Exclusive: Joe Reegan Talks Alien Outpost
Matt Boiselle
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We recently had the opportunity of speaking with Joe Reegan, who is currently starring in the sci-fi/action thriller Alien Outpost (review), which recently released on iTunes, On-Demand services, and in select theaters on January 30th.
It already has gained somewhat of a following among the alien invasion aficionados, and Reegan, who is a self-admitted Dread Central fanatic, was only too happy to discuss his character, the process of filming, and a few other topics so settle in and grab yourself a cold beverage, read on, and enjoy!
DC – Can you tell us how you first got your start in the business?
JR – I actually had moved away from a very small town in Northern California when I was 17 and went to performing arts school down in San Diego because my parents were like, “Absolutely no way are you moving to L.A. at 17 years old!” Through a series of events I got an audition for this movie that I’d never heard of called Jeepers Creepers 2 so I was driving up from San Diego, and I’d probably done about 12 auditions for that film, and I’d auditioned for the part of every kid on the school bus that was being attacked by the creeper. It was an ensemble cast, and I wasn’t fitting quite properly into different elements of it, and two months later, after I hadn’t heard anything from anyone, I got a call from director Victor Salva, who said, “Thank you for sticking through all of this; so would you like to do the last 5 minutes of the film and possibly set it up for a sequel and play Boy #2?” I felt like I’d just won an Oscar so I said, “Hell yeah, I’ll be there!” (laughs) That was like 11 or so years ago and that was my first paid acting job. I didn’t finish performing arts school [but] decided to move up to L.A. for the summer with every intention of going back to San Diego. I was fortunate enough to start booking work, working with Frank E. Flowers doing the movie Swallow. So here I am 11 years later, living between L.A. and New York, and I’ve been blessed to be making a living doing what I love. I was lucky enough to be exposed to theater in San Francisco, and my parents encouraged that, and I knew that I always wanted to be on that stage. I think you’re just born wanting to act – no sane person would choose this lifestyle (laughs).
DC – Give us the lowdown on your character of Omohundro in Alien Outpost.
JR – Basically, I had about three months before I left to go shoot in Africa, and Jabbar Raisani (director) and Blake Clifton co-wrote this script that reminded me of Battle of Los Angeles meets Restrepo meets District 9, and it also had this very cool character development that reminded me of The Hurt Locker. So I read the script, then called my people and asked, “This is cool right?” They agreed so Jabbar and I spoke about the character ad nauseam; probably on his end he got sick of me calling him and asking questions. My character plays a highly trained Marine in this post-apocalyptic world that has formed, for all intents and purposes, a one-world army called the United States Defense Force. Although my character has gone through every type of tactical training, and fully studied this alien species, he has virtually no field experience. For some unknown reason that wasn’t explained in the film (which I liked), he gets sent to Afghanistan, where an outpost has been formed to lead a group of soldiers. These outposts are set up to protect Planet Earth – we’ve defeated this particular species, but there are a number of these sleeper-cells remaining, and there are a lot of parallels between this war and the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that’s what the movie explores. So my character, Omohandro, comes in and starts to struggle with: “Is there a right and a wrong when a mass genocide has occurred – is there an enemy, and is there a good guy?” So it boils down to: “Are we doing the right thing?,” and he’s also struggling to assimilate into a group of guys at this outpost, where they’ve lived it and breathed it and have a very specific idea that they are doing the right thing. That doesn’t necessarily coincide with where my character’s at, and basically the arc of the character is that he’s a newbie trying to get his feet wet and slowly start to progress into a leadership position. It’s interesting to see a character that you’d never think could lead a group, and by the end of the film [he’s] achieved that – it’s a fascinating human dynamic.
DC – What can you tell us about the shoot? With all that military combat, it must have been pretty grueling.
JR – It was probably the most fun I’ve had on any film shoot ever, and the caliber of actors that they got for the film was impeccable. We weren’t on a Michael Bay budget, and when I read the script, I was like, “Oh my god, how the fuck are they gonna pull this off with an indie budget?” So I flew 22 straight hours to Africa, and that morning we started a 3-week boot camp; we were given automatic weapons and put in 50-75 pounds of gear and went through a really gnarly boot camp. We had to completely familiarize ourselves with the weapons – Jabbar told us that he didn’t even want us to have to look at our weapon in order to change the magazine – he wanted us to know how many bullets we just fired, how many we had left in our mags before they had to be swapped out. Your body changes with the weight of 75 pounds on you at all times, shooting 14-hour days, 6 days a week for 7 weeks. Jabbar and Blake’s families are very rooted in the military, serving in numerous capacities, and we were asked to treat it with just as much respect as something like American Sniper. The aliens were going to be put in (FX-wise) after the fact, and what I really admired about what Jabbar and Blake were doing was that they didn’t want to embellish the explosions or the gunfire, and Jabbar told us, if I remember correctly, that we now hold the record for the most ammunition used in a movie shot in South Africa, and the next film behind us is Starship Troopers, which shot for an additional 2 months longer than we did. It’s funny… when I was a little kid, I was running around my yard chasing aliens, and here I am at age 32, still running around chasing aliens, but now with better props and better toy guns.
DC – I was looking at your IMDb page the other night, and with all of the work that you’ve done between film and TV formats, do you find that there is a different mode of preparation involved when getting ready to film between one and another?
JR – Yes and no – I think with TV, it happens so quickly and like an independent film, you’re getting 2 to 3 takes at most. You’re doing a few episodes of a show that’s been on for a while and runs like a well-oiled machine. I’ll grab my neighbor, or anyone, and rehearse the scenes in my kitchen and improvise with props. When you work in TV, they usually hire you for what you’ve done in the audition room in front of producers and writers, and now you’ve brought their vision to life in that moment, and they then want you do that every day for as long as you’re on the shoot. So I just try to be as efficient as possible and give the best that I can, and I think that all of the TV work that I’ve done has helped me prepare for an independent film like Alien Outpost. There were a lot of times where there was only one take, and there was such a tight timeline with very little margin for error, or the whole thing was going to fall apart. If I could say one or the other, as far as to which format I’d prefer, I like both – to be able to spend the most time with the same character for as long as possible – that’s always my goal, whether it’s a TV show or a film that you’re shooting for 8 weeks. These things move fast, and budgets are getting smaller, and TV films are getting so good right now that it melts together in a really cool way, and it really helps me to have as much rehearsal time, either by myself or with a coach or a buddy of mine, and just being as prepared as possible the second you walk on that set.
DC – Lastly, what can we expect to see from you in the future?
JR – I’m jumping back and forth between a couple of shows right now, and one I’m not sure if it will hit the air, so I’ll only mention the other, and it’s “CSI: Cyber
with a dear friend of mine – Patricia Arquette – so they’ll be a few episodes of that, and in May I’m locked into an indie feature shot in L.A. that I developed with the co-writer of Dallas Buyer’s Club (Craig Borton). It’s an incredibly personal story, and I was fortunate enough to develop it with someone of his caliber. Indie films are “on one day, off the next” as far as shooting is concerned, but that’s really what I’m preparing for right now. I’m hoping to continue to do various TV shows and then to jump into a series in a more regular role.
DC – Joe, I can’t thank you enough for the time – best of luck with the movie, and we look forward to seeing you down the road.
JR – Thank you so much! Like I’ve said, I’m a huge fan of Dread Central so this means a lot – words can’t express.
Jabbar Raisani directs. Adrian Paul, Joe Reegan, Rick Ravanello, Reiley McClendon, and Douglas Tait star.
Synopsis:
Two documentary cameramen are embedded in an army unit in the most hostile place on earth, an outpost surrounded by the last remaining alien fighters (Heavies) of an invading attack force. The world may have forgotten about the Outposts, but the Heavies are planning the second invasion of Earth, and the soldiers are the only ones who can stop it.
Categorized:News
