[Editorial] Celluloid Screams: Interview with Max Booth III writer of We Need to Do Something

I was lucky enough to catch up with screenwriter Max Booth III of We Need to Do Something at this years Celluloid Screams: Sheffield Horror Festival. You can find my review of the film here.

Hannah (Interviewer): When I was watching the film, I was struck with the idea of when you are growing up and you realise that your parents are just normal people, they are no longer heroes, they are fallible. Was that something that inspired you?

Max Booth III (Screenwriter): Yes, I think there is a moment with every kid when they realise “Oh my family are just humans”,  they also fuck up. With my moment, when I was twelve, we lost the family house due to the - this is going to get gloomy! 

H: Straight away I have gone for the very deep question!

M: My mum was a gambling addict and we lost the house. We moved into the hotel that was by the casino as we would get comped rooms. So we lived in that hotel until the comps ran out and then moved to a shitty hotel close by and I didn’t go to school and I didn’t see anyone. I was just in a hotel room with my mum and my dad would go to work and that was kind of the moment, these folks aren’t so perfect.

H: We have your history of being stuck in a hotel room and our characters in We Need to Do Something being stuck in the family bathroom…

M: Yes that’s funny because I have written lots of books that take place in one setting and I am obsessed with it. But only recently I kind of looked back and think “Oh shit, that’s why I always write about that huh?”. Most of my stuff deals with dysfunctional families which I couldn’t imagine why! The parents in the book, in the screenplay are not exactly like my own parents, it was more my mum who was more the villain. But I have grown up knowing dysfunctional families - I mean its just what I know so it seems to feature in my fiction quite a bit.

H: How did the idea around adding this story into the supernatural and witchcraft come about?

M: I wrote this originally as a screenplay before I wrote it as a book because a friend of mine named Shane McKenzie, he wrote Bingo Hell (2021) which just came out, him and I we get together – he used to write books but now he does screenplays and he got with me and said “Max, there is no money in books – write a screenplay” and I said “I don’t know how to do that Shane!” and he encouraged “Easy just do it and I will help you find someone”. I already had the idea to write something set in the bathroom then when he suggested this movie thing I thought that would have a low budget as its set in one setting. I wrote it and sent to Shane -  he sent it to a few indie companies that he knew - no one responded. I got really impatient. I said to Shane “I am no screenplay writer, I am going to rewrite this as a novella.” And he said “Alright, I am not your mum – you can do what you want!”. 

I wrote it as a novella and re-looking at the script and wondering what I could do differently now I wasn’t concerned about a budget. In the original screenplay we have that monologue towards the end when Melissa (the daughter) is like ‘I was fucking around on Reddit and I did some witchcraft’. I don’t know what attracts me to witch craft in movies but I do like it a lot. And I love it when people do dumb things online because it feels realistic to me. I kept thinking what kind of witchcraft could she have done because in the original script it was super vague as I didn’t know much about witch craft. With the novella I did a lot of research into different spells and different old occultist books from the 1600s. I found some spells which tied into what was going on in the book.

H: Witchcraft is mainly practiced by women - in the novella and screenplay, did you always have Melissa being the driving force for the plot?

M: In the original screenplay it was way more vague of who was responsible, as I didn’t have a main character in mind. It didn’t occur to me until I started writing the book and thought ‘whose point of view am I writing from’ and then it came pretty quickly that Melissa was obviously the main driving force of the story. I re-approached from that point of view and it helped flesh out the story further.

H: Does Melissa look like what you imagined her looking? As she has that ‘e-girl’ vibe with the pink hair and heavy blush.

M: I didn’t have any of that in mind. I usually don’t imagine what the characters look like, just a teenager. But I do like how she looks in the movie. One day Sean (King O’Grady, Director) sent me photos of the cast. 

H: I loved the dialogue, really sniping and quick witted. Managing to find that balancing the serious darkness with comedy. Is that something that comes natural to you? 

M: It just came to me, its how I usually write. I thought a lot about how comedy and the horror genre can balance each other. I think it has a rhythm to it, meaning if you have something serious going on – it can be a good time to throw in a laugh as no one is expecting a laugh during a tense moment. Vice versa, if everyones laughing and then something fucked up happens, they don’t know how to respond. Both genres are the only 2 which have an audible effect in the audience, either a scream or a laugh. Like with a drama you don’t really make a noise. Even if you are watching the audience – you can’t tell if a drama is really effecting them. But with a comedy you know its working with laughing or if it’s a horror then hopefully you get a jump. 

WE TALK ABOUT SPOILERS GOING FORWARD SO THIS IS YOUR WARNING!

H: Bobby, sweet innocent bobby. Why did you choose him?

M: Because he is the innocent one. At the time it seemed right. Bobby is heavily based off my stepson who was the same age and my step son is really interested by Tornados also. He was sitting by me as I was writing the original screenplay and he was really fascinated by it all. A piece of dialogue which is kept from the original screenplay is where Bobby is explaining what EF5 tornado is is my step son’s own words. He stopped watching me write it once Bobby died though, he was like “That’s rude!”. 

H: Seeing as you wrote one, what is your favourite end of the world film? 

M: I’ll say Day of the Dead (1985) – also a one setting movie that takes place underground. 

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