An Interview with April Mullen, co-creator of Rock, Paper, Scissors: The Way of the Tosser

At Toronto's Fan Expo 2009, it's not unusual to see grown men and women walking around in ridiculous costumes.  From zombies, to Imperial Storm Troopers, to anime characters, to a proliferation of young women in old school Star Trek skirt uniforms, nothing is considered too strange to wear in public, even fluffy tutus, long socks, and short-shorts.

Convention guests April Mullen and Tim Doiron's costumes are unusual, however, because the characters they are dressed as are their own creations: the tutu sporting Holly Brewer and short-shorts/mustache wielding Gary Brewer, protagonists of the Canadian cult comedy indie hit Rock, Paper, Scissors: The Way of the Tosser.

Mullens and Doiron are dynamos of energy, manning their booth, handing out flyers, and posing for pictures for the duration of the day, always with smiles on their faces.

"We just got our Alliance DVD release last Tuesday," says Mullen, clearly excited, "so the film is on shelves everywhere across the country now!"

Somehow the goofy costume only emphasizes Mullen's movie-star-in the-making-beauty, and her undeniable charisma shines through as she talks about the film she has put so much into.

Mullen & Doiron in costume

April Mullen: It's about a guy who is obsessed with Rock, Paper, Scissors, and quests to reign supreme at the world championships; which happen every year, believe it or not. It's also a love story, and a story about friendship.

What were the origins of the film?

While we were in University, we read an article about the Rock, Paper, Scissors world championships, and we thought, "Hmmm, that's interesting!  Lets check it out."  What we discovered was an unbelievable world, where people go dressed up in costumes to toss, and it was just so inspiring that we had to do a film.

I understand you shot three years ago?

Yes.  We shot it at the 2006 Championships, and we did a theatrical release the next year, and the year after that we did a tour of every major university and playing tournament, showing the film.  Because of the ground swell and how much press we got - we were on Much Music, E Talk - Alliance (Canada's leading motion picture distributor) sought us out and picked us up.  And now we're finally out on DVD!

Considering it took three years to reach this point, the movie must be a real labor of love.

It is a labor of love, and now we're onto our second film, called Gravy Train.  It stars Tim Meadows, Colin Mochrie, Jennifer Dale, and Kyle Schmid, so we're on the up and up!

Did you fund Tosser yourselves?

We did everything on our own with private funding; which was basically ourselves and our credit cards.  Telefilm helped us with the alternative

Tosser's DVD packaging

Did you use a professional crew from around Toronto?

No.  We used just a whole bunch of indie people from Ryerson, because we went to Ryserson University.  Tim and I are, unfortunately, professional actors, so we had to go with the actors union, ACTRA, rates. But other than that, it was just a really small crew, maybe twelve of us, including cast, who all had a heart of gold.  The hours were crazy.  Gravy Train was much bigger and was all pro.

Is Gravy Train still shooting?

We're done shooting, and onto sound design right now, so we're creating all the sound and music. We're almost finished.  We're hoping to be at Sundance Slamdance this coming winter.

It's more of an accelerated release schedule on this one then?

This one was much faster.  It happened really quick, actually.  We just shot it this year, and it will be out within the year's end.

How many days was the Gravy Train shoot?

23, which is a regular feature.  But Tosser was only 7 days.  It was crazy.

Mullen, Doiron, and co-star Ryan Tilley

Barely.  It was like, "What are we doing next?!"  We block-shot everything, so we changed wardrobe in-between takes, and kept a lot of it in the same location.  It was really a very tight shooting schedule.

But now you are reaping the benefits of all that hard work!

We are.  It is in stores and we are selling copies off of our website. It's been great.  So far the release has been fabulous, actually.

You've had some festival success as well.

We did really well.  We won a lot of awards in the United Kingdom.  We did the Cambridge film festival, that was our world premier, and we won the audience top pick.  We went to Sweden, then we went to Los Angeles and we won the audience choice award again.  Then in Edmonton too we won best Canadian feature.

Why do you think audiences are responding to the film so well?

I think it's because we bring the characters to life.  Our whole motto, because we couldn't afford posters and all of the big blockbuster marketing campaign, was to bring the characters to life for interaction with people.  We're dressed in our fluffy tutus, long socks, and short shorts, and I think people find it really exciting to meet people that are involved in the film, and to play Rock, Paper, Scissors against them.  It's the one on one thing that helped us with the big ground swell of fans that we now have.

Are there Rock, Paper, Scissors techniques you have picked up while promoting this film?

There are!  I would say, for all of you out there who are just starting off, if you are playing against a guy who is really headstrong, or like a cop, or somebody who is really cocky and think they are going to win, they tend to throw rock first.  So go with paper and you'll beat them.  Sometimes, if you are confused and don't know what to throw, paper is the best bet because it's the least thrown toss.  I don't know why, but it just is!  So there you go, some hints for you (Cult)ure Magazine readers at home!

Rock, Paper, Scissors: The Way of the Tosser is in stores now.  Visit www.wayofthetosser.com for more info.

Kevin Johns is a senior editor and contributor of over 50 articles to (Cult)ure Magazine.  He can be reached at \n This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

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