Writers tend to find inspiration in a variety of sources. Hell, I believe this is true for all creators. The venues in which I call my muses are infinite in that I really do view any and everything as a potential story to tell. From an exchange between commuters that I witnessed on the train all the way down to a random article I read in a magazine. One of my most common sources of inspiration is music. In fact, I actually judge a piece of music by its ability to make me see sounds (word to N.E.R.D.). Basically, if your song makes my brain go into film montage-mode, I dig your stuff.
As you may or may not know, the homie (WITH AN I-E), Panama makes les musics. From concept to production, that man pretty much bleeds treble clefs. Well, because sharing is caring, he would often whip up something in his home studio and send it to his friends for their thoughts. I was one of those friends. I love a lot of his stuff… hell, there’s still a few of his instrumentals I want to use for future projects but that’s neither here nor there. IT’S EVERYWHERE!
Ahem. Long story short, there was a particular instrumental Panama decided to put his stamp on based on loving and being inspired by the song, “Love You”, by The Free Design. I distinctly remember him chatting me up with his enthusiasm for the song (which, never gets old for me. I love passion.) and how much he wanted to use it. So he sampled the joint (titled, “La La La (Run You)”) and I basically had a music-gasm. Which was closely followed by a story-gasm. His produced version of the song itself caused me to come up with an entire concept based on the lyrics and the high-energy of the drums.
And then came procrastination. I kept this idea on the backburner for a year or so until I actually decided to sit my cheeks down and write the thing. And thus, “RUN YOU”, my short film script was born. I shopped it to a producer buddy of mine who was looking for some projects to shoot and WALLAH MAGIC. I’d also like to note that someone else was originally slated to direct the piece, but due to scheduling conflicts, they weren’t able to. Since it was my vision and I always wanted to get my feet wet as a director, it was decided that I should direct it as well. So, yes… my directorial debut is allllll because Panama loved a song.
It was quite the experience and as predicted, I caught the directing bug like a mug. Interesting enough, I also wrote/directed another short that I’m excited to share in the future. However, today is about RUN YOU and I am super excited to share one of my dreams with you. To see the words I’ve written displayed on film. Thanks for watching and I hope you enjoy!
So, if you’ll excuse me, I’m just gonna be over here squeeeing for my life.
Run You from Tonja Renée Stidhum on Vimeo.