Acting in the 50 Kisses Project
9 November 2012 · 2 min read
I was delighted to act in « Love », directed by Phil Peel, screenplay by Rob Burke. When I first heard of the 50 kisses, I told myself « I really got to be in it ! ». I searched through the web, but I couldn’t find any team or film-maker taking part in the competition. So, I posted a message on the project’s page inviting directors to visit my website www.lulasuassuna.com and watch my showreel.
I knew the chances of someone with an appropriate role for me, coming across my message, watching my showreel and inviting me for a casting weren’t particularly good. A couple of weeks later, though, I received an e-mail from Phil sending me the script and inviting me to play the lead in his short film. I took a look at his website and I was very impressed by his good work. Plus, no audition required ; what a great honour ! I really liked the script and specially, my character : a tourmented man intending to do something really gruesome. An essential touch of darkness and bitterness among those 50 kisses.
After receiving some feedback, the writer made some adjustments to the text and a tragic flashback scene was cut. « What a pity », I thought: a bad thing happening to the character is always a good thing happening to the actor. In terms of logistics, however, that made things a lot easier for us.
My role is silent and that made things a bit tougher. What you say is always a consequence of what you think and feel ; delivering your lines usually entails a natural understanding of your character’s needs. When the script gives you nothing to say and a lot to do, the stakes rise. You must create much stronger backstories and subtext than usual. You must keep them all permanently pulsating in your head and guts, cause nothing’s on the paper. Only then you can reinforce your character and underpin each one of his actions without the lines’ support. Not an easy task. Especially not when shooting inside the tube with lots of distracting thing all around and people constantly staring at you. I definitely had to strengthen my attention. No coffee breaks and fooling around between takes this time, but I just loved the novelty and the challenge. Oh yes : and scaring some peaceful passengers was really fun too! Thanks to Philip, our excellent cast and crew for the great day. The final result is gorgeous ! Now, let’s hope for the best !
Lula Suassuna
Written by
Chris JonesPassionate about all things film, I have spent my life watching movies, making movies and helping others make their movies too. Most recently I have been directing Splinter Unit on 'Mission: Impossible Dead Reckoning', parts 1 and 2 for Paramount. I also executive-produced 'The Enfield Poltergeist' for Apple TV+. Deeper into my past, my early major projects include action thriller 'The Runner', serial killer thriller 'White Angel' and paranormal horror 'Urban Ghost Story'. I co-created and authored The Guerilla Film Makers Handbook series, published by Bloomsbury. There are now eight books in the series. More recently I have run a series of London-based festivals, kicking off with the London Screenwriters Festival which attracts over 1,000 professional screenwriters from around the globe annually. I also set up and run TEDxEaling, an annual TEDx conference on storytelling and human communication. In 2009, I made the multi-award-winning and Oscar-shortlisted 'Gone Fishing', the whole process being heavily documented on my blog. In 2014 I completed my fourth feature film, the crowd-created 50 Kisses which entered the Guinness Book Of Records for most screenwriters on a feature film. Following this success, I founded Create50 to continue the idea of crowd-created projects. Twisted50, our first book, was published on Halloween 2016 and immediately toppled Stephen King from the top spot on Amazon. Five books have followed in the Twisted50 series and we are working on the sixth now. During the summer of 2016 I trained to become a master Firewalk instructor and now regularly take people across the hot coals for charity. Late 2017 I directed the short film 'Seeing Him' which collected a ton of awards too. Over the following years I continued to make award-winning shorts, such as Meet The Nativity and Never Too Late. In the summer of 2022 I premiered Impact 50, the second feature-length movie from Create50. This time I directed the segment at the start of the film, with Olivia Williams as the President, and written by Joe Eszterhas. In the summer of 2022, I also joined the Mission: Impossible 7 and 8 productions as Splinter Unit director. At Halloween 2023, the Apple TV+ show that I co-executive-produced, 'The Enfield Poltergeist', premiered. I run regular filmmaking workshops for filmmakers both online and in person. Some people ask how I began making films? Like most filmmakers of my generation, it was with a Super 8mm camera, summertime and school friends, usually after watching a behind-the-scenes TV programme on a Hollywood movie like Star Wars. My first film was a zombie horror called Necronomicon, heavily influenced by John Carpenter's The Fog. And I was hooked for life. Contact me at Ealing Film Studios, Ealing Green, London, W5 5EP, UK
