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Farewell, Oreo Man. 

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Reflection & Artist Statement

‘Oreo Man’ was a huge challenge for me as a filmmaker. It pushed me not only as a director, but as a producer, editor, sound mixer, foley artist, and much much more. Let’s just say I had to wear several different “hats” to complete this project.

Going into it, my theater background gave me a stroke of confidence working with the actors, but my lack of professional film experience did hold me back from directing the crew as a perfectly unified team.  

That’s not even mentioning the woes of losing cast, crew, and a location mere days before production. However, it’s not all doom and gloom for Dan Brown. Making this film was a necessary step in my path to becoming better. 

During the semester, I watched an award-winning football documentary on Netflix called Undefeated (2011) . In the film, the coach always repeated the saying, “Football doesn’t build character. Football reveals character.” The best players were the ones who maintained strong character not in only victory but in defeat as well. The same can be applied to filmmaking.  

Suffice to say, this film certainly put my character to the test. 

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Speaking of character, Cookie, the protagonist of ‘Oreo Man’, is an allegory for the experience of mixed-race people and how they are at times unsure of the ethnic community they fit into. He’s caught between two identities and not sure which of them to fully align with. 

The term, Oreo, itself also defines someone who is “black on the outside and white on the inside.” Literally speaking, it’s a label for black people who don’t fit within the generally accepted stereotypes of what blacks are “supposed to be” and instead embody characteristics that are perceived to be indicative of whites.

Without getting too much into the history of these stereotypes, it’s worth noting that I wrote Cookie to feel like he’s constantly hiding a part of himself. As someone who grew up as a black person that went to a very non-black school, I myself often hid elements of my “blackness” from my white classmates. 

However, the traits that I picked up from that environment stuck to me in a way that when I did rarely interact with other black kids, I would be perceived as the “Oreo.” I like to think of myself as a well-adjusted person, so most of the negative experiences I have in life are things that I laugh off. 

Perhaps the reason I made this film a comedy was the desire to laugh off the trauma of feeling unable to be myself no matter which group I resided with. Or perhaps the concept of a white guy turning black when he sneezes and vice-versa was just too funny of an idea to pass up. You decide.

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Post Shoot Analysis

Shooting ‘Oreo Man’ taught me the most important skill needed for directing: preparation. First let me say that I got excellent performances from my actors after meticulously breaking down the scenes with them over zoom calls in preparation for the real thing. 

However, one thing I wasn’t prepared for was managing a crew larger than five people. It was a daunting task to both assemble and lead a group that size,  and oftentimes I would not have complete control over what was happening on set. 

I also wasn’t prepared for a scheduling conflict with an actor that nearly set the production back several hours. I made the mistake of not asking for their class schedule beforehand, and thus had to wait for them to finish up at school before coming on set. To remedy this, I reordered the scenes we were doing on the fly which had to have confused the AD and DP.

Speaking of the DP, I didn’t spend enough time discussing the cinematography with them during preproduction, so I wasn’t able to effectively communicate with them on the first day of shooting. At that point I was still having trouble visualizing exactly what I wanted from each shot. Some of that was due to losing my desired location less than two weeks from the shoot, but honestly it was also the result of negligence on my part.

However, this story has a happy ending as the two of us were able to buckle down and collaboratively structure our plan for the second day, making it much more efficient than the first. The difference in my confidence on the first day versus the second day was like night and day... or black and white, if you will. 

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EXT. SIDEWALK

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INT. HOUSE

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INT. BATHROOM

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INT. NEIGHBOR’S HOUSE

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EXT. BACKYARD

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White Boy Rick (2018)

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BlacKkKlansman (2018)

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House Party (1990)

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Director’s Vision

My upcoming short film, Oreo Man, will have the look and comedic tone of a film like House Party (1990), but still carry serious underlying themes of race and prejudice similar to BlacKkKlansman (2018). My production design will embody the aesthetic of a college frat party, and I want the lighting to reflect the bright and colorful atmosphere associated with such grandiose events. 

My first two reference photos originate from the movies previously cited, but the third comes from the film White Boy Rick (2018). It chronicles the real life story of Richard Wershe Jr., a man who became an FBI informant at the age of 14 and spent 33 years in federal prison for a drug offense. In the film, Rick assimilates into the predominately black drug underworld of Detroit in the 1980s despite looking like an outsider to his peers. The duality of being an informant and drug runner coincides with the duality of my protagonist’s struggle of being a white man and a black one all at the same time.