Creative State

Creative State | The John Rodsett Episode #7

• Chris Donaldson

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In this episode of Creative State, veteran filmmaker John Rodsett discusses working on Alien (yes, THAT Alien), managing multiple productions at 20th Century Fox, the New World of Web 3.0, the harsh reality of film festivals, and the hybrid funding approach that may just finance your next project. Jump in - the water’s warm. 

Creative State is a podcast dedicated to the movers and shakers who are making a difference, and provides us all with ways to survive in this crazy creative economy.




© 2023 Moment Film Co, LLC

Just when you thought it was safe to boogie in the streets. Along comes creative state at the intersection of art and business. In this episode of creative state veteran filmmaker, John Rob said discusses working on alien. Yes. That alien. Managing multiple productions at 20th century Fox, the new world of web 3.0. The harsh reality of film festivals and the hybrid funding approach that may just finance your next project. Jump in. The water's warm. But first a word from our sponsor creator deals. If there's one thing, all of us creators need out there to do battle in the creative economy. It's the tools for success, and that's why we've partnered with creator deals.com. The number one destination, to discover the best deals. Out there from Adobe creative suite to the best desk chairs, to all the goodies, we need to make the good stuff. So we can put a dent in the universe, check out creator deals.com, empowering creators everywhere. And now let's get busy.

Chris:

All right. Another episode of Creative. Oh God, sorry. I always do that right in the beginning. Alright, another episode. Alright, another episode of Creative State, the podcast here to discuss the movers and shakers who are making a difference in the space. And really trying to figure out a way to survive in this, this day's crazy creative economy. And I'm here today. Blessed mind you to have John Rod set with me. John is the author of eight books that dig deep into the film biz. Some of which really talk about blockchain and N F T and Web three stuff we'll be talking about soon. He's a media producer and distributor extraordinaire. He was a previous executive at the one and only 20th Century Fox baby, vice President of the Lost Angelist Olympic Games Organizing Committee, full-time lecturer. At the University of Miami Business School. I mean, the list just goes on and on and on, and I'm sure we'll dig into a lot of this stuff. But John, I'm so grateful to have you here. My first question to you is, why and what the Frick is Web three?

John:

Well, first of all, Chris, it's a pleasure to be here. I'm glad you gave a quick resume of which it's voluminous can keep going forever and ever, but I'm glad you shortened it down to, I didn't, I didn't

Chris:

include your good looks, which of course is right there at the

John:

top of the list, nor my huge intellect or my charming demeanor. Alright, you want to know about web three? Let's talk a bit about. The world that we have now entered as one of my paraphrases are the future is here, right? It's a hundred percent here. It's not tomorrow. It's happening today. Web three. Is part and the follow up of web two, which is a part and the follow up of web one. Web one was way back in the early nineties when you didn't really have any interactivity. It was merely consumer. People watched it, looked at it, pressed a few buttons. Web two became much more interactive, and Facebook, Google, and all that started to appear, and that's been going on for a number of years. Web three. Which has to be always thought of in conjunction with all the new technologies that are popping up, which is blockchain, vr, ar, mixed, augmented reality, the Metaverse. All these technologies are all intertwined into our new eco structure. So web three. It is very dependent on blockchain. I'll explain a bit about that. Web three is meant to be the new renaissance of individuality, decentralization, and a movement away from the big mega monsters of Google and Facebook, and more into a decentralized ownership scenario. The whole concept of web three is decentralization and ownership, and that the individuals take back much more control. Will that happen when you have Metaverse, uh, when you have me meta coming along with Zuckerberg who's spending billions of dollars to try and entice you into a world of social media control by them in the new web three and also in the Metaverse. So if one takes Web three, Web three is very dependent on blockchain. Web three won't happen without blockchain. Blockchain is a scenario of complete decentralization. Im I immutability, transparency and individual control. Nobody controls it except the group that everybody's in, whether it be a d o A or whatever. So blockchain. Is a technology that is amazingly strong and amazingly adaptable. It can go to version any industry, include the entertainment industry, which we can talk about in a minute. But once you start talking about web three, decentralization, blockchain, and then you start adding in the metaverse. Then you are starting to feel what's happening to our whole eco structure called reality or non-reality. What's amazing is I really got into blockchain about four years ago. I. And then I got heavily into understanding what Web 3.0 is. Then I got heavily into understanding ai, augmented reality. Then I started to get heavily into the, into Metaverse and what the Metaverse as part of this new eco structure can do for the creative minds for our film, tv eco structure. For the artist, for the video maker, it's all part and it's all there. Back to Web 3.0 is all part of what blockchain is about, which is decentralization, ownership, controlling what you are doing and having not to answer to any big mega corporation.

Chris:

So it's my understanding that, and you're gonna correct me and probably guide me along this, this, this. Me, me butchering the, the, the, the proper language here. But people talk about blockchain being a ledger where transactions are entered and therefore cannot be cha changed. Right, right. Um, there, there, it's, there's very little chance of, of any sort of, Although we've learned that certainly shenanigans occur in the space with, with, with FTX and sbf and all the rest. Mm-hmm. But there, but there is this, but there is very much a record of what's happening and you own that record. And it cannot be, it cannot be changed. You can add to it, but you can't subtract from

John:

it. And it's totally trans and it's totally transparent to the people who, who were in that group, which is so in essence, the antithesis of what. Facebook wants, right? Which is why the creative community want this so badly because they don't want to be controlled by con conglomerates. If you are within the, the blockchain scenario, you have complete identity complete. Immutability, complete transparency, and you can adjust as long as it's within the community and everyone knows it and you have access to all the records. For instance, if you, in your magic created a an art, you can digitize that art, you can log it in, you can register it, and you will know no matter what happens, where that art is, who owns it, who's looking at it, who's talking about it, who's buying it, or whatever. You don't have anywhere else how much it costs, right? No, blockchain is, well, it's, it is changing the world as we speak, especially in public health, especially in building, especially in supply chain. I wrote the book regarding whether blockchain will really change how the film industry works, and I've come to the conclusion that in the big studios they don't want it, but in the small independence and how we work, it'll work great. And we can talk about that. But the big studios don't want you to know. They don't want transparency. They don't want you to have access to all the records. And if they couldn't control, well,

Chris:

they love creative. They love their creative accounting. Right?

John:

Oh yeah, of course. You know the Hollywood fog and all that. Yeah. But in today's world, the studios are so different than when I used to be at the studios, and now we have all the big streamers. And the streamers in general tend to be more open, although Netflix is still difficult and other streamers are more open. Blockchain as part of the tracking of all films and of all creative content, is an idea, an ideal vil a vehicle. For you as an individual to know what the hell is going on with your product. Nowhere else could you ever find that blockchain allows that. I

Chris:

like it. So it removes well, it

John:

removes anything. It removes ambiguity and it gives you clarity. Yeah. Holy Moses, I better market that quickly. Remove ambiguity and create clarity. Right,

Chris:

right. And it really empowers the content creator once they learn how to

John:

use that. Here's an interesting concept. Everybody talks about blockchain. Yes, great to create blockchain in the manner we are talking about. From a creative perspective, you've got to utilize what's called smart contracts, which means a written contract has to be CRI put into a programmable language that becomes immutable, irrefutable, and in co completely transparent. One of the things that I pointed out in my book was, okay, it sounds great. You have a lawyer write up a contract. You then get somebody who's familiar with solidity, which is the programmable uh, uh, language for blockchain to put it into blockchain, which is then locked into a blockchain chain and is there for everyone to see, and it's immutable. One of the questions is, who checks. The checker because if you don't have somebody really auditing that immutable smart contract, you could have a line of program that goes, every fifth Penny involved in this transaction goes to John Rods, and I'll become a very rich man very quickly and no one will know. So one always has to be careful. Well, it's unhackable and all that. We all know everything is hackable, right? And that serial

Chris:

by itself. Yeah, no,

John:

for sure. I, blockchain has got a lot of difficulties in our distribution setup because of the way we distribute films around the world and the windows and the timing and, and all the various machinations of contract that's hard to put into a smart contract, and they haven't overcome it yet. Mm-hmm.

Chris:

Well, it's hard. Hard today. But as we evolve, yeah, as we evolve and iterate, it's gonna get easier and easier.

John:

I mean it, well, what's kinda interesting to me from Web 3.0 to blockchain and involved in blockchain is the whole tokenization, NFT stuff, and I just love, then you flow into the whole metaverse scenario. I put an ad in LinkedIn and I said, I want to acquire. Content made in the Metaverse for the Metaverse and other platforms, and people came back and went, what the hell does that mean? And, and from a creative perspective, you create content on the metaverse. Well, it can't be video because that doesn't exist in the metaverse. Humans don't exist in the metaverse, so you've gotta create avatars, right? Those avatars could do things, and all that can be into a very real world. And you can create content. You can create this podcast in the Metaverse, go to, uh, avatar, the, the company, and they've got a whole music in the Metaverse. Yeah. It's a program. Right? And then you go from the metaverse. To virtual reality, right? And your headphones and your Quest two, and then you go from a creative perspective. Let's take the virtual reality, the metaverse, another step, and let's look at Mandalorian, how they create Mandalorian, and the whole virtual production process where you can shoot a whole movie in a room. In a flash and change from the Arctic to Sahara and never move, and it's seamless and you cannot tell the difference. That, to me, is absolutely magical.

Chris:

Mm-hmm. Yeah. There's a program called Gen One, which is doing, you know, it's, it's rudimentary. Yeah, but they're, they're, you know, you type in your text, I want a video of someone riding a motorcycle and Oh yeah. You know, you know, with, with Salvador Dolly's face, boom. And, you know, and to flash forward five, 10 years from, I mean, it's gonna be,

John:

I mean, if you, if you into artificial intelligence, Which is now becoming the hot topic again. And you go to chat, g b t and you can go, I want a lion playing a, uh, a piano in the Arctic. Um, within two seconds. It can create that imagery. I mean, a journey. Yeah. I mean, it's stunning. So from a perspective that you said, what's three? What's Web 3.0? Web 3.0 is just one part of a humongous, innovative, disruptive technology world we're living in. That affects anybody and everybody in the creative community. Yeah,

Chris:

I think people A, have to understand it, which is the challenge. And then B, it has to be convenient. And what I mean by that is convenience trump's all. People will take the shortest distance between two points. As long as the ATM at Bank of America is easier to get to, to get the money, that's where people are gonna go. I tried, I, uh, successfully bought two NFTs, but they were, you know, I had to, I had a steep learning curve every time I was hooking up my wallet. I was wondering, is this thing getting hacked as we speak are all my life savings because I just push one button. There's lot of different layers of complexity that people who live in the. Web three space sort of laugh at and, and, and look down their nose at. But that's the, the, that's the fact. What we've gotta do is build that bridge to bring people like myself who are a little bit less knowledgeable into the space and that's when it's gonna be, begin to really take off. For sure.

John:

I mean, so tell me, go. If you go back into Bitcoin way back in 2000 10, 11, 12, I remember looking at it when it was like$12, you know, me too, and. And

Chris:

I wanted to buy some, but couldn't figure out

John:

Today, if you go on the open Sea platform for NFTs mm-hmm. You can buy NFTs like that. You can do your own NFTs. They have a whole program for you. You can create the CRISP Podcast NFTs and make millions. Oh, I'm doing it. Yeah. The only problem with that whole NFT thing is you've gotta find a community. That are interested in Chris's podcast, and that could be the problem. But you can create community.

Chris:

Well, hundred percent. I mean, that's the challenge with every piece of art. How do you find the community, you know? Yeah. That's, that's the age old story. Yeah. Um, so that hasn't changed. I mean, the, the, the bedrock of web one, web two, web three, Picasso, when he painted Vanko, was building community. If you wanted to, if you wanted to be a successful. If you wanted to make a living at it

John:

anyway. I mean, that's why with with this whole NF T stuff and crowdfunding, you've got to have a project that you can get a community on because it doesn't really matter how good an NFT is, if nobody wants to buy it, it's digital, nothing, you know? Right.

Chris:

Yeah. The community is still key. Oh, its, so John, tell me a little bit of, you know, I don't want to go down the memory road too much, but I think your background is so fascinating and, and you know, a mosaic of experiences. Tell me a little bit about your passion for film and what got you into the film business.

John:

Okay. I, um, originally I had no passion whatsoever for film, none. I had passion for. Soccer, cricket, and becoming a professional soccer player. I went to university, did an industrial economics degree, maths and stats. That's very creative, isn't it? Right. Came out, when did four years financial training in London was going to be a stockbroker. Then something stopped me. I was terribly freaking unhappy. So I jumped on a plane, flew to la, walked into 20th Century Fox and said, here are my credentials. Hire me. And they did. They hired myself and a South African to basically help them with worldwide, worldwide theatrical movement of their prints and their revenue. And we were supposed to go and understand how it all worked and come up with some improvements. I did that for six months and I just went 20th Century Fox. Oh my God, that sounds fun. And then I got moved into theatrical marketing. Where I met a guy called, um, Ashley Boone, senior VP of Marketing, and he was doing a whole campaign on a sci-fi movie that is just about to explode around the world called Alien. So I got heavy into the marketing of Alien, and here I am, kind of a science economics kind of person. And he sent me then to Pinewood Studios to pick up part of the Alien Monsters. Uh, first class, 7 47 across the ocean. I'd been there six months. How nice of him to do that. And then I came back and I'm still going 20th Century Fox. They make movies and then I got, Introduced to a gentleman called Alan Alder on the MASH TV series, and MASH was my favorite program back in England. So here I am, a little kid from England suddenly talking to this megastar MASH TV who was two years before the final. And he said, we need somebody to help us monitor and control all the financial aspects of a 22 hour, 22 episode TV series. And I said, I'll do it. And I went, and then he put me in that, and then I got kind of promoted to looking after Love Boat, Charlie's Angels Dynasty and all that. So I did that for nearly four years. That then allowed me to see production more than the creative. It was the production. I. And I understood probably cuz of my financials, what budgets were, how they all work, what the different aspects of budgets are, how it's all put together, the storyboarding and all that. Then uh, I got headhunted to go to the Olympic Games, which was kind of fun because you have guaranteed termination. So once the games was finished and we had a big financial success, and it was great fun because it was TV sports world, it was magic for me. I then left, went back to Europe. Um, as a chief media consultant to one of the big financial companies. So are you, are you

Chris:

getting more, are you getting more passionate about film as this journey is, is taking place?

John:

What's that famous thing? Show me the money. So I'm going, the money isn't in producing the product. The money is in getting the product sold. So I set up a whole distribution system around the world and we were acquiring and making about 10 movies a year. And we did that for 13 years and. I used to go to all the places, but what I really got into on our movies was the creative aspects, and I suddenly went, wait a minute, this is the other half of my brain is I'm learning and understanding how to create horror movies, sci-fi movies, ro uh, thriller romance, whatever. I started to understand what it took, and then I understood the marketing, the artwork, the trailers. So for 13 and a half years, I got involved in every aspect. From creating them and writing them right the way through to selling them in every country around the world. So I was lucky. Yeah, I was lucky I could come up with an idea. We did, I remember writing a, a synopsis of a story. We got a letter from a completion bond to say, we're ready to to bond you walking to Charlie Band at Empire. And I said, we need a hundred grand right now. And he said, fine, good. Here's a hundred grand. Start a movie. And that's, um, we did that time and time again, and as the v h S market developed, more and more money came in. We just kept making more and more movies till after about a hundred odd movies.

Chris:

It's interesting that you talk about, you know, you make money selling, selling the product, and that builds a bridge to what you said earlier about placing an ad on LinkedIn for content built for the metaverse. Mm. You know, you're trying, you're trying to take. You know, you're experimenting with taking that same model and now applying it to these, this, this new space in

John:

this, oh, there's, there's no doubt in my mind that people who create content for the Metaverse will be leaders because it's gonna happen. People are going to want content on the metaverse created in the Metaverse for the Metaverse and other platforms. You can put it out on t, on TV and plug it out on, on your tablets, you go. But it's just a, you can do man magical things on the metaverse you can't do in reality, so it's gonna happen. I just wanted to see who's done it right. You know? Right. It's just, I feel now in my vast old age and vast old experience, I want to try pushing the edge on virtue every facet of the creative and film community that. Should be happening and I see could be happening. Why don't I just press and find out? Mm-hmm. It's kind

Chris:

of fun. Oh, ab, absolutely. I mean, I, I've always been a, I believe that the meta and DR are 100% certainties. The question is for me, when, and so, you know, obviously this AI has been taken up a huge bandwidth. You know, it's been sucking up all the oxygen in the room, Zuckerberg's. You know, sort of pointed back to AI and sort of taken away some investment from, from the Metaverse because he utilizes that AI is sort of the next iteration of where we're going. Mm-hmm. Uh, what, what do you sort of see the timeline being for the Metaverse? Is that 10 years from now, what's, what's your, what are your, what's your

John:

thought on that? I don't know. I bought my first q uh, quest two a year ago. I nearly got the new Quest probe, but I kind of waiting for the new Apple one to come out and see if that's Yeah, they keep postponing it. Yeah. But for me, the Metaverse is so exciting and one day it's gonna start filtering through to the general public and then the costs will come a bit like flat. Flat. Remember flat screen TV that used to be three,$4,000 an hour? It's$400. Once that starts happening, The world's gonna change rapidly. Mm-hmm. But the metaverse a, an AI is exploding again. I mean, it's just fabulous. And from a creative perspective, I'm involved in trying to, with a, with a very good friend of mine to build a virtual production studio like the Mandalorian set. And there are about 200 of them around the world. But the cost savings involved in doing a whole production on a virtual production set is so significant it's gonna happen. So I want to, can't get in on that, you know? But you need a lot of knowledge. You need some funding, but you need people to understand that technology, and that's not easy by itself. The guy I'm involved with was the main, um, uh, The VFX guy who, who put together the whole of Lord of the Ring, so he knows what he's doing, but there aren't many of those kind of people around, you know? Right, right.

Chris:

Well that, that is interesting. So the future of filmmaking in the future of production, you know, being brought into one room. I know that's definitely room,

John:

that room. That's definitely, it's. If you've ever looked at the video of Mandalorian with John Fav the director, and listened to him and watch how it's done, it's just awesome. It's just freaking awesome. It's like green screen on steroids multiplied by steroid steroids. It's just unbelievable. And the, and the seamless transition between the human and the digital, it's. It's astounding. Unlike on green screen, you know where you'd see the halo and all that. It's gone. It's just boom, boom, and you're in the Arctic, boom, boom. You're in the Sahara. Well, you had a pretty good

Chris:

introduction to the film business by working on Alien, which was in you, you mentioned Pinewood Studios, which is the biggest studio in the, I think the big, I think it contains the biggest physical stage on the globe. I could just see this technology being applied, you know, having many of these just side by side, you know, each one housing a production. Not so different than today, except that you're filming everything there. So when you,

John:

when you think how much episodes cost or what was the latest Game of Thrones? Won the Lord of this Throne or whatever it's called, 30 million for one hour episode of 30 million for one hour. It's just astounding. It is. And yeah, I like dragons and I like the fights, but the rest was a bit hum heart. But you know.

Chris:

We also have to wonder how sustainable it is. I mean, when you, when you have the studios spending huge, huge, absolutely. Netflix, for example, sending these extremely rich deals that are in the hundreds of millions of dollars with content creators, you know, they're gonna wanna maximize the return. And so what you're talking about, the direction that you're talking about is definitely one that's gonna gonna

John:

come to fruition without, well, I think, uh, I think the streamers are starting to realize as a Wall Street, you can't keep that. Level of spending and that relatively stable revenue of income. There's a big discrepancy. Well, profit matters. I think people are, yeah. Yeah. Otherwise,

Chris:

exactly. Tell me a little bit about, um, I know you, you're, you're sort of just putting together the pieces and I know they're intricate in, in, in and complex and ever changing. But this, this whole sort of, um, hybrid funding approach that you've, you've sort of been talking about for, for creators out there to sort of put together projects that they might be interested in creating. I know you're probably gonna talk more about film making specifically, but I imagine a model like this can, can. De applied to artists. Any projects?

John:

Any, anything? Well, anything that it's applied right down to real estate, but the concepts that I had grown up with and the way of pre-selling and equity and tax credits and deferments and using, um, in-kind as a package that would allow you to shoot a movie has somewhat changed. And the world that provided me huge pre-sales before we even started a movie is virtually gone. So for about a few years I've been thinking, how is all this changing? And we're seeing all the streamers coming along and Netflix coming along. You go to Netflix, have a great project, they go fine, we'll buy the script. Bugger off, we'll shoot it ourselves or, fine. Thank you for the concept. We'll create our own goodbye. And. I was trying to think, how can me come up with some formula to help people produce movies or creative content? So with the whole blockchain, NFTs and crowdfunding, I came up with my hybrid form, which is basically first angel investors, namely you, your mom and dad to get some form of elementary equipment together. Two come up with the whole concept of blockchain as an overall envelopment of the project, which will allow investors to feel comfortable, safe, and transparent, and utilize smart contracts so that they can see the revenues coming in and the cost going out. So it gives an an element of comfortableness to investors, not a Hollywood fog two. Now that Blockchains established and NFTs have established themselves as a fundraising exercise and anthony Hopkins did a a zero contact movie and he utilized NFTs to help fund it. Great. That's a good solid example from a known quantity. William Shatner utilizing equity crowdfunding has just funded his own documentary, so I kind of go, okay, if you're going to use blockchain, if you're going to use NFTs, if you're going to use equity crowdfunding, and we can talk a bit about that and then use a bit of tax credits and then maybe use a bit of equity, you have a hybrid scenario to replace. What used to be what I described earlier, and it can work. Why not? Here's a problem with equity crowdfunding. You need to have the platform and you need to fall under what's called the S E C Guidelines of Crowdfunding or Regulation A. That takes maybe five to$8,000 to actually put it in place, but it can open up a Pandora's box of investors that can fund virtually anything. Equity crowdfunding, if you use the right platforms, not every platform on crowdfunding can do it, but a number of them can. And one of them, the Shana one worked. And so I go, wow. But they're limited to 5 million under crowdfunding. But you can go regulation A, which allows you to go up to 75 million. But I would rather just for the first time on one of my projects, stick under 5 million and go for it. What's important is also the community blockchain community, N F T Community crowdfunding community, and you have to have the right project. Like for instance, we talked about this. Friends of ours, uh, film, it involves the Indigenous Indians of America involve World War ii. It involves a very strong drama element. Well, there are big communities that at love those topics. If you can access them, bring them in, they can be part funding, they can be working with you in part of the film. They can be a, a strong film base. They can be involved in actually the profits as well as the costs. And it's like an, an immersive reality to making movies, which again, let's go back to what Web three is. It's all about immersion. It's all about decentralization. It's all about ownership and owning and controlling and following what you want, not Big Brother. So it goes all into big circle. So your comment, web 3.0 has now gone a big circle and it, and it's magical to me. This is such fun.

Chris:

No, definitely. And I, I think there's just a ton of promise there. I do, I do think that people look at Web three a little bit and, and some people sell it as the cure-all for creators. I. And there's it, it's not only in that there's still a ton of work that needs to happen. Yeah. There's still a ton of pa there's still a ton of patience that that needs to, you know, there's a lot of, you know, you still still take time to put together and, and you need to be building that community at the same time. Um, I mean, I How many filmmakers, how many filmmakers have you talked to John who say, I just made this film, and you go, great. Have you thought about how you're gonna market it? No. You know, and so you've gotta develop that. You've gotta have the community in mind at from, from square one.

John:

Well, they're the old adage, you know, why are you making it and who you're making it for? I. You know, usually with filmmakers it's all ego. Oh, I wanna make it cuz I want to be the next Spielberg, you know, whatever. Um, but again, when I go back to when I was heavily involved with vhs, I needed product so that I could sell, get the money in. I didn't want to spend the money. I wanted to get it in. I wanted other people to spend it. I'll get it in because show me the money worked for me. Mm-hmm. And it taught me a lot. But what's so interesting about this whole concept of selecting products and knowing how to market, I see now, especially with young people or even old people who are just beginning, they go out, they shoot a movie, and they rush to a film festival. And they think that that film festival, I don't know what they think in all honesty, because when I was heavy into film festivals and I did Sundance, the year after Sex Eyes and Videotape, there were like 800 film festivals in America. 800. Now there are probably 80099% of them. Do not lead to any distribution deal. Do not really create any marketing buzz other than to your own family and friends who are there to cheer you on, slap you on the back and tell you how great you are. But from a commercial perspective, I don't give a toss about those because I just want to license my movie. And let it be seen on television or D V D or streaming. That's the object. I make product to sell, not to be patted on the back. And I think the I and I get so tired of seeing all these posters with 92 Laurel Reefs. I. From the most obscure film festivals in the world, completely covering the artwork. And I just go, I'm not sure what you're trying to do, but they don't mean anything to anybody who really understands this business, and I wish. Yeah, no, I

Chris:

think that, well, when you ask someone like, like I referred to the filmmaker who, you know, have you thought about the marketing? Well, yeah, we're gonna enter the film festivals. Yeah. And that's, that's not, that's not the right answer. And so people need to be really, really thinking ahead about. Much more than

John:

that. Um, well, it, it depends. Do they really want the film sold to recoup their money? Do they want the film seen by people? And if you don't want that, that's fine, you know? Yeah. But it was so funny. I saw on Facebook, uh, uh, a poster, an artwork of a movie that had, that had gone to an X number of film festivals and he literally, Add 20 to 30 Laurel Reefs of the most obscure film. I couldn't even see the artwork. I could, and I had no idea what the taglines were, what the, and I go, well, I know where his head is at. Right.

Chris:

Tell me a little bit about the Anthony Hopkins case study about this, this movie Zero Contact. What do you know about that?

John:

Well, I mean,

Chris:

obviously Anthony Hopkins is two things, a major movie star. But also seems to be someone who is interested in the future. I mean, he's, he talks about that, you know, he's, he's very active on social media. Mm-hmm. Um, you know, he's, he's participating in all this stuff. Yeah. So do, do you know much about that

John:

story other than it was shot during Covid? It was all shot on Zoom. They didn't ever meet. Interesting. That's an interesting thing. It all, it reminds me of like the, that's

Chris:

the Title Zero. That's the title Zero contact, yeah. Yeah.

John:

And um, you know, the, the film was part funded with NFTs because of Hopkins. Yeah. And that was the marketing angle. Join the movie with Hopkins. But part of what I was talking about, my hybrid isn't just the NFTs of. Of, because it's Hopkins, but the NFTs as part ownership of the product as a fan base to participate, to become a, a real fan, to really come and come on set, get credits, go and see the, the, the people and have meetings with, I mean, really become an integral, immersive part of a film process, which has never happened before. Right, and blockchain allows that along with NFTs,

Chris:

not to mention participating in any associated revenue that comes in for the film. Well,

John:

you're gonna be careful with NFTs and that regarding revenue separation. That's why you. Um, I know a couple of companies who've said, oh, take these NFTs and you can share in 100th of the net profit thing. And to do that means Uhuh, that's gonna fall foul of s e C regulations because you're getting into ownership and participation. And then get into a gray area with NFTs. Whereas when you go equity crowdfunding, you are actually participating in shares and valuations and topics as a formal investor. Correct. But NFTs allow tokenization, which allows ownership of part of the. Product, but not profit. But you can own a piece of the set. You can own a piece of the video, you can own a piece of the script. I mean, you can do anything with NFTs. And that's what's fun about it. And then attached to the NFTs is what's called utilities, which allow them participation in screenings and going on set in credit and that, and that brings them in, in like we've never had before.

Chris:

Tell me, tell me this, what pisses you off the most?

John:

Um, a gentleman called Chris on the podcast. He's a real bastard. Yeah, I've heard what really pees me off is these stupid film festivals everywhere cuz there's only one group that make any money and that's the film festival. And when you see how much they charge and how much you have to pay and go get your, your ti, you know, your badge and your hotels, they all make, there's a reason why they've exploded and it's got nothing to do with selling your movie. Yeah, I think

Chris:

there's probably four that matter, right? I mean, you got, can you got Sundance, you have Tiff, maybe you got South by Southwest. Yeah.

John:

You tried the, I mean, Sundance. Um, can Toronto and maybe Tribeca a bit, but yeah, south by Southwest were never even around, but now that's coming along. But 99% of these are just totally irrelevant in terms of either marketing, getting a distributor or licensing a product Absolutely of no use. And I go to the the A F M and I go to Khan. I go to Berlin, I talk to all the distributors, cuz remember 70% of all my income when I used to license movies came from foreign only 20, 25, 30% from domestic. So when they, all these buyers and licensing and TV people see these product and all they see is these obscure film festival, it doesn't mean a thing to them. It's, it's, it's like everybody just wants to be patted on the back and told how brilliant they are by their family, their friends, and that's good too. But it has no meaning, meaning in the real big, bad world of filmmaking and film licensing. Well, they really just wanna

Chris:

know if John Claude van dams in it. I mean, come on. That's the bottom line. What's your

John:

favorite movie? My favorite real movie, subject to

Chris:

Change. Subject to Change.

John:

I saw when I was involved in Alien, I went to the. Theater on the, on the studio lot because I brought a print and I, they put it up on the 75 millimeter projector and I was the only person in that theater, and I had hardly ever seen movies before coming to 20th Century. I mean, really, I was never a movie person. And I sat in that theater and I watched Alien all by myself on this super big screen. And not only did it absolutely I was in awe, but it scared the bejesus outta me, and I just thought, what a quality, quality product. I was lucky because nowadays it's all superhero stuff, but I, that was all, has always remained to me, one of my GR best movies I've ever seen. And then of course, on the other, the antithesis is Wayne's World. How can anybody not love Wayne's World?

Chris:

Oh, cute ass for you. That's awesome. That's awesome.

John:

But you know what's interesting? I watch a huge number of European TV series, huge number and the quality of their TV series, their acting location, shooting scripts. It's just extraordinary. I mean, whether it be from Germany, France, Iceland, Scandinavia, they give to me a much better, um, viewing experience than most of the series here in the us well, we had, we had

Chris:

Squid Game come through. That was, that was good.

John:

I'll tell you one, one series that's a humongous hit around the world is called Money Heist Made in Spain. If any, if you have a shot, go watch that cuz it you it's in English, even though it's, it's dubbed into English. Yeah. But it is brilliant. It's articulate, it's clever. It's all about a heist in the Madrid Bank. It is brilliant. So go see it. Money heist. Money heist.

Chris:

I'll do it. Write it down

John:

right now. Okay.

Chris:

Tell me if you had some, just, you know, if you were to give, you had, you were riding on an elevator with, with an up and coming content creator, filmmaker, artist, someone who really had stars in their eyes, what business advice, practical business advice that was, that it's, that's actionable. Would you, would you give this person,

John:

learn the new technologies quick and understand how they can apply to your craft? And when you say a filmmaker, you're talking a producer or a director or a writer or an actor or any of those? Yeah.

Chris:

Any of those need to learn the craft. I mean, you're talking about

John:

the world. You're talking about The world is changing so rapidly. You need to, uh, especially the filmmaker, I mean, God, when, remember the old days were 35 millimeter cameras. Now it's. Yeah. You know, this has more power than virtually anything we, we could vfa used in the old days. Look how industry has changed. Look how post-production has now become household and all the post-production houses have gone. I mean, yeah, it's, it's staggering. You need to learn new technologies and how to adapt your craft to those new technologies. Yes, if you're a graphic artist, you are in trouble.

Chris:

Unless you can figure out a way to use the new technologies.

John:

Yeah, I mean, you know, if you are a splicer of film 25 years ago, you've gone, you need to understand where technology is gonna take your craft, because if you don't, you're gonna become a dinosaur real quick. And that's how fast it's coming. I mean, I personally would go, how do you make product on the metaverse? To license it in the Metaverse as well as other platforms. But how do you do that? I would love to get more technical into that. You know, that's the question

Chris:

you're asking yourself right now. Well, one of them. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. It is. It is fascinating to me cuz I get a, I see a lot of people talking about chat, G P T for example, and they're saying, oh, I can't do this, it can't do that. It's not, you know, X, Y, or Z and I think that they're forgetting one thing. The answer to that. It's not doing that yet. I mean, Moore's, Moore's law will take care of that pretty damn quickly when you're talking about, you know, the capacity and functionality of these, these technologies doubling every 18 months. It's probably even faster now.

John:

You know? So you've got, I remember a year ago, a guy on LinkedIn said, can we ever fund a movie with NFTs? You know, and that was only less than a year ago. Right. And. I. And I kind of now, as, as I said with this whole hybrid, you put blockchain in that can give a structure to investors and make them feel comfy. You can use NFTs to create not only funding, but a a, a community database and you can go into Discord and you can just. Create communities up the gao, which is good for the movies, make them participate in the movies, then bring in the whole equity crowdfunding and bring that in as a community. And then add all the little bits and pieces, and you've got a method of making product. And that product can be, film can be metaverse, it can be ai, it can be anything. Mm-hmm. It can be for my virtual production studio in Syracuse, New York. Mm-hmm. Is that where it's gonna

Chris:

be? Yeah, I love it. I love it. Do you have any favorite quotes that you've lived your life by

John:

I came, I wrote a book called Be the Best You Can Be. And to me that's it. Just be the best you can be. Put your mind and your effort, and your focus in being the best at what you can be doing, what you're doing. And if you shortchange yourself, it's you. You short changing, you know? Mm-hmm. But the thing is, I find a lot with people is they're like a butterfly. They don't really know where to go. They're all over the place. And at some point you need to really focus and identify all the various facets of who you are, what you are, and then what you want to do, and then go. And make it happen. A good friend of mine said, you are a really lucky guy, and I go, I am. But luck is really the creation of opportunities and then going for those opportunities and making the right decision. You can't create opportunities to get the good luck if you sat on a couch feeling sorry for yourself.

Chris:

There you go. Well, John, it's been an absolute pleasure. Where can people find you online? You know, tell,

John:

tell me where? Well, you can Google, you can Google my name anyway. I'm the only person with my name. There you go. God, that's nice. Nice. Then you can go to my own website, which is john rod.com. Uh, I, I'm all over the place.

Chris:

John, I really appreciate your time today. So many good gems here. Actionable gems. I think you know what you said. You know if, if you don't tell the world who you are and the world will tell you. And so you don't want that. You want to take control of your destiny and own it and, and, uh, be in charge of. Or at least do your damnedest to be in charge of who you wanna become in this, in this short thing we call life. So I really, really, um, value that, that advice. Yeah. John, a, a real pleasure. Do you have any last words before

John:

we go? No. It, it's just that you are, you seem to be getting younger every time I see you. Chris, what's the art of this?

Chris:

Well, I, you are actually seeing an AI generated image of me.

John:

And that's the way to go. Stick with that.

Chris:

Stick with very nice talking to appreciate.

And so ends another episode of creative state. Thanks for listening. And don't forget to visit our sponsor creator deals.com. But even more importantly, keep making the good stuff. See you soon.