Director Paul Osborne’s film ‘Favor’ (2013) is a dark dramatic satire about two best friends who help each other with a series of favors. ‘Kip’ (Blayne Weaver) lives a seemingly perfect male chauvinist life with a well-paying ‘suit’ job, a hot stay-at-home wife and a sexy mistress on the side. One day, tragedy hits the calm in Kip's life, sending everything into a domino-effect series of chaotic events until it all seems anything but perfect. Enter ‘Marvin’ (Patrick Day), Kip’s best friend. Kip asks Marvin for a favor; but this isn’t just any favor, this is one that leads to a gruesome favor hell that turns into a string of endless obligations on both sides and a ‘Merchant of Venice’ (measure for measure, 3,000 ducats for a pound of flesh) situation that eventually leads them down a sinister and vicious path. - by Vanessa McMahon

I interviewed Paul Osborne after the Sonoma International Film Festival:

ME: What inspired you to write such a dark story where both the main characters are villains?

PAUL: I honestly don't think of Kip and Marvin as villains. They are deeply flawed and guilty of some pretty morally questionable behavior, sure, but they're also complex and human. A label like villain is very one-dimensional. It's like Robert De Niro's character in ‘TAXI DRIVER’. He does some reprehensible stuff, but while you never condone it you at least see what brought him to that state. With ‘FAVOR’, I really wanted to explore the darker side of friendships, specifically male ones. A lot of times things are sort of fine on the surface but there can be inequity and jealousy lurking just beneath it. So I created two characters with a flawed, precariously balanced relationship and let the plot upset the apple cart.

ME: There are no heroes in this tale, and yet it's called: 'Favor'. Do you think there are more dark forces in people than light?

PAUL: I think inside everyone there is a little black, a little white and a whole lot of gray. People are more complex than the simple notions of "good" and "evil", and really both of those are man-made ideas anyway. Even Hitler, who is pretty much the go-to when you think of "worst person ever", felt he had justification for his actions. But generally I believe that people try to live up to their better nature. Look at what happened in Boston. Yes, you saw a couple of kids give into a very dark side of themselves and set those explosives, but it was followed by an overwhelming amount of heroism. I mean, heroism from a whole damn city. So even if our "good" and "evil" sides are evenly matched, I think people tend to veer toward the former. But what fascinates me, and probably why I'm drawn to darker material like ‘FAVOR’, is when they don't choose their better selves. Or when maybe they don't realize they aren't.

ME: Was it a difficult film to make? Are there any stories you want to share that took place while filming?

PAUL: It was actually a very smooth shoot. We didn't have much money - this was definitely a micro-budget affair in the truest sense - but we kept everything contained and modest so we knew we could pull it off for what we had. The producers and I did our homework, planned carefully and made sure everyone was on the same page. We also had an insanely dedicated cast and crew, which I think was a happy byproduct of our lack of money. No one was really getting paid, so everyone was there donating their time and efforts because they actually wanted to, because they either liked the script or just believed in the dream. They would show up every day excited and ready to work and smiling. Every Damn Day I've spent the better part of my adult life on film sets and I've never seen a group of people come together like that making a movie, ever. It was beyond humbling. Not a rotten apple in the bunch. I would lay down in traffic for any one of them.

PAUL CONT’D: The only real negative during production was the injuries actor Patrick Day and I kept suffering. I sprained my ankle, blew out my back and knees. He broke a finger and cracked a rib. It's weird because we weren't making an action flick scaling the mountains of Columbia, dodging rebels and wildlife and working with explosives. We were shooting a talking heads movie in the suburbs.

ME: Is your film a comment on society at large or more of a genre film?

PAUL: It's funny… After our premiere at the Phoenix Film Festival I was approached by a member of the audience who asked me if ‘FAVOR’ was an allegory for the whole "1% versus the 99%" thing, the rich against the disappearing middle class. It certainly wasn't an intentional message, but that's what he took away from it. I don't consider ‘FAVOR’ either a comment on society or a genre film, although people usually classify it a thriller. A few have even labeled it a horror movie, which I think is a bit of a stretch. It's certainly dressed up like a thriller in terms of the basic plot and conceits, but I think of it as a relationship drama. We're saying something about human nature.

ME: How did you find your cast for Kip and Marvin? Was it a long search or you knew from the start?

PAUL: I wrote the roles for those actors. I'd been friends with both of them for years, and also really admired their work. In the back of my mind I knew I wanted to write something for Blayne Weaver, who plays ‘Kip’ and for Patrick Day who plays ‘Marvin’. At some point, I had the epiphany of creating a single script for them both. They'd never worked together before, but I felt like it might make for a good mix.

ME: This is your first fiction feature film? Was it a challenge compared to making documentaries?

PAUL: I've been making films since I was a small kid, so while I hadn't directed a narrative feature before, I'd spent a fair amount of time behind the camera. I'd written, produced and edited other features, plus directed a pile of short works. I felt like helming a feature was maybe a little overdue, to be honest. Of course you never really know if you can handle something until you do it, so it was a relief when I didn't crash and burn. At my core I'm a writer so narrative work is more in my wheelhouse than documentaries. ‘OFFICIAL REJECTION’ is my only doc thus far, and making that film was a huge learning experience. I really had no idea what I was doing when we started it, and I'm not sure if or when I'll make another. I find doc work significantly harder than fictional film. But for any narrative filmmaker I do recommend doing at least one documentary, because there are techniques you'll pick up that you otherwise wouldn't. I learned some nifty tricks that I completely applied to ‘FAVOR’.

ME: What do you consider are your greatest inspirations in past films?

PAUL: My inspirations come from: ‘USUAL SUSPECTS’: Hitchcock and Scorsese, Billy Wilder, early Coen Brothers, mid-career Soderbergh, later-career Aronofsky. I'm a big fan of the writing of Sorkin, Taratino and Dan O'Bannon. We did a little homage to O'Bannon in ‘FAVOR’ by naming one of our characters after his role in ‘DARK STAR’.

ME: You recently had your film at the Sonoma International Film Festival. What was it like to screen there?

PAUL: This is terrible but I didn't get to go to Sonoma. We'd just done the Phoenix Film Festival the week before which jumbled my schedule and I wasn't available. We did send both of our lead actors, Blayne and Patrick, as well as our producer Tiffany J. Shuttleworth whose family is from the area, and I know they had an insanely good time. Sonoma International is known for its hospitality. Also, one of our corporate partners on ‘FAVOR’ is the Roche Winery, so they hosted a big reception for us as well. Tiffany and my actors are still telling me stories about their exploits up there. As far as the screening itself, we were concerned that ‘FAVOR’ seemed to be a bit edgier that the usual Sonoma flicks and the audiences might not respond to it, but from all reports it went extremely well. The Q&A was positive and spirited, and there was a lot of excited chatter afterwards. Plus I woke up to another positive review the next morning. I couldn't have been happier.

ME: How did audiences react to the film?

PAUL: Because of some of the darker elements I always assumed ‘FAVOR’ would be a very divisive flick, but so far that hasn't proved to be the case. Audiences seem to largely embrace it. Usually you can gauge how many enjoyed a movie by what percentage of your audience stick around for the Q&A, and we've had excellent retention at every screening. What's interesting is I consider ‘FAVOR’ kind of an intellectual, talky movie, but the crowds I've sat with have had very visceral reactions. I've heard people refer to it as a "rollercoaster ride", which both surprises and delights me. We've also gotten really good reviews thus far. I'm talking about the kind of reviews you dream about - not only positive but analytical, deconstructing the flick like a puzzle. It's incredibly flattering.

ME: Will you continue to direct features? What will you be working on next?

PAUL: I definitely plan to keep on directing. The next flick I'm hoping to do is a crime drama with romantic overtones entitled ‘SMALL HOURS’, which I wrote for Patrick Day. We're trying to package that one now. In the meantime I've collaborated on two scripts with other filmmakers - a noir heist movie called ‘CLIP JOINT’ with Blayne Weaver, which he'll star in and direct, and a pitch-black coming-of-age flick, ‘BRUTALLY FRANK’, for Scott Storm, who also directed ‘TEN TIL NOON’. If your readers want to keep up with me, ‘FAVOR’ or those future projects, they're welcome to follow me on Twitter @PaulMakesMovies.

Interview by Vanessa McMahon; May 1, 2013