IFH 868: How The Asylum Makes Movies That Actually Make Money with David M. Latt

Alex Ferrari 1:32
Enjoy today's episode with guest host Dave Bullis.

Dave Bullis 1:43
On this week's show, I have David M. Latt. David is the co-founder of the Asylum, one of the most prolific independent film studios around. They have won dozens of awards and created such movies as Sharknado, Sharknado Two, Sharknado Three, and the upcoming Sharknado Four: The Fourth Awakens. We're going to talk all about how the Asylum comes up with their ideas and how they market it and how they make money. So here we go with David M. Latt.. Hey, David, thank you very much for joining us today.

David M. Latt 2:25
Oh, sure. Hey, thanks for having me.

Dave Bullis 2:27
My pleasure, my friend. You know, you know. So, David, you know, as you know, the co-founder of the Asylum, you've produced all these films. You know, you have such a, you know, a really, really long IMDb. As I was looking at, I didn't even know you produced that many movies. So, you know, I wanted to ask you know, David. You know, how did you get started in the film industry?

David M. Latt 2:45
Oh goodness, I lost a bet. It's a well. I have a very, very, very boring story about that, which is that I just always made movie. You know, I'm the the nerdy kid that back in the 70s, yes, I'm that old. That had a Super 8 camera and made a lot of short films. And as my wife likes to point out, the Goldbergs, the TV series, is my family life. That's exactly it. And just always had a passion for directing, producing, you know, telling stories in this medium, and when I was 12, I saw Star Wars, and that kind of changed my life. Going, wow, you could actually make money in this business, and you know, tell stories at a mass level, and and that kind of just really focused me very cutely to to make movies, which for some strange reason in this life, I won the lottery, and I'm allowed to do the things that I love to do, which which I know is very rare. And trying to take advantage of it, but I kind of do. But that that's it. I mean, I'm not trying to. I'm not curing cancer and doing important things. I'm just making movies, being very self-indulking.

Dave Bullis 4:03
So, did you go to film school?

David M. Latt 4:06
I did. I have a degree, so I'm allowed to make movies. I I went to Loyola Marymount University, and I graduated there with some kind of degree. I can't remember what it was, and I think it was film production something, and here I am today.

Dave Bullis 4:25
You know, you mentioned permission to make movies because you know Lloyd Kaufman. When I bought his filmmaking DVD set, it actually came with a degree from Troma University, and he's just like, just write your name in there. He's like, just write it in with pen and hang up on your wall, and you can make movies too.

David M. Latt 4:41
I think Lloyd is probably the greatest human being in the world. So yeah, I that's that's awesome. That's awesome.

Dave Bullis 4:46
You know, I actually had him on the podcast.

David M. Latt 4:49
I don't doubt it. Actually, had him for dinner a couple weeks ago. So it's it's one of those weird things. Like, hey, do you hang out together with filmmakers? And and you look back and you're yeah. Kind of do. It's really a neat, you know, experience to be able to share those moments with people that you put on a pedestal and admired for so long, and and you look back and go, wow, they're friends, and Lloyd is his friend and his wife, and it, you know, he's he's the real deal. He's an auteur, an independent filmmaker, a guerrilla filmmaker, really enthusiastic, as you know, and and you know, genuinely just a sweet, sweet man that really loves what he does, which is it's invigorating. It gives you know gives me kind of this renewed energy, and I think he's like 103 years old. So you know, it's like to to do that at his age. It's crazy,

Dave Bullis 5:42
And now you have another story for when when you see him the next time. You could say, "Hey, remember that shitty podcast we were both on?

David M. Latt 5:48
Yeah, and they'll say like CNN, and I'll go, "No, no, it wasn't CNN. It was another one. So

Dave Bullis 6:04
The other shitty podcast we were on.

David M. Latt 6:04
Yeah, yeah, that one, that one. Bullis, yeah, yeah, yeah, I got

Dave Bullis 6:05
Lloyd is an absolute great guy, but David, you know, just to go back to you know to your career, I wanted to ask you know when did you decide that you wanted to start the asylum?

David M. Latt 6:08
It was that easy when I got fired from my day job. So my partner and I, David Romali and I, both worked at different businesses. He worked at a company called Village Roadshow, and I worked at a company called Shmera Multimedia, and I was head of production for that company. And I was there for a couple years, and I got fired. And I don't know why. If I was sober, I would have known why, but I wasn't, and so to this day, I still don't know why, but but and David got fired too at the same time. Except his fire firing was much more legitimate. Warner Brothers bought out the company and then went on to produce The Matrix with Village Roadshow, and you know they've done everything. But so we kind of were let go at the same time, and so we had previously made a couple films, like a film every year and a half, and said, "You know what? Let let's do this legitimately. Let's get into this and and start a company together, and we could actually start making movies. So we did that with another partner, Sherry Strain, who also worked at Village Roadshow. So it was the three of us, and we worked out of David's apartment for the first I don't know four years, just doing whatever we could. You know, we were young, we needed the money, and started you know actually releasing art house movies was our first kind of foray into the into the business side of business. But that was 19 years ago. That puts things in perspective.

Dave Bullis 7:42
So when when you first lost your job, and you know, I'm sure you know you and your partners were were sort of sitting around the table, so you know discussing what to do. Did you just decide? You know, did you make a list like, hey, this is the resources I have available now. This is how much money I have, and just try to go from there.

David M. Latt 7:59
No, we're not that smart, you know. We we just we had we all three of us had a passion of making movies, and we knew that's we wanted to do. And I think had we put together a real plan, it would have been we would be a lot more successful now because I think we kind of started around the same time Lionscape did, except they had a plan. So if you want to put things in perspective about where things, how things could have been, but you know, I think Netflix started around the same time too. It's one of those things of you know we just wanted to not be homeless, so we just you know I I immerse myself, and I'm a workaholic, so I do, and and I love making movies. So on on a set, I've done everything and continue to do everything in a lot of ways, and and enjoy every aspect of it. And you know, from catering to boom op to you know camera, whatever it is, I touched it in some particular way. So you know, it didn't matter what we were doing as long as we're making movies, and initially it was I was I was an editor, so I was cutting trailers and promo things for clients that Ramali was bringing in. David Romawi is more the business side of things, and I'm more the creative part side of things. As I always like to say, he finds the money, I I spend the money, and we both enjoy what we do. So he would find work, and I would do the work. And you know, and that's kind of the way it went. He found he he kind of got this great opportunity where his old boss's old road show started a thing called First rights, which was being set up in the native country in Australia, first-time filmmakers with an exclusive output every month to a one of the largest video distributors. In Australia, they were looking. They were looking for an American partner. So David O'Malley part became that bridge between Australia and America, and we created a an output deal with Hollywood Video, which was the second largest chain in America at the time. And every month, we would release art house movies from first time filmmakers to the tune of about six to 10 every single month, and that increased to 15 to 20 at a certain point. We had hundreds of titles. It was a very successful program for about three or four years, and that was what our life was. And what got us back into film production is that when we saw the writing on the wall, that was kind of waning. We needed to kind of diversify. We went to Blockbuster and started releasing with Blockbuster, not with First Life. They said, "Look, if you can come up with a film a month, you know, for us to distribute on the horror side of things, the genre, not the art house, we'll take them. And so we started finding movies. But the problem was we we were competing against Lionsgate and other big companies that were offering minimum guarantees to filmmakers that we couldn't do, so we couldn't come up with a product. And at a certain point, we went, "Well, you know, we're filmmakers. Let's try and find an angel investor to bankroll specific movies for Blockbuster, these cheap horror films. And we did. We found someone to give us, I think, half a million dollars, and that bankrolled the first like 10 movies. And by that time, because we were releasing a film every single month, it you know caught up to you know after about five or six months, it caught up to the investor and to us. We were cash flowing our films, and so for the first 10 years of our of our business, like we were a cash flow company primarily, where money coming in would go to fund the next project going out, and we're still to that degree, some somewhat to that degree. Although we're a little more financially sophisticated at this point with all the employees we have and the products that we make and everything else, but fundamentally the same kind of business, but yeah, we what I think kept us alive and the doors open is that we were very nimble and very flexible to opportunity that came our way, and it was rare that we said no to an opportunity. It's you know you just never know where those are going to take you, so you know, our goal as a good druggie was to always be taking drugs in the sense, and the drug being film, and to you know just always keep that process going, and and that led us into the business that we're in now. And it's not for everybody. Sherry ultimately left the company because she actually wanted to make, I guess, quality films, and and saw herself more, you know, in the art house world or bigger bigger shows, which is fantastic. And she left in about 12 years ago, and then we brought in a guy named Paul Bales. We still don't know what he does, but he does. Oh, and he's looking at me right now. So Paul Bales used to work for SAG for about 10 years over there, and came into the asylum, became a partner at the asylum simply because he just slept with the right people. Because Paul and and Romawi were fellows with friends in Michigan, growing up in Michigan, also with the same background of making movies when they were young, and Super 8 cameras and all that stuff. You know, we all share that kind of same initial passion. And Paul's been very invaluable to the or valuable to the company. He's the guy who says no. He acts as kind of our CFO to everything, and you know really regulates how things are done, so you know that kind of control has really, you know, aggressively grown the company in in very wonderful ways. Because we're not just out, you know, partying and being crazy and wild. We're we're actually being responsible human beings that have a payroll and insurance, and and you know, he made it legit, which is kind of cool. I just answer really long, don't I? No, yes and no. I'm sorry, yes and no. That's it for now on.

Dave Bullis 14:13
There's a funny side note between yes and no. I had a friend of mine. He he interviewed. Remember Bismarcky?

David M. Latt 14:18
Well, of course he was in Sharknado too.

Dave Bullis 14:21
That's right, he was. He actually interviewed him for his podcast, and and he said Biz literally answered everything with yes or no because my friend shot himself in the foot right out of the gate. The first thing he says is, "Hey, remember you say she's just a friend? And Biz goes, "Yes. He goes, "But I've done other things besides she's just a friend, and through the rest of the podcast, he's just answering yes or no. And my friend was like, "Can you elaborate? And Big was like, "And Bizman was like,

David M. Latt 14:49
Well, as a no, yes or no. And I'm sure, I'm sure, with Biz was more like, "Yeah, no, no, yeah." Oh man, I don't have a year job.

Dave Bullis 15:05
On your IMDb, I know you mentioned that you know the Asylum. No movie has ever lost money that from the Asylum. I mean, you know, I wanted to ask you. So, using that that that structure of you know never losing money, you know, do you write the script with a producer's hat mainly, so that way you know, like, okay, look, I don't, I'm not going to include things that are just way too outlandish, and I can't, I can't actually, we we can't actually do, or is, or do you sort of do that at the later point? So you're sort of always making sure that the movie don't sort of get all, you know what I mean, like out of control.

David M. Latt 15:39
Okay, so there's a couple things going on there, so this will also be another long answer. So just be prepared. You can go to the bathroom. I'll just keep talking. Which is, if you've ever seen one of our films, we do not limit ourselves with oh, this has to be four actors in a room talking about you know the monster outside in the hallway. That will never happen. And when people, you know, try and solicit scripts or pitches, it's like, oh, it's a perfect asylum movie. It's four guys in a room talking about a monster, and you know, the closet. It's like that. It's obvious you've never seen an asylum film because we never go there. I mean, we, you know, I don't think we've ever had the discussion of you can't do it, which, you know, it's part of the charm of the asylum films that you watch because they they really go pretty far, you know, with with everything, concepts, execution, story wise, and you know it's you can't really contain it. You don't. We're not making a low budget film. We're just making a big budget film on a budget. So you know, and we'll figure out a way to do it. We have you know at this point in our careers, we have everything's in house. So we have a whole room full of visual effects artists, and we have a whole room of sound designers. We have a whole room of editors. We have a whole room of everything. So you know, there's nothing that we really can't do. We just run out of time sometimes. So you know, may look a bit cheaper. We may be cutting corners here. There are tricks we do to make it look bigger when it's really not bigger, and so we can't afford it. So we never story-wise limit ourselves to anything. And in our in our, the only time we ever really felt nervous was doing Titanic Two, because we knew doing these big ocean sets and doing water were very difficult for us. We hadn't done them well in the past, and and I just was looking at going, really Titanic Two? We, you know, my partners had free sold it, and that was film we were making, and I was really nervous about you know doing it, but I'm like, no, we're gonna still we're gonna still jump into it, we're still gonna try, and I think Titanic Two is a success story, certainly just the way it sold and all that stuff, but just story-wise, the fun story, and it's a big story, and it looks great. I'm very proud of the film, and you know, it's because we didn't limit ourselves, and we made it all work. We had tanks. We were drowning people. We shot at the Queen Mary, which is out here in Los Angeles, to have that look. We shot in the submarine. We shot, you know, it's like, and yet we still didn't spend any more money than we had, and that kind of leads into why we haven't lost any money. You know, the asylum is very rare in the business. Usually, it's your distributor, your sales agents, or your production company, and they don't mix. We're all those things. Forget the sales agents, but we're we're distributor and producer, which make the a studio. I mean, we're the the only history between us and like the majors is we don't have a rodent for a mascot. We don't have an amusement park. I mean, which is really where you make the money. But it's we we do everything they do, which means that we pre-sell things, you know, to our to what we make, and so if we know that a film is going to make a million dollars because we pre-sold it, it's my task as a producer not to make it any more than that million dollars or less because we have whatever our overhead is. So if our overhead is another 100,000. So if I don't make it, if I make it for more than $900,000, we're screwed. We've lost money, and or whatever the budget is-half million, quarter million, 2 million, 5 million. But I have my constraints. Those constraints are limiting, but they're also really exciting too because it makes you have to really think how to produce a show for no money, and when I say no money, you're like picking up. Well, you just said a million dollars. Well, we shot films for 15,000. We've shot films for 100,000. You know, half a million. I mean, we've gone all over the place up to you know a few million dollars with the Sharknado series. And then certainly our TV series ain't cheap. It's cheap in the television standard of things, but not cheap for the very best endeavor. So we haven't lost money because I won't spend more than we have. It's a really odd concept. It's not the way the film business works. Then we get into big arguments with other people about it, in you know, in the studios and and whatnot. But it or other producers that want to produce at a bigger level. But it's just us. I mean, at the end of the day, we're still working out of, you know, mentally we're still working out of an apartment, and trying to live paycheck to paycheck. It's just now we have a staff of 42 that have insurance and and pension and health and payroll and you know two big studios and sound stages and equipment and all that stuff, and and you know it's a little bit bigger, but it's still the same feeling of we have to make X amount of money in order to keep the doors open. We've been lucky; we've had some great breaks and great opportunities over the last you know number of years, and so we've been able to keep people employed, and then we produce two films a month, including and and then on top of that TV series. So you know that's another 50 to 100 people every month. It's great. It's great to surround yourself with people that are very passionate about things and and love the the business and and want to succeed. Are you back from the bathroom yet? Should I wait? Yeah, I actually I just got back. Actually, okay, okay. Then you're the plus.

Dave Bullis 21:45
Yeah, it's actually it's down the hallway. So I got it. I was thinking about it.

David M. Latt 21:49
I get it, and I appreciate it.

Dave Bullis 21:51
Yeah. So you know, Dave, I wanted to ask. You know, when when you know you're making films, you know, obviously you know you were talking about your criteria and everything like that. But I mean, do you have a lot of brainstorming sessions where you kind of just want to come up with, you know, maybe something like, you know, someone's never seen before, or you know, do you sort of have like a people meaning like people in a room just sort of throwing out different ideas, and when finally something finally, you know, hits, you know, you sort of start developing that idea.

David M. Latt 22:17
No, we're very boring. I mean, let's let's be very clear. We're, I mean, we we are because you know the networks, our partners, our buyers tell us what to make. We don't. That's why we don't take pitches, and that's the one thing. It's like you know, in Twitter, and I've started to get much more active on my Twitter page. You know, I'll get at least 10 to 20 solicitations a day, going, hey, I wrote a script, or I have a novel, or I have an idea, and I have to say, look, we don't do that. We don't take. We're probably only student count. We don't take pitches. We don't take submissions. We don't read novels. We we don't care because when sci-fi tells us to go put a make a film about a shark in a storm, we're not going to have that script in the ready. We have to go manufacture that script. We turn around to our writers, our development team, and we produce that. We we find it. We we we we make it. So it's very very rare that someone comes to us with a project. The only time I can think that it really happens and happened successfully would be Nick Carter with Dead Seven, where he, you know, came to us and put it, you know, fricking Nick Carter. You know, it's it's hard to say no. Plus, he bought us lunch. You know, we're gonna we're gonna say yes anyway. But he said, "Look, I'm a huge fan of the asylum. I'm a huge fan of of the genre, the zombies genre, and I'm gonna come to the table with some money. I'm gonna come to the table with all my Backstreet Boy band members, and I'll get some NSYNC guys, you know, and and I'm going to give you a genre that you could sell, which is zombies. Now we wouldn't have gone forward if if we didn't turn around at that point to sci-fi and said, "Hey, look, we have this particular project. We don't necessarily do this, but this you know kind of came to us. Are you interested? And they said, "Yes. If they said if they would have said no, then we wouldn't have done it because we're just not in that business to to take scripts and and solicitations and submission. But we found a partner that was willing to kind of say yes, we will give this film a home at the end of the day and and promote it and do what we're going to do. So that's when we were able to work with Nick and to make it happen, and you know, I'm really happy that we did. I'm very proud of that film too. I think it came out really nice. Now, when you say, you know, where the where's the creative elements come into this thing, and you know, the fun and the rolling up the sleeve, that happens after the script is written, when you know you you've given the studio or your partner, what they want on this page, which is great, and then you get to talk to the filmmaker about what the style is going to be and how we're going to approach this and what we're going to do and and what's unique about the the the show that we're going to do. I mean, I the one thing that that I think you you can't look at the asylum movies that are all cookie cutter in the same films because. We hire tours, and we hire real, you know, people with strong vision and people that really want to to create something that unique and fun and interesting and not just cookie cutter and you know master shop close and close stuff. I mean, they they're really trying to make something special, and so that's when you really get into it and go, how do we make this special and unique and fun for the audience and and and enjoyable while maintaining what the story lines would be for our buyer and and make that happen? I'm you know I'm a firm believer that you know yeah you have a thriller and you know the you know heroine and the villain whatnot but you know you have those structural things where you can really do crazy stuff. You know, go go go nuts and go crazy. I mean, there's no reason not to. The audience wants to see it; they want to be engaged, and the filmmaker wants to do it. They want to be engaged, and you have to kind of know your audience too. I mean, we're gonna we're gonna go nothing crazy on you know, if Lifetime wants, we do a lot of stuff for Lifetime. But you know, we have to keep it in the in in the realm of Lifetime. You know, we can't shoot a black and white and you know close up of a of vase and go that's your thriller. You know, you have to you know know the audience a little bit. But otherwise, you know, these guys all want to have you know make a really engaging movie, and and that's where we have fun with the toys and get into the creative part of it.

Dave Bullis 26:26
So I have to ask David, what did Nick Carter buy you for lunch?

David M. Latt 26:29
Pizza. He actually oh nice came in and and got everyone from the office pizza. Came in with Cater, and it was he wines and dined everybody. So he couldn't say no. You know, it was it was a very unique approach to it to to getting our attention. But and in truth, we told you didn't have to do anything. You know, we're we're all old enough where Bash Street Boys and that that group was a big deal and still is. And Eddie just a super nice guy. So you know, it's it's hard to say no to to Nick.

Dave Bullis 27:03
Yeah, I was gonna say I'll make sure to edit that out because in case he wants to buy you pizza again, you know, I should probably

David M. Latt 27:08
Doesn't have to. You don't.

Dave Bullis 27:13
You briefly mentioned Sharknado, and you know when when when that movie came out when Sci-Fi Channel came to you about you know putting sharks in a storm. Did you ever imagine that it was going to sort of hit as well as it did?

David M. Latt 27:26
Yeah, we're fricking geniuses. We we know everything, and it's really weird. We just we we're 100% on everything. You know, no. By that by by coming main shark nano, I think we made 150 movies, and shark. was just one of them, and it was stupid. And I, you know, the first to admit that I did not understand the script, I didn't get it. And but Sci-Fi loved the script when it was written, and they were just like they couldn't get enough of the script. And and so my my role as a producer is not to get in the way, you know, of what the buyer was. And so sometimes I push back, but I was so lost with it. I'm like, how does this work? And he goes into the shark and the the chainsaw because we don't make comedies as much as you you you might want to think that we make comedies. Now we do in the sexy comedy, but we really, you know, lean heavily in the sexy, not the comedy. But on all these monster shows and creature shows, everyone takes it very seriously. There's no one's winking to the crowd, to the audience, and you have Sharknado, which is a huge wink, and it can be played that way certainly. And on the script, it reads comedy, and I'm like this. We got it. I I was also I had ages of notes to get back there and really kind of get more serious, more grounded, and and more believable and authentic and everything else. But because sci-fi loved the script so much, I completely backed off and said, "All right, well, this is our buyer, and they want this, and they love it. So let I'm not going to push the issue. And I really didn't think much of anything. And we had a bitch of a time casting it because no one wanted to be in a film called Sharknado. Tara Reid signed up first, but I don't even know if she even knew that she was in a a film called Sharknado, and that's not to say that she, you know, I know where the jokes are with that, but she's a busy person, and I think her her people just kind of said, "Look, you're doing this film; they're going to pay you X amount of money. You know, you're in it for a week. Just go and shoot this thing. It's good, you know, money that when you go to Barbados, you could, you know, spend on bikinis and mai tai And so I'm sure for hers that was just a quick and easy pay thing. But we couldn't find the lead, and we went through in in the history of the of the asylum from then and in that from beginning until even now, we've never had to push a title, you know, push because of cash. And we had to do that for Sharknado. We could not find a lead for Sharknado because no one wanted to be the film called Sharknado. So ultimately, we retitled it Dark to a film called Dark Skies, and repackaged it. We had previously even gone to Ein Zeering, but he turned us down. But we call the Dark Skies, and we got Hein Zeering. We paid him a lot more money than we, you know, at first on the first offer. And halfway through it, the show, they heard rumors that it was actually called Sharknado, and I instayed in this trailer and called his agents that I want off the show, and they all the capmates said we are not going to be. And I got calls from the agents and lawyers, managers going, "You cannot call this film Sharknado. We will not allow you to. If you want these actors to be in this film, we basically our threat was all right. Then they're running in. We'll recap. We'll redo the whole thing. But you know, we're we're like you know basically actually the the our our stand was we don't know what it's going to be called, which is true because sci-fi could have changed it to anything. That's not up to us. It's up to sci-fi. If they want to call it, you know, this is the craftiest film in the world. They can call it that. You know, that's up to them. We're and we're not gonna, you know, you know, pigeonhole them into what the title is gonna be. So, you know, there's a chance to call it Dark Sky. There's a chance they're gonna call it Sharknado. There's a chance they're gonna call it Shark in the Storm. Who knows what they're gonna call it? But let's go back to work. So it took a few hours, but everyone went back to work. But they were really pissed off that it was called Sharknado. I think the only one that wasn't upset was John Hurd. I think you know he got it from the get go. He was excited that it was called Sharknado. He thought that this was going to be a big hit. You know, you talk to him and he he knew it all, which is which is great. He probably does or did at the time because the man's insanely smart, and you know he's been in the business forever, so he he probably knew that we had lightning in the bottle. But he might have been the only one. I don't think anyone else did. I think everyone just looked at it as a either a forgettable movie that no one's gonna you know give a rat ass about, or you know it's gonna destroy their career. I mean, those were the only two choices, not a film called Sharknado.

Dave Bullis 32:24
It's it's like snakes on a plane when they were going to change the name to like you know, the terror on flight, whatever. Right. And then it became back to snakes on a plane.

David M. Latt 32:34
Yeah, and I mean, I know that happened with with a film we did called Mega Shark versus Giant Octopus. Debbie Gibson had never really done a film before, and her manager basically said, "Look, just do this film. No one will care. It'll be a forgettable movie. You know, at least then you'll have something on your resume, and you'll move on. And for us at the time, Mega Shark versus John Oxyvus was a big film we'd ever done. It became huge cult success. Not like Sharknado. Nothing's like Sharknado, but but big enough. We're like, oh my gosh, this is phenomenal! You look at us for a Jeopardy question and a crossword puzzle in New York Times, and this is bizarre and fun. And not knowing that Sharknado was right around the corner, we thought that that would be on the in the obituary. The producer of Mega Shark was during Octopus died today suddenly, but yeah, but that'll definitely do Sharknado. Maybe the nations. I don't know.

Dave Bullis 33:33
Now, now Sharknado Four is due out, I believe, in June. Correct?

David M. Latt 33:37
July 31.

Dave Bullis 33:39
Ah, July 31. So, is is there anything? I know you can't go into into specific details, but is there is there any even little tidbit that you you know the you can sort of mention on the show right now?

David M. Latt 33:50
Yeah, there will be sharks, there will be tornadoes, there will be ironserri Probably all the spoilers I could give you. You know, it's a challenge.

Dave Bullis 34:03
I do explain it all, by the way.

David M. Latt 34:05
It's a challenge because you know Thunder the writer has set the bar so high with all the fun gags and the fun things and the tweetable moments and whatnot. So you know you never want to go into these projects trying to do less than what the last film was, so you know I I hope that we got there. I think that we did. I think there's some really fun, like holy crap moments in in the film. We're done shooting. We're just editing now, and it's I think it's coming together really quite fun. I mean, it's it's you know, but how do you top sharks in space? I think we have an answer to that. So hopefully, the audience will agree. And I do like the title, the the Fourth Awakens. Yes, that that was courtesy of Sci-Fi.

Dave Bullis 35:00
I may make sure to link that in the show notes as well. That the premiere of Sharknado Four, and that will be on sci-fi, correct?

David M. Latt 35:08
Right, sci-fi. It's a Sunday night this year, which is I think really exciting. I think they're leaning into the family time. I think they, you know, after doing a lot of kind of who watched the show, they understand that it's really a wide range. It's not their typical sci-fi audience, you know, like 50-year-old men that are longing for Stargate. I mean, it it it it really hits a big swath of demographics. From I mean, we have so many kids that are Sharknado fans. So many kids. Oh my God, my kids haven't even watched it. I mean, it's they haven't, and they're like 25 years old. No, they're not. But it's it really ranges on the age thing. So I think Sunday night's a perfect night for it. Very excited. I think you know they're going to pull the stops out. They're going to do a lot of fun stuff. It's it's great that that they're still supporting the show after four years-it's bizarre. In fact, you know how much support they're putting into it. But we're very grateful, and they're amazing partners.

Dave Bullis 36:09
And just like your Twitter Twitter bio, you mentioned your kid in your Twitter bio. You have, of course, my kids tell their friends I work at Walmart.

David M. Latt 36:18
Right. I think they would like that better because they would get the swag, you know, the pajamas and the shirts and stuff. They like wearing that stuff. Like I said, they haven't seen my movies, but they do like you know wearing Sharknado shirts. That's for sure.

Dave Bullis 36:32
Yeah, I I saw the Sharknado pop vinyls, and I was like, wow! I was like, this movie has really arrived. And I even had Andrew Schaefer on on the podcast, and he wrote the book "How to Survivor Sharknado,

David M. Latt 36:43
Right! And that was a New York Times bestseller. For God's yeah, it was crazy, crazy. Yeah, the the you know it's it's it's it's it's you know as my partner Paul always says, it's like prior to Sharknado, you tell people what you do, and you tell them you know like oh great what films you produce and they look you like you know you talking in a foreign language but at least you can say Sharknado and everyone kind of goes oh okay yeah I haven't seen it but I heard about it which is which is great you know how many filmmakers get that opportunity you know we've made a lot of movies, and and just it's it's fun to play in that space and and and whatnot. But even even Thunder kind of kicked me in the nuts with it and said, "Well, look, you get you go to the you go to bat 150 times, you're bound to hit a home run. Okay, thanks.

Dave Bullis 37:35
We mentioned this briefly about one of your other projects, was which was which is Z Z Nation, and you know we I've actually had Doctor Murch on the podcast, Lisa Cornato, and you know I did you know think that it was very interesting that you know you know the Asylum did make a TV show because like you said it is expensive because you know instead of just being you know one product like a Sharknado it's you know it's episodic you know there's you know there's so many episodes per season. So what I wanted to ask, you know, is you know, you know, what was the impetus to start a a TV show by the Asylum?

David M. Latt 38:08
Well, we've always been we've been recently circling that space because that's where the world's going. I mean, what three years ago you had 200 TV series that were available now. There's over 500. I mean, the the I mean, there's a lot of content out there, and everyone's turned to TV because there's no DVD market, there's no Blu-ray market, there's no VOD market. The one-up that we do, no one wants in the sense that they wanted it, you know, a few years ago. So you know, if we want to survive, we have to figure out what is making money, and and series are you know we think is making money. We haven't seen that yet on our end, but we've been told that you can make money in TV series, and so you know we've been circling that wagon for a very long time, and nothing really stuck. But we we pretty much are convinced that the the thank you from Sci-Fi for producing Sharknado and doing the writings that it did because it broke records on their network and and and it became a big success for them. You know, at that station, the thank you was here to do the series. We, you know, they even though we've been pitching for a while, they kind of called up and said, "Hey, okay, take those pictures aside. But you know, you did this movie for us number of years ago called Zombie Apocalypse. Well, it was our number. It was our third like highest rated show, and and we're in the market to do another zombie, to do a zombie series, and we think that could translate well into a TV series, and you know, from what we hear now, you know, on on the back end of it is that, you know, we got really lucky because that. They ordered 13 episodes off the bat. They didn't do a pilot like the normal network would do. So they they really were very happy about Sharknado, I guess. Ultimately, and and so we were able to out the bat get a certain episode commitment, which was really helpful for us, and and the show found its voice very early on. The creator of Zombie Apocalypse also you know co-created Z Nation. We also brought in Carl Schaper, who's a veteran in this business, has been doing it for decades, and was sci-fi's top choice to be our quote-unquote showrunner. I say that in quotes because it's not a legitimate title anywhere, but the showrunner is like the main producer, guru, person that kind of drives the show. And Carl is just-I don't even understand him. I thought I was a workaholic, but he makes me like lazy, like my kids. I mean, you know, just sleeping all the time. He his work ethic is bizarre to me, where he's just 24/7, you know, working on unznation But he really created the voice and and the look and the style with his team and both him and and and Craig Engler, who was the other co-creator, and it's it's a hey, I've always said that if I wasn't producing the show, I'd be a fan of the show because it's just it's so fun. The Cats is so great. The scripts are phenomenal. The production is is amazing. I mean, there's just it it hits in all cylinders. So grateful for that show, and and it happens to be Sci-Fi's number one scripted series, so it's working on that level too, which is great.

Dave Bullis 41:49
And like you just said, David, you know, there's so much content out there now. You know, that's sort of what everyone's been sort of sort of gunning for now is a TV show. You know, you see like you know top actors in TV shows now, and now, you know everyone's creating their own original content, and most of the time it's you know a TV show.

David M. Latt 42:06
Yeah, I mean it's because that's where the interest is. People viewing Havoc have changed. They're now binge watching, which is a thing. I mean, and I know your audience like, of course, the only way you know, you know, everyone that younger than I am, which is a lot of people here in this office don't even own a television set. They have a computer and they binge watch. They wait until it's on Netflix and they watch certain episodes or something. So it it's a tough, strange, bizarre world that no one has an answer to on how to navigate, and we're just kind of all like you know zombies slowly walking towards you know a goal. We just don't know what that goal is at the moment. It'll it'll clear up in a few years, but for now it's like okay, everyone's thinking this is what we need to do, which is create television content, 13 plus episodes, and so we're doing it, and we'll see if that if it if it's full, or if we close our doors, because we're going to go bankrupt. But those are all real possibilities. I mean, this is you were we're playing at a higher level now, and it's tough. It's really tough.

Dave Bullis 43:13
Very true. Very true. You know, David, I know we're starting to run out of time now, and I know you have to run. So I wanted to, you know just ask one final question in closing. Oh, by the way, David, before I forget, um, the the number one question that came in you've already answered, and that was how do I pitch a movie to asylum?

David M. Latt 43:32
Yeah, and I get that a lot, and and I feel I feel so bad, but it's like, but you know, we just we just we're not in that business, and I know everyone's struggling out there, and I know they want a piece of something, a success of something, and I I'm just not in the position unless you're part of a boy band. I guess that's the like the one after to do it. If you're part of a boy band, probably I'll do something. But outside of that,

Dave Bullis 43:51
When when Nicola Shay did tweet me, so I guess he'll be in touch. So so you know, so in closing, Dave, you know, if I could just, you know, one final question, and that would be, you know, is there any sort of piece of advice or anything that we didn't cover that you wanted to to sort of mention that we didn't get a chance to, to sort of put a period at the end of this whole conversation?

David M. Latt 44:16
Well, you know, I will say that I'm grateful for the fan base out there. We seem to be hitting some kind of chord, and it's just really neat. And jumping into the Twitter space, it's amazing, you know, because I I've been so insulated, and so you know to see if there's people actually interested in what we do, it's bizarre. So thank you to everyone that you know has feels that way, and and and and screw you for those that don't feel that way. But you know, for those that really want to kind of get into business and to follow the passion, it's a very hard you know path to take. But it's fun. The biggest advice I can give is. What I try and give when people ask me the question of how do you do X, Y, and Z is meet a lot of people. Just meet a lot of people. Go to parties. Go to seminars. Go to festivals. This business is all about relationships. It's rarely by sending a resume to anyone. So you have to, you know, just keep putting yourself out there and and shaking hands and being a politician and and you know just getting yourself out there. That that's like the biggest thing. So and then the last thing is is just on a personal level. You know, for those that want to engage in the conversation about phylum stuff and what's going on here, you know, please follow me on Twitter. I'm at David M. Lat, and I pretty much talk to everybody on there because I have no life. I'm not producing a film. I'm usually on Twitter, you know, answering questions and talking to everybody, and fun. I enjoy it.

Dave Bullis 45:54
I noticed you're very active on Twitter, David, and you know that that's I'm very active on Twitter as well. But you're even more active than I am, and that's how we actually met again on Twitter. And you know, you made that mistake of saying, "Sure, I'll come on your podcast, and now you're going to regret that.

David M. Latt 46:08
Nah, not at all. I enjoy it, unless this is all about neo-Nazism, and I forgot. You know, and to look through the research, you know, it's like, hey, no,

Dave Bullis 46:18
Exactly, right, exactly. Do the research, like, who is this?

David M. Latt 46:21
So, how do you feel that Adolf? As a net, you know, no, it's not good. It's not good.

Dave Bullis 46:27
How did I get on here again?

David M. Latt 46:30
Yes, the problem of being my own public.

Dave Bullis 46:33
You know, David, I want to say thank you very much, and everyone listening. We're gonna, I'm gonna put all of the show notes. So I'm going to link to David's Twitter as well, David Mucklett. I want to say thank you very much for coming on, sir.

David M. Latt 46:46
Well, thank you. Thanks for having me. Appreciate it.

Dave Bullis 46:48
Oh, my pleasure. I want to wish you the best of luck with all the future projects of Asylum.

David M. Latt 46:52
Thank you. Colony time.

Dave Bullis 46:54
Take care, David.

David M. Latt 46:57
All right, you too. Bye, Dave.

Dave Bullis 46:58
Bye.

David M. Latt 46:59
Bye.