How The Far Side Gallery Inspired ‘Your Lucky Day’ Director Daniel Brown

  |  
Nov 17, 2023
Your Lucky Day Interview

The lottery has become a depressing pillar of the American Dream, a gleaming beacon of getting rich quit that most of us will never achieve. And yet, that doesn’t prevent many people for not giving up hope. So what would you do if you happened to discover a winning lottery ticket? Writer and director Daniel Brown examines just that in his new holiday action thriller Your Lucky Day, featuring Angus Cloud in one of his final performances before his passing earlier this year.

In Your Lucky Day:

After a dispute over a winning lottery ticket turns into a deadly hostage situation, the witnesses must decide exactly how far they’ll go—and how much blood they’re willing to spill—for a cut of the $156 million.

We spoke with Brown and star Jessica Garza after the film’s premiere at Fantastic Fest about working with Angus Cloud, capitalism in America, and more.

Dread Central: Your Lucky Day was a short film first in 2010. So what was it like, the journey from taking this from your 2010 short to now a feature film at Fantastic Fest? Your first feature film, right?

Daniel Brown: Yeah! It’s a long journey. It takes an unexpected turn. I wrote a short and I had no feature aspirations for the short. I wanted to make a feature film, but I just felt like [this idea] would make a good short film and play with a Shakespearean kind of set-up and be really true to the short was very, let’s be a tragedy. And tragedy is defined. Everybody dies. So I assume that was the right way to make a tragedy, at least in the Shakespearean sense. So that’s how we did the short. And I think I probably would’ve been smarter if I was thinking of the feature.

So the short did really well. I took a bunch of meetings and I had no real desire at that moment to make a feature film out. It just wasn’t what I was into. And I felt pretty definitive about what had happened and I didn’t want to just stretch it out or just make a movie to make a movie. So then time goes by and some of the stuff that I felt like was really relevant to the story in 2010, I felt like, “Oh, maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s getting better.” I was wrong. 

I was way off on that. As I realized how wrong I was. A lot of the ideas that I really cared about for it were more relevant. And it also felt like some of the stuff that I wanted to make sure if I was to make a feature, I wouldn’t get any pushback against. The characters are the characters. I didn’t want any other version of the characters. I didn’t want anybody to be like, oh, well this should be this. And I was like, well, that’s not right for me, that’s not for the story. 

So it felt like that was kind of changing and it still was relevant. And then I had an idea that the person who won the lottery, in the short is a sweet old man. I was like, “What if that’s a piece of shit, an asshole who has tons of money and has no need for this?” That kind of unlocked the whole story for Your Lucky Day and I had a reason for the rest. 

DC: That’s amazing. That is so cool. And how did you get involved with Your Lucky Day, Jessica? 

Jessica Garza: Very classic story. I received a self-tape request. It was a whirlwind, quick casting process. Quick get to LA. Quick shoot.

DC: What were your first feelings when you read the script though, especially with your character? 

JG: I loved it. It’s all there on the page. It’s easy. And through Dan’s past work that I had seen before, it’s all there as well. So I loved the script, I loved the character. It was very different than anything I had done in the past. It was, she’s a leader. She’s all the complex things that make us all who we are. She is all of them. It was so exhilarating and I’m so honored that he trusted me to do this. So all of these things are why I was so excited to join. And then another big part of my excitement about joining was I had known Angus Cloud was attached, and I loved his work on Euphoria. 

He’s one of my favorite parts of that show. When I watched it, I knew he was just a kid that they had picked up at a mall and I was so amazed by his presence and his overall ability to just do nothing and say so much. So it was very easy to sign on and to be excited about Your Lucky Day when I knew these two were going to be there. 

DC: It’s absolutely heartbreaking about Angus. I know you’ve probably been asked a lot about this today, but what was it like getting to work with him as an actor and getting to collaborate with him? Especially after watching him on Euphoria? 

JG: It was very exciting. So many of my friends were so excited for me and wanted to know all about it. It was great. We have different processes that mesh really well together. I feel like I’m more on the anxious side of the personality spectrum. I’m all the way over here. Then there’s a very calming presence he brings even in the midst of chaos. And he was incredible. It was a really quick stressful shoot and he was a godsend.

But he operates in a way that was like, he was always so spontaneous and unexpected and kept you on your toes and it was a challenge. You know what I mean? For me, I want to be rigid. And he forced me to get out of that box and always be really grateful for the time that I got to work with him. It was something I cherish for the rest of my life.

DB: Absolutely. I don’t act, but in books and such, they always say acting is not listening. And a few actors always say that and I feel like he was the best listener. There’s this thing where he’s there listening. He’s not an actor waiting for a line, he was there hearing what you had to say. And I think that was part of the different process. He would hear it, take it in, then respond. 

Even though we already had a script and everything else, it was more like, “Hey, we’re having a conversation, so you just told me something and I’m going to think about it.” It just sort of changed the dynamic. We all knew the script. There was a lot of pressure to finish quickly. And I think he just had that chill like, “Well, I’m going to listen to you, I’m going to treat this at the moment.”

JG: Totally. I think of that one scene where me and him have maybe are one and only moment. And it was so easy to look into his eyes and pull from just the way that he was able to look at you. It was really special. 

DC: That’s amazing. Well, you said it was a really quick shoot. How quick was it? 

DB: 15 days. 89 or 99 pages. Something like that.

DC: That’s incredible what you were able to achieve. But I also want to hear why Christmas. I love a good Christmas movie. Especially a holiday action movie. 

DB: I know what you mean. I love those kinds of movies as well, but I don’t think that was the number one reason. I think this, I don’t want this to sound too pretentious…

DC: Hell yeah. I love when an answer starts that way. 

DB: I feel like for the movie I was telling there isn’t a better way to talk about capitalism in America than Christmas because it’s supposed to be this thing. It’s about Jesus. And then we’re just supposed to buy crap ad nauseam. But I just felt like, oh, this is a great way to talk about capitalism.

DB: I did. 

DB: It’s ridiculous. I’m a big Far Side fan as well. My favorite types of ideas are more things that make me think. I remember, no one needs to hear about this, but I wanted to write a movie about the kid in Fargo. 

DC: Oh my God. 

DB: Because I was like, imagine if that was you and your dad killed your mom and killed your grandfather. What’s that kid’s story? That would be a great movie.

Anyway, so that Far Side joke, I don’t know if you’ve seen it. It’s got two coroners, a dead body, and the guy’s got a winning lottery ticket and the other guy says, “Lucky Stiff.” And I was like, “Oh, that’s like a fun idea.” And then I just invented the whole story and there’s no coroner in there. But I think it was just that idea of how do you have a dead body that has a lottery ticket? And then, I dunno, the rest was like, I lived around the corner from the convenience store. It must’ve just all been like that kismet of like, “Oh, there could be something there.”

DC: Cool. My last question for you is, have either of you ever won a lot of money from a lottery ticket or scratch-off? 

DB: I wish. 

Your Lucky Day is out now on VOD.

Share: 

Categorized:
Sign up for The Harbinger a Dread Central Newsletter