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April 1, 2022 • Schneps Media
BY BOB KRASNER
A lot of people picked up
new skills during the pandemic
lockdown — chess,
knitting, collage, whatever was
within grasp to pass the time at
home. Maxx Starr, co-owner of the
East Village tattoo parlor Fun City,
taught himself how to make movies.
“I had a schedule,” he explained.
“I would spend the day reading
about how to make movies, then
in the early evening I would watch
how-to YouTube videos. And at
night I would watch movies.”
“I ordered books about film
history and screenwriting,” he recounts.
“The Big Goodbye” (about
the movie “Chinatown”) and Roger
Corman’s “How I Made A Hundred
Movies In Hollywood and Never
Lost a Dime” were two pieces of his
research that led Starr to spend eight
months writing a 21-page script.
“I watched a lot of Truffaut and
crime movies like ‘Heat’ and ‘Pulp
Fiction,'” Starr notes. “I had put so
much time and effort into this, I had
to try and make a film.”
The result of his crash course in
cinema is a 24 minute caper that is
an “often absurdist look at life, love
and crime in the city” (according to
the press release) entitled “The Crusaders”
and will be premiered at the
Village East theatre on April 7.
It has probably been awhile —
maybe since the 80’s — that a filmmaker
living in the East Village has
shot a film entirely in the neighborhood
with a cast drawn from local
downtown streets. After enlisting
Brendan Brulon to produce the venture,
Starr filled the small cast with
names like Peter Greene (“Pulp Fiction,”
“The Mask”), Sophia Lamar
(a veteran club kid) and newcomers
Frederick Rusak and Tessa Gourin
— the latter two being on Starr’s
mind when he wrote the screenplay.
“It was bizarre – I had no acting
experience when Maxx brought it to
me,” Rusak admits. “I was a Fashion
Design student at FIT and now
I’m designing furniture. But I didn’t
even think about it, I just said yes.”
Gourin, a method actor, had
taken a two-year break from acting
and “was doing what everyone
else was doing – a whole lot of nothing!”
when Starr approached her
about the role he had written with
her in mind.
“It’s very unique – very Maxx,”
she muses. “It’s a Noir for this
day and age. Making it made me
remember why I love acting.”
Greene, the most seasoned cast
member, knew Starr through a
friend and was intrigued by the
script. Starr mentions that when
Greene took the role the actor proclaimed
that “this is either going to
be really good or f—ing terrible.”
Starr, a painter as well as a tattoo
artist, left the actual inking at the
shop — when they were able to reopen
— to his partner Big Steve and
their six employees as he concentrated
on his new career. While Fun
City, the oldest tattoo shop in NYC,
has seen its share of bold-face names
come through — Miley Cyrus, Action
Bronson, Evan Rachel Wood
and Cedric the Entertainer, for example
— the joint itself didn’t rate a
closeup in the flick.
“We shot at the International Bar,
NuBlu Classic, local apartments and
streets, but the shop just didn’t fit,”
Starr admits.
The shoot itself moved along
without incident, wrapping in just
seven days. But it didn’t start out as
well as Starr would have liked.
“I was hoping for movie magic,”
he says, but the first thing he had
to do was fire the director of photography
who wasn’t quite up to the
director’s vision. Nevertheless, with
Hunter Zimny stepping in that role,
and producer Brulon on top of the
scheduling and logistics, the project
wrapped spending somewhat less
than one might expect.
Brulon, who has known Starr
since they were teenage hardcore
Above: Maxx Starr, tattoo artist, painter, business owner, scriptwriter,
director. Top left: “I brought my pizazz,” said Tessa Gourin ,
between Maxx Starr and Frederick Rasuk at Fun City
punk fans in Richmond, VA, admits
that the whole thing went pretty
smoothly. Much of the shooting was
done at night and other than occasionally
having to beg a construction
worker to stop his jackhammer,
there weren’t any problems
to speak of.
“I had a feeling that Brendan
would be perfect for the job, and I
was right, ” says Starr.
As for the result, Starr feels
that he accomplished what he set
out to do.
“I’ve watched a lot of crime
movies that are serious all the way
through,” he muses. “But my angle
PHOTOS BY BOB KRASNER
is that there are funny moments in
everyone’s day. I’m trying to mix
in light moments – some levity in
dark times.”
“I’m confident that I’ve done
something good,” he concludes.
“But I know that I can do it better
next time.”
Tickets for the upcoming free
screening are sold out, but you
can get on the waiting list at
eventbrite.com/e/maxx-starrs-thecrusaders
village-east-by-angelika-
tickets-291547274747.
More screenings will be
announced on Instagram
@thecrusadersnyc.
ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT
From ink to indie
East Village tattoo parlor co-owner makes
his mark in another art form: filmmaking