NOLA Film Scene with Tj & Plaideau
A podcast about acting, filmmaking, and the improv scene in New Orleans.
NOLA Film Scene with Tj & Plaideau
Warren Mitchell: Chasing A Dream On Film
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A guitar class, a choir stand, and a daydream: that’s where our conversation with filmmaker Warren Mitchell begins—and it quickly unfolds into the raw, unvarnished story behind his debut feature, Aspire. Warren opens up about discovering his autism diagnosis, choosing transparency as a creative tool, and shaping a story about independence, work, and love in New Orleans that reflects reality without reducing it to a label.
Voiced by Brian Plaideau
Have you been injured? New Orleans based actor, Jana McCaffery, has been practicing law in Louisiana since 1999, specializing in personal injury since 2008. She takes helping others very seriously. If you have been injured, Jana is offering a free consultation AND a reduced fee for fellow members of the Lousiana film industry, and she will handle your case from start to finish. She can be reached at janamccaffery@gmail.com or 504-837-1234. Tell Her NOLA Film Scene sent you
Follow us on IG @nolafilmscene, @kodaksbykojack, and @tjsebastianofficial. Check out our 48 Hour Film Project short film Waiting for Gateaux: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5pFvn4cd1U . & check out our website: nolafilmscene.com
Hi, my name is Warren Mitchell. I am an independent filmmaker, and my production company is Warren World Films. I have been making films for the past 15 years now. I have 22 short films to my credit, and I have recently made my first ever feature film, Aspire, which will be uh streaming for the first time on the Indie South channel. I have always wanted to be on a podcast. I am really excited to have you guys be my uh first ever podcast appearance.
SPEAKER_01:I'm TJ, and as always, I'm Play-H.
SPEAKER_00:Warren, it's great to have you. We're gonna dive into your filmmaking journey. When you said 22 films, I'm thinking, wow, that's just incredible.
SPEAKER_02:With the feature film added in, it's 23.
SPEAKER_00:There you go. I gotcha. Okay, 22 shorts and a feature. Don't try to cut them short, TJ. Trying to jinx them.
SPEAKER_01:Could you tell us a little bit out of your journey of how you got started and how you got into filmmaking?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, uh, so when I was getting out of high school, I originally wanted to become a singer and try to shoot for a recording career. I actually uh took some took a guitar class and I uh even joined the school choir during my senior year of high school just to practice my uh craft a little. And the more I realized, the more I got into that, I realized that my uh even though it was a fun time and I uh grew as uh grew into music, didn't think I could actually uh hold a uh studio album on my own. I would be better off in a background, providing either harmonies or bass vocals. So uh right when I was about to graduate though, I uh started com daydreaming about uh a concept in my head that I felt be really uh intriguing to make a movie about. And I ever since I was born, I like to daydream about original stories in my own head. So when I realized that what I was coming up with could make a good movie, I started thinking of some other ideas, and from then from there, I realized that's what I wanted to do. So I uh pretty much uh found what I wanted to do in a nick of time.
SPEAKER_01:Right. Very cool. We've talked about this off the air. Could you tell us about your autism, your Asperger?
SPEAKER_02:Asperger's That was something that I learned about right before my senior of high school started. I was uh I was at Christian Life Academy for my junior and senior year in Banrooch. And in between that time, I was really uh gaining a best friend, and we were hanging out a whole lot, and one night he uh decided to bring to my attention that might be autistic because he he overheard some information from the faculty, and a lot of people in my life had known about it, except for me. My mom uh and dad got me diagnosed with autism when I was two years old, and I was taking special education classes, but I didn't realize why I was there. I didn't even know autism existed until uh that moment happened. For a while, it was tough for me to even be public about it, and then slowly I started telling one person at a time, and then I started doing autism awareness day posts since uh 2015.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, cool. And I uh I've seen your movie, you've talked about it, that it's about to come out, Aspire, and that is about what is it what the story, what is it about?
SPEAKER_02:Well, it's a semi-autobiographical movie inspired by my own uh experiences with autism. Initially, I was diagnosed with Asperger's. You know how they had to change that term to autism. It took a while for me to get adjusted to that, and so I created a movie where I play an autistic man in his 30s moving to New Orleans and moving in with his cousin, and while I'm there, I start a job at a credit union because he's using this opportunity to really prove himself as an independent adult. It's like a now or never situation to achieve what he wants, and one of those things is a romantic relationship, and he's able to find that through his coworker.
SPEAKER_00:Very cool. I got you. Our friend uh Rachel Knapps was in that, right?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, she uh plays my uh sister Amanda, and no wait. She plays my Rachel Knapps plays my sister Lisa, and she was just the greatest when uh we had her on set.
SPEAKER_00:And just dropped Danielle Laneux did your makeup, right?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, she did it for the wedding scenes.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, uh we we interviewed her a while back, and her episode went live today. I I got the the chance to work with her uh a couple months ago. She's she's really cool.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, she's uh a really great makeup artist. Really came through for us during that during those scenes. And uh after the movie wrapped, I uh agreed to take part in an exercise at Fran Yu that she was doing, where she would turn us into zombies with the zombie makeup.
SPEAKER_01:Nice.
SPEAKER_02:And we uh did a little uh escape room uh exercise with the Fran Yu students.
SPEAKER_00:Oh fun. That's awesome.
SPEAKER_02:And one of those uh fellow zombies of mine was writer Petite Wise, who had uh acted in a few uh short films of mine.
SPEAKER_01:It it's all about making community and and helping each other out and being in each being in each other's films.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, that's what I've always emphasized on when I put my uh cast and crews together on every project. I want to get people that I know, get people that I'm a uh wanting to work with, and make sure they all uh come together to create a fun experience.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, that's awesome. Can I ask you what kind of challenges you face with filmmaking and autism?
SPEAKER_02:Well, in my position, I have to be able to uh get my point across and making it a coherent message because some people may not understand what I'm saying or what my intentions are.
SPEAKER_00:How do you overcome that?
SPEAKER_02:Being honest, yeah. I've always uh emphasized on just being open with uh everything to anyone on my uh crew set.
SPEAKER_01:I got you. What are some of the other films that you made and a description of some of those?
SPEAKER_02:Oh man, I can go for a whole lot. Um, the first one I did was a student film in 2020. Was it was the stalker, and it was based off an idea of mine where somebody was just chasing another one across the city. So uh we had somebody stalk this guy, and they're running throughout the campus. One of my uh favorite ones that I did was 2017's pie shop, where I did an homage to the silent comedy era, and I created a character where Guy owns a pie shop. He's really good at making the pies, but he also suffers from muscle spasms. And at any given moment, his muscle spasms will act up and he'll throw a pie in the customer's face. The most recent one that I did was Vacation Time that came out last year. I did that for the 48-hour film project, and we got nominated for Best Supporting Actress, even though the person that was nominated, Valerie Lamb, was playing the lead actress. You know, I could get nominated for like use of prop in the background, and it'll always be an honor. It'll always be an honor to be nominated.
SPEAKER_01:Hey, look at the Golden Globe. Best comedy is like the bear. That's not a comedy. So those categories aren't that's a different type of comedy. Right, right. It's the one without laughter. No, I'm just kidding.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:That's very cool. Exploring the autism part, it it doesn't seem like it holds you back. Quote unquote normal people have to be direct and communicate, and it's just something you deal with and then you work through it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:It's my biggest obstacles is just being able to communicate very well with other with other people. And that really uh hinders me in areas where I really want to see success at.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly what art is channeling your emotions, your success, your pains, your frustration, and then making a product. I hate the word product, but that's what you know, making a film and that will touch other people's lives and share with that. That's that's awesome, man. I'm proud of you.
SPEAKER_02:And it's not everything's based off of my life, but I have sprinkled bits and pieces into certain parts.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I mean, you gotta tell your story, right?
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, yeah. So so when the groom gets superpowers and flies off, that's not you.
SPEAKER_02:Well, we did have a wedding scene where Rachel Knopfs's character, which is my sister in the movie, gets married to Jacob Leinberger's character, and that's based off of my sister's marriage ten years ago.
SPEAKER_01:Okay, cool. Don't give out too much. Make them watch it.
SPEAKER_02:I know.
SPEAKER_01:What's that channel again for them to go watch it?
SPEAKER_02:Indie South Channel.
SPEAKER_01:Indie South Channel.
SPEAKER_02:And streaming platforms are coming soon.
SPEAKER_00:That's awesome. Yeah. How how long did it take you from writing to filming and editing to produce the film?
SPEAKER_02:So 2019 is when I started trying to write it, but I kind of struggled with coming up with the dialogue. So I put it aside for a while, and then after I got this new rush of creativity, I started writing it again in 2022 and spent the whole year trying to write the first draft. And in 2023 was when I started trying to put some pieces together to get a Cast and Crew and Schedule together. Man, that was gonna be a documentary of its own, but I am I'll be uh sharing a little bit of those experiences. Anyways, we started filming for real in 2024, and 2025 last year is when we had our premiere and the Manschip Theater in Ban Rouge, Louisiana.
SPEAKER_01:I gotcha. So, Warren, what kind of movies or TV shows do you like to watch? What inspires you?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, so my favorite film of all time is Back to the Future.
SPEAKER_00:Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And I have really been inspired by the Frank Capra movies, the Steven Spielberg movies, the John Hughes movies, the Christopher Nolan movies, a lot of uh storytelling and TV shows from my childhood to uh what I uh discover nowadays. I'm uh more of a I like to be more of a comedic person, but I do uh want to blend other genres in. I don't want to be confined to just one.
SPEAKER_01:Right.
SPEAKER_02:If I have the right idea.
SPEAKER_01:You don't want to do it just to do it. You want something of value value to you.
SPEAKER_02:And all of the films that I've done, I've uh at least made it something that really uh strongly believe in, and I feel like it deserves to be uh put out there.
SPEAKER_01:Is there anything you would want to tell someone who doesn't have autism that you find that people just assume that a person with autism has? You know what I mean? Is there something you would say to, hey, this is what's real, this is fake, that kind of thing?
SPEAKER_02:I would pretty much tell them that my intentions may get a little uh hazy when it's uh projected. But I have never done anything out of ill harm.
SPEAKER_00:And so mis miscommunication is common then.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. And in my own uh struggle with uh finding a relationship, I want to prove to someone that I uh am worth taking a chance on. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Man, you are just from me to you, you are. Even take that to the bank.
SPEAKER_00:TJ's not, but you know, you are I tend to scare people off. It's the beard.
SPEAKER_02:I gotta say, TJ, you uh really aren't into uh your beard.
SPEAKER_00:Thank you.
SPEAKER_01:What's next? Any movies, any stories that are looming on the horizon for you, Warren?
SPEAKER_02:Yes, actually. Um I am uh doing a couple of uh ideas on the horizon, hoping to have them ready uh for this coming year. I have a sequel to a Christmas-themed short film I'm gonna do next year. I was originally gonna do it last year, but I couldn't get a script done in time. I feel like I really needed to uh make sure everything's right. And then as always, I do the 48 hour film project every year. Um entertaining the idea of doing the Louisiana Film Fries. Ah yeah. I want to do at least one other short film to uh enter into the Baton Rouge Underground Film Festival, and then aside from that, I am also getting ready to write my next feature film, which will be a zombie comedy.
SPEAKER_01:Nice.
SPEAKER_02:I've already started writing bits and pieces of it, but it's gonna be uh the script's gonna be done with a fellow co-writer because it's gonna be daunting to do it all on my own.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And I feel like having another writer is gonna get it done faster so I can plan out how I'm gonna make the film.
SPEAKER_01:That's a good plan.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Warren, you were telling us earlier you have some behind the scenes scoop that you want to share with us. Tell us a little bit about some of the behind-the-scenes stuff. Yeah. You've piqued my interest.
SPEAKER_02:Most of those days, especially towards the beginning, were so drawn out and dramatic. I feel like the more I have to be open about it, the more it adds context to what I had to do to uh the mission that I was completing. And so the first thing we did in 2023 was a uh photo shoot with uh my sister Lisa and her uh groom, and that was the first thing we did, and then throughout uh the time leading up to that first filming period, we were doing Zoom calls and meetups uh one-on-one to go over any specifics, and we were originally planning to shoot in September through uh October of 2023, and a week or so before we started, my actresses uh backed out. That was a big role that she had. She was not only gonna be uh the sister of my love interest, but she was also uh a singer, and she was gonna record some uh original songs for the movie. So already messed up my mind as I was about to go in. Little did I know that every day from there on out, full of dropouts, drama, and fallouts, as a couple more people start drop out due to reasons out of their own control. And then the first day that we were gonna shoot, we were at a location where it was completely messy, and we had to clean that up in order to make it presentable for the scenes that we were gonna shoot, and we did not understand that. And then a few days after that day, I found out that my uh actress, who was playing the love interest, had to go into the hospital for asthma. It was so difficult to get her back on because it was taking up a lot of time for her to be uh ready to go again, and then everything started piling on one at a time, day by day. Uh I kept reminding myself of Murphy's Law, where everything that can go wrong will go wrong, and that's exactly what happened. And the breaking point was when we attempted to do the wedding scene, a place where we did not get a permit for it. And then uh it was gonna be somewhere else. Else, but we had a fallout with that location. So uh we had to uh think of something else, and that day I was already demoralized by everything else that had happened, and I almost did not want uh go out there, but my mom encouraged me to uh just get it done and then we'll regroup and re-uh schedule everything uh immediately after. And I realized that with all the people that had dropped out, I didn't want to be what they did and just bail at the last minute with uh no heads up.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And then little did we realize that our uh activity was conflicting with uh Tiger Band shoot, and the campus had to shut us down.
SPEAKER_00:Hmm. Man. It's never easy. Was it a student film or you were just filming at on the LSU campus?
SPEAKER_02:Filming on the campus.
SPEAKER_00:I gotcha.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:So how did you overcome how'd you overcome all these things? It seems like it was piling on you.
SPEAKER_02:Well, immediately the first thing I did was start apologizing to a couple of people that uh I might have cross caused a problem with it and patch everything up with them. And that was really helpful in uh my own uh circumstance because I learned that if I do something bad, I really need to apologize and own up to my own mistakes.
SPEAKER_01:Right. I remember when you were having a trouble with the permit, but I think you were given bad advice, or there was a misunderstanding there that you didn't need a permit.
SPEAKER_02:Uh misunderstanding.
SPEAKER_01:And that happens. As much as that hurt and demoralized you, and then you lost people, which happens with every production, not just yours.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Resolving to finish and getting it, you know, it's streaming now or about to be, that's fantastic. That's what it takes for anybody to make a movie.
SPEAKER_00:A lot of people would have just given up.
SPEAKER_02:I know. I never had it in me. I always wanted to finish the mission that I start, no matter how long it takes.
SPEAKER_01:Definitely.
SPEAKER_02:So uh after a couple of uh I put everything together, tried to fill everything up again, and then replaced some of the positions that had been lost, and I had a new uh schedule for uh the beginning of 2024. And during that time, I also got a day job at a coffee shop, which would help me uh with the finances in the movie to be able to afford props, uh meals, and uh paying the cast and crew that really needed a a paycheck. And that was one of the bigger, bigger uh obstacles with getting people attached was the money. I uh I couldn't make any promises because I uh had very little to give. What I can offer is my kindness and a good time on set.
SPEAKER_01:Yep, and respecting those people.
SPEAKER_02:So uh we ended up with a great group of people that are on the cast. As he as I've already mentioned, uh Rachel Knapps plays my uh sister Lisa, who gets married. I also had Savannah Marcinello play my youngest sister. Those two sisters were both younger than my character, and I based them off of my uh own two sisters. And then I also have Susie LeBrie playing my mom Robin. And when I first wrote that character and she expressed interest in being involved at some capacity, I knew that's who I wanted to play my mom. And then I also had a new uh actor, uh JT Fletcher, play uh the role of Derek, who uh my character moves in with. And then the two uh characters that I really uh would tie the whole film together were my love interest, Amanda, and her sister, uh Emily, who uh does uh gigs at a small bar. After uh trying to find some people, we originally had Stephanie Graves attached, but after that fell through, I looked into uh one of the people that I had booked as an extra, and after finding out that she is really interested in being available for the movie, I reached out to her and hey, would you like to be able to move up to uh the love interest? And we uh were able to get Casey LaFleur from that uh process, and she's gonna be playing Amanda Spencer and Emily Spencer, we originally had a singer out of Tennessee, but that fell through before uh we even before she could even make it to Baton Rooch. And then I replaced her with one other person that I had met before uh filming, and she was a singer as well, but after uh that first uh filming period fell apart, it was tough to get her really focused on uh committing to the movie. And then one day when we uh were filming the wedding scene for the second time with uh extras at a church, one of my uh actors had brought a friend along, and when I learned more about her and uh noticed that she was a singer as well, I realized that the person that I already had not gonna do much and was gonna hold me back if I kept relying on her being in the movie. So I gave the role to Stevie Pearl.
SPEAKER_01:Nice. It's and you've got an idea, you want this asterisk, you've got it planned, but then you realize it wasn't working out, and man, right there, happy accident, you've got somebody even better. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:I uh really uh looked out when I uh found Stevie Pearl, and uh I was putting a lot more focus into writing her character out than I did uh writing my own character. I was trying to write a character kind of inspired by a former American Idol uh contestant. You probably remember uh season three, uh Diane DeGarmo. I uh tried to write what I remember from her and tried to base that into the character. And there's a scene in the movie where I uh had a little Easter egg had her uh baby album on a shelf, would uh also uh go with a telling of what I uh based this character off of.
SPEAKER_01:Nice.
SPEAKER_02:And in bed and in the center of that is a picture that I was able to discover online that I really fell in love with. And when I was writing that uh part out, I had a specific picture in mind, and I was able to come across uh When Dreams Come True from the late Leonid Aframov. It was a 100% match of the description that I had in mind.
SPEAKER_01:Sweet. How'd the premiere go?
SPEAKER_02:Oh man, I really had it in my mind that the first place I wanted to show it at was the Manship Theater in Banroge. And I would do the research and realized that it probably uh was going to cost me an arm and a leg. So uh I tried to look into investors and I was sending out requests, but wasn't getting a whole lot of interest, and then I kind of thought about my uh dad's uh company, the Pangburn Group, which he was working at and was one of the higher execs from its founding in 1996 to its passing in 2013, and then uh I reached out to them and they were willing to donate the full amount of the booking for that uh company.
SPEAKER_01:Nice.
SPEAKER_02:And it was uh really great to have them uh involved in that part because I had written a little piece in the script that was kind of a dedication to my own father's memory.
SPEAKER_01:That's beautiful.
SPEAKER_02:So uh when we did it in April of last year, I was really impressed by the people that were supporting me and then turning out to see the see the movies for the first time.
SPEAKER_01:Excellent. Very cool. That's uh that's really touching. And you were able to pay tribute to your dad. It's been a blast. We love talking to you, love learning about your process and what you've had to go through with the industry, and it's it's really inspiring, and we aspire to be as good as you.
SPEAKER_02:Thank you. Guys, really great to talk to. You TJ? Yeah, absolutely, TJ. And uh whenever uh I start my own podcast, I'll uh make sure to get you guys to appear on one of my episodes.
SPEAKER_01:It's a date. Well, Warren, it's been great talking to you. Do you have any socials you want to share with the people so they can follow you?
SPEAKER_02:I am on YouTube, Warren World Films, Warren World Films. I also have the Warren World Films Facebook, Instagram, and threads that you can follow. And I have recently launched a new merch line for the Aspire movie uh through Teespring. See you later, folks. All right, see ya, folks.
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