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Alumna producer brings film to Minneapolis

By Tom Vogel
June 18, 2006

Hollywood producer Andrea Michaud '95 will be screening her new film, The Almost Guys, at the Lagoon Cinema in Minneapolis beginning June 16.

MichaudAndrea95LG
Andrea Michaud '95 on the set of The Almost Guys. She credits St. Olaf with helping her develop many of the skills she uses as a producer.
As she prepares to return to her native state for the viewing, Michaud spoke with St. Olaf Communications Specialist Tom Vogel about the trials of movie-making in Los Angeles, her desire to shoot a film in Minnesota and the St. Olaf experiences that equipped her for Hollywood.

The Almost Guys is the story of a repo man and his partner who find a Major League Baseball player in the trunk of a car days before he's scheduled to pitch in the World Series. When it's revealed that the player has faked his own kidnapping in order to pay off gambling debts, the repo men make a deal to split the money and play along.

"It's about blue-collar American dreamers," Michaud says of The Almost Guys. "It's a conventional, sweet film with a splash of dysfunction."

The film, which Michaud calls "a '70s throwback," recently opened in Los Angeles to positive reviews. "It played really well," Michaud says. "People seem to crave this type of film."

Self-Promotion
As producer of a small, independent picture, Michaud finds herself wearing multiple hats and juggling a legion of last-minute details.

At the time of this interview, she was preparing for a press screening in Minneapolis while writing production notes. She had just finished working on graphics for the DVD of the film, which will launch at the time of the screening.

Lacking the blockbuster budget of major Hollywood studios, Michaud also is limited as to where and how she can promote her film.

"I can't put a movie on the big screen all over the country," she says. "I don't have $30 million to use on advertising, but I have to find a way to get my movie out there and generate some buzz."

That's meant finding alternative, innovative ways of promoting The Almost Guys, using the Internet and blogs to spread the word. One strategy involves an online "grassroots" campaign that publicizes the DVD. The film's experiential website plays off the theme of "almost" (the film's tagline reads: "Kidnappers. If only they were good at it"), featuring stories written by visitors to the site.

"We've had a lot of fun with the web site, The Almost Guy Nation.com, Michaud says. "We've created a viral campaign telling and sharing these stories, which are heartbreaking and funny -- things like 'I almost got hit by a train,' or 'I almost made it to the Olympics.'"

The goal of the site, Michaud says, is "to find and unite like-minded citizens who have stories to share."
Almost Guys
Eric Fleming, writer/director/star of The Almost Guys, and his co-star, veteran actor Robert Culp.


The Cast
Michaud describes the cast of The Almost Guys as "very understated and very effective."

The film is a bit of a family project for Michaud. Writer/director/actor Eric Fleming, who stars as repo man Rick Patrick Murphy, is Michaud's fiance.

"A few years ago Eric did a short film for fun called Fallen Arches, a 'mockumentary' about Ronald McDonald, that led to a sudden career in Hollywood," Michaud says of her star. "We did a few movies together and decided to make a movie no one else would make."

Joining Fleming is veteran actor Robert Culp (of the early 1960s television hit I Spy), long-time acquaintance James Edson, Shawnee Smith and Oliver Davis (of ER fame) in his first feature film. Although Michaud has high praise for the cast, she emphasizes how difficult the casting process was.

"It was grueling," she says. "I'd never have the confidence to put myself out there all the time like these actors do."

Shooting in Minnesota
"I'm always looking to shoot in Minnesota," says Michaud. "There are a lot of creative, capable people there. Plus it's beautiful."

Despite the recent filming of Robert Altman's A Prairie Home Companion in downtown St. Paul, Michaud sees a decline of filmmaking in Minnesota from its heyday in the 1980s and '90s, when the Coen brothers, for example, were filming the likes of Fargo in the state. Minnesota, she says, is an excellent alternative to the jaded L.A. scene she's been working in for years.

Shooting a film in Minnesota, where her parents still live, would allow Michaud to drop in on her family for support -- and possibly dinner -- after arduous days of shooting. But Michaud also has practical reasons for wanting to film there: it's cheaper.

"People in California are accustomed to being paid so much by studios just to film on location," Michaud says. "That's tough for me. I don't have the money [the major studios] do."

Even the seemingly routine can be expensive in the movie business. "We found an alleyway we wanted to do a shot in, and we were originally told it would cost $300 to film there, plus permits and cops," she says. "I called the owner of the property the day before the shoot to confirm things, and the cost had gone up to $5,000. That's just to shoot in an alley."

She imagines that shooting in Minnesota would be more accessible and down to earth. "It's so unusual to most of the world to see a film being shot. Outside of L.A. you get welcomed. A film brings a lot of business into a community, for things like groceries, catering and local employment. It makes you happy in the end knowing you've dumped a lot of money into a community."

The Ole Connection
"I was attracted to St. Olaf initially because I was interested in the science program," says Michaud, who entered college as a pre-med major. "After two years I discovered there was this really creative part of me, too. I had this strange duality: a concise mathematical side and a creative, abstract side."

Michaud credits an interest in printmaking and St. Olaf's art department for helping her develop her creativity. "[Retired Professor of Art] Jan Shoger and [Professor of Art and Art History] Wendell Arneson really helped me open my mind to looking at things differently," Michaud says.

"Judith Yourman's computer-generated imagery class was also a big influence," she adds. "The art department was the perfect environment for me."

The blend of art and science has proven invaluable in the field of film production.

"You have to understand dollars and numbers," Michaud says. "Post-production is all about precision. At the same time, working with all these people and learning to understand different needs is a very creative aspect of making a film, and I found that my education at St. Olaf served me to be able to do all of these things. I learned how to speak, to write and to communicate; those things were really emphasized at St. Olaf."

In addition, St. Olaf gave Michaud plenty of practical experience. A semester interning at a Chicago sound-production facility her senior year planted the seed that led Michaud into the film industry.

"If not for that internship I wouldn't have had the inclination to go into film," she says. Michaud has taken that inclination and combined it with the logic and creativity fostered at St. Olaf to make the leap into moviemaking, making her story more than just an almost story.

Twin Cities screening times for the The Almost Guys are available at the Landmark Theatres website.

Contact David Gonnerman at 507-786-3315 or gonnermd@stolaf.edu.