Jason
Wilson is an editor who works in film and television. He has also
been in more punk rock bands than you could shake a duct tape-covered
mic stand at. His current project is Stopper:
The Rise and Fall of the Bastard Squad.
Well, he has a shit-ton of current projects, but that’s the one
he’s here today to promote.
I’ve
known Wilson since the mid-90’s, but only reconnected with the guy
a couple of years ago at a Tone Deaf Pig-Dogs show.
I had no idea he was all famous and powerful and award-winning and
stuff. I thought he was just a funny dude in a hat.
1)
Where were you born and what is one way that place has affected you
as a person?
A)
In a hospital to the best of my recollection, but let's jump
into what I want to talk about....I was raised in Fayetteville,
Georgia. When I was a boy, there was this character named
Michael that lived up the street from me. He did crazy shit on
the reg (is that how the kids say it?). Once, he was trying to
light a fart in his garage while I was standing there watching
him...pants around his ankles, anus aimed to the sky as he lay on his
back with his legs up over his head, fumbling with a lighter. His
mother walked out the door as he sat there with all his stuff hanging
out...me standing over him watching. She looked up at me in
shock as if something unholy was about to take place between he and
I. I said nothing. I walked out of that garage and went
straight home. You can't explain that kind of shit....not to
the puritans of society. Good woman, that one. What were
we talking about again?
2)
What was your favorite toy when you were a kid?
A)
So many segments of time...at a younger age, I would say it was
the Millennium Falcon (although I had this space ship I loved before
that..."Star- something". It broke into 3 segments to
make other space ships and it was mad awesome. No franchise
affiliation that I'm aware of.) Castle Grayskull a little bit
later on...really, the majority of those He Man figures and vehicles
were pretty damn cool! What I would really like to harp on is
the shit I never got....the AT-AT, for example. Too big. Too
expensive. Not a lot of money for such foolishness, I guess.
My mother was awesome and would try to accommodate, but not
always on time...I remember being in 10th grade and her excitedly
telling me that Wal-Mart had marked down the G.I.Joe aircraft carrier
(the name escapes me. USS Flagg?)...did I still want it? I
almost didn't have the heart to point out that this would impede my
already terrible chances at scoring with the ladies. My mother
worked at Wal-Mart, so I guess she could have used her employee
discount on top of the markdown. This was probably a proud
moment for her. Perhaps, I should have just accepted.
Whatever.
3)
What is one album everybody should own?
A)
The Clash- London Calling. This is one of the first
albums I bought my son (he was 8 at the time). The Clash were
never loud enough or fast enough for me to be anymore than a casual
fan of when I was younger. As I've gotten older, I've gained a
great appreciation for them. It's hard to narrow it down to one
album, but that one springs to mind because I made it a big deal that
I wanted to make sure Brody could someday tell people "the first
CD I owned was London Calling". "Ramones- Ramones",
"Mission of Burma- VS", "Wire- Pink Flag", "Dead
Kennedys- Plastic Surgery Disasters", "Television- Marquee
Moon"....these are all up there for me too, but you said just
one, right? Who do I think I am? James Warbington?
4)
Is your current occupation a career?
A)
I suppose it is. I work in TV and Film. Some of it
is madly entertaining...some of it is tedious and terrible. I
work on films some days and get to be creative and have a good time.
Then there's the "money projects". I recently
finished a medical video that was essentially 47 minutes of a
decapitated head being dissected. The awesome part was that I
was hired to "save" this project. This thing had been
mishandled from the preproduction in California, to the shooting in
Michigan, to the editing in New Jersey. Even the doctors were
screw ups...they had apparently dropped the head, causing some
bruising. Part of my job was putting a blur over the side of
the head that was dropped...frame by frame, trying to disguise the
bruising as the camera zoomed and moved around. Also, as I
edited further into their raw footage, I asked "Am I crazy or is
the head looking worse and worse?". I was informed that I
was in fact crazy, however, I was right...they had forgotten to
refrigerate the head the night before, thus I was slowly watching the
head "rot". I will let you decide if this project was
tedious and terrible or madly entertaining. I'm just not sure,
myself.
5)
If so, how and when did you realize that? If not, what are you
working towards?
A)
It's the first type of work I've had where I was given business
cards. That is obviously the sign of a career, right? I
mean, if they had given me business cards at Subway, then I would
have considered that a career. It's the simple things in
life.
6)
Who is your favorite wrestler and why?
A)
George "the Animal" Steele. I always loved
watching him fighting Macho Man over the Lovely Elizabeth. Also,
I would like to throw out there my love affair with "Hollywood
and Vine" from GLOW Wrestling. I was 12...I have no doubt
they were not as attractive as I remember them, so I haven't even
looked them up on the Googles. No need for shattering dreams
and what not.
7)
What are the best shoes you’ve ever owned?
A)
How does one gauge their answer? Practicality? Comfort?
My Converse Allstars were always my favorites, but they managed
to start breaking down the arches in my feet, so I had to steer away
from them. Sadly. When I was in Round Ear Spock, J had a
song called "Rocks for shoes". It was essentially a
love letter to the idea of tying rocks to your feet with strings, as
Gluk the caveman would do, way back in the old days. Yep.
Those were good times, indeed.
8) How
did you become involved with Stopper: The Rise and Fall of the Bastard Squad?
A)
This question has a smiley face with sunglasses, so I can tell
I should think this one out a bit more. Well...once upon a time
I was in a band (I was in a bunch of damn bands, as a matter of fact)
called Stopper. Stopper was fun, but it was born to be
short-lived. You couldn't keep up with the pace in a band like
that for very long. A lot of drug abuse, drinking, and general
shithead shenanigans. Once Stopper ended in 1996, the
shenanigans continued....with the singer ending up heavily addicted
to heroin. He made a "suicide by cop" attempt at a
Fayetteville drugstore and ended up with a pretty long prison
sentence. Former members of Stopper and friends of Dave have
come together to try and raise money to help his mother with legal
fees, as well as make an attempt to get him into a prison with a
rehabilitation program. Otherwise, he's likely to come out and
end up doing what he was doing before. Soooo....the
documentary, "Stopper: The Rise and Fall of the Bastard Squad"
is a part of the money making machine to help with our cause. I
have other projects, but that one is the focus of my efforts at the
moment, so that's what we'll talk about.
9)
Which actor do you feel like you could sit and watch for hours no
matter what they were doing and why?
A)
That's a tough one. I would say Bruce Campbell, but that
bastard Warbington already took that. Steve Buscemi is always
interesting to me. He has a lot of dogs, but I enjoy watching
him. Christopher Walken is similar. These are character
actors that get their share of kudos for being kooky looking
oddballs, but you forget Buscemi doing something like "Tree's
Lounge" or Walken in "Deerhunter" or "The Dead
Zone". They are good at what they do...beyond being goofy
looking. 10 years ago, I would have told you that Johnny Depp
is interesting to me, but his love affair with Tim Burton's sinking
ship has grown tiresome. Time to move on, Johnny. You
were great in "Fear and Loathing..." and "Gilbert
Grape". It's time to do real stuff again...quit being
oddball of the week in Burton's nightmarish remakes.
10)
What inspires you to do what you do?
A)
I like creating things. When I was a kid, I was damn sure that
I would be an artist...comic book preferably, but I was sure that I
would be drawing for a living. By my later teenage years, I was
done with that fantasy and was sure that music would be my career
path. By my mid 20's, I knew that was foolish and decided film
and video would be my career. The common denominator in all of
these things is A. these are all career paths your parents try to
talk you out of and B. each of them have some form of self
expression. I can't imagine doing anything else. I've had
tons of frustratingly dull jobs over the years and knew early on that
I had to escape that somehow. Pursuing improbable career paths
also helped extend my childhood well into what should have been
adulthood. I'm good with that. Fuck being an old man.
11)
What is something you cannot wait to see or have more of?
A)
There's a lot of things I am excited about in the future. First,
although I am sick of all the remakes and reboots, I still am not
tired of all the superhero movies. I know the world is getting
pretty fed up with them, but I've dreamed about seeing Avengers on
the big screen since I was a kid! I am still excited for all of
that! Call me a dork if you like. I'm also looking
forward to seeing some of these projects I'm involved in get
finished. But that's just me being a shill once again.
12)
Is there a movie that should never be remade and if so which one?
A)
There's lots of them that shouldn't be remade. There's the
obvious choices...Citizen Kane, Gone with the Wind, Casablanca,
Wizard of Oz, Star Wars...too late for King Kong. These are
films that are held in such high esteem, you really can't match that.
Why bother? Kind of like someone trying to do a cover of
"Thriller"...in a non-ironic way. You can't match
that original idea, so maybe you should move forward with your
thoughts and quit trying to ride the coat tails of people that were
obviously smarter and more talented than you. Less obvious
films that should be left alone (and I fear they won't be left alone)
are "Dead Alive" (or Brain Dead), "Slingblade",
"No Time for Sergeants", "Nightmare on Elm
Street"...wait....anyways, these are films that achieved cult
status for one reason or another. They may not have been
monetary hits immediately, but they gained a following and made their
money eventually. Again these are films that are held on such a
pedestal that you can never appease the fans of the original and the
ideas weren't popular enough to hit a larger audience anyways. I
heard there was a remake of "Drop Dead Fred" in the works
at one point. What is the thinking there? I love "Drop
Dead Fred", but this is a film that ruined careers. Was
"Water World" next? They scrapped the "Fred"
remake eventually, but it shows that nothing is ever fully
dead...they will dig that fucker up 10 years from now and try to
reheat it again.
13)
Closer – can you sell me cold on your current project? Take as long
as you want.
A)
Well, obviously I want to sell you people on "Stopper: The
Rise and Fall of the Bastard Squad", as I mentioned above. The
story itself goes beyond the band...everyone knows someone that has
gotten in over their heads with addiction. It's relatable. On
the surface, it's a punk rock tragedy, but really it's more than
that. It's a guy with unbelievable talent that pissed his life
away. It's sad and it breaks my heart even typing this out (for
the 100th time!). Talking about all of this never gets easier
for me, but I know this needs to be promoted...we can't continue
putting addicts behind bars and throwing away the key. There
needs to be some form of rehabilitation for them, otherwise the cycle
begins again once they get out. Through savestopperdave.com
we
are also selling his artwork that he creates in prison (the "store"
is not open yet, by the way!).
All money going to his legal
fees. The idea is that we can maintain this for him until he
gets out...it will be waiting for him as a revenue stream upon his
release. Anyways, check out the trailer.
I
would also like to take a second to make a push for James
Warbington's film, Black Earth. The guy is putting together a
kick ass film and for the price of one ticket to see the next Avatar
film or whatever dumbass reboot you deem to put your money towards,
you could be supporting an indie film...plus you get a copy of the
DVD! I've known James for a long time and this bastard works
his ass off to support his friends and has always been out there
promoting for whatever foolishness his friends cook up...including
me! Help the man out! I saw a rough cut a few weeks back
and it's a fun movie!
I
have nothing else to sell the good citizens of this fine nation.
At
this point Wilson took advantage of me – in a way differently than
he normally does – and threw in his own, final question. Kind of a
stamp of uniqueness for an already good Q&A session. I’ll let
him get away with it this time, but when we do an actual interview in
the future I’m striking a question from his list.
14)
What is your favorite flavor of Dum Dum?
A) Just
to buck the system, I've added my own 14th question to your "13
questions with Phantom Troublemaker". No reason for silly
formalities here. If we were good with numbers, we'd have
chosen much more lucrative business ventures. Correct?
Anyways, thanks for asking. My favorite flavor Dum Dum
is root beer. Whenever we went to the bank when I was a child,
I would fish through that bowl for a root beer Dum Dum. Woe is
the teller that had nothing but "pineapple" or that
abomination that was simply a "?". What kind of plan
is that? We don't know what flavor this is? Well, if you
don't know, who the hell does? You made it, Melvin. Is
it the flavor of a 9 year old's broken heart? Assholes. So
yeah....root beer.
Also,
since Wilson asked the question I feel it’s only fair for me to
provide an answer, as well. That way he looks less like a lunatic for
answering himself.
A) Pineapple.
Asshole.
-Phantom
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