Recently my friend, comedian and actor Greg Santos approached me to direct a series of comedy shorts he wrote. Short, sweet, hysterical vignettes into the ridiculousness of relationships. He teamed up with the very talented Jade Catta Preta as his co-star.

Greg getting into character. Photo Cred: Evelyn Stommel

I was so pumped to do it, Greg is a fantastic talent and a gifted writer as well. (Check out Billy and Greg's sketch group The Yacht Club.)

Essentially, the sketches are quick moments of voyeurism between Greg's character and his girlfriend (played by Jade). The idea is to present a window into who these people are (in a short amount of time) and showcase the absurdity of a long term relationship as it grows. Few situations include; being too funny, mangina, PDA, misspeaking, food in beards and catching someone singing a horrible song out loud.

I enlisted my friends at Stommelhaus, Clifton and Evelyn Stommel to give the films a look. Clifton and I decided we wanted the look to be natural light motivated, so the space seemed natural and the comedy could play out front as the star. Often times the aesthetic can distract from the content in comedy, so it was important to me this look as natural as possible. Makeup artist Lili Kaytmaz made everyone look soft and beautiful on screen.

Lili making Greg look human. Photo Cred: Evelyn Stommel

Lili fixing one of the talents hair. Photo Cred: Evelyn Stommel

Hey I know that guy! Special cameo by Kevin Nealon. Photo Cred: Evelyn Stommel

We shot six sketches over the course of one eighteen hour day. We set up around 8 am and moved quickly through each short script, (about 1 min each) making sure to gather plenty of options for the cutting room. I was a bit nervous about shooting 6 concepts in one day, but Greg and Jade delivered with ease, and the vibe on set was one of camaraderie. Made the day go smoothly, and we got everything we needed.

I'm pretty excited about these, we just reached picture lock and are in the process of coloring picture and mixing the audio. Shout out to my friend Michael Seifert for his post mix work on this as always. Stay tuned for more information about the release. Thanks to everyone who came out for this one. Excited to start working in the comedy world.

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"Idiots" - Comedy Shorts - Behind The Scenes