Imagine you’re someone whose passion lies in an industry that’s beyond difficult to “make it” in. Moreover, imagine that it historically doesn’t support the type of thing you want to create. And, imagine that its epicenter lies primarily across the country from where you live. Would you let that stop you from following your dream? Or would you confidently pursue your ambitions, no matter how challenging? If you’re a filmmaker like Erika Arlee and Kristi Ray, the latter is exactly what you do.

North Carolina natives and filmmaking partners of Honey Head Films, Erika and Kristi, are shining examples of indie filmmakers who not only create but support female-focused films. In our exclusive, wide-ranging conversation, Erika and Kristi discuss their path in filmmaking, producing their latest film A Song for Imogene (which Erika wrote and directed, and Kristi Ray produced and starred in), creating their female-led production company, their lessons learned, and what all lies ahead for the filmmaking duo.

 

It’s such a pleasure to meet you both, Erika and Kristi. What was the last great film you watched?

Erika: This is going to be a huge throwback, but I just watched Gone Girl for the first time recently and loved it. I started my career as a writer of fiction, so I am always excited by films that are based on books. There is something different – perhaps more intricate – about the weave of the storytelling. I’ve been a Gillian Flynn fan since I read Sharp Objects (which is now a miniseries starring Amy Adams), so it was no surprise that I enjoyed Gone Girl. I appreciate a film that keeps you guessing and a writer who is always one step ahead of her audience. That’s smart work. Flynn’s duality in both traditional literary fiction and screenwriting is something I have always aspired to. 

Kristi: Such a fun icebreaker. We started our festival run this summer with a World Premiere at Bentonville Film Fest. I haven’t gotten Fresh Kills out of my mind since. This was Jennifer Esposito’s directorial debut – a powerhouse female-centric story about the life and unspoken realities of the wife and two daughters of a Staten Island mob boss. The casting was phenomenal and the whole film and how it was made was incredibly inspiring. We were lucky to catch it the day after its Tribeca premiere and Jennifer, who also stars in the film, led a memorable Q&A.  I loved the similarities between this film and A Song for Imogene – both diving into the burden of expectations that mothers, daughters, and sisters bear and how women struggle to be everything to everyone all the time.

 

You’re both native North Carolinians. What was life like growing up there for each of you?

Kristi: I love this question because it helps to unpack the layers of catharsis that went into making this feature. I spent my formative years down a dirt road off Hwy 17 East, in one of those drive-by Southern towns where people never really seem to leave. Getting out wasn’t easy or intuitive. At a very young age, I knew I would grow up to be an actress and started on stage at the community theater in maybe first or second grade. Being raised in a small town kept me grounded and I’m thankful for that. My grandparents had a huge garden on their property and we spent summers shucking corn, picking strawberries, and running through the sprinklers. We had a modest little house that backed up to a trailer park where my siblings and I shared a bedroom.

My blue-collar parents got married right out of high school and worked hard to try to give us opportunities that they didn’t have. I wasn’t raised to be an entrepreneur and had to figure out a lot of things on my own. As far back as I can remember I was always daydreaming of building a career in film in some other place other than where I was raised.  Part of what makes Imogene so special is that it pays homage to my upbringing in a very personal way. I never watched characters I could relate to on-screen as a young girl and I think our film does a very good job of remaining authentic to Eastern North Carolina and the working poor in these off-the-map places. 

 

 

Erika: I have always been a storyteller. Growing up, I was a voracious reader and journaled constantly. Sometimes the journal entries would become short stories, which eventually became plays that my sisters and I would put on at dinner parties, much to our parents’ chagrin. We weren’t allowed to watch television, but both my mother and father were constantly filming home movies on our enormous VHS camcorder. We could watch the tapes whenever we wanted, and I remember being fascinated by the fact that I could see myself on screen, like an actor in a play or movie. It wasn’t long before I wanted to pick up the camcorder and observe the world through that medium.

I guess that’s what my childhood was: an experiment in observation. I have always been a highly observational and intuitive human since I was young. The first time I became fascinated by rural eastern North Carolina was through observation; every time I went home to visit my grammy and papa at my mother’s childhood home. I didn’t know it at the time, but that was the genesis of Imogene: the desire to explore the people in these forgotten places. To give their stories a chance to be told.

 

Erika, what were some of your earliest and most formative memories of watching movies? Which films and filmmakers were you drawn to growing up that shaped your cinematic worldview?

Erika: When we were allowed to watch movies, it was always the classics: Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Back to the Future, and The Sting. And of course, anything Disney. Epic tales. Class Spielberg and Lucas. The adventures and heroes’ journeys. I loved being brought into a filmmaker’s world and bonding with my family over films. And once DVDs came out and they had a “special features” tab… that was it for me. I would just turn on a film to watch the “making of” or “behind the scenes” or “director’s commentary.” And this was as early as middle school.

 

 

I was fascinated by the practical effects and how a director chose to tell a story: what to reveal to the audience and what to keep a secret. The fact that those films are still extremely popular today resonated with me. I understood that there must be some universal truth to them: something that can transcend generations and advancements in VFX. Even though Imogene is a gritty study of realism, I think the principles of storytelling that I gleaned from those classics growing up will always ring true, no matter the genre. 

 

When did you both get into filmmaking? And how did you both first meet?

Kristi: I left home at 17 and moved straight away to Los Angeles – thinking that was simply what you had to do to break into the industry.   I’m so thankful I was wrong. I was in a serious state of culture shock for some time and as my meager savings were dwindling, with no film credits to my name, I was hitting a wall getting my foot in the door. About a year later I fortunately found myself cast in the lead role in an indie feature shooting back home in North Carolina. At that point, I decided to put a few fake films on my resume so I could at least land an audition. Not my proudest moment, but it worked.

I remember being so humbled/nervous/excited stepping onto that film set for the first time – and realizing I didn’t even know what a mark was. I was hyper-aware of all that I had to learn and took that 21-day shoot as an opportunity to soak in not only what was expected of me as an actress but also to observe and respect the technical roles of crew members in every department. I fell in love with indie filmmaking on this fairly intimate set and realized then that I could make a career in the Southeast, a place where my soul felt its best. 

I traveled for the next 5 or 6 years working on indies and training at Lee Strasberg in NYC. At that time I was still supporting myself with random odd jobs – the kind you could quit without notice when you booked a movie. I ended up in Wilmington in late 2014 and met Erika through a Craigslist casting call for her earliest short film. She was the second female writer-director I had the opportunity to audition for and her screenplay was incredibly nuanced. At that point, I was exhausted by the one-dimensional characters I was going out for and wanted to be in her film. I had no idea that she was so green (or young!). We met on set the night before Day 1 and have been making female-centric narratives together ever since. 

 

 

Erika: I have always been a filmmaker at heart, but I didn’t realize it could be a career until I found my way into it. As a young twenty-something, I was primarily focused on acting, either for the stage or screen. I came out of college wanting to start my own theatrical production company, but I didn’t want to live in New York or Chicago. So I moved down to Wilmington to get a bit of a fresh start, and I got involved in local theater and film here. I was doing stand-in work, taking acting classes, and eventually landed an agent. I booked my very first audition, which was a day-player role for a major network show that was filming here at the time. That put my worldview into perspective.

Going on the lot at Screen Gems to get fitted, then showing up on location, seeing hundreds of crew running around, being shepherded to the HMU trailer, then to holding, then to set, where there was a huge dinner scene happening with about twelve cast members all in period costume… it was a lot. I had never seen anything like it. But what left the biggest impression on me was how stressed out everyone was: even angry at times. We were all doing something we had probably dreamed of since childhood, yet no one seemed happy to be there. Log that away for later after I meet Kristi and realize we’ve both had similar experiences with a broken system. 

On weekends when I wasn’t working odd jobs to stay afloat, I was making short films with a group of friends. After a while, I decided to try writing and directing my own short. It was a two-day shoot, all set in one location, where I could cook and host the cast/crew, as well as the production. Two of the five roles were already filled, and we had three more to cast. I put a casting call on Craigslist, and Kristi submitted for it. She was excellent, of course, so I cast her, and that’s kind of how it all got started. 

 

You both founded your production company, Honey Head Films, in 2016, with a mission to tell powerful, female-centric stories. How did you both decide that’s what you wanted to focus your films and stories on telling?

Erika: Bringing it back around to the note I pinned in the earlier question: after Kristi and I met, we started putting each other on tape for auditions. It was through this process that we both realized how absurd the casting process can be. Kristi would pour her heart and soul into preparing an audition, only to get passed over for some model with many followers on social media. The superficial nature of the film industry can be soul-sucking, and if you’re only investing in one path forward, it gets discouraging pretty fast. Especially as a young woman reading one line for “Hot Girl” at the party. Or driving to Atlanta and back in a day for a callback for “Waitress.” It didn’t take long before we decided to “stick it to the man” and start making our movies. Gatekeeping be damned. 

And a huge part of that was giving women more depth: we were done with seeing women put into such limited, trope-y boxes: “the nagging wife,” “the sex object,” “the 26-year-old model playing a 17-year-old.” And we wonder why young girls have body image issues and feel like they have to be people pleasers. Things needed to change. And it wasn’t going to change just by putting female characters in an executive suite or a superhero suit. By making them men. It was going to change by embracing all the ways women are dynamic and unique without men: putting those qualities on screen and creating compelling cinema around stories that explore the female experience. 

 

 

Kristi: I touched on this a bit in the last question, but to unpack it: the evolution of Honey Head has been incredibly organic. There was the intention behind the kinds of scripts we wanted to bring to life and the roles for females in them, but we founded the company as strong women who felt there was a better way to produce films. At a time when inclusivity, equality, and counter-culture environments were not necessarily valued in our industry, Honey Head stood for something fresh and different. 

Naturally, the characters were layered, multi-dimensional, and relatable – Erika can’t help but author empowering stories like that. With acting being my first love and Honey Head the catalyst to continue on that journey with more autonomy, Erika is constantly developing challenging characters for me to explore. What started as a group of women being their most authentic selves quickly attracted collaborators and clients who aligned with the brand we were building. In a way, everything unfolded fairly effortlessly – with a lot of hustle.

 

Erika, A Song for Imogene–which you wrote and directed–is your feature film debut. What was the process like for you seeing your vision come to life on the big screen?

Erika: Wow. This is a great question. Imogene started as a short film called Lorelei, which I wrote in 2015 for Kristi and myself to play sisters (at the time, I had cast myself as the character who is now “Janelle,” and Kristi as the character who is now “Cheyenne”). It was the second short film I ever wrote, and it poured out of me: seven pages in one night and the script never changed after that. 

Developing the story into a feature was a different task. I had to figure out where the short narrative fell in the timeline of a full-length treatment, then reverse engineer the characters: their needs, desires, struggles, and triumphs. The film is highly personal, from the landscape to the struggle between Cheyenne and Alex. I had about 20 pages written for about half a year in 2019, but it wasn’t until 2020 when the world came to a screeching halt, that I was able to take a full week to sit down and pump out the rest of the first draft. It was rough, but it was a starting point. Over the next two years, I fine-tuned the story. To be honest, I was tweaking up until one of our producers told me I couldn’t anymore because we had to finalize the stripboard. The first day on set, when we got the picture up and I saw Kristi as Cheyenne for the first time, that was pure magic. It was happening! All that time spent financing, prepping, revising–all the false starts, the joy, and tears–had led to this moment. 

Celebrating our world premiere at Bentonville this past June was truly rewarding. And seeing the impact it has had, and the conversations it has started has made every tough moment worth it. Are there things I would change? Sure. Every project is a learning experience: a chance to hone your craft. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to fully relax at a screening. But that just means you’re growing as an artist. 

 

 

Kristi, not only do you play the film’s lead, “Cheyenne,” but you are also a producer of the movie. Can you talk about how you were able to do both jobs throughout production, and what challenges you faced?

Kristi: “Fix it in prep” is a mantra I live by as a producer. I knew this story and this character inside and out – Erika wrote the role for me back in 2015 shortly after we met when it was just a seven-page short film. “Cheyenne” has of course evolved throughout development, but I think what I love most about that process was how much of myself I was able to bring to the character with the final draft of the script. Playing the role came naturally to me; so aside from guitar lessons and learning to ride a motorcycle, most of my prep work came from the producing side. 

Erika and I had been developing this project for years and pushing through some form of financing, pitching, or pre-production for over two years by the time we stepped on set last June. It truly is our baby and I’m proud to have played a pivotal role in every stage of the process from script revisions to location scouting, building our crew, the website, the pitch materials to financing and securing an EP, all the way down to sourcing our wardrobe stock, making casting decisions and fine-tuning the budget and equipment lists. 

I had a goal to step away from logistics two weeks before principal photography. That didn’t happen, because: of indie film, but thanks to my amazing producing partners Michelle Roca and Andrea Nordgren, I was able to retreat into deep character prep about a week before cameras rolled. Since we had done such a thorough job in pre-production, things went very smoothly during our 21-day shooting schedule. I put out fires after wrap each day which sometimes was mentally exhausting because there were dozens of weighty scenes that required deep emotional vulnerability throughout the shooting schedule.

One thing I will say is that each crew member was hand-picked and departments were curated based on skillset, chemistry, and trust. I can’t stress enough how important it is to surround yourself with a passionate crew who you can be transparent and authentic with during your first time out on a feature. We hired on potential over-proof and assembled an amazing team and support system where each crew member felt deep ownership over the film. At the end of each day, people felt cherished and appreciated. That boost of morale goes a long way to mitigate inevitable stress on set. 

 

Erika, you’ve said that the character of “Cheyenne”–who struggles with being in an abusive relationship–is a character that is highly personal to both you and Kristi. You’ve also said that making the film was a cathartic process to heal from your own experiences dealing with coercive control. What was it like as an artist to need to be so vulnerable and honest in telling this story to share with audiences?

Erika: As writers, I think it’s our job to be vulnerable. To write from a place of what we know, and allow others to step into shoes that feel familiar, in one way or another. Domestic violence can take many forms. It’s not always physical. It can be financial control, emotional abuse, guilt-tripping, or gaslighting. Things that leave emotional scars that are easily hidden from the world. That was my experience. With my first partner, I truly loved, and then subsequent people after that. It’s hard to break the cycle once your perception of what love is has been so twisted. But I did finally break the cycle and learn to love myself again.

 

 

My hope for this story is it helps people who might be in danger of a partner escalating to see the warning signs. And for bystanders to recognize when someone close to them could be suffering in silence. It might be easy to say: why doesn’t she just leave? Well, it takes a victim an average of seven attempts to leave an abusive partner. The story is subtle. It’s realism. You can’t authentically connect with an audience and start important conversations unless you’re willing to be vulnerable. The number of people who have come up to us after a screening and shared tears or relayed a shift in perspective tells me this film is doing what it set out to do: one small step at a time. 

 

Kristi: It was a tremendously rewarding experience, and continues to be as we’ve started to share with audiences.  The script hits so close to home that even some bits of the dialogue are direct quotes that either Erika or myself have pulled from past relationships. I’ve personally broken each of the emotional chains that Cheyenne faces in this story in my real life and bringing that character work to set each day could have been a triggering experience.  Fortunately, there was a deep trust between myself and Erika – obviously, but also with my co-stars Haydn Winston and McKenzie Barwick.  These two incredible actors approached each scene with so much reverence that it was, for the most part, an empowering and comfortable environment to perform in.  We held closed sets when necessary and surrounded ourselves with sensitive artists who understood and respected the depth of the work. 

This was the story we needed to get out into the world and witnessing so many people relate to and empathize with these life-bruised characters and the subtleties of their struggles made the work purposeful and cathartic.  

 

The film was shot in North Carolina, where nearly the entire cast is from. Can you talk about how you found the cast, locations, what you wanted to emphasize about North Carolina, and what makes it so special to you?

Erika: Authenticity was incredibly important to the casting of this project. One of the reasons why I was hesitant to write the feature at first was because I wasn’t sure if we could find the right actor to play Alex. He needed not to come across as a one-dimensional antagonist. If he was easy to hate, then the audience would have no sympathy for Cheyenne, and we would lose them. Alex had to be complex, and manipulative not only to Cheyenne but to the viewer. That is a tricky thing to pull off, but when I saw Haydn act for the first time on the set of another project I was producing, I knew he could do it. From there, I wrote the character for Haydn, which I love doing as a writer. 

When it came time to cast Janelle, that was an open call. I had written the character in my voice since I played her in the short, but we didn’t have anyone in mind for the role. We had entertained the idea of casting a name actor as a way to bolster the marketability of the film and raise our chances of distribution on the back end. We sent a slate of actresses to a couple of different distributors, and they all came back as “not needle-movers.” Short of casting Brie Larson as “Janelle,” it seemed like we were better off finding someone local to play the role. That also fits the story better.

Imagine how distracting it would be to be chugging along through this slow-burn indie drama set in the rural South, then suddenly Jennifer Lawrence appears. Honestly, once McKenzie submitted her tape, we knew she was Janelle. The character was in her bones, as a comedic actress and Southerner. The rest of the cast fell into place from there, and I am so glad to have such strong performances from talent who are part of the fabric of the setting. It makes the film immersive, and it gets that reaction from audiences when they say: “I know those people.”

Kristi: We had a unique experience casting the nuclear family and the film’s lead characters. It’s something that came together back in 2020 when we were pitching the project. Honey Head produced a three-minute proof of concept trailer to present to potential investors that showcased tone, pacing, and production value. Creatively it also served as an audition or mood board for various locations and actors and costuming choices.  When it came time to lock the cast for the feature film, we held multiple rounds of auditions for every character but Cheyenne and Alex – who Erika wrote specifically for Haydn and me. 

In the end, it was a big family reunion as the mother, sister, and nephew characters were all reprised by the original cast from 2020. It was crucial to both of us that the casting was authentic and we are very proud to tap into the deep talent pool in the Southeast while mixing in the right amount of non-actors and very green actors to the roster. It helps keep the film verite, the accents subtle and the faces interesting and real. I think that’s what was most important to us as filmmakers – that this piece felt like a true character study of the South and a raw exploration of an overlooked demographic with a powerful sense of place.  

Finding sets with built-in production design and convincing layers of real life was both economical and determining in pulling off this film. We had location owners who felt like family and were genuinely enthusiastic about hosting our film crew at their single wides and auto shops and grocery stores across multiple rural counties outside of Wilmington where the Honey Head production office and crew live. Commuting was essential to the schedule and something we weren’t willing to compromise on to keep the film as a direct reflection of the drive-by towns that inspired it. We’ve seen too many mainstream movies that create a caricature of “Southern culture” and so we strived to give voice to this part of our region without the threat of parody. 

 

How did making A Song For Imogene with such a large majority of women influence the movie, as well as yourselves as filmmakers?

Erika: Both women and men have connected with this story, but overall, it is women who have come to the forefront asking to be a part of this project – whether that was in prep, financing, crewing, or just helping spread the word. As a first-time director, I felt safe being on a team of women. Unfortunately, during my career as a short-form writer/director, I was often ignored or worked around by male department heads who felt they knew better than me. I knew my voice would be heard and the leadership environment wouldn’t be so cut-throat with more women around. Especially as indie makers, it’s important to have people at the helm who are emotionally intuitive and can problem-solve while keeping everyone’s perspective in mind. I think those skills are unique to women, and it is what has made Honey Head productions famously positive, pleasant, and great learning environments. 

 

 

Kristi: I echo Erika in all regards here. The entire genesis of Honey Head began because of a lack of dynamic female characters and a subsequent lack of respect and space at the table for female voices in leadership in our industry. Over the years we’ve learned powerful lessons of discernment around who we invite into the proverbial “Hive.” We were fortunate enough to find 8 incredibly supportive, talented, and passionate men who are feminists in their own right to balance the 20 strong women who rounded out this independent film crew. There’s something safe and empowering about having a 100% female above-the-line team producing this poignant film about women simply existing. 

We were never rushed, never dismissed, and were able to curate a protective environment for both the story, ourselves as creative women, and the young female interns and crew members invited to be a part of this production. I’m proud we were all able to grow and learn in an environment where women and men are equal, and happy to witness our handful of male crew members fully commit to bringing this film to life because they believed in the powerful story and the mission and culture of Honey Head. That kind of thing has ripple effects of energy and sets a positive precedent for what’s possible. 

 

What were some of the biggest unexpected challenges you faced making this film that first-time filmmakers should know?

Erika: Financing is always a challenge with indies, especially for first-time filmmakers. We ran into a lot of speed bumps on our journey to greenlighting the project. We even had an investor who we eventually had to part ways with because we found out he had brokered some shady deals in the past. That was a hard decision to make since he was promising to finance the remainder of our outstanding budget. But if it doesn’t feel right, you should always step away. Never make a business decision from a scarcity mindset. The right opportunity will present itself. 

From the other side of things, the choice to forego name talent for the sake of authenticity has also presented challenges in distribution. None that we can’t overcome, but it’s going to be a different path for us to prove the film’s worth, since we can’t slap Meryl Streep’s face on a poster and immediately have the golden ticket to every top-tier festival and overseas sales (no shade on Meryl, of course: she’s the queen). Names give you an easy “in,” so we have to figure out a different, more innovative way to get Imogene in front of audiences. For those going this route, prepare to get creative with your DIY distro plan.

 

Kristi: I still feel that pitching and financing this film (during the pandemic!) was one of the most difficult things I’ve had to navigate in my career. In hindsight, I can see that it was outside influences like pressure to meet a certain budget threshold or navigate expectations around pre-sales and distribution that slowed the process, inhibited our intuition, and created – perhaps – unnecessary roadblocks that could have been avoided.  In the end, we decided to do what was best for the film and with that, we created a beautiful, timeless piece of cinema in a tangible way that we’re all very proud of. If that had been the singular original goal, I think we may have saved ourselves some sleepless nights and moments of immense doubt. 

All in all, every hoop we jumped through has been a valuable learning experience and afforded us the necessary perspective, knowledge, and skills that we continue to utilize in this next chapter of scaling into the sophomore feature. However, if I had known we’d walk around the moon just to get out the back door to make an award-winning film and that we had it inside of us all along to do so, I would have trusted the process a little more. Realizing early on that making an excellent film isn’t “enough” – but then setting out to do it anyway – and throwing away all expectations of what happens next, that’s the biggest challenge and most valuable lesson I can share. 

 

  

What do you hope to share with audiences about this film, and about where you, this film, and Honey Head Films are going next?

Erika: I truly believe we have made an excellent film with Imogene. It’s now our calling card: the project that we can show potential collaborators and financiers to prove we are capable of making quality cinema. The film has already opened doors for us that we never could have stepped through before. I am excited for the next chapter of Honey Head as not only a film production house but as an independent studio producing original work that continues to grow in scale. The next project in the works is a thriller, so very different from Imogene. It is exciting to have the opportunity to explore stories with more complex elements while remaining true to our mission to put dynamic women at the forefront of our films.

 

Kristi: In the current climate we’re facing in our industry with strikes and very real threats to the future of original cinema and how it’s consumed; it’s more important than ever to support small, meaningful films. Films without studio pressure to be this-or-that, but emotionally generous stories that evoke curiosity and empathy from their audiences. That’s what A Song For Imogene is, and what you’ll find at the core of every Honey Head film. We’ve always been in the business of breaking down barriers and bucking the system and I encourage viewers to seek out creative work from filmmakers like us who continue to do that. It’s like a commitment to “shop local” as much as possible – it benefits the creative economy and helps to bolster the careers of emerging talent. 

But it won’t be as easy or convenient as eating up whatever Netflix is spoon-feeding you this weekend. We’re currently navigating a festival run and distribution for this debut film and as Erika said, it has become a calling card for financing the next project – one that will scale 10x in budget, caliber, and concept. I think that’s every filmmaker’s dream, to have a stepping stone guiding you to the next chapter. We haven’t taken the easy road, but the hope and the silver lining are revealing themselves.

Visit www.honeyheadfilms.com for more as well as http://imogenemovie.com/ for updates on the the film and when you can stream it.