We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Christopher Alan Maloney. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Christopher Alan below.

Hi Christopher Alan, thanks for joining us today. Can you open up about a risk you’ve taken – what it was like taking that risk, why you took the risk and how it turned out?

Five years ago, I sat motionless in a second-hand rocking chair beside my bed. I looked down at my feet, firmly planted in a new reality. I had just, for the first time, accepted something about my life that I never thought I would have to accept:

I don’t get to do what I wanted to do. I don’t get to be who I wanted to be.

What I wanted to do was write and direct movies. Who I wanted to be was a filmmaker, someone whose name might someday be uttered in the same breath as my cinematic heroes. But after years of false starts and failed projects and creative endeavors that ultimately fell on deaf ears, I had to accept that the life I wanted for myself was not going to happen. It was the first year of a global pandemic and established film directors were having their movies delayed indefinitely or even canceled – how could I, a nobody, compete with that?

Before the Coronavirus intervened, I was working to bring a nonfiction film about the foster care crisis in Texas to the screen. It was going pretty well – I had the first bit of footage in the can and had secured the cooperation and support of a child advocacy group. Even the financial backing was in place (a first for me). After toiling in obscurity for over a decade with unproduced screenplays and documentaries that few saw, I felt in my gut that the chance to break through had arrived at long last. But, after a few months of dealing with COVID and the unique challenges it presented to the kids they serve, this group withdrew their support and the financing dried up. The project was done.

This was a devastating blow, and one that came after countless others. Its coinciding with the beginning of the pandemic prompted some deep reflection. I had to admit that, after years of failure and disappointment, I no longer enjoyed pursuing the art of making movies. Whatever it was that made me love it in the first place had been replaced by a drive that was fueled by anger and desperation.

So I took the biggest risk I had ever taken – I gave up.

A lot happened in the years that followed. I began working directly with at-risk kids. I got divorced. I had a mental breakdown and ended up in a psych ward. And, somewhere along the way, my love for the art of storytelling returned. I began seeing movies play out in my head and to hear characters speak from wherever it is that characters come from before we write them down or film them. In short, my love and my dream came back to me. Since I “gave up” I’ve written two feature screenplays and revised one from way back. I’m talking with independent producers about getting these scripts financed and made into films. I produced two nonfiction podcasts (one was licensed by a documentary film that’s playing the festival circuit now) and currently host a movie appreciation podcast called Why This Movie?

When a seemingly impossible dream drives us, we wonder where it comes from and how it got its hooks into us. In my case, I put it to the test by setting it free. And, to my surprise and delight, it returned. It wasn’t done with me. And I’m not done with it, either.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I think a lot of why I do what I do can be traced back to a scheduling glitch during my senior year of high school. I ended up with two study halls that year – and even though I was mostly coasting at this point, I decided to go to the office and ask if there was something worthwhile for me to do with all that free time. The result was an independent study video production class. It was just me, an advisor, and a bunch of digital cameras and editing software. Over the course of the next nine months, I experimented with shots and editing and storytelling techniques and filmed everything I could think of. By the end of the year, it was obvious what I wanted to do with the rest of my life – I wanted to make films. Since then, there’s been no looking back (except for the time I quit and gave up, which you can read about elsewhere in this piece).

I’ve directed documentaries that have been broadcast on PBS and the Discovery Channel, and have written and produced nonfiction features and shorts that have played at film festivals internationally. For the past few years, I’ve been writing feature screenplays that are all in some stage of development (stay tuned) and producing documentary and film appreciation podcasts.

I have kids and I work with kids, and my biggest and loftiest dream is to make films and tell stories that make children feel seen. Some of the only times I felt safe growing up were the moments when I was wrapped up in a story – at a movie theater or with a stack of VHS tapes or in the middle of a book I couldn’t put down – the chance to provide that for children navigating their way through life is motivates me more than anything else.“

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

I believe that stories exist all around us, like an ingredient in the air. I call myself a storyteller, but sometimes I think it’s more accurate to think of myself as a storyfinder. What I mean by that is that it’s my job to listen to the stories that exist already but that haven’t found the right person to tell them yet. Everything I’ve written or filmed or recorded or edited – I feel like it already existed, in a way. It was just waiting for me to catch it and then share it with the world.

Is there mission driving your creative journey?

For me, it is a privilege to die. It’s the ultimate rest at the end of whatever it is we’ve been tasked to do in this life. I want to feel worth of that privilege when it’s my time to leave here. My approach is to tell the stories I am tasked with telling until there’s no work left for me to do.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/why-this-movie/id1786184759
• Instagram: Christopher.alan.maloney
• Youtube: christopheralanmaloney1220