Screenwriter Joe Russo says his latest project, Netflix's The Last Will & Testament of Charles Abernathy, was "born out of necessity."
"My go-to composer and Abernathy associate producer, John Jesensky, and I were horrified by what we were seeing politically at the time and we thought — wouldn’t it be cathartic if we could crack a horror movie where the ultra-rich are terrorized?"
Once Russo landed on the theme, he quickly went to work with his long-time writing partner, Chris LaMont, to craft the story. While Russo had been initially approached to create a movie that could be shot in one location on a micro-budget, he says that once he and LaMont started writing the script, "Two things became apparent very quickly — we’d identified a story my reps were very excited about, and there was no way it could be done justice on a micro-budget, so we instead decided to write it on spec. It turned out to be a good bet! It opened up tons of doors for us and wound up making The 2018 BloodList and Hit List."
According to Russo, the screenplay's success was a fast turnaround. Brainstorming began in January and the first draft was completed by February. A “ready for market” script was ready by April. Once the script landed at Netflix, "Things moved even faster because we were green-lit from the jump," he says. "There was only about two months to crank out all the production rewrites."
The film follows billionaire Charles Abernathy (Bob Gunton) who, on the eve of his 75th birthday, invites his four estranged children back home out of fear that tonight someone – or something – is coming to kill him. To ensure his family will help protect him from whatever’s coming, Abernathy puts each of their inheritances on the line: They’ll get nothing if he’s found dead by dawn.
The horror film is directed by Alejandro Brugués, with who Russo previously collaborated on the horror anthology feature, Nightmare Cinema. "We had an incredible experience. It was a joy to work with him again on Abernathy and know that our script was in the hands of a friend who I trust."
Speaking of friends, Russo's and LaMont's partnership goes back to their film school days at Arizona State University where Russo was a student and LaMont was a young faculty member.
"[He] was notorious among students for being very critical and direct when giving notes. Because of that, I constantly turned to him for feedback. He would always make my student films better. When I started planning to move to Los Angeles and needed a calling card piece, Chris shared a short screenplay he wrote,
Take-Out, and graciously offered it up for me to direct. It was our first time collaborating and it worked out great."
Take-Out went on to play over a dozen festivals, winning awards, and made its way into an anthology feature. The film ultimately helped Russo land a job in development and worked at night on scripts with LaMont who still lives in Arizona.
"We've always worked remotely," says Russo. "We were using Zoom before Zoom was cool! With the pandemic, I’m glad we already had a remote system down — we were ahead of the learning curve!"
As for their writing process, Russo says the pair typically "blue sky an idea a lot." Then, they try to get a solid foundation outlined. "Not necessarily beat-for-beat, but a strong enough roadmap that we can be creative while writing without getting lost. Once we have a handle on the characters and story, we tend to pass pages back and forth, rewriting them as we go, until we have a draft."
Due to all the polishing along the way, he says their first draft is more like a solo writer's second or third. Then they "stress test" it with a select group of trusted readers before it goes to their reps.
"Usually by the time it goes to market it’s been revised three or four times and that’s our official 'first draft.' It’s a process that’s worked well for us project-to-project, including on
Abernathy."
The duo continues to sell and write projects together, including the upcoming
The
Locksmith, which is currently in production.
"That’s one that absolutely validates why it’s worth writing on spec, even if that spec doesn’t get made," he says. "The director and one of the producers were fans of our spec work and, because of that, we got the call to come in and help re-write
Locksmith
. Our draft landed them cast, like Ryan Phillippe and Ving Rhames, and their green light, which we’re really proud of. Being the third writers on the project, and hired guns at that, I know they’ve made changes to the script since we worked on it, which is just the nature of the screenwriting game sometimes. It’ll be interesting to see how the final product has continued to evolve."
Given the success of
Abernathy and his other projects, including
The Locksmith, it's no surprise that Russo is a big proponent of spec writing, especially for emerging writers.
"I’m a big believer in writing on spec — and doing it over-and-over so you can keep honing your craft. I
t took us writing five feature specs to find representation. Six to land our first sale. Our seventh was the first to be produced.
Abernathy
was our eleventh feature spec.
Screenwriting is a learned form of storytelling. The more you do it, the better you get and the more executives and producers trust your instincts. That’s how you find work. That’s how you get movies made. A spec is the best way to show the proof is in the pudding."