As the gaming world increasingly bleeds into mainstream culture, with hits like Fallout and The Last of Us gracing our streaming platforms (and a few flops too *cough* Borderlands *cough*), Chuck and Fern offers a poignant reflection on the power of escapism. Chuck, a D-List villain with a heart of gold, and Fern, a Link-inspired swordsman with a sunny disposition, find themselves in a predicament beyond the confines of their video game.
When the child controlling their destinies faces real-world challenges, these virtual companions embark on a meta-journey that blurs the lines between fantasy and reality. Playwright-filmmaker Henry Alexander Kelly shares his vision for this unique short film, Chuck and Fern, which premiered at the LA Shorts International Film Festival earlier this summer.
Your latest short film is about the secret lives of characters in a video game. It tackles some heavy topics whilst keeping a consistently fun tone. Where did the inspiration for it all come from?
Where do I begin? I’m a huge Legend of Zelda guy. My mom and I played Zelda when I was a kid growing up, and I would try to get her into the new ones, and she complained she didn’t know how the new 3D spaces work. It all started playing The Legend of Zelda with my mom, and then growing up, I kept playing and playing.
The inspiration for this story was actually based on Toy Story. I was like, what if Andy’s toys saw Andy go through something very real, hard and dark? How would they handle that? And then I was like, huh, okay, what if that happened, but it took place in the Zelda game. How would the character be even able to communicate or try to get into somebody’s reality? So that’s kind of where the idea, the inspiration came for this.
Blending that video game fantasy aesthetic and tone whilst tackling ideas on domestic violence – those are very contrasting themes. Did both of those elements always feel like they were the right fit for each other?
100%. For me, the stuff that happened in this movie, it’s much more dramatised in terms of storytelling through the short film format. Growing up, video games were an escape when my parents would argue, not to the extent that happens in this film, but they really helped me get through tough times. I think both of those things came together as the story was happening. Originally it was a stage play, so you weren’t able to see the little boy and his mom, because in the play version, you have Chuck and Fern on stage kind of looking out at the audience, just talking about what they’re seeing. So one of my friends was like, you need to show the real world. And I said, ‘you know what, you’re 100% right’. When rewriting it into a short film, we really went into the real world and back and forth. It was seeing the colour juxtaposition and the emotional juxtaposition that made me really feel, oh, this is so cool and exciting.
Was the game world you envisioned always an RPG / Zelda style game?
Oh, 100%. There were never any other kinds of game types considered. Funny thing actually. This is actually a story I’ve never told before. One of my good friends, Cedric, is a director too. He said, ‘I was thinking it was going to be more Mortal Kombat-esque and darker’. I was like, no, it can’t be that. I wanted it to feel warm and vibrant. That conversation made me go, God, it’s cool how directors look at something and then completely splice it differently. It’s super exciting.
So the film debuted at the L.A. Shorts International Film Festival.
That’s right.
What an achievement. How did that kind of happen and how did it feel?
Yeah, it was amazing. I mean, to be in L.A. and in a packed theatre full of people. I think the most exciting thing was this was the first time I saw the movie with people that have not been involved with the film. There was this lady that was sitting behind me and all her reactions were visceral, audible reactions. My favourite reaction was when the camera pulled out from the game world into the real world, she went, ‘oh my goodness, oh no, oh no.’ And then she saw what was happening. That was super exciting. And then at the end, when everything kind of wraps up neatly, she was like, ‘oh, thank goodness!’. It was like a sense of relief that I’d really nailed it.
I really loved some of the ideas behind this game world, the kind of rules that make it up. And in only a short amount of time, you managed to kind of reveal how the game world works without it feeling like a heavy exposition dump or without losing the real focus. Another filmmaker could have very much gotten too caught up in those elements. How important was it to you to make this kind of game dimension feel authentic and lived in?
My new favourite filmmaker right now, and I just freaking love her, is Jac Schaeffer (WandaVision, Agatha All Along). Her idea of world building is so incredible. She loves the rules of the world, and they get me excited because then as an audience member, it’s fun for me to think of the consequences of something in that world. But what she does is cool because she’s like, we’re going to do this, but it won’t be crazy complicated. It’ll be a little splattering of things here and there. And that excites me. To tell a fun story that’s character driven,but also has these little things that make this world a little off-kilter.
I liked the real dynamic between your two main characters, Chuck and Fern. It’s great that they both have not just distinctive personalities from each other, but also from the character archetypes that they’re supposed to be playing. Fern’s supposed to be the hero of the game, but he’s not all that heroic. What was the process for devising those characters like?
One of the first ideas I had for this project was what if Link was a reluctant hero? How would that be? He goes through all these things and adventures because he has no choice, he has to. But what if he didn’t want to? His actual personality is: ‘I don’t want to be part of any of this’. That thought was really funny to me. And I thought, okay, you have a main character who doesn’t want to do any of this and is dealing with a very real situation in the real world. What is the conflict there?
And then there’s Chuck. She just wants to get through things and be done with it and to have her be the person that is the hero essentially and shapes Fern’s perspective. I wanted to do a role reversal on what a hero or a villain was and what it is really like understanding somebody’s personality and what happens when you take on a different role than the thing you were designed for. What if your true role isn’t the thing you were designed for? It’s a really cool idea. I found playing around with that was really interesting.
The cast fit well into these roles. How did you kind of go about casting them? Had you worked with some of them before?
Matteo, who plays Fern, was in the original stage play version of Chuck and Fern. And I told him, once we’re done with this play, someday I want to direct this as a short film. Fast forward to four years later, here we are, and it was just amazing to see. I knew he was going to be great. Stage, screen, he can do it all.
And then Lorena, who plays Chuck, was found by my casting director, Alan Luna. What made me really excited is out of everybody that sent a self-tape, she was the only one that looked into the camera. That’s when I knew she’s completely in this. I told Matteo about her, ‘hey, there’s this girl called Lorena’, and he’s like, ‘Lorena Jorge? I want to work with her!’ It was just sparks. They knew about each other, and so it was amazing.
The score was really good. It’s so layered and fits the fantasy vibe really well. How did that come together? How important was the sound and music to the story you wanted to tell?
Oh my God, so important. The Legend of Zelda, specifically Ocarina of Time, playing the Ocarina is the main mechanic to get you through this whole game, and so many Zelda games have these incredible scores. The music is the focus, an engine that leads to these new levels, these new discoveries. And so when I was going to make this movie, I felt it had to have a beautiful, fantasy score to fit that Zelda-esque world.
So there’s this composer named Charlie Rosen, who’s done things for Broadway, but specifically I know him from the 8-Bit Big Band, which is this video game cover band. I messaged him some time in 2021 / 2022, and I said ‘hey, you don’t know me, but I wrote this little short video game movie and I’d love for you to be the composer.’ He goes, ‘dude, whenever you get this funding, let’s chat.’ I raised the money, but he suggested making the score with a live band. I didn’t have that kind of money, but he covered it and I made him an executive producer. That blew my mind, Charlie was just incredible to go to New York and then be there with this 11 piece band. Everybody was so excited because they were all gamers.
I’ve read that you describe yourself as Venti Caramel, is that right?
Yes, because I’m chubby and brown, like a big Venti Caramel blend. Starbucks could just sponsor me, or a coffee shop could sponsor me, so it’s my face with the beard as the outline, and then you put coffee in the little cream, and it’s my skin tone level of brown that the coffee would be.
How does your culture and background influence you as a creative? Is it easy for you to try and find stories in the intersection of cultural identity?
Yeah, 100%. I think for me, I’m realising this, because all the stories I’m writing are genre subversion. I’m an Afro-Latino filmmaker, but I’m first a filmmaker who is Afro-Latino, who loves video games, anime, and all these things. All those things make up the intersection of me, and I think I wouldn’t be one without the other. The culture of being Nicaraguan and having listened to things like salsa, merengue, but also watching anime while my mom is blasting that in the background creates this very combination of so many contrasting and fun things. There’s so much to pull out of my life, the things that I love, and things that I experienced growing up.
So what would kind of be the main takeaway that you would want audiences to get out of Chuck and Fern?
I think the main thing is treasuring the thing that helps you find escapism and brings you comfort. Hold on to that, because it will get you through tough and dark times.
But I will say this, there was this lady that came to a screening, and she was a journalist. She said to me,‘wow, your movie made me rethink about my job. I thought my job had no purpose really. Seeing Chuck and Fern doing what they do and realising that I have the power to have an impact on someone made me really go, my God.’ That brought me a lot of joy.
Everybody’s finding what this movie brings to them. It is great when so many different people can take away something different for themselves from it.
When can general audiences expect to get the chance to see Chuck and Fern? Where is it going to be available?
So we’re still in the festival circuit right now. We have some festivals coming up, so probably like mid 2025? There are some conversations about where we’re going to distribute it exactly and who would like to get it distributed. I know it’s a long time, but getting this movie to the festivals has been so fun.
Specifically with this movie, we’ve done a lot of video game conventions, which is very fun. We went to PAX West. We’ve gone to this film festival in Portugal called Esports Insider Film Festival. It’s one of the only gaming and movie festivals in the world. And Chuck and Fern won best short film, so that was very cool. We have a few coming up that we’ve submitted to and that we’re in talks to see what happens.
Do you have any upcoming projects in the works? What’s next for you?
I have another short film called Super Focus that I just wrote and it’s much darker. It’s about this aspiring filmmaker that gets a galactic franchise IP by a studio, but he has to give up his bodily autonomy to get the movie made. The studio and the superfan focus group want the movie to be their movie. It’s really talking more about how art right now to me feels like it’s being created by these groups of people. It’s not allowing an artist to think. Feedback and notes are super great and important, but you need time to cook something before it can just exist. I’m all for people having discourse and things, but this filmmaker is the person hired for this movie because you like the work that they do or that they would inject into this world. Taika Waititi is a perfect example. Thor Ragnarok is so good because Taika is like, ‘this is my Taika brain putting Thor here’.
So yeah, I’m working on that and then an animated Capybara and Toucan series where they pop from video game to video game and that one’s been a lot of fun.
We wish you luck on your projects going forward.
Chuck and Fern is still in the festival circuit, meaning it’s full general release won’t be until mid-late 2025. For more details and updates on seeing Chuck and Fern, follow the official Instagram account. Check out the trailer down below:
Words by Kieran Webb
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