We recently connected with Sunday Kinslow and have shared our conversation below.

Sunday, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Do you think your parents have had a meaningful impact on you and your journey?

Something I think about often is how supportive my parents were of me no matter what. I’ve had so many opportunities to learn and meet people all because I was able to communicate with my parents that I was interested in something new, and their answer was almost always, “Absolutely”.

A part of that may come from us being an artistic family, with visual artists on my dads side and musicians on my moms. It was kind of a no brainer that I’d come out a little funky. Ever since I could hold a pencil both my parents encouraged me to draw, paint, and blend. I’ve always loved being crafty, but I loved movies a little more. I don’t know if you’re really supposed to let your kids watch movies all the time but I’m glad my parents did because my favorite thing was to go to the Special Features on the DVD and see all about how those movies were made. We had recently gotten a Netflix subsciption and rented Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride. It blew my little four year old mind! We eventually had to get our own copy (which I still own to this day, even though it skips).

As I got older my love for movies grew and grew and I thought I wanted to not only be an artist but an actor too. My loving parents, who during this time were getting a divorse during the 2008 recession told me, “Of course you can be and artist and an actor,” and I really believed them. Even though they had divorced each other they had decided to both stay in Utah so I could have both parents to grow up with. I thank them for that choice eveyday. They put me in small charter art schools which was a lot better for me because I got more art in my education!

After years and years of “I want to be an artist, actor, singer, painter, person,” I realized the one thing that had remained consistent was making movies. I was always behind the camera filming things with my cousins and taking media classes in school. When it came time to look into college and find a major, Film Production was the one thing that I knew instantly I wanted to do.

My parents couldn’t have been happier! I’m so grateful that they always kept art in my life and encoraged me to try new mediums. I couldn’t have asked for anything more.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I’ve always been so taken with Coming of Age stories. I remember when Lady Bird first came out, I saw so much of myself on the big screen. I walked out of the theater saying “I want to make something that makes people feel just as seen as I feel right now”.

As a queer creative I’ve found that a lot of the themes found in horror reflect the “otherness” that can be felt growing up or just living as a queer person. If I had to identify my “brand”, I’d say it’s a mix of a teen coming of-age, satire, gore/horror, and romance. Throw all those things into a mixing bowl and there you have it. Me, in a nutshell.
Horror is also just a lot of fun to make! A great example would have to be Super Dark Times. It’s a brilliant and terrifying film that I faun over, far too often. I don’t think it gets enough credit.

I made a film titled “Real”, a few years ago in college. It’s something I want to rewrite and work on more because I only had about two weeks to make it. It’s about a person moving into a new town. They start seeing things out of their windows or out on walks but no one else seems to see what they see. I got this idea getting home way too late from another film I was working on that semester. I had recently been diagnosed with Bipolar disorder with minor psychosis. I saw someone walking down my street and after watching him for a while he disappeared behind a light post. I was so convinced it was real, I didn’t want to get out of my car. After about an hour of waiting I got the courage to go inside but I stayed up writing. I think the idea of knowing what you’re seeing is most likely not real, but what if you could prove it was?

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

I make most of my films with a tight-knit group of friends who have helped with nearly all my projects over the last three years. They’re my family and I know I can depend on them anytime I want to make something. They are there through all the preproduction, production, and even postproduction.

All that being said, I think the most rewarding part of being able to create something is getting everyone together to see the final project. Even after all the long shoot days, worrying about keeping everything on schedule, and being completely stressed out about every detail, there’s that moment when you can get your whole crew together and see what all that hard work was for.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

Something they taught in my film classes was “The more hands you have, the better”. I do think this is true when it comes to larger projects, however, there comes a point when you might have too many people and you have to put your foot down.

I was working on a project a few years ago where I was co-directing with a friend and also acting in the film. It was a bigger project than either of us had done before, so we agreed we needed a larger team than what we were used to. We had hired someone for costuming, an SFX makeup artist, two art directors, an assistant director, and several production assistants. When we got on set we quickly realized we had far too many bodies in the tiny house we were filming in. My co-director and I had to decide who we had to send home.

I do think that even though it was hard cutting people, it was a lesson we needed to learn. It also helps, in the long run, to have those experiences so you can refer back when planning a shoot. It gives you a better gauge of how big of a team you need for the size of the project and the size of your location.

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Image Credits

Eve Erskine
Mason Schofield