Interview with director Ti West of ‘The Innkeepers’

The Innkeepers, the new film from director Ti West, investigates all the things that go bump in the night at the eerie Yankee Pedlar Inn, a hotel set to close its doors for good. Claire (Sara Paxton) and Luke (Pat Healy) are watching the front desk, but there aren’t too many guests … at least not of the living kind.

The haunted horror film is set to be released Feb. 3, but audiences can catch an early glimpse with video on demand. Recently, Hollywood Soapbox talked with Paxton and West about the new movie. Here, we present our interview with West. (Click here for our talk with Paxton.)

How did this project start for you?

I guess it started when we made The House of the Devil a few years ago. We stayed at this hotel, and we stayed there just because it’s a cheap place to stay. And we would drive about 30 minutes to set every day to make this satanic horror movie, but weirder things would happen back at the hotel where we were staying.

I didn’t think too much of it at the time. I just thought of it as being funny stories. And then about a year later when I was trying to think of what to do next, I wanted to do a ghost story, and I thought, ‘What if I just made the ghost story like the one I lived?’

So I wrote it about the experiences we had at the Yankee Pedlar. And then we called the Yankee Pedlar to see if they would let us shoot there, and they said, ‘Yes.’ And the next thing I knew we were back there making a movie. It was really an odd way to do things.

The hotel management liked the idea of having a ghost story filmed there?

They seemed into it and they also could use the money of a movie crew staying there for a while. It was like a double whammy.

Is it a creepy hotel?

It’s not scary because it’s kind of a cooky place. There’s a weird vibe there, for sure. I’m sure Sara told you little ghostie things. I don’t believe in ghosts. The only one I think was really weird is that in the movie, the room we use for the most haunted room, like the honeymoon suite, the only reason I used that room was because it was on the third floor at the end of the hallway and it was big enough to do a dolly shot. It was purely technical reasons.

When we wrapped I found out that that is the most haunted room in real life. And it could just be a coincidence, but it’s a weird one. And when you add it up with all the other things that were going on. It’s a strange place, for sure.

How did you find these actors?

Well, Pat (Healy) is someone I knew a little bit in real life. I just e-mailed him and said, ‘Do you want to be in this movie?’ And he did. So that was pretty easy.

Sara is someone who came in more through the normal channels, like her agent submitting her. And I wasn’t that familiar with her. But we started talking, and she really got the vibe of the movie, which a lot of people didn’t. She was not quite what I expected her to be, and I wouldn’t say she is like the character in the movie, but she’s more like that than she is like the characters in some of the other movies she’s been in.

We just all got along really well. Pat and Sara and their characters, Luke and Claire, are not that far removed from who they are as people. And our sensisbilites are all the same. I’m not trying to say that it wasn’t hard for them to do it, but it was really like perfectly in their wheelhouse. If that makes sense. I just found two people that I was like, ‘If I put them in these roles, they will really excel and then make me good.’

Had distribution been set up when you shot the film?

The company that paid for it, this company called Dark Sky Films, they are our distributor and they could have distributed themselves if they wanted to. But with my previous film, The House of the Devil, they did the same thing. They made it and ended up selling some of the rights to Magnolia, and we just had such a great experience that we just opted to do the same thing this time around. And I couldn’t be happier. It’s like the place to have this movie.

Are you hopeful the new VOD strategy will work for The Innkeepers?

I’m certainly hopeful. It worked very well for The House of the Devil and that was two years ago. Hopefully, I would assume that video on demand is more popular thing than it was two years ago. So it should only be better. It gives people a chance to see a movie who otherwise wouldn’t. When it comes out on Feb. 3, it’s in every major city, but it’s not in Des Moines, Iowa. They are able to not miss it, and I think that’s progressive and valuable.

Have you loved the horror genre your entire life?

I think it’s probably my favorite genre. I think I’m more of a film fan in general, than I am a horror fan. My first film was a horror movie and it did well, so I made another movie that was a horror movie, and it did well. And I got another one. It just sort of snowballed into this.

I think I turned around one day and was a ‘horror director.’ I’m not opposed to it, but I guess it was an accident that it has happened. I have been able to write and direct all my movies thus far, so they all feel like my movies. That’s all that really matters to me. If you see it and go, ‘I can tell that that guy made them.’ And that’s why I make them, because the process of making them is a personal process for me. And if you can see my movies and go, ‘Oh, I can tell that it’s by this guy.’ Even if the movie is very different. Even if The House of the Devil and The Innkeepers are very different, you can be like, ‘I can see that it’s still that guy.’

As someone who doesn’t believe in ghosts, how do you approach this material?

(SPOILER ALERT)

I want to believe in ghosts, but I can’t until I see a ghost. I believe the movie can be rationalized in two ways: 1) There was ghosts and it’s a ghost story, and everything that Kelly McGillis’ character says is true. And it’s all meant to happen and it’s a haunted place and so forth.

Or, she’s a kook and it was Sara’s paranoia that ran rampant. And she got in over her head, which led her to panic more than she should have, and it ends up with her freaking out and having an asthma attack. There’s a skeptic way of looking at the movie and then there’s a believer way of looking at the movie, and I think that that’s part of what was important about making the movie to me. You can be one or the other, but the outcome is still the same.

Was it a difficult shoot?

It was remarkably easy. When I made The House of Devil, it was one catastrophe after another. It was a very difficult shoot. And this one was payback where things just didn’t go wrong.

Do you have plans for your next project?

I have a science-fiction movie that I think is likely to happen next.

Do you have a career highlight?

Certainly not Cabin Fever 2, just because that was taken away from me and re-edited by the studio and I tried to take my name off it. You can’t really enjoy your own movies. It’s like hearing your voice on tape. But I feel personally that The Innkeepers is my best movie, and, at this moment in time, the most enjoyable one for me to talk about.

By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com