Interview with Filmmaker Jason Trost

A couple years ago I saw a movie called The FP and it forever changed my life. Enough so that my wife and I have shown it to all our friends and we all started paying close attention to the movies Jason Trost makes.

Here he is, a few years later, looking to get his new independent feature, Wet and Reckless, out to the masses in a very unique way. Trost himself gave us a few moments this past week to talk about his works, specifically his newest one.

Wet And Reckless 1

Project-Nerd: Hey Jason, thanks for taking the time to chat with us about your work, including your new film, Wet and Reckless

Jason Trost: Thank you. Anytime. 

PN: So I’ll start with the standard question, what made you get into filmmaking?

JTRO: That’s a massively long list of convoluted things, but If I had to pick one thing it’d be Terminator 2.  That movie blew my mind when I was four years old. I’ve never been the same since. I guess it all started with the fundamental childhood dream, “I want to be Arnold.” Which has modified over time, but I still want to be Arnold! 

PN: Well, unlike Arnold you have had the chance to work with your siblings on most of your movies. Do you enjoy getting to work with them?

JTRO: Yeah it’s awesome.  We have a super good relationship so I see them all the time anyway. It is nice being able to work, but due to the tiny budgets of everything I’ve made I have to work with them. No one else will work for free. 

PN: I think your best off screen quote is, “I’d rather make the worst movies ever made than sit on my ass and complain about the worst movies ever made.” What’s the motive behind that?

JTRO: Well there’s this thing out there called “the keyboard cowboy” on the internet. I get hate tweets, facebook messages, death threats all the time from people online because of how “terrible” my movies are. All you want to do is shake these dudes who live in their parent’s basements and tell them you have no idea what goes into ACTUALLY making a movie! Do you even know what 20,000 dollars is!? But then you sit back and realize they’re  just jealous because they never had the balls to actually try and make something themselves. It’s easy to sit behind a computer and anonymously spit insults at people trying to follow their dreams and sit there mumbling to yourself, “I could do so much better than that, I just don’t want to.” But It’s quite another thing to actually get off your ass and make a movie yourself. Long story short, I love the venomous hate filled tweets and reviews my movies get. It means I’m making an impact. There’s nothing quite like knowing you ruined a hate filled persons day. I guess I’m turning into the Robin Hood of the internet. Ha. 

PN: Did you ever expect The FP to gain the cult status it has?

JTRO: Absolutely not. My brother and I just made something we thought was funny. We had no idea anyone would ever watch it. I think we largely have Netflix streaming to thank for any “cult status.” Which I still didn’t believe until I went to Comic Con this year and met people dressed as me and other cast members from The FP. It’s surreal. At that point you just have to sit back and go, “Oh shit.” This is real. 

PN: It looks like you’ll get another go with the universe shown off in All Superheroes Must Die; based off the cut budgets and cut time frames, how excited are you to visit these characters again?

JTRO: I’m so excited it’s unbelievable. I can never fully express how screwed over I got on the first movie. So now with the comic series and the second (and hopefully third) movies I get to do it right this time. I’m really excited about these stories. They’re things you wouldn’t expect and definitely things that haven’t really been done in any superhero movies I know of. I wish I could say more but I really don’t want to blow it. Hopefully I can find an evil genius to fund the second film soon. 

PN: Many people might have missed it, but tell us about your cameo in This is the End? What was it like working with that group of guys?

JTRO: That was awesome and totally an accident. I was in town (New Orleans) to shoot Hatchet 3 and it got pushed. So I was staying with my brother who was shooting This is the End out there at the same time. I was hanging out on set and I guess my brother had shown all the guys The FP and they loved it. It was surreal being greeted from Seth Rogen and Danny Mcbride for the first time as “JTRO.”  Those guys are awesome. So funny, so nice and down to earth. Basically I just got drunk with Seth and Evan and my brother one night  at a bar while I was waiting for Hatchet 3 to start and they were like, “do you want to JTRO in our movie?” The rest was history. 

PN: So I have to ask, is there a reason for the kickass eye patch? Even better, is there a reason you’re in a dress in your new film, Wet and Reckless?

JTRO: Well I’m blind in one eye so the eye patch is just much cooler than the alternative. And as for the dress. I think there’s nothing funnier than grown dudes in dresses. Maybe I’m weird. 

PN: Now that we’ve brought up Wet and Reckless, tell us a little bit about your new movie…

JTRO: New movie? Which one? I’ve always got several in the pipeline. Though at the moment none are in active pre-production. Just a bunch of scripts waiting to hopefully be funded. Actually it’s kind of nice to not be making a movie for the first time in five years. But I’m sure that’ll be short lived and I’ll start making something this winter. God knows what it will be.  

PN: Wet and Reckless of course. From watching it, it appears that reality television is not your thing. What’s that all about (other than most of it obviously being crap)?

JTRO: Well the movie is largely based on this guy I used to live with. I was sleeping on his couch and he’d just watch reality TV for 24 hours a day. It was disgusting. I hated it. Then I realized, wait a second, this is hilarious and god it would be cheap to fake. None of this crap has any production value. After realizing the bar is zero with reality TV, I got really excited and threw a bunch of ideas in the blender until Wet and Reckless was born. My sister also had a pretty shitty experience on Project Runway which really gave me some insight into how terrible things are behind the scenes on those shows. Basically yeah, passion project and fuck reality TV. 

PN: You worked with Lucas Till on All Superheroes Must Die, how was it having him in one of your films again? 

It was a blast. ASMD was super tough on us, so it was nice to actually do a movie where we got to have fun. It’s also great working with Lucas because him and I have a natural chemistry so we don’t have to do 15 takes every time trying to find one. He really is the best young actor out there in my opinion. I’ve worked with and been on sets with lots of the other ones and you’d be shocked to see what it takes to pull a performance out of some of them. Lucas always comes in prepared and kills it on the first take. The only reason you ever do a second take is if you screwed up. 

PN: The rumor is the party scenes in Wet and Reckless are just you all “bum rushing” actual house parties… any truth to that?

JTRO: Pretty much 100%. I even through a party at Lucas and I’s place and didn’t really tell people we were going to film then we got them drunk and started fucking with them. The segment Bitch Hunter in the movie was literally us going to a house party and actually trying to find our friend’s girlfriend who we though was cheating on him. When we found out she actually was and we caught it on camera, it got awkward. Thank god we were drunk. The full moon party in Thailand was really just us; Lucas, Scout, my sister, and I running around drinking with thousands of people. No security, no handlers, just bad decisions. And I think that energy really transfers to the final film. 

PN: You’re releasing this online due to it taking your other movies so long to get to the audience, can you give us an insight into what it takes to get that movie from done to watched?

JTRO: My god. That question is massive, ha.  Basically it took The FP almost four years to came out after we finished shooting and it took ASMD two years after we finished shooting. You have no idea how long contracts and festivals take. Lucas and I were sick of that. So when we saw Vimeo come out with an on demand site we exhaled and jumped on it. We’ll do a limited DVD release and who knows what else later. But this is all a big experiment to see if we can avoid the two year down time after your movie is done. I make movies because I want people to see them. It sucks having to sit on something for years. 

PN: In closing, what do you want to tell your fans regarding Wet and Reckless?

JTRO: www.vimeo.com/ondemand/wetandreckless… Tell everyone you know to go there any buy the movie. I think it’s a blast. If you liked The FP I think there’s almost scientifically no way you can’t like this movie. Adhere to the three drink minimum and you’ll have a great night. And please don’t steal it. Every purchase on this movie counts. This is a huge experiment to see if we can get an FP2 off the ground. If you’re an FP fan and you steal this movie, you’re helping kill the sequel. Otherwise thanks to everyone who’s stuck it out with me for this long and I can’t wait for the chance to entertain you again. None of this would be possible without you guys. 

PN: Well, we loved the movie as much as your others and look forward to sharing our thoughts with the Project-Nerd audience. Thanks for your time!

JTRO: Thank you guys so much for this interview. It was a lot of fun.

You can check out Wet and Reckless on Vimeo On Demand and our review of the film here.

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