Stealing Roses – A Talk with Megan Clare Johnson

A little while ago, I caught a repeat of The Sopranos, and I was reminded of just how great the Season One character of Vin Makazian was.  As played by John Heard, he was this really funny and tragic character. Heard was also a favorite in his role as the Governor on Prison Break, and I got to thinking about how much I’d like to see him in another series.  And shortly thereafter, I received some promotional material about an upcoming movie starring John Heard, Stealing Roses.

Written and directed by Megan Clare-Johnson, Stealing Roses is the story of Walter (Heard), who learns that his wife’s cancer treatments aren’t covered by their insurance.  With no place to go, he turns to crime to get the money he needs to save Rose (Cindy Williams of Laverne and Shirley).  Complicating things is the fact that his son (Mark Famigletti of FlashFoward) is a cop who’s not on board with the plan.  Now, not only does that sound like a great story, but I think it’s something that we can all relate to.  I’ve lived a relatively trauma-free life, but even with health insurance, I spent four years paying off a broken leg.  I try not to even think about a serious illness in my family.

Between the intriguing premise and the spunkybean-friendly cast (including Josie Davis of Charles in Charge and Bruce Davison from LOST), I wanted to find out more about Stealing Roses.  Luckily, Megan Clare-Johnson was available to talk to us about the movie and a really interesting social media campaign.

Megan, thanks for taking the time to talk to us.  Now, did you write Stealing Roses with the idea that you would actually be directing it?

I wrote Stealing Roses a few years ago and initially was pitching it to sell after it did well in the Austin Film Festival Screenwriting Contest (it was a finalist and semi-finalist in a few of their contest divisions). After a few years though I decided Stealing Roses was a story that had to be told now, especially during the current economic and health care crisis. There comes a time when you just have to do it – just get it done and release it out to the world and stop asking permission so much (but that is more targeted advice for filmmakers in general). I raised the budget through private investors and met Alexia Melocchi a producer who owns Little Studio Films in LA – she helped me assemble the cast and crew. Actually, once I decided to direct it – everything came together very quickly and smoothly.

If I’m not mistaken, this is your first feature both as a writer and director.  Was that intimidating?

No, it wasn’t intimidating because I felt I knew the story so well having lived with the characters from Stealing Roses for over five years I knew I could direct it and bring my vision to the screen. Also because of my background as an editor in post production (ten years editing commercials in Chicago and Detroit), experience as a screenwriter and producer, and having shot a few videos and commercials I felt pretty well-rounded in all aspects of the filmmaking process. Although obviously I learned a great deal on the set and owe a lot of gratitude to our actors and crew who agreed to participate in the film knowing that I was a first-time director – I guess they had to take a leap of faith also but it really never came up as a topic other then mentioning it was my first feature. We had a great cast and crew so that made my job all the easier. To be surrounded by such experienced actors was a great blessing.

According to the Stealing Roses Facebook page, shooting took only 15 days, which seems just insanely fast.  How did you manage that?

Yes, it was challenging to make a feature in 15 days but actually we usually ended up wrapping for the day early on most days. Our line producer and co-Producer, John Milton Branton, did an excellent job scheduling the shoot and coordinating our locations with our Unit Production Manager, Dave Marion.  My Director of Photography, Armand Gazarian and I would review my floor plans before we shot every scene so we had a good plan each day that let us be efficient with the time we took for lighting and blocking. We were shooting 6-8 scenes a day so I actually give a huge amount of credit also to the actors for being able to shoot their scenes and nail the emotional and comedic elements every time we changed scenes – that is where hiring experienced actors was so essential and helped immensly. We had a fast crew that worked very cohesively – I owe a lot of thanks to the film department heads also – they worked their tails off.

These days, there’s a certain amount of controversy inherent in anything that’s even tangentially related to the topic of health care.  To what extent did you have that in mind when writing the script?  And what inspired you to head into this territory – is there a personal connection or were you motivated by the way it’s been dominating the discussion?

Overall, Stealing Roses is a love story and the catalyst for the conflict is that the main characters, a couple in their early sixties, don’t have health care insurance causing the lead character, Walter, to rob a bank with his eccentric friends, when his wife Rose gets cancer and they need money for her treatments – and Walter’s son, a cop, tries to stop him.  I, personally, am appalled that we have 46 million Americans without health care coverage and began thinking what choices would a person make at the age of my lead character, 61 years old, to save their life partner. Walter tries to do all the right things but feels desperate. I wrote the script 6 years ago so I don’t know if I had controversy in mind, and couldn’t predict that we would have the political/social climate we have right now, but the topic is close to my heart and that’s what writers do – write things that they connect with and want to delve into and explore.

Also, I should note that I have a background also in health care consulting which I do on the side – for six years I worked for Kaiser Permanente (the largest HMO in our nation) on staff and currently I freelance as a health care consultant – helping large health care systems be more efficient or take on health care reform – so I know how the inside of health care systems work but that wasn’t needed so much to write the script but it gives me a perspective. I tend to write family films and comedies so the humor that is in the film (and there is a lot which John Heard, Cindy Williams and our cast perform brilliantly) is a part of our character’s personalities and the way they get through life, marriage and crisis – although the serious moments in the film are captured nicely.

So part of the connection I had in writing this script was a personal belief that we need to do a better job taking care of each other in America regarding health care access and wanting to tell a love story about a couple who’s age you don’t see represented often in films these days – that being a couple in their 60′s. The film is largely about choices – all the characters, Walter the husband, Rose, his wife, Johnny, their son a cop, all are making choices and dealing with love and fear in their own way. Family dynamics are fascinating to me and I enjoyed writing and bringing these odd, offbeat, and lovely characters to life.

Along those lines, what do you want people to take away from the movie – do you want them to focus on the story of these people or are you hoping to make viewers think about the bigger issues here?

Foremost, I want people to enjoy the movie – laugh, connect to it, empathize, find themselves or people they know in this film’s characters. We all have our own health care stories – of our friends and families that suffered from cancer and many friends and families that are enduring financially hard times.  If the audience comes away with connecting with the love story between Walter and Rose, or the father/son dynamic of the story or thoughts on why Walter robs a bank – right, wrong or why he would even have to – and this actual catalyst is very much a reality of our times right now (I mean we have all read stories in the paper about people robbing banks just to go back to jail to receive healthcare) then I will feel satisfied. If this causes many people to talk and have a dialogue about bigger issues we have in our country about healthcare then by all means I hope my film can help cause and start more discussion on the topic. But mostly I want to entertain, make people feel, laugh and have a moment with these characters. I enjoy being with these characters and I hope others do also.

What can you tell us about the tone of the movie?  I see on IMDB that it’s listed as “comedy”, “drama”, and “romance”, which covers a pretty wide swath.  I can certainly imagine how it fits into any of these categories, but I’m curious as to what direction you’re taking.  (The poster, by the way, is very funny.  Whoever created that image did an excellent job.)

Stealing Roses is a comedy-drama, feature length film. The love that Walter and Rose have for each other captures the “romance” part of the story – their love is deep, trusting but also they rib and drive each other crazy just like any couple would who are married over 35 years – that’s where the comedy comes in – also with Walter’s eccentric friends. The serious dramatic points of the film when Rose is given her cancer diagnosis, her first chemo treatment and the choices she makes at the end of the film bring us home to the reality of her serious illness. John Heard, who plays Walter, asked many of his acting friends to join the film to play Walter’s buddies in the film – because of their real-life rapport you get to see that rapport in the film – the bank robbing scene was fun to shoot so you can see how comedy, drama and romance are all good descriptions of the film.

Can you tell us anything about the WeStealRoses campaign?  Where can our readers go if they’re interested in participating?

Yes, our WeStealRoses campaign is a way we can have a dialogue with our audience and fans.  We are inviting anyone that has a health care story of a friend/family member dealing with cancer or really any serious illness that they want to share – they can share any aspect of it on our movie website – such things as; how they dealt with the serious illness, lessons learned, stories of support or stories of difficulties if they also had financial issues when trying to pay for their medical treatments. Really it’s a way to share and connect on any of these interrelated topics. There’s so much that happens when a loved one gets diagnosed with a serious illness – feelings of love, fear, guilt, long-seeded family issues, secrets get revealed, true feelings emerge, panic over insurance coverage if that’s an issue, etc. Support from your family, friends, and community can come into play sometimes beautifully and sometimes not so well. But we all can acknowledge that we have been affected by health issues in some way personally with our own health or friends’ and families’ health. We’re giving an opportunity for people to connect on this topic – especially if people think we could be handling this all better – that’s not just interpreted in a political way – just a “better way” of taking care of those in need of help. As a writer of stories, I love hearing other people’s stories which can inspire us, educate us, or make us want a better outcome if it is a tragic ending – but sharing as we all know is cathartic.

Is there anything that you want people to know about Stealing Roses that we haven’t covered? 

Thanks for doing this article, EJ, and covering our movie. I invite people to become fans of our Facebook site and keep tabs on us as we release the movie. I’ll keep in touch in the future as we find out what film festivals and distribution channels our audiences will be able to see our movie.

Thank you very much!  Keep us posted on the movie, and we hope to talk to you again soon.

We’ll bring you more coverage as the movie gets closer to release.  Right now, you can check out Stealing Roses on their Facebook page or their Twitter feed.  Everything I’ve seen so far is really impressive, and I’m looking forward to the movie.  And not just because it has actors from both LOST and Jon Benjamin Has a Van – I think Stealing Roses is a story that is more pressing than ever right now, and it looks to be an entertaining way of telling that story.

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