For George A. Johnson, not one but two layoffs directed his passion for filmmaking into a promising career.
As a boy, rather than staging gunfights or battles of war with his action figures, Johnson positioned his plastic people as characters in productions of his imagination. Neighborhood friends became his audience as he cut his storytelling teeth.
Later, Johnson’s passion moved from live productions to films—albeit still on a small scale.
“I have had a passion for working in TV/film ever since I was about 5 years oldbut had never had the opportunity,” says Johnson, who grew up in rural Woodland, Mich. “So, I made hundreds of short films with a video camera throughout my high school and college years.”
By 1998, Johnson was working in Kalamazoo, Mich., at a factory assembling medical and surgical tools and supplies. He says it was a mindless job that he performed essentially on autopilot as he conjured up movie scripts in his head throughout the day until that first pink slip arrived.
“This was the first time I’d ever been laid off in my life. I had just entered into a serious relationship with the woman I wanted to marry, so I needed to find work that would support us,” he said. “I tried other factories in our area, but nobody was hiring.”
With time on his hands and no employment prospects, Johnson decided to keep busy while hunting a job. Contacting a public-access cable station in nearby Grand Rapids, he volunteered to work as a camera operator. The job was unpaid, but Johnson got to do what he loved.
“I totally threw myself into my work there,” says Johnson, who still speaks with a boyish zeal whenever the topic of filmmaking arises. “I was like a kid in a candy store. I did everything from lighting the set to camera operation to remote shooting and editing.”
Soon, the station offered him the paid position of program director. From there it was a steady progression of jobs at various television outlets, including an ABC affiliate in Grand Rapids and a faith-based network in Ohio.
While television honed his cinematic skills, his passion continued to be telling his own stories. When a friend offered Johnson a marketing job that would give him more time to work on his own movies, he packed up his family of four and headed to Auburn, Ind.
Good pay afforded Johnson the luxury of pursuing his childhood dreams. It even looked as if those dreams soon would turn into reality. Johnson completed a couple of screenplays, and a group of investors from Minnesota offered to put up millions to bring those scripts to the screen.
That’s when Johnson’s second bout of unemployment hit. The marketing director job was gone, and, in the course of just a few weeks, the funding for both motion-picture deals fell through. The recession year of 2009 came, and jobs in rural northeastern Indiana were scarce. Bills continued to mount, the electricity was disconnected, and the Johnsons risked losing their home.
At a point of utter desperation, Johnson did what he does best. He sequestered himself and wrote another tale. This one hit close to home.
Or, more precisely, his looming homeless state. In a true case of art imitating life, Johnson penned Homeless for the Holidays. The screenplay mirrored his family’s struggles, and Johnson drew many scenes directly from their daily struggles for survival.
However, as Johnson knew all too well, writing a screenplay and getting it to the screen are two completely different things. As Johnson laid down his pen, a string of circumstances unfolded that he counts as nothing short of miraculous.
Despite his dire financial situation, Johnson held one caveat: He never wanted to film another movie with a camcorder. He was determined not only to use a commercial-grade camera but the gold standard of digital videography, the Red One.
Receiving a telephone call from a cameraman friend and learning that he had just purchased a new camera, it was with a bit of trepidation that Johnson asked, “What kind of camera did you get?”
“A Red One.”
Johnson dropped the Homeless script in the mail and soon had a film crew. With technical aspects falling into place, logistics—including finding places to shoot—became the next hurdle for Johnson and his wife, Karyn, who became his assistant director. The couple scoured local abandoned businesses, but nothing was suitable. A friend offered to contact the management of Penguin Point, a popular restaurant chain in northern Indiana.
“Not only did Penguin Point agree to let us film in their restaurant,” says Johnson of the chain’s location in Auburn. “They paid their employees overtime to keep the place open and assist us.”
Despite the generosity of restaurant management, Johnson approached the next issue nervously. His main character, Jake Baker, needed to wear a penguin suit in part of the film. Would the owners go for that? “Not only did they agree,” Johnson says. “They told me they had a penguin suit we could use.”
Next on the Johnsons’ checklist: casting. Placing a few ads in trade publications, an open call went out. “We were upfront that there was no pay involved,” says Johnson. “We were hoping to get 40 or 50 people to show up.”
More than 800 people came from around the country to audition, including an actor who had appeared in the TV series Lost and the Ben Affleck film Pearl Harbor. Now a minister in Decatur, Ind., Matt Moore was thrilled to return to the screen as the lead in an inspirational film.
As production on the film progressed, community enthusiasm swelled in Auburn. The city closed down streets and decorated for Christmas, even though the holidays were months away. Random people approached the Johnsons with monetary and other support.
“I had one elderly woman come up to me on the street,” says Karyn. “She just wanted to do something, anything. Finally, she asked if we could use some water. She [returned] a short time later with cases of bottled water for the cast and crew.”
The movie premiered at sold-out Auburn theaters, earning back 75 percent of its $20,000 budget during the opening weekend. Figures on DVD sales or the film’s gross return weren’t available, but it achieved a spectacular holiday run in late 2010 on television networks and cable outlets across the country, reaching into 90 percent of U.S. households. It also was shown at the Grand Rapids Film Festival.
Johnson’s story follows the theme of others WEALTH has profiled in writer Martha Fry’s series called Passionate Avocations: After losing a job, people turn hobbies or pastimes about which they are passionate into lucrative and life-changing new careers.
In Johnson’s case, his own storytelling remains paramount, and he currently is working on his next film. It’s based on the true story of a 42-year-old hockey equipment manager who gets his dream chance to play goalie when a farm team’s goalie gets called up to the majors.
Johnson also wants moviemaking to be more accessible to others who hold similar passions. To that end, he created iproducefilms.com, a website to facilitate development, production, marketing and distribution of independent films.
“The film industry is a massively difficult one to break into,” says Johnson. “For those who do not want to work in the film industry, but still love movies, the site allows you to be an active part of productions by voting for cast members, soundtrack artists and more.”
Again reliving that childlike excitement and without a hint of remorse over the tough times, Johnson sums up his expectations for the future: “It’s going to be awesome!”
Martha Fry is a freelance writer based in the metro Atlanta area. She is a regular contributor to WEALTH magazine.
Tags: filmmaking, George A. Johnson, Homeless for the Holidays, passionate avocations