

What was your approach in bringing a subject matter like this to the screen because it elicits such strong feelings on both sides of the issue?

I think it was really, really important to, like you said, show those both sides.

So the couple is very Christian and she is, they're both virgins and they get married and, you know, they have this child.

So displaying the reality of that and also experiencing that growing up as a Catholic, it was very close to my experience as a young woman growing up and figuring out all of these really, really heavy subjects that, you know, once you read in a Bible or you hear from other people, you feel one certain way and you know and you think and you believe that there is only one certain way to behave.

And it becomes way more complicated than that.

Way more complicated than that when you're actually put in that situation and having to make those life decisions.

And what I really want to have audiences take away is a conversation of understanding both sides of the coin.

And it's not easy and you don't understand what it feels like until you are put into that situation.

And I think that's the power of

stories and movies and TV.

You really do get very intimate with these characters and you start to feel and empathize with them.

And I think it's just such a powerful story.

And

yeah, it's not a cut and dry black and white situation.

It's look at it from her point of view and what would you do.

And you mentioned, as a great way of putting it, the idea of starting a conversation.

And with a subject matter like this, it's very easy for people to kind of land strongly on one side or the other.

You mentioned you wanted people to have a conversation, but I'm also curious, did you want people to feel one way or the other?

Or was this more, I'm going to put this out there and people can superimpose their own beliefs, their own political stance on this?

Is it just something for people to reflect their own feelings?

That's exactly what it is.

And it's more of the latter.

You know, I'm not here to try to change your mind on anything.

And I think that, you know, again, growing up with very strong Catholic beliefs and then getting challenged and challenged and realizing that's just not the way that I want to live my life, it's really up to the individual and I'm not here to tell you what to believe or what not to believe or how to feel.

I just want to show a story of a woman who's extremely conflicted, who's got these set beliefs and are now and is now being challenged.

And you can take away from it whatever you want to take away from it.

I just hope that you can somehow empathize with a situation that is seemingly impossible.

In both the characters, you have the husband and the wife, and they obviously deal with this situation in different ways.

And I feel like they were written as kind of opposite sides of the same coin.

And was it your hope that either character would be seen as kind of the good person or the bad person?

Or were you trying to get a little more nuance to the characters so they're not just the right-wrong black-white type of approach?

I do think I was attempting at nuance.

I feel that maybe the male character skews a little bit more extreme and then is pushed to the edge when he

holds on to this belief so hard that he is pushed beyond.

I don't want to spoil it again, but I do hope that people see that if you push too hard on a belief that that could be a danger without being empathetic and open to another person's experience.

The point is not to stuff my beliefs or ideas into anybody else's head, but it's more of a challenge and a conversation and just opening up something that is so, honestly, can be so shameful for a lot of women who go through this and feel that they can't talk about it, who are isolated and feel lonely and just

so much shame surrounds it.

And I just, I just want people to be able to talk about it without feeling disgusting and

hellbound.

Exactly.

It's a good way of putting it.

Now, I'm curious, how did you connect with Francesco and find yourself up in Sault Ste.

Marie, Canada filming this?

How did you join this team?

So one of the producers, he had recommended me to Francesco and John Kelly.

And so they facilitated a meeting.

And then I kind of did a pitch on the movie.

And they had seen some of my past work and really connected with it.

And I was able to land the job.

job and I was so excited to be part of this amazing project.

I've always read the No Sleep Reddit page and was just so excited about these stories and so excited that they were going to make it, you know, a show around all of those stories.

And they're all based out in Canada.

I had never shot there before so I was very excited.

Sault Ste.

Marie is very, very, very different, but it was such a pleasure to get out there and experience and see what it was like.

And it brought a lot of of amazing production value.

We got to shoot in this amazing house that was actually historical.

We had to be very, very, very careful in shooting in it.

But it brought so much personality and character to the story.

And yeah, I love working with Canadians.

They are literally the nicest people ever.

And I'd love to shoot there again.

Oh, that's great.

Well, as a fellow Canadian,

I'll take that compliment.

Yeah,

we're certainly known for that.

That's great.

Now, in a production like this, as you mentioned, it's really not a supernatural story.

It's not a ghost story, but there's certainly a psychological element that sort of manifests in very creepy ways.

For people who have not seen the episode yet, we're not going to spoil too much, but you had to, as a director, you had to film scenes where there were certain effects, there were certain puppetry and stuff like that involved.

And is that something that you were familiar with?

Or what were the challenges in filming with

these unique props?

Oh my God, that was the most exciting part for me.

So one of my favorite things about horror films are creating the monsters or, you know, things like that.

And I love to use practical effects as much as possible so that it doesn't come off cheesy and it's physically there so that the actors can feel, see, and hear it and they have something real to play off of.

We were able to work with an amazing amazing effects team that put together these puppets for various of the episodes, but particularly mine, it was terrifying.

We did a lot of research and they were able to make something very, very viscerally disturbing and exciting.

It was pretty challenging on the day of we had a couple puppeteers

and to make the creature move realistically takes a lot of time and effort and we had, you know, this is a very, very tight schedule and a tight budget.

And so we've got limited time to make it look good.

And so a significant portion of the day were spent on just the movement of it and having two people coordinate and hide between objects and underneath objects to make it look realistic.

It was really, really fun and definitely something I want to keep doing for the rest of my life, really, is just creating realistic creatures and doing puppetry and having like practical effects like that.

It's really just a joy.

Now, I don't know if Francesco told you, but I interviewed Francesco and John last night, and they were talking about how there was a screening they did in Toronto for a small group of the public.

And they screened Carrie.

And there was a gentleman in the audience who, at the end of that episode, basically fainted.

And there was thought, you know, was he drunk?

Was he on drugs?

But he basically just said there was just something about the scene at the very end, certainly the

last image you see on the screen that just really affected him.

Yeah.

And so there's, I suppose that's a compliment to horror creators to elicit a response that's so visceral like that.

That is a huge compliment.

And I do feel that.

like I said, it's so personal.

There was many times that I even had to like step away and cry because it was just too much to bear.

I don't shy away from things like that.

I want to talk about those things.

I think it's worth it.

Like if it elicits some sort of reaction to people in that way, then I think it's worth talking about.

And it can be very shocking to see those images within it, but it's worth it.

And it's not just for shock value.

It's really to prove a point.

Like, look at this thing that you know, 50% of our population has to go through and, you know, has to live with.

Look at it, you know and it's it's not easy i'm i'm really happy that happened and i you know it's funny because i never believe when when people say that in like screenings and things like that but i was like wow that's that's a real thing right yeah on the no sleep podcast we adapted this story very early on in the show so our audience wasn't overly you know wasn't a big audience back then I think it's safe to say that this episode is probably going to be the most controversial.

And what fascinates me about stories with this kind of politically charged message is that you're going to get people who on literally on both sides of the subject who are going to be angry because you presented one side or the other in their opinion.

And so it's fascinating to think that there will be people upset because they're going to say, oh, you're so

anti-abortion or you're so pro pro-abortion.

And it's not really fair to say how are you going to deal with the response until you hear the response, but how do you feel about dealing with some people who will probably be upset by this episode?

To be completely honest, I'm pretty scared.

You know, having experienced a lot of the things that are happening within this story and knowing so many close friends and family who've also experienced it, Talking about these things is not common.

You know, a lot of women keep this inside and they cry and it tears them apart and it traumatizes them and it creates so much fear.

I have just started to talk about these things with my friends openly and it feels like freedom.

It feels like joy because then you realize so many people have gone through the same things.

My mom, again, like I said, I'm afraid for her to find out, honestly.

She's a huge pro-lifer.

She's got like, I grew up with these giant magnets on the back of every car that have like the Blessed Virgin Mary and pictures of like aborted fetuses.

And she goes and she prays to at these, at Planned Parenthood, you know, every weekend.

You know, I've had these conversations with her and no matter what we do, we will not agree.

And so I kind of just let it go and,

you know, allow her to just talk at me.

So I kind of have a lot of experience in people talking at me.

Again, it's something that's worth it.

That I'm terrified of hearing what people have to say.

And a lot of me is very hesitant to open up.

You know, like I've closed my Instagram because I don't want to leave myself vulnerable.

And the way that I express myself is through these stories.

And sometimes nothing what I say will influence that person.

And that's because they're just not ready to hear it or they don't have any basis of experience that can show them otherwise.

Of what I've experienced, or what many women have experienced.

But being scared doesn't mean I'm not going to move forward and talk about it.

I think that's just like the nature of being

a filmmaker, is putting yourself out there and allowing yourself to be vulnerable.

Because most of the time, a lot of people are going to hate what you do.

And

you know, luck, I do say luckily that I've, you know, gotten bad reviews and had people say, this sucks.

You're horrible.

And then I've also gotten the opposite of, I love this.

This has changed my life.

Thank you so much for saying it.

And all I can do is express my truth and hope for the best, but I'm not going to please everybody.

This is just a representation of my experience and so many others' experience.

And what you take from it is up to you.

And I think with all good horror stories, there has to be a level of social commentary.

And we've seen that from the earliest days of horror.

And what I find interesting is this is a story that's written by a queer man.

And it's obviously, as you've said, it's such a emotional subject matter for women.

And of course, you know, men have a connection to it.

And certainly, as the husband is portrayed in this story, but I think even Grayson, Grayson's approach to this story was not so much to be so polemical and divisive, but to allow people to search their own emotions and see where they're coming from.

But I think it's really important, and you've done an amazing job, and the writers and the actors, the people who created this episode, of creating a genuinely terrifying story, but that brings out that social commentary.

And that's where the essence and the oomph of this story is.

It's not just creepy puppets, it's what's happening with real people.

people.

I really appreciate that.

Thank you so much for the kind words.

Yeah,

it's key.

And as I say, we've seen that throughout.

That

you can do an effective horror story with ghosts popping out of a scary attic or something.

But if it's not going to touch on the human condition and what people can relate to, then I think that you're going to miss the mark.

And so this episode does not miss the mark in that way.

Oh, I really appreciate that.

So with this episode all wrapped wrapped up and everything,

what does the future hold for you?

Do you have other projects working now?

Yeah, I have a lot of other features that I'm developing right now with a few different production companies.

There's one, another true crime thriller that I may be flying out for like next week.

I'm just kind of putting together all of the imagery.

We're just waiting for the final green light, but it's about to, it's based on another true story I can't really talk about it right now, but it'll be really

exciting and it actually has some dark humor in it, which is something that I don't usually do.

I think I've done like a couple projects with dark humor, but um but still such a joy.

Um, and then I'm working on another one that is also true crime, but it's also horror and paranormal based on Teresita Basa, who was a Filipino-American immigrant who came here to Chicago in the 70s and was murdered.

And it's a paranormal kind of possession story.

It's super fun, a super fun thriller, and then a couple of other projects that I'm developing, but all kind of have.

I really, really enjoy projects that have some sort of truth in it or reality to it, but then also kind of the supernatural element.

I just love having those type of conversations with people and having those types of subject matter.

So I'm excited.

Yeah.

Well, very much so.

That sounds great.

And I look forward to seeing those.

So, Marty, thank you for sharing your insight into this incredible episode.

And as we've touched on, it will, I'm sure, stir a lot of people.

And I can't wait for everyone to see it.

I really appreciate this.

Thank you so much, David.

You're very welcome.

All the best in the future.

And maybe we can connect again sometime soon.

That'd be amazing.

Okay, thanks for being on the show.

Francesco, welcome back to the behind the scenes podcast and you're joining us on this episode to discuss the third episode of Tales from the Void, in which you direct the story Starlight, based on the million-dollar question by João André Narigueta Ribeio.

And that's the extent of my Portuguese.

Francesco, thanks for being with us again.

That was an impressive pronunciation.

Good to be here, David.

So let's talk about Starlight, another great script by John Thomas Kelly.

And we touched on this in our first episode, but this script is probably the one that strays the most from the original story.

Well, certainly keeping the main themes of it.

What was it about this story that made it such a good jumping off point to expand and adapt in the direction it went?

I think this one was always a favorite for me, and we wanted to do it because it is not necessarily well known in the No Sleep community.

And I think we wanted to show that you can take a couple paragraphs and stretch it into something really interesting.

But I always thought the premise was quite cool of like a game show that isn't real.

I always thought it was a really interesting thing.

And like, how far would you extend your beliefs to go along with something if you wanted to believe it was real?

Right.

That was kind of like the sort of one of the themes that we tried to tap into.

So yeah, I went to like when adapting this one, we spent a lot of time on this script and we had versions of it that started at the game show before we figured out that you need to hate Wit before we kill him.

So we need to give him some backstory.

And that was a bit of a breakthrough moment with one of our development execs at the exchange that had shared, like, I don't know if I'm supposed to like this guy or hate him.

And then that was kind of like, oh, we need to make him a piece of shit, so to speak.

So that was a big adjustment that we made.

And then it was funny.

We actually had like a version of the script where he

doesn't get killed like he gets drugged and he's getting dragged into like a room and he you can kind of see through a blurry vision that there's all these people that have been like murdered and tortured and we had like the the police show up and as the kind of killers kind of getting taken away by the police he says to the kid you know you're or says to wit you know you're going to be a star and he has like an engraving of a star in his hand that was one of the original kind of endings that we had done and we just thought like it's better to have more of it kind of live in your mind.

So, we just showed him kind of being killed and didn't show how the whole operation works or whatever.

It was kind of more interesting to see it from the perspective of like, he doesn't realize it until it's too late, and you never get to see the kind of dark stuff that's going on in all the other rooms.

So, it was a really fun one because we had a bunch of different avenues that we could take it.

And we sort of explored different things with the character, different things with the ending.

But I think that was what was so great about this story and a lot of the stories on No Sleep is that there's like enough meat on the bones to make it interesting but then when we're going to stretch it to a 30-minute format you can add a lot more in there but this one in particular was we chose to add more about character than kind of add more in terms of plot so we cut all that stuff out of the ending and just gave it a beginning sort of like a backstory of what happens before he gets there and i think it i think it worked quite well right yeah i think it is a very effective framing for that for that story Now, one of the things that makes for such great horror stories is when you have a conflicting character.

On one hand, the audience audience should be kind of rooting for the main character, the one you want to win in the end.

But when you have a lead character who isn't always likable or relatable, there's a tension, and

that can add to the horror.

So, you mentioned from your perspective, you felt that Wit was a character that should be hated, that should be disliked, and you've had people give feedback about, hey, should I or shouldn't I feel a certain way about this character?

Do you think ultimately it matters if the audience really likes Wit or really doesn't like like him?

I hope the audience didn't like Wit.

I think we tried.

I don't like Wit personally.

And it was, it was funny on set because we, I had to keep saying to Sean, like, you're not cool.

Like, they're not going to like you.

If they like you, we haven't done our job here.

Like, Wit thinks he's cool, but we need to, we need to kind of make you a little bit detestable.

And I think it kind of speaks a little bit to John and my sensibilities about like trying to be a little bit humble and kind of like not being so into social media.

So it's stuff that John and I kind of like talked a lot about and kind of put into the character.

I personally think if you don't like wit and you see his kind of character attributes as a little bit unusual and detestable, it makes it more believable in my opinion that he would have blinders on for as long as he does.

If you kind of see him as someone that this is normal behavior, who's someone who's trying to be like a famous YouTuber, then you might ask yourself, like, well, why the hell did he just run out of there earlier?

Right.

So we thought it was important to like establish the absurdity of his character to make it almost more believable that he's sticking around because he's just so desperate for, you know, this to be his big break.

And I think you need to kind of hate him or see him as like an absurd caricature to kind of go along with that.

Right.

Yeah.

And that definitely comes across.

Now, there is some interesting, I'll call it misdirection in this episode.

And again, without spoiling it too much, you were telling me a bit about how certain scenes, for example, in the theater, were filmed and how some creativity made the overall scale seem bigger.

I'm curious, are those things planned in advance, or are there some happy accidents where you stumble on great solutions as you're basically on set filming?

So we did a lot of planning for the stage scene in particular.

I think some of it worked on the day.

Some of it we had to kind of pivot on the fly.

Believe it or not, that scene only has 12 mannequins in it in the audience.

And we actually

had to come back for a pickup day and just reposition mannequins in a hundred different ways and re-film them in different groupings so that VFX could build all the different plates.

We also had to basically shoot all of which reactions and everything on a separate day to a separate setup with the mannequins.

So we almost had to like plan out: okay, what are we going to show at which moments?

And it's funny, we probably had like three hours of mannequin footage, and I think there's like maybe five seconds in there.

And every kind of test screening we did, and everything, it was like show it less, show it less, show it less, because um, it's trying to get the audience to kind of suspend their kind of belief that the you know, this is like a real thing.

And the thing about Starlight is like, I feel like the audience is always maybe a minute ahead of Wit.

So, what we tend to find is they kind of realize, well, the game show is not real before Wit realizes it.

But if you extend that length to three minutes or five minutes, it doesn't work.

It's okay if you're kind of a minute ahead and you're going, well, it's because he's kind of infatuated, but any longer than that, it kind of becomes disbelievable.

So, that was something we really like tried to refine.

But yeah, there was a lot of planning on like spotlight kind of you know stuff going off,

the blocking of the Carnival barker that was played by dan uh and brumichi and then sean meldrum kind of uh played wit and having kind of his reactions at different points we also like freestyled some stuff on stage i think the line i'll burn this place to the to the effing ground uh was freestyled on the spot and we kind of rewrote the script there and changed uh his kind of reaction to storming off so yeah it was uh it was a fun scene it was a crazy day because it was you know i think that scene reads as like 11 minutes in one go So you only get a couple takes of them doing it and then kind of just picking up different moments.

So a lot of planning, but also a lot of improvisation, especially with Dan, who played the Carnival Barker.

We kind of gave him the full range of the stage just kind of to go around and have fun.

So it was nice seeing him kind of get into character.

Yeah, and that really comes across on the screen.

He really has that improv sensibility, which works so well.

Yeah, it was one of those where like when he first came out, it was like, okay, forget what I have on my shot list.

Just

let him cook and we're going to keep the camera on him.

Right.

Yeah, it was fun.

When we talked in the first behind the scenes episode, you said that you wanted this episode to be a bit like a reverse Jallo film.

And I'm wondering if you can explain a little bit to the audience what a Jallo film is and what it is that you meant by a reverse Jallo film.

Yeah, so a Jallo film sort of like predates a slasher, and it's sort of an Italian kind of murder mystery thing.

I think in Italian, Giallo directly translated as yellow and there's these yellow kind of paperbacks in Italy back in the day that would be murder mysteries.

They started making them into kind of horror films.

I think the godfather of it is Dario Argento and they kind of have like a few things in them.

It's typically somebody witnesses a murder sort of early on.

and they're trying to figure it out or kind of like you know help the cops figure it out and they keep kind of stumbling into different murder scenes and you keep having it happen.

And then, the murderer is typically, you know, somebody in a mask or with like a fedora or like a leather jacket.

It's very like Italian style.

The music is very like synthy and kind of over-the-top.

It's a lot of like Goblin was a big band that kind of did a lot of Daro Gento's film.

So it has like a distinct style.

Heavy use of like color is like a big one.

So they go like over the top with the reds and the greens.

If you think about like Sesperia, which is more later in kind of the Jallo films where they kind of like adjusted the format a bit, or Opera was like a big reference for this as well.

But the idea of this of like doing it as like a reverse Jallo or kind of trying to, you know, lean into sort of like a neo-jallow, like neon demon or some of the newer films that kind of take elements from it.

What we did was, is like, instead of Wit sort of like witnessing a murder, figuring out the clues, and then like catching the killer, he's effectively being killed at the end, but he's getting all the clues that he's going to be the victim as the episode's happening.

So rather than the murder being at the beginning of the episode and then he has to figure it out, it's at the end.

And when he figures it out, it's too late.

And it was great because we wanted that kind of like synthy sort of goblin sound.

And we brought in Steve Moore, who actually used to tour with Goblin, and he has an amazing band, Zombie, that he plays with.

And like, I could not have picked a better composer.

The playlist I gave him, and then kind of what he came up with is so similar.

And he kind of like put his own spin on it, but just elevated the work so much.

He was amazing.

And then Scott did such a beautiful job with my kind of reds and greens.

We really got brighter and brighter on the reds as kind of Wit was kind of infatuated by the idea of fame and on the game show.

And then we have that sort of dark green, decrepit corridor that we flip the color scheme when he's, you know, taken to be killed.

So that was kind of, you know, a little suspirious-esque that we tried to put in there.

And then you'll notice, too, we do a little bit of the Jallo style with the knife stuff, right?

So all the knife shots are Jallo kind of close-ups and, you know, very close-ups on the stabbing and the music kind of changes to be a little bit more upbeat.

And then even the mask, we tried to do a kind of a traditional Jallo style mask, which is like kind of a, you know, kind of mask over the, over the face.

That's, I think it's usually like paneos or something that they use.

But what what i thought was kind of cool about that was that in my mind i i actually had thought about it being green but we went with the red jallow but i liked the idea of the killer wearing one of those kind of like green screen masks and maybe on the social media feed it can be changed to whoever's face you want it to be that was something that we kind of like tried to play up on but still have like the style of it be that of a jallo killer so we pulled a lot of references from jallo films i watched a ton um and i hope that comes across in the work but um yeah, I don't know, being Italian, I kind of wanted to have something kind of being a nod to that genre of horror.

Yeah, that's fascinating insight.

And I think if people, maybe they've already seen it and they hear this, go back and watch this with that perspective.

And I think that's going to be really fascinating to see it through that lens, as it were.

Now, it feels like the internet is crowded with people who either desperately want the cloud of being an influencer or those who just cannot stand the influencer culture.

Do you think there's a message in this story that leans to one side or the other?

I don't imagine you're suggesting that all influencers deserve to be knocked off like that, but is there a message about the pros or cons of influencer or social media culture?

I think there's something to be said for when you live for an online presence, it kind of can make you an asshole in the real world.

I think is I feel like the theme is very overt in this episode, right?

Like in the unknown, it's more kind of subjective and there's, there's different ways you could take the story.

I think this and Carrie were very kind of like on the nose with what we're trying to say.

But to me, the way I always saw like wit is like, everyone's walked past someone talking into their phone, filming a video or doing something.

And the way you portray yourself when you're looking into that window is very different often than how you portray yourself in real life.

And working with John on it, we talked a lot about like, well, what if you were always trying to portray yourself that way?

And do you lose a little bit of yourself in that?

And I guess that's kind of the warning is that, you know, the time that Witt spends off the phone, he's, he's a bit of a dick and he doesn't have a ton of friends and he lives a very, you know, lonely life.

But if you, if you just watch his, you know, social media phone videos in the in the episode, it seems like he's having an awesome time.

Yeah.

I think it's something that a lot of people will relate to and connect with.

So, Francesco, thanks again for being with us and for talking about Starlight.

And look forward to seeing how people respond to this fascinating and very fun episode.

Thanks, David.

It was a great time today.

I want to thank Marty Goh and Francesco Los Chiavo for joining me and sharing how they brought these two compelling stories to the screen.

Tales from the Void, the behind-the-scenes podcast, is a Creative Reason media production in conjunction with Envoy Entertainment.

Music by Alex Cuervo and Brandon Boone.

Thank you for being with us.

Join us next time for a deeper plunge into the void.

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