The Life and Times of Ansel Faraj

There’s an age-old debate that has raged amongst those engaged in the art of cinema creation that has always transfixed me for some reason. Do the young, ambitious creatives who are determined to ply their trade behind the camera receive more education and training for the work detail and hardship from behind a desk in a classroom or through first-hand experience on an actual set? Maestro Italian helmer Luigi Cozzi once told me in an interview in 2018 that he never regretted bypassing the film study at university in favor of an actual set. “I left school because I wanted to work in the movies. I didn’t care about what they told me in school. And so I started with assistant for dubbing, assistant editor, assistant

for set decoration. I wanted to know how to make a movie. I wanted to be always in control.

In order to know what’s behind a movie, you rely on the A.D. You rely on the editor. You cannot tell him what’s wrong. I did that again when I started working with Dario Argento, following him as assistant editor and doing a lot of things. I also work on the production side because I wanted to know how a production worked. Because that is a key to do a good movie. If you draw on production assistance effectively, you have a good possibility to make a good movie. If you are lost, you rely on production crews. They tell you no, this is not possible. It costs too much. You mustn’t give up. Try to learn what works for them. Ok. Then let’s do it this way.”

Gaining knowledge by simply doing is a mantra that many accept in any industry when feeling confined by the convention of someone’s predisposed notion of what educational structure should be. This methodology is often adapted by young independent filmmakers not under the thumb of the movie industry as a way to stand out amongst the mass of those

looking to make their imprint through the lens. The artists that need our support if we ascribe at all to the idea that the individual voice is far better than the single-dimension sameness studios crave for dollars. One such artistic warrior is Ansel Faraj, an exciting rising star (somewhat restrictive in phrasing as he has been creating since he was 16, now in his mid-thirties) who prides himself on being self-taught in the business of movie magic. When the chance to interview the incredibly talented Mr. Faraj came up, I leaped at the chance and discovered we have similar passions for classic film, Dr. Mabuse stories, the horror

film and Dan Curtis’ immortal Dark Shadows series.

This young hippie from Venice Beach cuts a striking figure in his blue Hawaiian shirts, faded jeans, flip flops and shark tooth necklace that belies his darker thrillers, but also serves as a reminder he’s directed other styles of film, a romance entitled Will & Liz, and his most recent feature, award-winning comedy The Great Nick D. As a preventative measure before-hand, I rubbed my metaphoric rabbit’s foot in hopes that I wouldn’t geek out. Well, that certainly crashed and burned. Anyway, onward we go!

Kevin: I’ve read, or a little birdie told me, so to speak, that a production of Phantom of the Opera at the historic Pantages Theater was one of your inspirations to get into motion picture magic.

Ansel Faraj: Yes.

Kevin: Was there a filmmaker actually that you followed at the age of 6 that had you thinking “I want to do what he does. I want to become a director” or was it Andrew Lloyd Webber?

Ansel Faraj: So it was long before the film, which is 20 years old this year. At that point, the show was still dark, and it wasn’t glittery. It wasn’t heavy on the Twilight vibe. The Phantom is shooting fireballs across the stage and it was scary. There was still that that element of danger to it. The chandelier is crashing and all that stuff. I was like “I don’t know how they’re doing that. I wanna do that. That’s cool, like this huge elaborate magic trick”.

They had constantly been talking about doing a movie of it. At that point, it was all a pipe dream. I then wanted to see all of the Phantom movies that existed, primarily to see his disfigurement, which kind of launched me into Universal Monsters and other classic movies. I don’t think that I really had a filmmaker that I started emulating. My mind goes to Dan Curtis, obviously, with House of Dark Shadows, which I saw around the same time. Even then, it wasn’t so filmmaker-oriented as it was just movie-oriented. My parents and I watched a lot of noir. I remember seeing The Maltese Falcon when I was really young as well as The Thin Man movies. My sister is into MGM musicals and Valley of the Dolls, stuff like that. I was getting that on the side. I wasn’t really filmmaker-oriented for a while. Probably not till I was maybe 9 or 10.

I remember really following Tod Browning, Dan Curtis and then Jack Arnold because of The Creature from the Black Lagoon, and I’d see his name appear on quite a few Gilligan’s Island episodes too. That’s a really interesting question. Nobody’s ever asked me that about, like, what filmmaker really started me way back when. I don’t really have an answer.

Kevin: I ask the question a lot because I think for me, as a film reviewer, you have to have a basis of understanding as to how films are put together, how the product is made.

Ansel Faraj: I remember watching Sunset Boulevard when I was young and loving that. There’s couple I mean, The Apartment, Irma La Douce. I remember getting a lot of Wilder and Hitchcock. My parents were constantly bringing home Hitchcock videos from 2020 Video. I did see Vertigo when I was, I think, 6. That was a gut punch to me. You know what? We could say Hitchcock. We could say Hitchcock because I was aware of an identity behind the movies.

Dan Curtis and Dark Shadows as well, because Kathryn Leigh Scott published ‘The Dark Shadows Movie Book’, which had the scripts for House of Dark Shadows and Night of Dark Shadows around that same time. I started seeing what a script looks like, with behind-the-scenes photographs of the movies, the series and understanding that there’s a process for this stuff that I’m seeing on television, it isn’t just happening. There’s actually a

whole thing behind it. All that infused my mind of “okay, I want to do that. I don’t want to be an architect like my dad. This is what goes into The Phantom of the Opera on stage. How did they do that?

How did they do Carolyn being staked in House of Dark Shadows and that blood coming out? It scares me. How did they do that? I wanna do that.” With a filmmaker, I could say Hitchcock and Fellini, because I remember a lot of Fellini as well. As far as really studying careers, that didn’t happen until I was probably 10 or 11 when I really started dissecting Hitchcock. I bought these books on Billy Wilder, Polanski, Fellini, John Ford, Fritz Lang.

Kevin: A bit of an oddity. In researching your bio, I saw that you were rejected by a film school...

Ansel Faraj: Yeah.

Kevin:...At the age of 17 for knowing too much about film?

Ansel Faraj: I really wanted to go to Cal Arts. Going back to following a filmmaker, I liked Edward Scissorhands, and Mars Attacks - nobody likes that movie, but I do. When I was in middle school and high school everybody was like “you could be the next Tim Burton”. That was not something I ever wanted to emulate or had occurred to me. I used to have hair at that point, and I had crazy, curly Tim Burton-esque hair. We were a match. I was still thinking of, if you really wanted to get me, Terence Fisher and Brian De Palma and all of them at that point. But, ok. Tim Burton can do his weird things and have similar loves to me in Vincent Price, gothic and Roger Corman. Corman to me was my hero growing up and still is, along with Robert Altman. I have a story about visiting Roger Corman’s offices, too. Well, Tim Burton went to Cal Arts.

So I thought, okay I’ll follow in his footsteps in that way because he was somehow able to get in into the industry through there. I don’t come from an industry family. I don’t have any connections. Then we (my parents and I) toured Chapman, LMU and others. I hated all of them. I knew I was never gonna get into USC because I hated school. I didn’t have the grades because school is a distraction from me being at home making movies. I asked myself why am I here in math class? I can’t understand these numbers. Let me just go write a script. I went to Cal Arts. I toured it. I loved it. It had the right energy. I submitted my stuff. I remember he lady that was in the academic admissions office. Really nice. She came to my house.

I remember she came to my room and was looking at all my Universal Monster figures along with my movie collection. She’s like “Oh, wow. You know, you’ve got to figure out how to bring all of this to our school”. I was wait-listed and didn’t hear anything till late April. Everybody else in my class, I went to a private school and there was 18 of us for many years together all day every day, had gotten their letters and I hadn’t. I was rejected from Chapman and LMU, and didn’t care. I was just waiting for Cal Arts. Finally a letter came. They were like “We really liked your stuff, but we don’t know what to do with you. We don’t know what we could teach you. You know too much. Our best advice is to just go make a movie”. Which is not at all what I wanted to hear at that time. I wanted to go off and have the college experience.

It was heartbreaking, but it was probably the best thing that could have happened. They were right. Go make a movie. I just kept making movies. I love Ken Russell. My senior year, I had directed my Russell-esque rock opera Faust, which takes place in Venice Beach. It’s the story of Faust as a teenager. He sells his soul for a girl and then all hell breaks loose. It was a jukebox musical, very Tommy-like, where all the songs forward the story. I remember the day after high school graduation, I did my long in development adaptation of Hangover Square, but based on the novel, not a remake of the old film.

I’d written the script as a black and white film noir. I was just making movies. My dad, who is old school, says “You need to go to school. You need to go to school. School, job. That’s how it works”. I knew that that that wasn’t how it works. Just go make a movie. Let me just do this. I’ll find a way. I just kept doing it. I ended up with Doctor Mabuse about 2 or 3 years later.

Kevin: I interviewed Luigi Cozzi a few years ago. He had a similar situation to what you’re talking about, where he was presented with either going to film school or working on a film. He said, basically, there was no question. He abandoned film school and went right to working on a production. Luigi said the best education you could have is to just start doing it from the ground up in features. He went into a working set and took the very first job he could get. The icon started as a gaffer, essentially, and climbed his way up. His reasoning on doing that was when he asked the editor or lighting tech to do something, Cozzi knew what he was talking about.

Ansel Faraj: Exactly. Know from experience.

Kevin: He said it was the best film school ever.

Ansel Faraj: I have an addendum to this. I was 16 when all this happened due to graduating young. When I was17 and making my little student movies, I wrote a letter to Roger Corman’s offices, which were up the street on San Vicente, and put together a reel and a resume. I felt, if James Cameron and all of them got their start with Roger Corman, let me do the same thing. I went to his offices. There are posters for Amarcord and Ingmar Bergman movies going up the stairs.

I thought to myself “Wow! This is really cool!” I met his secretary and said something like “I am here. Here’s my stuff. I have learned everything from watching his movies. The Trip is in my top five favorite movies of all time.” She was super nice, happily taking my material. About 3 weeks later, I got an email from Julie Corman. She said “we enjoyed your reel”. Roger laughed because I was working at that point with Linden Chiles, who I miss, and had included in the reel a scene from my movie Mr. Twistedface, where he played a horror movie host.

In it he says “Tonight, we are showing A Bucket of Blood, directed by Roger Corman”. Of course, I had to include that moment in the thing. She (Julie) said “Roger got a good laugh out of the wink and nod to him. Unfortunately, you’re just too young and there’s nothing happening right now.” I still have that email. Sadly, I didn’t even get to do the Roger Corman experience. But I can say that I went, was in his offices and I have that email. I have that for posterity and it is purely awesome.

Kevin: I can only imagine seeing an office that has posters of Amarcord and Galaxy of Terror, on the wall right next to each other. You must have had the feeling of living the charmed existence since you’re in Roger’s office at that moment.

Ansel Faraj: There was the big poster of Vincent Price in Tomb of Ligeia that you see in photos of Corman in his office. That was the best of all, seeing it hanging there.

Kevin: Something of an emotional experience for you?

Ansel Faraj: Quite emotional. It was surreal and exciting. I was filled with lots of hope. I was 17, so you’ve gotta be filled with hope.

Kevin: Yeah. If you’re not filled with hope at 17, you got a real problem because 18 doesn’t get much better. The nostalgic part of me seems driven to ask this. You grew up with VHS-C, I saw.

Ansel Faraj: I did.

Kevin: Do you remember laser disc?

Ansel Faraj: Of course. Still own a few.

Kevin: As my age is 57, I can say I go back to 8-track tapes, 45 records etc.

Ansel Faraj: The kids today don’t even know what VHS or laserdisc is.

Kevin: Was it that older technology mode combined with your Universal Monster action figures, your passion for Dark Shadows etc that showed gothic as the way to go for you from the start?

Ansel Faraj: Well, yeah, because that was the only technology I had. There weren’t digital cameras, or anything, it was all tape. And I’ve never limited myself, though. I still try not to. As I said, I came from a very sort of film-literate family. We watched mostly anything, depending on who it is that you were watching it with. I got started with monster movies but then I was making a jukebox musical when I was 16. I’m not adverse to different kinds of things. I never wanted to be pigeonholed. In my student years, I did my action trilogy that was sort of inspired by Batman called Detective Adam Sera, which was something I revisited later on as a web-series in 2015. I did comedy, the musical and straight drama. I guess you could call Hangover Square a drama in a way. Where I have fun, however, is in horror first. As a kid, it was almost exclusively that genre.

Kevin: As with any artist, you are tempted by whatever subject the wind directs you to.

I take you as ‘Don’t anyone dare put me in a metaphoric box.”

Ansel Faraj: I am. Following on about filmmakers careers, Hitchcock stayed in his lane of suspense. There was variations of it, but it was always nearly the same. You know what it’s going to be unless it’s Mr. and Mrs. Smith. That was an anomaly in an entirely different lane. With Corman, you have his Poe entries, The Wild Angels, which I love. Not to mention The Trip and Von Richthofen and Brown, which isn’t that good, but still different. He goes in multiple directions. Not being stuck on one subject or theme has always been on my mind. When I was a kid, it was almost exclusively hard to do. As I got older, I tried to change it up and am still doing it now in my professional years.

Kevin: We talked about Dr. Mabuse, a fictional character long popular with fans. Many lump it into the category of art-house horror due to its roots in 1920s German literature and kind of the Limehouse style. Do you consider yourself an auteur because you fell into reading Mabuse creator Norbert Jacques when you conceived your trilogy, or were you the guy who saw on late night television Dr. Mabuse the Gambler, and decided to venture into it more with a film? Looking at some of your catalog one can see touches of Fritz Lang and Germanic expressionism, which is a dying art today.

Ansel Faraj: The auteur theory is kind of French bullshit. I can say that, I went to a French school, so I know what I speak. Auteur theory or being an auteur always felt very sort of egotistical for me. It makes me think like it all comes from me. Granted, in my early years I had to rely upon myself to do most of the tasks involved in the making of a film, but I don’t subscribe to the theory that the director is the author because there’s so many other people that have their hands in the creation of cinema. Everyone has ideas. I make it a point to hear each one, no matter who they are within the production. It might be a good idea or might not be but it triggers another idea that could work.

I was 20 years old when I did Dr. Mabuse. I was used to being by myself and making pictures. I would get friends from school to be in them. This introverted kid making movies by himself. Suddenly, this film happened and a bright spotlight shines. Fangoria magazine, Dread Central interviewed me. The movie got a two week theatrical run. It kept snowballing into something I wasn’t prepared for. I just had to hang on for dear life. People were saying “oh, I’m a prodigy” and all this stuff.

I really try to tune all that out, not taking any of that seriously. Try to focus on the work and let the work speak. I don’t try to consciously, you know, mark off places, themes, or elements, what have you, within the work that I want to focus on. Venice Beach happens to be a recurring motif because one, I’m from there and two, it’s a visually interesting place. However, it’s not something where the thought was ever “we’re going to make another Venice movie”, you know, or “this is going to be a gothic story” or what have you. It’s more in the moment creativity born of whatever opportunity comes your way. You sort of dig into that sandbox and do your best to bring it to life. Does that make sense? I don’t know if this is making sense or not.

Kevin: It’s in a sense, similar to the photographer who carries his camera around in the hopes that he finds something that’s an inspiration at that moment. They see a bird flittering in the air or something or sees a unique tree or a plant and simply has to film it. You just have to let the moment come to you.

Ansel Faraj: Exactly. Totally.

Kevin: Getting back to Dark Shadows. I’m looking at some of your career, some of your films. You get to live some of your fan passions for the series each and every time out because you use that cast of surviving actors quite as much as possible. You’ve got Jerry Lacy, Kathryn Leigh Scott, David Selby, Lara Parker, Chris Pennock... That must be a continually refreshing thing for you to have a repertory as go to.

Ansel Faraj: I’m very lucky that they want to keep coming back again and again. David Selby, in particular. I just talked to him last night. He said “what are we going to do next?” Chris Pennock was the same way. Was it ever something I planned? Though I watched House of Dark Shadows and Night of Dark Shadows a lot as a kid, it was never in my deck of cards that I was going be involved, let alone work, with these people. Life is weird and funny. I have ended up working with them kind of on a fluke.

When I pitched Doctor Mabuse to Kathryn, I didn’t expect her to respond. She even has said “I don’t know why I opened that email and responded. I have no idea why. Something told me to open it, to read it and to write back”. Life is honestly weird. Linden Chiles was the first professional actor that I worked with, and I learned a lot from him. He was in Marnie for Hitchcock, and so on. It was really scary the first time I directed him because it’s like “oh, shit. He was directed by Hitchcock!” I was really young. That’s when I was, like, 17. The first thing I directed him in was an anthology movie called Three Shadows, with The Picture of Dorian Gray as the second story. He played Lord Henry. When he showed up, he goes to me and says “I wanna be really gay”. I’m like “Okay. Go for it.”

He had this long cigarette holder and was very theatrical. Linden was like an old hippie from Topanga. First time I met him, he had the biggest bag of marijuana I’ve ever seen in my life. That day, he was very pompous, theatrical and loving every second of it. My thinking was ‘oh my god! He was directed by Hitchcock. He was on The Twilight Zone and The Munsters. I gotta show him I know what I’m doing’. But in truth, I learned a lot from him. Linden was a huge mentor who gave me a lot of much needed self confidence, validation and proof that I do know what I’m doing despite my youth and knowing nothing about the real life experience of Hollywood. With Mabuse, I had him with Kathryn, Jerry and Lara.

They taught me how to communicate with actors. Dually Lara and Kathryn - Kathryn in particular, were instrumental in preparing me for the spotlight. I remember her saying “There’s you, but there’s the version of you that the public sees and perceives. You have to learn how to balance this.” She taught me how to write a press release, how to give interviews, how to present myself and how to handle myself at events. All these things that nobody teaches you. What it’s like meeting fans and such. I directed John Karlen. Talk about character! I directed him twice. Worked with Lisa Richards, Chris Pennock who I miss so much. David Selby. All of them are like this weird, crazy extended family.

Jim Storm as well. I can’t really watch the show now because I know all of their personal tics and acting methods. If they’re messing up on a line I can see the panic in their eyes and I start getting anxious for them. Maybe they’ll do a certain thing that I just know is them coming through because they’re having an internal crisis centering on whatever the fuck is going on in the scene moment. The two movies feel like some bizarre family movies with more budget and value, but I still see them. I see Kathryn. I see Selby. I see Chris. It’s not at all the same experience that I had when I was a kid growing up of watching those films, reading the script as the action goes along, looking at what Dan Curtis is doing with the camera, or wondering what that Night of Dark Shadows deleted footage looks like. More so, it resembles home videos at Christmas with them.

Kevin: Everything that you have described is basic film class 101, switched to a film set as opposed to a classroom. Can you give us an example of how to talk to or approach an actor?

Ansel Faraj: It depends on the actor. For the film Todd Tarantula, the young man who ended up playing Todd, out of 600 guys auditioning, he drove me up the fucking wall! He would never cheat to camera. He would try to re-write my dialogue. He had the approach of “this doesn’t feel natural”. I’m like, “youre talking to a fucking lizard! None of this is natural”. You have to find the truth in the moment and do it. I trusted you with the role. Just perform.

Just say the dialogue and do it. It’s in you. I didn’t say it as harshly as I’m telling you right now, but this is still the subtext of it all. David Selby now, he’s just this super down to earth, good old boy from West Virginia who just so happens to be an actor. The man’s not Quentin Collins or Richard Channing on Falcon Crest. He’s simply David. Very much just like Chris Pennock, he too always wants to do and be the best he can. He plays the villain in the picture. Lucifer, in fact.

I had breakfast one morning with David and his lovely wife Chip. He says to me “I’m just wondering, is there something redeeming about him?” I told him “No. I want you to be seductively evil. And as a result of your actions, good things will happen because you’re so evil”. I remember Chip saying “David, this character comes from the Bible. This is one of the best parts you’ll ever play. Stop worrying and do it. This also was happened on Loon Lake and every other time I’ve worked with him. David will be, like, “was it good enough? I’ll do it again”. I would tell him “David, if we didn’t have it, I would make you do it again. But trust me, we’ve got it”. A great deal of directing of actors takes place before you’re on set. With the kid that played Todd Tarantula, I sat down with him for about 4 hours and spewed out from my head some ten years worth of stuff regarding that role since it had been germinating with me for so long. I laid out the character’s history, what he wants, where he’s going, how he navigates through life and plays games with people to get his way.

Essentially to find what his throughline is in every scene of the script. I’ll do the same thing with David or Kathryn. This is who you’re playing. This is why they are the way they are. Following it up, I would ask what questions do you have for me? They ask some things as we break down and reassemble the character so that, by the time that we’re there on set, everyone knows who they are within the world that we’re playing in. Only for a very few do you have to do more hands-on direction, stepping in to say something while in the

moment. In The Great Nick D, O-Lan Jones suggested “I want to be under the table for the scene”. I said perfect. That’s exactly who that character is. Now every director has their own process but, for the most part, that’s the general way to do things.

If you’re prepared before everybody gets on the set, you’re gonna have a much smoother, exceedingly effective shoot. It’s never a you’ll stand here, move here, the camera will be there process. You’ll look up at the required moment, walk out there - because we’ve done all the work beforehand. And, you’d better have an answer, as well, for the actor

because they’ll throw questions at you. Even if you haven’t conceived of the issue, you have to say something and trust your own instincts as a director of what is the grander picture. Here’s another example I can give. I remember doing the second Doctor Mabuse entry, which was a fucking nightmare. I was so miserable every day of that shoot. Kathryn wanted to say a line humorously. Initially, I replied “No. It doesn’t play”. She countered “this is why I think it should play. At this point, if I say it like this, then it makes my actions later on here like this”. I told her something to the effect of “I don’t think so”. I stood there, playing the movie in my head for a minute to see where we are in the story and how will this line delivery affect what’s come before and what will come after. I thought about it and they’ll just wait because they’ll get an answer. I responded with “Okay, fine. You can say it snarkily and it should play”. If you’re prepped before, it’s a much more smooth operation.

Kevin: Lets do the final question of what’s next for Ansel Faraj?

Ansel Faraj: I don’t know what my next project is. It might be my version of Lovecraft’s The Dunwich Horror, which I’ve been trying to make years on end. We shall see. A lot of false starts on that one. I’ve got a couple of scripts that have been stacking up as I move out of the micro-budget independents and get more studio opportunities. I don’t know what is next. It depends upon what financiers want to pay because I’m not paying for anything myself anymore. I’m done with that. In the meantime, I do have my Asylum for the Psychotronic column in We Belong Dead magazine and my writings for a couple of other publications. Like David Selby always says to me, just keep going. So we’ll see.

Kevin: My thanks, again, for Ansel Faraj agreeing to the interview. A genuine free spirit who deftly shows his skill even when presented with nil budgets. The true joy was in finding we share common passions in movies, writing about them, Hammer Films and Dark Shadows producer/creator Dan Curtis. In a previous life I think we were boyhood pals who spent their days watch the monster show and building creature models. To all those budding helmers in the making who have the digital cameras and technology replete with the all-consuming passion to create a world of make-believe to show the masses, if you set foot on a college campus where Film 101 is an offered course and decide the classroom is not for you (or the program tells you same), head right a nearby shoot and volunteer.

There is where the real education begins.