Q&A: Director/Co-Writer Jon Knautz Discusses THE CLEANING LADY

From Jack Brooks: Monster Slayer to The Shrine to Girl House to his latest feature, The Cleaning Lady, filmmaker Jon Knautz has always delivered an intriguing variety of genre stories. He recently celebrated the world premiere of The Cleaning Lady (ICYMI, read our review here) at the Arrow Video FrightFest UK film festival, and Daily Dead had the chance to check in with Knautz about his newest film project, with the director discussing the collaborative process with co-writer and star Alexis Kendra, the relevancy of this story to things currently happening in society, and more.

Can you talk about working on the initial short with Alexis and then the process of taking it from short form storytelling to a full-on feature film?

Jon Knautz: Alexis and I had already written the feature script for The Cleaning Lady and we wanted to shoot a small part of it to help raise financing, so that’s where the short actually came from. But it also helped us get a sense for the mood of the story, so it was an interesting kind of practice session for us. Alexis actually played the character of Shelly in the short, which was fun.

Because Alice and her experiences with these other characters, plus her perspective, are so integral to this story, how essential was it to have Alexis working with you on this project on the story side of things?

Jon Knautz: I love writing with Alexis; she brings that female perspective that I could obviously never bring. It was great to have her play Alice because she knew the story and character inside out from writing with me. Alexis and I have written a number of scripts together now, so we have our system down pretty well. I’m grateful to have a female writing partner, as I believe it balances well against my male perspective on things. She’s taught me a lot. I’ve since seen some films and read some scripts written solely by a male and the female characters are sometimes lacking. I can really see that now after working with Alexis. She has a real keen eye, and not just for writing female characters—she comes up with some incredible story ideas.

There’s definitely some deliberate stuff that you did in The Cleaning Lady on a visual level that I really enjoyed—from the shooting style to the color palettes for both Alice and Shelly—and I was wondering if you could talk about your approach to this film visually?

Jon Knautz: I wanted calm and controlled motion to the camera. My DP, Josh Allen, and I talked about only moving the camera with motivation, never just for style. Too much “slick camera style” never works right in horror films for me. And in terms of the color palette, Alexis (who was also the production designer) and I worked out a color scheme for both Alice and Shelly. I wanted them to be different in every way. Alice has these blues and yellows and Shelly is all greens and browns and some burnt oranges. I think it’s easy for filmmakers, especially in the indie world because of tight budgets, to forget about visual design, but it’s so important. Film is a visual medium. People want to escape into another world when they watch a film. It’s not just about camera angles and color grading, you have got to get in there and really create the world that sits in front of the camera, and Alexis is fantastic at doing that.

Something I’ve enjoyed about your career is that you’ve always managed to bring something different to the table as a storyteller with each of your projects. Has that been conscientious to you at all, or are good stories just good stories regardless of where they happen to fall genre-wise?

Jon Knautz: At the end of the day, a good story is a good story. I would be definitely be interested in tackling different genres at some point, but right now I’m really into the horror/thriller world. But in terms of bringing something different to each of my projects, I’m always trying to keep myself entertained. If I tackle too much of the same stuff, I get bored, and the last thing the audience needs is a bored filmmaker. I had a lot of fun in my earlier films, but I never had the full control that I have now. I’ve really found an amazing team over the last several years and I’m finding I’m able to grow a lot more as a filmmaker now.

Did you and Alexis realize when you were working on The Cleaning Lady that this narrative would be tapping into some very relevant issues to what’s going on these days?

Jon Knautz: I can’t say that’s something that we were consciously aware of. When we write, we’re never trying to make a statement about issues in reality, we just focus on crafting an engaging story; ultimately something that we feel is entertaining. However, I’m sure we’re thinking about relevant issues on a subconscious level because we’re always trying to create characters that seem realistic and believable—people you could believe exist in our reality. Believability is everything to me. Even if a character is larger than life, or even a superhero, they still need to be believable so we can relate and sympathize.

I’m only asking because I’m still a huge fan, but are there any hopes that we might one day get a Jack Brooks sequel? (I remain patiently optimistic.)

Jon Knautz: I really appreciate you being a fan of that film. Jack Brooks will always have a solid place in my heart, especially being my first film. Shortly after the film came out, we developed an outline for a sequel and it was just so awesome. I still think about it today. But it would need a hefty budget so… don’t hold your breath, sorry to say.