Excerpt article from the Quantum Storm .357 E-Magazine [QSE.357] Issue 24 of September 1, 2023.
In May of 2010 while the studio web series THE SECRET OF ANGELIKA5 [TSOA5] was in full swing entering it's second season, the Quantum Storm Productions film producer and director [David Quintana] crossed paths with Eric Echevarria of EJE Productions while he was making final touches on a web series entitled ALEKHINE'S GUN [AG], then starring Romen McPherson, Mary Grace Snow, and Alan Berkowitz, which was presented as a premiere at the film gallery in downtown Houston, Texas.
Almost immediately, Quintana was captivated by Echevarria's film format and camera work, which he felt mirrored his own, and he made immediate contact with the new indie film maker to possibly collaborate on some new projects, possibly bolstering both studios portfolios and developing a reputation for making better films in the Houston area independent film circuit. They both reviewed each others work and traded reviews and critiques which both were brutally honest about. Soon after, they decided to meet up and see if they had anything else in common.
Both studios hit it off pretty well initially; they both met on neutral ground and began pulling their resources of actors and equipment together to see what they could develop. Both studios had a strong set of actors that could cross over in a new production and the two directors weren't limited on ideas that were being tossed around. Quintana's TSOA5 had an issue that the cast was growing, but that most of the new members were only brought on as strong extra's and he felt that some of them were talented enough to be used on other projects outside of TSOA5; maybe even in dramatic works.
Echevarria's production team on AG had some new faces, a couple of talented leading actors who delivered some outstanding performances, but he admitted that some of the casting to AG were troublesome to cast and his series needed several reshoots to fill in some gaps. He knew he had a good team, the right locations, and a solid film format, but that he was missing a better part of production standard to filling in parts to build a better team.
Quintana dropped off some ideas for possible collaboration. The two directors traded ideas on a possible mini-series entitled HUNTSVILLE; a dark drama with a plot which circled around a prison where a psychopathic inmate who actually ran the prison from the inside with a group of prison guards who took care of a lot of the dirty dealings outside of the prison. This project was projected to star Danny Gallehugh, Larry Carrell, Sam Rivas, Saira Ramos, Mary Grace Snow, Romen McPherson, and Alan Berkowitz. The locations for this mini-series were plentiful and most of the sites being looked at were located in downtown Huntsville, Texas. A few test video sequences were shot under Echevarria, but were never released and was shelved for later.
During this same time, Quintana brought Alan Berkowitz, Larry Carrell, Mary Grace Snow and even Erik Echevarria into TSOA5 and had them fill some spots on the show as extras. Quintana and Carrell began to collaborate on some short films which were produced during a break in TSOA5, where they came up with a concept to produce another mini-series for THEY LIVE, which would be a spin off of John Carpenter's 1988 horror/scifi classic.
The problem that arose for even attempting a web series for THEY LIVE was, who would play the lead of George Nada, the leading character from the featured movie who was played by Roddy Piper, an infamous professional wrestler. Piper' performance wasn't anything to really brag about and there were reports that he improvised on the set of the feature film a lot, adding a little of his widely know persona to the character. Even the secondary lead character of Frank Armitage was going to need some wild and bulky consideration for filling the role.
Luckily, Quintana was working on TSOA5 which was in the middle of developing a psychotic killer in the third season of the webs series, an ex-Marine named Jeffrey Kelly [played by Danny Gallehugh]. Quintana had slowly introduced Gallehugh's character into the series, giving the new actor time to develop the evil ex-Marine over the course of two seasons. Gallehugh was huge and brooding, even more so on camera; which made most of the leading cast members of TSOA5 look small and too insignificant to try and fight someone like him off. As expected and with some clever scripting to hide the limited talents of the actor bringing the ex-Marine to a life of his own, TSOA5 had introduced a new character that was gaining a little notoriety within the show.
Quintana and Echevarria talked about giving the nod to Gallehugh to lead the new web series; but both agreed that the big actor would have to up the ante on his acting, especially were large amounts of dialog were going to added to the script to tell the unique story from the feature film. Even though the actor seemed more than willing to play the part, Quintana and Echevarria knew it was going to be an up hill battle to get the new actor up to speed to lead the production.
Quintana had stumbled on Gallehugh in early 2010 at an indie film meet and greet in Houston and immediately set up an interview with the large, muscular actor. Quintana thought that Gallehugh's work on TSOA5 was progressing well and that in no time, and that through time in the production of the new mini-series, it would give him a chance to learn and grow as an actor, eventually developing him into a stronger lead. Gallehugh's physical appearance was impressive on camera, but it would take an entirely new production angle to add big action sequences to the web series if the new show was going to impress real fans of the now classic film.
Echevarria loved the idea of the new series and initially the script writing for this new THEY LIVE Series was being developed as a dark comedy, but after the idea of adding Romen McPherson as Frank Armitage [from the actual film], Quintana's early scripts changed to more of a "beat down" action film where the two lead characters in the film had to fight their way through from one town to the next, trying to survive through a hoard of aliens hell bent on capturing or killing both the lead characters. As the first five scripts to this new mini-series were being completed, a small hiccup occurred which made the once thought out solid collaboration of bringing two studios together, began to show cracks in the foundation.
Quintana only met with McPherson once at a dinner and team get-together at Echevarria's
home, but he was impressed about how the large actor electrified a room
with his presence and was open minded about how his character in the
initial scripting for HUNTSVILLE should be presented. Quintana wanted the part of Armitage in this THEY LIVE Series to not only show McPherson's intensity, but also his power, intellect, charisma, and physique while also manhandling aliens left and right.
The new production team's first meet and greet went down without a stumble. Echevarria took out his camera and began to film the night showing the cast and crew cutting up before the camera, enjoying a sing along, and sharing their thoughts about what to expect in the near future from both studios. A few months later, the entire team collaborated on a few short films and the acting prowess of all of the actors was pristine with good chemistry, dramatic sequences, and emotional content.
HUNTSVILLE would never see the light of day due to a licensing issue with the local prison in Huntsville, Texas requiring special permits and authorization to use any and all visual descriptions of the prison with any locations that might present a collaboration with the state and the web series production. Even though the production team were a little devastated to loose the edge to produce the prison, series, Quintana and Echevarria decided to push forth with the THEY LIVE Web Series.
And so, then additional actors were thought up for several supporting roles to bring this new web series to life. Mary Grace Snow was being brought on board to take the role of Holly Thompson, then performed by Meg Foster in the feature. Her part would introduce an insight to the alien culture that she supported openly and who is eventually used to spy on the two lead characters. A dramatic chance to the character would have presented her taking sides with the humans and form a resistance to free the rest of the humans who are under a "sleeper spell."
Alan Berkowitz was penned in to play the role of Gilbert, then played by Peter Jason in the feature; who is part of the resistance and who directs the leading characters to perform missions to fight the aliens by destroying alien amplifiers that send out the "sleeper spell" signals to the entirety of the earths population.
After
the first five scripts to this new mini-series were being completed, a
small hiccup occurred that brought the once thought-out/solid
collaboration of bringing two studios together, crack within
the already established foundation. The following paragraphs were witnessed by many and some still laugh about it. Shortly after the following events, some of the actors mentioned disappeared from the Houston Indie Film Scene, seeking sough attention and success elsewhere.
The first thing that surfaced and shook the ground between the studios was that Gallehugh had identified himself as an ex-Navy SEAL; which wasn't completely true at all; when openly questioned about it he changed his tune and began to play a different card claiming he worked with "Special Operations" which also wasn't true. He also claimed to attend several acting schools and clinics that also didn't pan out or exist. There was honestly never any real need for him to brag or bolster about a trumped up resume in acting. All of the projects being developed were being done so for fun and with no real chance of actually making it into the prime purview of success. He was already being used extensively as a bad guy in TSOA5 and also in the test reels of HUNTSVILLE; but many thought that his "selection for the leading roles" in the future projects was just too much for him to take in.
Within two months of the web series pre-production efforts, studio team members felt that in Gallehugh's own mind, he just couldn't be that "new guy without any skills" to be given so many good parts. So, he began making shit up to play the role of a leading man; things like interviewing himself with made up local indie news teams. Most of the studio teams got a good laugh out of his "unique" creativity and Quintana finally had to privately confronted him about it. He never made any wild demands on the production team or claimed he was worth pay, but it was obvious that Gallehugh wanted total success as a leading man in in main production and he felt that being an indie film actor wasn't enough for his growing ego.
Shortly after that, a lot of drama began to fill within the acting teams. First, Carrell didn't help much, adding to the drama by talking badly about some of the "lower actors" and how he could have directed this or that a whole lot better. He had started pre-production on his new horror film, JACOB, and was asking the actors of the collaboration about them being in his future film. Over the course of a few weeks, the damage was done and the collaboration began to brake apart with spite between both teams. Quintana tried to keep the teams together and got everyone to attend a production team meeting at the Lightsey Ranch; but the drama had already spread like a bad virus, consumed several actors who easily became insulted through targeting. Then, after a text message was miss-sent between a director and an actress, things went from really bad to worse; where the finger pointed began to start about who ws at fault for ending the newly formed collaboration.
By the end of April 2011, the collaboration was torn completely apart. All of the planned projects were doomed and there was no way to save the film projects and mini-series that were entering production, so the entire thing was dumped into the trash. Quintana still has seven completed scripts for the web series first season shelved in a computer. He has produced four web series and three feature films since the breakup. He worked with an additional 52 actors who performed their roles brilliantly, professionally and without any drama; winning 14 film awards in seven years and continues to produce indie films, write scripts, hold acting courses for beginners, produces affordable and professional head shots for local area actors.
Since the fall of the collaborative team, Echevarria filmed a few short films with no real success, giving roles to Carrell, Snow, Gallehugh, and others that all went no where. McPherson has been the quality actor and model; performing small roles in films and commercials; He's made quite a name for himself inside the Houston film scene. Gallehugh tried his best to remain a leading actor and submitted resumes for several films, but only received sub-par roles as an extra before he vanished and moved to San Antonio. Snow had no luck in feature films, she worked on a few short films; that kind that will never see the light of day, and became an at-home mommy. Berkowitz passed away a few years back. He had roles in a few films and wrote two books before his passing.
QSE .357 ISSUE 26 dtd 11/1/2023
