Every year, six talented, new filmmakers are chosen from hundreds of applicants to make a short film for Crazy8’s.
Crazy8s provides filmmakers with a significant boost to their projects. Six finalists receive $2000 each, plus an in-kind production package and post-production service valued at up to $50,000. This includes professional equipment, mentorship, and access to locations, helping them complete their short film within eight days. There is a huge gala screening at the Vancouver Centre.
We met with director Kat Reynolds to talk about her career and Gone Viral.
HNMAG: Where are you originally from?
Kat Reynolds: Well, I was born in the Bahamas. I moved with my family to Guelph, Ontario, when I was five years old.
HNMAG: Oh, okay.
Kat Reynolds: Eventually I moved to Toronto and went to theatre school, then traveled around a bunch doing theatre and landed here in Vancouver about ten years ago.
HNMAG: What theatre school did you attend?
Kat Reynolds: I went to Randolph Academy of Performing Arts downtown Toronto in the Annex.
HNMAG: How was that?
Kat Reynolds: It was good preparation for a career in musical theatre performance. A three year program for singing, dancing, and acting.
HNMAG: Nice.
Kat Reynolds: Yeah, every day, they were preparing you for a professional career in live theatre, which is what I thought I was going to do for my whole life. The whole film thing was a bit of surprise.
HNMAG: That’s the way it goes. We have a plan, and that always changes.
Kat Reynolds: Exactly.
HNMAG: You moved to Vancovuer ten years ago to act?
Kat Reynolds: Yeah, I moved to Vancouver to get a bit of a change of pace. I’d been living in cities all over Canada for regional theatre and New York for a bit and was getting tired of moving around so much. I wanted to plant some roots, and I was visiting a friend in Victoria, I couldn’t get over how gorgeous it was. I decided to stick around and I ended up booking a musical at the Arts Club.
HNMAG: Nice! Which one?
Kat Reynolds: Godspell.
HNMAG: That’s great.
Kat Reynolds: I ended up falling in love with the city and it eventually, it brought me towards film, which I had never done before I came to Vancouver.
HNMAG: What was the next step after Godspell?
Kat Reynolds: I actually was fortunate enough to work quite a bit at the Arts Club. I ended up doing Avenue Q.
HNMAG: Avenue Q is hilarious.
Kat Reynolds: So funny! I also did Rock of Ages and a few other really fun shows at the Arts Club.
HNMAG: Nice.
Kat Reynolds: Yeah, I was just doing a bunch of musicals here. Then my agents at the time, started sending me out for commercials.
HNMAG: Right.
Kat Reynolds: I started booking television and movies. My eyes were open to this entirely new world. It was something about watching these television shows and movies being made. I kinda became fascinated by the process of filmmaking and I really wanted to learn how to do this in order to tell my own stories.
HNMAG: How did you meet Felicia?
Kat Reynolds: We actually met on the set of Schmigadoon Season Two!
HNMAG: That’s great. Obviously there’s the singing.
Kat Reynolds: I was in season one, dancing and singing in the ensemble and Felicia joined the cast in season two. We met on that and we had a great time shooting that together. We were kind of in this like, this sort of Motown girl group.
HNMAG: Nice.
Kat Reynolds: We connected on that set and then I drove her home one night from set and we just became friends. A few years after that, she had written a web series for herself to star in. She asked me to direct the first episode. I had directed one or two shorts before then and I felt ready. I directed that episode for her and that’s kind of how our relationship went from being actors and singers together in an Apple TV show to then evolve into a co-creative partnership in the indie film space.
HNMAG: Felicia is a singer as well and also performed and wrote a song in your Crazy 8s film?
Kat Reynolds: Yes, she co-wrote it with our composer Shayla Swanson, who’s incredible. Shayla wrote the music and Felicia wrote the lyrics and performed. I’m so proud of her. I’m so proud of them both. The music is our movie is so fantastic.
HNMAG: In your movie there’s a liquid that makes people go viral. If you received these blue liquid vials as a surprise delivery and you didn’t know what they were. Would you drink it?
Kat Reynolds: Me personally? Absolutely not. (Laughs)
HNMAG: So the character is more trusting and just drinks it right away.
Kat Reynolds: Yes, and we talked so much about this moment at length. There were very many different versions of this moment. We decided that part of the message and the theme is the desperate desire to go viral and at what cost? Or whose cost. So as soon as our character, Nicole sees the words “want to go viral?” she’s instantly intrigued enough to drink it without question.
HNMAG: Everybody is so obsessed with trying to create content just for the sake of creating content.
Kat Reynolds: The pursuit of fame and recognition is nothing new but It’s a really interesting time having social media as the world stage, that’s for sure. Our movie explores many themes. Appreciation versus appropriation. The objectification and commodification of black bodies in black culture. One of the themes that I don’t think that a lot of people are talking about is social media as social currency and therefore becoming a version of real currency. A lot of these people when they’re chasing virality with the goal of becoming a social media star, these aren’t pipe dreams. These days having a viral moment could lead to becoming a popular influencer which is an extremely legitimate and lucrative career path that could open doors to generational wealth. So now that social media can lead to wealth it becomes a really interesting conversation about who is profiting the we’ve had many times in the past, who’s getting credit for their work?
One of the things that I really love about our film is how we’re using visual language to bridge these two worlds. The commodification of black culture is a problem that’s been happening for many, many, decades. So, when our villain is talking about why she’s doing these things, it’s because of something that happened to black artists in the fifties and sixties. It’s reflecting on the exact same issues that are still happening today but now on the global stage of social media. It’s systemically the same problem. You know, a quick example would be Black, female artist, Big Mama Thornton who recorded hound dog, but then Elvis got all of the praise and profit.
HNMAG: That was part of the Public Enemy song Fight The Power. Society at the time, was so overtly racist, they would not listen to any black music on the radio until someone like Elvis could appropriate the music for the masses.
Kat Reynolds: Exactly. Which is interesting because it becomes a conversation about credit where credit is due. Compensation where compensation is due. And if they don’t want to respect or acknowledge the black people who are making the art rooted in black culture, then they shouldn’t be allowed to profit from the black art. It seems simple.
HNMAG: Right.
Kat Reynolds: It’s been kind of camouflaging itself and changing and morphing, but it’s at the root of everything. Systemically, it’s still been going on forever.
HNMAG: Is the film set in Vancouver?
Kat Reynolds: We were purposefully vague about the location in order to keep the message feeling as universal as possible.
HNMAG: There are move movies and TV shows set in Vancouver right now.
Kat Reynolds: Yes but there could always be more. I actually played a character named Roz on the show Family Law for a few episodes. That show did such a great job showcasing Vancouver as the gorgeous city that it is. We don’t get a lot of Vancouver shot as Vancouver so that show was really special. I hope it comes back.
HNMAG: Do you think international audiences will watch things set in Canada?
Kat Reynolds: I think so. There’s the Heated Rivalry of it all, which took many, many, steps forward in that regard. In Canada, there was a bit of a lack of a star system. So many artists leave to go to where the work is. If we can try to keep the work here, use our incredible crews, our incredible storytellers and populate our stories with our incredible Canadian actors, then we can have enough work here for people to stay. I do think that we are turning a bit of a corner. We are making stories for ourselves and using our amazing filmmaking infrastructure to create incredible indie projects.
HNMAG: What’s next for you?
Kat Reynolds: I will be performing in Sister Act The Musical, playing the Deloris, which I’m super excited about. I’m so, so excited to get back on stage. I haven’t been on stage in the last five years or so. Also, Felicia and I, are looking forward to our journey towards the feature version of Gone Viral. We want to go deeper on these themes. We want to see more facets of these characters and we want to dive into layers of this story that a feature length can support.
Gone Viral has the surprising ability to keep you on the edge of your seat while dealing with very relevant and serious societal issues. It could be compared to Get Out. We are hoping that the feature will come out as well. That could open up an important film to a broader audience. Kat Reynolds is a very talented performer and filmmaker. She has a lot to offer and her vast experience on the stage and in film and television will be a strong asset. We are looking forward to following her flourishing career.