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On the JJ Barnes blog, I share the experiences that led me and Jonathan McKinney from the same small town school, Blessed William Howard, to international film distribution with Scooter P Entertainment for our movie, Hollowhood.
Growing Up
Growing up, my human life partner of choice, Jonathan McKinney, and I went to the same small town high school, Blessed William Howard. We learned about Catholicism, and the usual high school subjects. We socialised, we took exams, and, most importantly, we dreamed. We dreamed of a life built around stories and creativity, but we never truly believed it was attainable.
In our separate homes with our separate lives, we grew up obsessed with stories and films. We watched films, we listened to film soundtracks, and we read books about filmmaking. My passion took me to the visual side, I was obsessed with photography and visual art. For Jonathan, it was the sound. He focused his energy on music and sound engineering. But the end goal was the same. To tell stories. To write books. To make movies.
Adulting
Of course, that was as idealistic teenagers. We were in the same school but we weren’t friends. We had lives to live that weren’t with one another and weren’t about the dream we pushed aside as out of reach. We both got married, not to one another, and we both had children, within months of one another. But we weren’t working towards our dream, we were just living. We were being “grown up.”.
Being grown up sucks.
Our marriages both broke down, for different reasons, and in 2014, we both found ourselves as single parents to one year olds, figuring out who we were, what we wanted from our lives, and what we needed to do to get it.
Getting Together
Say what you want about Tinder, it has a lot to answer for in our lives. We connected and began a conversation in November 2014. We had both dated, had experiences both good and bad, but we weren’t satisfied. We wanted more. We both wanted to find that strange and elusive person with the same amount of bizarre drive to achieve things that people who live in small towns in England are told they can’t achieve.
Say what you want about Tinder, but that’s how we met.
We met. We dated. We moved in together. And then we got to work.
In 2015 I got pregnant with our youngest daughter, just a few months after we got together. Some blame fate, some blame passion, I blame wine. But either way, a baby was on the way and our dreams had not been accomplished.
Siren Stories
We formed our company, Siren Stories, in the beginning of 2016. Our goal was simple; write stories, share stories, find other people who love to write stories, and share their stories too. Then it grew. From that one idea, we have published multiple books by multiple authors, released multiple singles by multiple artists, and, as of 2023, had one film released internationally.
But let me back track.
We released books from the launch of Siren Stories in 2016, and books we are insanely proud of. Books that have readers that we have moved to tears of both sadness and joy multiple times.
When Lilly Prospero And The Magic Rabbit was released, and I finally got to hold a book in my hands that had my name on the cover and my characters inside, I cried. That teenager, who was obsessed with reading and writing but felt a million miles away from the world of publishing, was having a dream realised in that moment. We love our books and will always write books. Books are powerful.
Gracemarch
In 2017, a wonderful friend of mine, Cliff Thomas, asked if I had ever thought about writing a script.
Had I ever thought about writing a script?
Yes. The answer was yes. Yes. A thousand times yes.
We came up with a concept. Sisters, witches, hidden powers. A world of danger and monsters that sisters needed to stand against. And a family secret that wasn’t going to stay secret for much longer. In 2018 we filmed the first hour of that story, Gracemarch, and hopefully we will be able to complete our story soon. While we wait, I have been novelising the script, so that will hopefully be added to my bookshelf of JJ Barnes book soon!
Wanting More
But we had a problem. Our experience on set had been so very wonderful. We had found a home, somewhere creative and passionate and excited, where everybody cared about stories like we did, and had their own jobs to do to get those stories told. It was an experience that changed us. We wanted more. And we wanted it immediately.
We did not get it immediately. We wrote scripts, we made contacts. But this industry is still incredibly competitive, and we are still in a small town with families who do proper jobs, not in Hollywood with families who have won Oscars. Scripts being produced doesn’t come easily to people like us.
So we decided if a studio wasn’t going to do it for us, we’d do it ourselves.
Doing It Ourselves
I remember the moment we made that decision so clearly. It was date night. We had a plan to go out for dinner, to wander the pubs of Stafford town centre, maybe find a jukebox and have a sing-song. Sitting on the number 9 bus, we had a conversation that would change our lives forever. Jon suggested that maybe, just maybe, we could make a film ourselves. And because I’m somewhat impulsive, and defiantly ambitious, I agreed whole heartedly that it was absolutely the best plan I had ever heard and we must immediately plan it, write it, and cast it. So we did.
Before we could write a script, we had to know who was willing to be in it; there was no point writing a script about twelve women doing something if we could only find three men to act in it. And because we had a budget of a weekly shop in Aldi, we had to find people willing to do it all for free.
With an offer of working long hours for no money to act in a movie that very few people would see, we assembled an astoundingly large cast of generous, kind, and naïve friends and relatives.
From there, we had to work out WHERE we would be able to film. Fortunately, my parents have a holiday cottage which they let out and, even more fortunately, they seem quite fond of me. One phone call and two willing parents on board later, we were able to secure ten business days of free usage of Squirrel Barn in Milwich in January. January just two months away. With no script… no kit… and no idea if our team of budding actors were even available.
The rest of our evening was spent on characters, story concept, and securing our cast for the filming dates. The following weeks involved spending any available time on brainstorming and writing our script, then plotting and planning a filming schedule.
Getting Ready To Film
For Christmas our incredibly kind parents stepped up to the plate. Jon’s mother bought him a recording box for the microphone. My father bought me a video camera. Our Christmas money was spent in the post-Christmas sales on a couple of box lights, props, and costumes.
We didn’t have much but we had what we needed.
Then disaster struck. One of our lead actors dropped out a week before filming was due to start. We had people scheduled to arrive for filming in just a few days time, and a script which had been rehearsed, and a shooting schedule arranged. We couldn’t rewrite, so we had to recast.
Vicky Burke had been rehearsing for the role of Bethany Palmer, the cynical boozer with a heart of gold. When we told her of our crisis, and because the heart of gold ran through both actor and character, she agreed to a last minute role change and took the lead role of Penny Jones. And then I, the performance anxiety riddled nervous wreck, took the role of Bethany. My dreams of staying firmly behind the camera were gone, but our film was back on track.
Making Hollowhood
Filming was a wild ride. Jon and I had watched the highly qualified, highly trained and highly paid professionals on the set of Gracemarch doing the jobs we had now commandeered for ourselves. We made mistakes, we learned as we went, and we worked really long hours.
Most of our actors drove in from our little town of Stafford, friends and relations kind enough to show up for us. Others came from far and wide. Jennie from Yorkshire. Josephine from Lancashire. Laura from Manchester. And Josette from Nashville, Tennesse. This band of people, some of whom had never met, became firmly bonded friends. Our film family. People who shared an experience that was hard, and stressful, and wonderful. We laughed, we cried, we screamed. I discovered swear words I never knew existed as time and time again I lost my m*th%rf@ck*in£ script.
When the two weeks were over, we had just a few more scenes to do to finish the entire film, but scenes that were to be shot outdoors so we arranged to meet up in a few weeks to finally call cut for the last time.
Lockdown
That all went wrong when the Covid-19 pandemic swept the world, lockdown shut down production, and all future filming was cancelled until further notice.
While we home schooled our assorted children, and navigated the new and confusing world we were trapped in, we put our film together. I edited it, learning the technicalities of software I’d previously only used for simple writing advice YouTube videos. Jon scored the film, using new equipment he’d invested in for that very purpose.
Our children were fascinated by the process and offered up firm opinions, in between squabbling over what to watch, suddenly bursting into loud and unexpecting songs right behind us, and needing to eat more snacks than felt reasonable.
Finishing The Film
When lockdown finally ended, we headed to our locations to shoot. This was in the middle of the hottest summer we’d had in a while. Filming scenes set in October. Convincing our actors to put their Halloween costumes back on, with their big Winter coats over the top, while we filmed them in shorts and t-shirts, wasn’t the easiest sell but, once again, they showed up for us.
We finished the film. We shouted cut for the last time. We were complete.
We contacted musicians we knew from Twitter to ask if they’d be willing to contribute music to our soundtrack and some incredible artists volunteered. For the rest, Jon and I used our Siren Stories teamwork style to write and produce songs, and our amazing band of actors showed up to record them. Even I managed to sing on one of the tracks!
And soon, after more work than I can possibly explain, we had a complete feature film. Our film. Hollowhood.
YouTube
We premiered on YouTube and watched in awe as the viewing count went up and up. We had an audience. It was a dream come true.
We had a viewing party at a pub in town, and the Mayor and Mayoress of Stafford showed up to lend their support. We ate, we drank, we remembered the experiences and we vowed to do it all again.
And then our film was out there. It had a life of its own. It was only on YouTube, but it was there and it was watched and it was enjoyed. Some people didn’t get it, it’s goofy, it’s low budget, it’s a primarily female cast with a lesbian love story as the emotional heart but no sex scenes (that pissed off more than one person). And we thought that was as far as it would go.
Scooter P Entertainment
And then Francis Perdue of Scooter P Entertainment contacted me. She believed she could find a home for Hollowhood. Between feelings of amazement, excitement and disbelief, we accepted her offer and, just like that, we had a distributor.
It didn’t feel real. Our little film.
We had work to do, things that were needed to make it up to scratch for international distribution. Tailor made subtitles, graphics to specific dimensions, a music cue sheet. Things we knew very little about but were ready to figure out.
The team at Scooter P were full of positivity and kindness but I don’t think we ever truly believed they could sell Hollowhood. It felt like a dream so much bigger than our world could accommodate.
And then we got the email. They had found not one, but THREE platforms who wanted to share our film. Since then, it has been a whirlwind. Hollwhood has gone to Plex first, it has been also accepted by Tubi and Mometu and will be going there next. Then who knows where else?
Sharing Our Story
We spoke to the BBC about it. They booked us for the Radio Stoke breakfast show and we got to chat about our film on air.
And now we’re looking for more places we can tell our story. Share with the world what we accomplished. How we went from two dreaming teenagers in the same high school, to having our little movie made with no money, no time and no experience distributed internationally.
Perhaps most importantly, we also want to inspire other dreamers. We want to tell them not to let their fear that what they do won’t be good enough from stopping them from doing it anyway. It won’t be a big budget Oscar winning sensation, but it’ll be a film. And it’ll be your film. And if you make it with enough passion for both the craft and the story, and with the kind of good people who will show up and help you to realise your dream, then your film will find its audience. It might be a small audience on YouTube, it might be a larger audience on streaming platforms. But it will be your audience, for your film, and truly, what could be a more magical experience than that?
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