‘Brooklyn 45’ Director Ted Geoghegan On His Unique New Horror Film
Mary Beth McAndrews
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In his new Brooklyn 45, director Ted Geoghegan transports viewers to post-war Brooklyn where a group of old friends, all of whom served in the war, gathers for what they learn in an impromptu seance. Both a heart-breaking chamber piece and chilling ghost story, Geoghegan’s latest cinematic outing weaves a tale about the horrors of war and what we’ll do to survive.
Read the full synopsis below:
Friday, December 27, 1945. Five military veterans gather in the ornate parlor of a Brooklyn brownstone. Best friends since childhood, they’ve reunited to support their troubled host. But when his invitation for cocktails turns into an impromptu séance, the metaphoric ghosts of their past become all too literal. Trapped in their host’s lounge, the Greatest Generation now finds themselves put to one final test, with their only route to freedom being more bloodshed.
Dread Central spoke with Geoghegan about this amazing tribute to his late father and his inclusion of a messy queer character.
Dread Central: Brooklyn 45 came from a personal place for you, right? It’s inspired a lot by your dad.
Ted Geoghegan: It’s not so much inspired by my dad, but it was helped into existence by my father. When the decision was made to set the film at the end of World War II in early post-war America, I reached out to my father, who served in the military. He was a staff sergeant in the Air Force. He was involved in an accident in the early 70s and became a quadriplegic. After he was honorably discharged from the military, he went back to school and got his degree in US History with an emphasis on the 20th century. And I thought, “Well, God, who better to have involved with this film than a veteran who knows everything about 20th-century America.”
I reached out to my dad and my dad said, “You know, I’m not creative. This isn’t what I do.” And I said, “I know, I know. Just tell me what I’m doing wrong.” And I sent him the first 30 pages of Brooklyn 45, up until the big surprise at the end of the first act. Let’s just leave it at that. <laugh> I asked, “What’s wrong?” And my dad said, “Well, you call this guy a general, he should be a major, and this guy should be a sergeant.” He went through it and basically just clarified all the things I had gotten wrong.
Weirdly, when he did that, all the characters came to life, and I know that’s such a douchey thing. Suddenly I was like, “Wow, all these people have backgrounds. They have histories, this is so neat.” The second and third acts of the script poured out of me. I knew exactly what they were supposed to be.
Once I was done, I sent it back to my dad and he said, “Oh, wow, okay. I didn’t know this was gonna happen, so now you have to change this. And okay, this is wrong. So it has to be this.” He never gave any creative information. It was always factual, and it was always so nice to be able to bounce the script off him. We sent the script back and forth six or seven times until January 2019.
When I sent it to him, he called me up and said, “Wow, it’s done. The script is done.” And I was like, ”Yeah, it’s amazing.” I asked him, “Do you want a co-writer a credit on it?” And he laughed and he was like, “God, no. I didn’t really write anything.” So I said, “OK, well, I’m gonna give you special thanks.” And he said, “That’s fine. I can’t wait to watch the movie.” I said, “I can’t wait for you to see it either.” We hung up the phone and he died. It was the last time I ever spoke to my dad.
Suddenly, this movie was the most special and important thing to me ever because I knew I had one chance to make a movie with my dad, and this was it. I love my dad, and he was the most incredible human. We spent a very long time trying to find the right people to make it with. Eventually, Divide and Conquer and Shudder and Raven Banner and the Line Film company, all these companies came together to support this rather unconventional horror film, a movie that’s not like most of the stuff that’s getting made right now. They knew how important it was to me, and they felt like it was a story worth telling. Now my dad is no longer in the special thanks of the movie. Instead, the film is dedicated to him.
DC: That’s amazing. It really is such a beautiful tribute to him and you created something that you said is so different and special from what we see in the genre. You make us fall in love with these characters who are all very damaged in their own ways but also love each other. So I wanted to hear more about what it was like writing these characters and these friendships.
TG: When I was writing the characters, I knew that they all served a very specific purpose in the story. But I didn’t know what that purpose was in the first draft. Everyone existed for a reason, and I knew they all had a reason. I knew there was a reason why Marla was an interrogator, and I knew that there was a reason why Bob had never picked up a gun. But I didn’t know what those reasons were until future drafts where suddenly all of these strange little intricacies came out. Sometimes it would be a line that a character said that suddenly changed another character’s whole existence. One of the characters would reference a battle they were in, and all of a sudden I was like, “Oh my God, so-and-so was also in that battle. And that’s why they are the wreck they are today.”
It took six or seven drafts to really dial in all the characters who they were and why they were in this room, aside from just being friends. I knew that I wanted these characters to be very broken, but I didn’t the film to hate any of them. It’s okay if the audience hates them. It’s okay if the characters hate each other. But the film couldn’t hate these characters. No one in this could be the clear good guy and the clear bad guy. Just like war, humanity exists in shades of gray, and every single character in this film believes in what they are doing. They believe that what they’re doing is right, which is a terrifying concept both then and now.
I wanted a film that people like me, very liberal, anti-war peaceniks, and people like the folks I grew up with in rural Montana who are conservative and pro-military, would be able to watch the film and get something out of it. I do believe that most people, regardless of their political affiliation can agree that war is Hell. Whether you’re pro-war or anti-war, you can still say it. It absolutely breaks people. That was something that I imbued throughout the entire film, both in these characters’ friendships and in what they’ve endured professionally together.
DC: You have a queer character in Brooklyn 45, Jeremy Holmes’ character, Archibald Stanton. And I like how you incorporate his queerness. It’s not at the forefront, but there’s still him arguing about his identity and reinforcing his identity with this group of people. I wanted to hear more about why you incorporated a queer character in this story, especially since these conversations and arguments sadly feel also very prescient.
TG: Yeah, absolutely. As a queer person who does not make it his identity, I think it’s very important that we see more LGBTQ+ representation in film in two very specific ways. I think we need more characters who are not defined by their queerness. I’m bi, I’m married to a woman, I have an adorable little human that I call my own, and I’m proud of my identity. I’m not ashamed of it in the slightest, but it also is not what defines me. And I feel that way about Archie in this film. Archie is a soldier. He’s an American. These are the beliefs that he holds up front.
It just so happens to be that he is a gay man in the 1940s. And over the course of this film, it’s revealed that his friends have known that he was gay for theoretically almost all of their lives. These are people who served together during World War I and World War II. They’ve known each other for a very long time. Archie’s never had to come out to them.
During one specific scene in the film, which I won’t give away, Archie has to come out to Marla about something. It destroys him because suddenly this woman that he has loved his whole life and who has loved him is now seeing him in a different light. It’s a very painful moment. And it’s a moment that that very much echoes when someone comes out and someone says you’re not the person I thought you were. And it’s like, I am absolutely the person you thought I was. You just now know more about me.
The other thing that’s very important for me about queer representation is that we can’t be golden gods. We see that very much with the character of Archie. He is a deeply, deeply problematic character. He is a character who has a lot of baggage, but none of those problems, and none of that baggage come from him being a gay man. I think of that HBO series Peacemaker with John Cena. I loved that show for a number of reasons, not the least of which was that it’s wildly entertaining. <laugh> But the fact that the lead character in it, Peacemaker, is a bisexual man who is not defined by it. It’s only brought up a few times, but he’s also a train wreck.
I am the first to say I want more bisexual representation in cinema. That means someone who is imperfect and has a lot of problems and has fucked up so many times over the course of his life. I want that because that’s truer to me. That will make me hold that person closer to my heart, knowing what a fuck up they are. And I love that. We’re in a time where representation, so much of it is very clean-cut.
That’s not representation. Representation is seeing people, warts and all. I want to see more of that. Archie is in many ways a representation of that. I think people will come away from that movie thinking Archie’s a monster. I think some people will think Archie’s a good guy who had a lot of issues. And I think some people will think “Archie’s me if I was in his shoes and I was terrified, I may have made the same horrible life-changing forever haunting decision that he made.”
That’s the point of him and of everyone in the film. Right down to Bob, who is the audience catalyst. He’s the character who’s watching all of these characters just like we are. And throughout the film saying, “God, I can’t believe what you guys did.”
DC: Not only are these characters amazing, but the cast you have is incredible. I know that you’ve worked with Larry Fessenden before, but how did you put together this cast? They really just have such great chemistry with one another.
TG: I am fortunate enough to call Larry Fessenden a friend. One of my dearest pals. I wrote the role of Clive with Larry in mind. I think Larry is such an underused actor. For a man who’s in six to 10 films a year, I still think he’s wildly underused because he’s typically not given a lot to chew on. I wanted to showcase that in We Are Still Here, and he delivered in spades. So it was such a joy to be able to bring him back for Brooklyn 45 and again show people that he can command an entire film.
Ezra Buzzington, who plays Paul, was the villain in my 2017 film Mohawk. He’s the main baddy in that, playing a weirdly similar role of a military man filled with a whole lot of hate and believing that what he is doing is right.
Anne Ramsey, I had grown up watching her in A League of Their Own. So I’d always really liked her, and then I saw her do a turn in horror in The Taking of Deborah Logan.
DC: Oh God, she’s so good in that movie. <laugh>
TG: She has got some real genre chops, and so what a joy to be able to work with her. Then, Jeremy Holm, I had seen in Jenn Wexler’s The Ranger. I was really excited about the idea of being able to work with him and play against type for him. You know, Jeremy is just this big commanding guy, in real life and in this film. We gave him the Clark Gable sort of look then played against type and made him this very troubled gay man.
Then Ron E. Rains is a local Chicago actor who played Bob. I’ve actually been a fan of Ron’s forever. He plays the Onion’s film critic, Peter Rosenthal. I saw [his] audition and said, “It’s phenomenal, he’s in.”
And last but very not least is Kristina Klebe who plays Hildy. [She’s] just a powerhouse of an actress. I’ve been friends with Kristina for pushing 20 years now, and we’ve always wanted to work together. And Kristina is a German American whose parents fled Nazi Germany. You couldn’t ask for a more appropriate and skilled actor to play that role. So she brought a lot to that performance. I really hope people come away from this having a newfound appreciation for Kristina. She’s just amazing.
I think the secret ingredient in this film is an unexpected sixth cast member who is not featured very prominently in the art or the trailers because it’s a surprise. We don’t want to give away that surprise, nor do I want to give away just how phenomenal she is in this movie.
Brooklyn 45 comes to Shudder on June 9, 2023.
Categorized:Interviews
