The following is not horror related but is from one of Georgia's most respected indie horror film makers - Dave R. Watkins - who decided to show his more comedic side.
Not being the type of person to sit down and watch a web
series I was only interested in this newest web series “The Lumber Baron of
Jasper County” because it was produced in Georgia and starred several known
actors in the Georgia indie film community.
The first season of the series (eight regular episodes with a Halloween
Special) is now on Blip (www.blip.tv) at http://blip.tv/lumberbaron. The series is created by Dave R. Watkins and
Michael D. Friedman and concerns the misadventures of The Lumber Baron
(Watkins) and Ashley (Candace Mabry) when The Lumber Baron hires his fallen
from Wall Street cousin Mike (Grant Garlinghouse) to help modernize the lumber
business. Mike’s changes don’t always go
so well especially when it comes to Pete (Friedman), the yard manager, and the
colorful customers that visit the business on a day to day basis. Also making things more interesting is the
fact that “The Lumber Baron” is a split personality of real owner of the lumber
yard Dave. The “Lumber Baron” was
originally a character Dave used to promote the lumber yard and business but
now it seems that the Baron has taken over Dave completely.
Most of the first season of episodes is written by Watkins
but co-writers Friedman and Nathan Hill contribute greatly to the series’
overall off-beat nature. One of the show’s
greatest strengths is the relationships between characters. As Dave fights through his personality
conflicts with “The Lumber Baron” he misses out on the fact that Ashley has
fallen in love with him. Ashley is all
heart except to Mike, the person she believes came in and stole her promotion
so she is constantly undermining his authority and Mike has his own problems
just trying to fit in at the lumber yard with all the colorful characters that
he didn’t have to deal with when he was in New York working on Wall
Street. And just why did Mike leave Wall
Street to begin with? These questions
and many more add a level of realism to the characters that could have easily
fallen into caricature if handled in the wrong way but Watkins and his writers
and especially the actors manage to always ground the series by the personal
issues that each of the core characters have to deal with.
Each episode comes in at just under ten minutes so they are
a breeze to watch in just one seating.
Knowing this, Watkins and company created a companion web series to run
along the main one called “Ask the Baron”, which is an open forum for customers
and fans of the Lumber Baron to go online and ask him questions about
lumber. This is made even more
entertaining by the fact that The Lumber Baron and Ashley are doing this behind
Mike’s back. These smaller webisodes allow
fans of the series to get a glimpse at the people who shop at the lumber yard.
The web series (both of them) are quite entertaining and
despite some occasional lighting issues (especially in outdoor scenes) the
series is an extremely competent endeavor that demonstrates that Georgia indie
filmmakers have more to offer than just more horror films and web series
(which there is no end of). Also of note
is the original music by Markleford Friedman which gives the series a very
surreal ambiance that elevates the tone and mood of the series.
Dave R. Watkins is
best known for his starring roles in indie feature films Jack O’Lantern (2004)
and Stragglers (2004), which he also wrote and directed, and for producing another
series “Witch Hunters Extraordinaire” (2002) as well as countless other short
films. Candace Mabry is no stranger to
web series as she had a role in “The Rising Sun” (2009) and “Let Us In”
(2011). She is best known for her roles in
Return of the Jackalope (2006) and Undocumented Executive (2011) but has
starred in numerous short films. Grant
Garlinghouse is a regular of Watkins’ films having starred in “Witch Hunters
Extraordinaire”, Return of the Jackalope, and the short "Dead Vengeance" (2009).
