Filmmaker Luke Greenfield opened up about directing ‘Playdate’, an absurd action-packed adventure starring Kevin James and Alan Ritchson.
“We are the little movie that could,” says Greenfield. “We were so constricted with budget and timing.”
Greenfield came to ‘Playdate’ after receiving Neil Goldman’s script, a rare instance where he directed a project he didn’t write. He described the production as a tightly constrained independent shoot with little prep time, limited resources, and a schedule driven by Ritchson’s return to ‘Reacher’. Improvisation played a role on set, particularly with James and Ritchson, while Greenfield and his editor worked to keep the film’s pacing lean. Although shot with theatrical play in mind, the film ultimately went to Amazon, where Greenfield hopes it will still reach a wide audience. He said he aimed to balance the film’s action-comedy elements with some grounded emotional moments.
Directed by Greenfield from a script by Neil Goldman, ‘Playdate’ stars Alan Ritchson, Kevin James, Sarah Chalke, Alan Tudyk, Benjamin Pajak, Banks Pierce, Hiro Kanagawa with Stephen Root and Isla Fisher.
‘Playdate’ is currently streaming on Prime Video.
Awards Focus: It’s so nice to meet you today. How are you doing?
Luke Greenfield: You too. Good, good, good.
AF: How did you first find out about Neil Goldman’s script and at what point did you know you wanted to direct it?
Greenfield: I normally write all the movies I direct. I’m a writer, and this was a unique experience. A script came to me to consider to direct, and it was written by Neil Goldman, who’s a huge TV writer. Started in ‘Family Guy’, went to ‘Scrubs’. He’s the showrunner of ‘Shrinking’.
The concept was amazing. Like every filmmaker, I’m very particular in regards to what I’m gonna direct and it was such a crazy concept. He obviously has whip sharp dialogue.
It started there, it came to me and we developed it for a while. I always wanted to work with Alan. Alan and I—we were trying to do a comedy before here, and so when I was developing, I’m like, this is Alan Ritchson, this is Alan. Get it to Alan right away. Yeah.
AF: What was the most challenging aspect of making the film?
Greenfield: That it was an independent film. No one really realizes it. Everyone thinks we’re this big budget movie. We are the little movie that could.
We were so constricted with budget and timing. I had no preparation for this movie whatsoever. I normally am Mr. Preparation, so I get a phone call saying, “You’re going to Vancouver in a week, get going.” Boots on the ground, no prep for these big action sequences.
The biggest challenge was definitely budget, schedule, racing to make a schedule because Alan has to go back to Reacher. It was crazy.
AF: So were there times, especially with it being an action film, where you’re like, we’ve gotta drop this shot because we don’t have the money?
Greenfield: Billions of times. There’s a whole sequence in a parking lot where the kids are being chased and being hunted down.
I mean, we had that in a fly zone where people—the jump around thing with kids, we had a laser tag, and then budget and time is like, okay, here’s a parking lot, make it work.
And so, in a Kmart parking lot, I’m trying to create this kind of very tense chase of these mercenaries that are realistically trying to get at these kids. That was the parameter. You got a parking lot, go. And that’s challenging.
AF: When you’re working with someone like Kevin James, is there any room for improv?
Greenfield: Oh, yeah. The guy’s a pro. Both those guys. Alan is amazing at improv.
I always believe have the greatest script you possibly can and really spend months and years on the dialogue and then let them bring their own stuff to it and bring their own drama.
There’s a lot of scenes in this movie that aren’t funny, that are heartbreaking, and bringing pathos and bringing relatability so that it really hits home to audience members who care.
AF: How long was the rough assembly cut?
Greenfield: It wasn’t long, to be quite honest. We had no time. I have an editor named Joe Mitacek, who is the most talented editor I’ve ever worked with. Him and I spent twenty-four hours a day in that editing room.
I think the first cut was maybe 15 minutes longer. We knew we wanted it to be lean and mean. I always wanted this thing to have a very high-octane, adrenalized pace, and that was the whole goal, yeah.
AF: When you were originally making the film and in production, did you know if it was going to theaters or streaming at the time?
Greenfield: We didn’t. Great question. We didn’t. I’ve never made a streaming movie in my whole career. It was always being shot for theatrical as all my films.
And then, Amazon—Amazon was very smart. It’s really tricky today, as everyone knows, is that you have a theatrical movie, you’re competing against the most gigantic budget films that are event films, or you’re competing against ‘Marty Supreme’ and these little Oscar movies.
Amazon came in really having conversations with us. The decision was 200 million people are gonna see this movie in their homes and more eyeballs.
What I love about Amazon—I’m really trying to do another movie with them—is they’re gonna go theatrical, a lot more theatrical that I really, really love, and they’re gonna make a ton of movies theatrically that no one else is doing. I think that’s amazing.
Look, I started making movies when I was ten only for the reason of sitting with an audience and seeing the reactions and their laughter and their crying and their tension. And so movies—that’s what I’ve always—I think every filmmaker has been in this to be in a theater of 500 people.
I think Amazon knows that and is and is gonna be the one place to really be a big player in theatrical movies, which is amazing.
AF: I hope they become a player in theatrical because it’s just not the same watching from home.
Greenfield: It sucks.
AF: Especially with comedies—you’re missing that energy.
Greenfield: Totally.
AF: I’ve seen indie films at home where I have laughed hysterically.
Greenfield: Yeah.
AF: And then I’ve seen indie films at home where the chuckles are few and far between. But if I see that in a theater, I know I’d be laughing up a storm.
Greenfield: Comedies are made for the contagious laughter. I mean, imagine seeing ‘Wedding Crashers’ or ‘Superbad’ or ‘Bridesmaids’ or ‘Silver Linings Playbook’. I mean, all those things, I can’t imagine not first seeing that at a theater where people are laughing so hard, you can’t even hear the dialogue.
That’s the win. We have that a lot. I’ve been watching this movie a lot with audiences, and luckily, we had that experience where as a filmmaker, you’re sitting in the middle of the audience and they’re laughing so hard, and you’re like, ah, they just missed that joke, they’re laughing over it. But you can never predict that.
AF: Yeah. I was at the world premiere of ‘Blockers’ at South By.
Greenfield: Wow.
AF: I was interviewing the composer the next day.
Greenfield: Oh, wow, okay.
And so, I’m sitting there like, there was a score?!?
AF: Greenfield: (Laughs) Exactly. Exactly. That’s the thing. But I what I’m told is comedies are really coming back. I made this film, ‘The Girl Next Door’, in the early 2000s. ‘Wedding Crashers’ and ‘Superbad’ and Judd’s movies and David O.’s movies and Spike Jonze’s movies, I thought that was the greatest time for comedies.
I mean, yes, we grew up obviously on Eddie Murphy and Bill Murray and the absolute greats, but I don’t think there’s been a time since where you’re seeing so many great comedies at one time. I think people are just jonesing for it.
AF: Yeah, I mean I remember that time because I graduated college in 2007—
Greenfield: There you go.
But I really believe they’re coming. I’m not to judge at all. I just I don’t really watch comedy in a long time. I’m much more of a super dramatic—I like the big dramas. It’s been a while, but I really hope it’s coming back.
AF: I enjoyed the blooper reel during the credits. At what point in the process was that added in?
Greenfield: Funny should ask. Because we’re so tight and lean and mean in running time, we thought, my G-d, we’re gonna need extra time. I believe in pace in movies. I really do. I think it’s crucial.
That was the plan early on in post. Let’s run the actor credits over outtakes. That’s where that came from, yeah.
There’s such a vibe in this movie of dance, hip hop, and I love putting songs to music, so I knew I wanted to shoot an early hip-hop music video with these guys. The whole plan I had was to intercut the music video with outtakes. Yeah.
AF: I have to ask, partly because of my own experiences during the past two years and change, but are you finding it challenging to exist as a Jew in the entertainment industry right now?
Greenfield: No. I haven’t personally, but I hear—it’s such a tricky time and I don’t really get into politics at all, but you hear about things and you read about ’em.
It’s just a tough time all around. I think people want comedies. I think this is gonna help. I think people really want to just laugh and for at least an hour and a half just be laughing and being taken out of their lives, having a little vacation from life.
AF: I know exactly what you mean about people wanting comedies. During the pandemic, I was saying yes to a lot of screeners that ended up not getting watched because I just kept turning to the same things for comfort.
Greenfield: Yeah. Yeah. It’s been a while. I mean, I loved that movie, ‘My Old Ass’. Did you see that movie?
AF: Yeah.
Greenfield: That was one of the best dramedies I’ve seen in years. I was just talking about it with Julia Rapaport at Amazon. They’re coming. They’re coming.
But that was the movie that I was just so blown away by. I cried my eyes out. I was laughing.
I think there are gonna be more movies like that. That movie didn’t get the attention either, and it killed me. After I saw that film—I saw it opening night—I had lunch with Maisy Stella, the actress in that, and I was just trying to scream from the mountaintops everyone needs to see this film. It’s just hard, it’s hard to get people’s attention.
AF: Yeah. And then when the film’s going to streaming, it’s like you hope it doesn’t get lost in the algorithm.
Greenfield: It’s tough. I know. When ‘The Killer’ came out by Fincher, and in my opinion, there wasn’t a lot of a lot of attention on it, and I said, “Wow, I never thought I’d be in a culture where David Fincher is coming out with a movie and not in the world doesn’t really know about it yet.” Pretty crazy.
AF: Yeah. That was 2023, right?
Greenfield: I think so. I mean he’s got a new one coming out, but yeah, it was a couple years ago.
AF: Yeah, because there were a number of films, especially that October and November where, for me, it’s like just a blur.
Greenfield: Yeah.
AF: Just because I have so much family living in Israel and antisemitism was also really starting to surge and it’s like, I’m sitting during in a movie theater, but the headspace, the focus, it just isn’t there.
Greenfield: Yeah. It’s a tough time. It really is. All over the place. Yeah, it really is. But I’m a I’m an optimist. I think I think things are gonna get better.
AF: Yeah. What do you hope people take away from watching the film, if there’s anything to take away at all from an action comedy?
Greenfield: Yeah, I like to infuse pathos wherever I can. My plan in this movie is I hope it hits home for people that had a parent or are a parent, and want to connect with their kids and how tricky and challenging that is.
I mean, there’s a scene in this movie where Alan Ritchson’s crying because his father never wanted anything to do with him. And if you look at ‘Midnight Run’, there’s this beautiful scene where De Niro goes back to—he has to visit his ex-wife and his daughter, and he needs money, and his daughter’s coming out with a piggy bank, trying to give him money.
I mean, I think some of these best movies have these kind of very memorable dramatic scenes. I’m hoping they take away some grounded stuff. I mean, look, the movie’s bonkers. It’s a crazy ass movie and that was the goal. It’s super unpredictable, but yeah, hopefully they’ll take away some some gravitas.
AF: It was so nice to meet you.
Greenfield: Yeah, absolutely. Great questions by the way. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.