Where’d you go to shoot?
Evans: The thing about skateboarding with this film… The name of the film is We Are Blood. It’s about that connection around the world that all skateboarders share. Paul and I both based in Los Angeles so we started there. We did a huge US tour where we got a RV and traveled around the US for seven weeks. Met so many amazing people. Then from there we went international. Went to China and skated all these amazing places in China. We went to Barcelona, Spain and skated out there. We just recently got back from Dubai. We go to all these different places around the world and we meet all these amazing people and connect with these other skateboarders, and that’s what it’s all about.
Even when we went to Dubai, the skateboard scene is blossoming. It’s growing. We saw these amazing spots that were untouched. Had never been skated before. We met all these kids who had never met pros but know about skating. It made their day meeting these guys. It was just such an amazing experience making this film. This film is bigger than skateboarding. This film is about that connection that we all share. It’s not that skateboarding connects us all, it’s that we’re all like-minded individuals. That’s what drew us to skateboarding and made us skateboarders.
How much of the ultimate narrative of the film did you have in mind going in?
Evans: Ultimately we wanted to set out to make a film about the connection of skateboarding. Being skateboarders, there are a million things that we could show about skateboarding. Obviously we can’t show everything in this film. I really decided to set out on having Paul as the central voice, but also having this cast of these other skaters. Chris Colbourn, Jordan Maxham, Tiago Lemos, Chase Webb, Clint Walker, Clive Dixon. They’re the main guys under Paul’s wing who really go and experience the world.
Paul has been through a lot of this. He’s been in skateboarding for a long time. I feel like it was almost refreshing for him to go on this trip and make this film and see things through their eyes. He kind of reflected back to the 13-year-old version of himself that was these kids. I think ultimately that’s what this whole film is about. It’s about the connection of skateboarding. Paul is this huge person within skateboarding and him going through the motions of making this film and coming full circle and seeing that 13-year-old skater still inside of him traveling the world and sharing this bond with all the skaters he travels the world with. Plus, meeting all these other skaters across the globe as we go along.
Rodriguez: Skateboarding’s a hell of a thing man. You fall in love with it and once you get hooked, it’s similar to being a hardcore drug addict. You are obsessed. You’re run by this thing. You don’t’ have time for anything else except skateboarding. I’ve been very fortunate in getting a level of recognition in skateboarding, and I’ve been there for a while now. Like Ty was saying, it was refreshing.
Skating with these guys, the guys you see on the poster, they’re just getting to that point. They’re just about to touch their dreams. Just starting to get some taste of getting in the industry. That was refreshing to remind me how that was me also. I was that same kid. I had those same desires. Those same goals. So when I caught myself bitching and moaning or complaining about certain things, I reminded myself by seeing how enthusiastic these guys are about everything. It’s like, hey man, this is what dreamt about. What is your problem? I had to keep checking myself a lot over this process. I think I really needed that. Like he was saying, whether a person has been skating for a long time and it’s getting you back in touch with that 13-year-old kid when you started skating, or if you are a 13-year-old kid who is being exposed to skateboarding for the first time. This is really speaking to that.
That concludes the interview, but we’d like to thank Paul and Ty for taking the time to talk. We Are Blood releases August 2015 and will be available digitally and on Blu-Ray.