Film

Making movies is an enormous joy. It is also a daunting challenge. There is an unofficial dictum for making movies that goes something like this; Never make a movie with kids, animals or snow.’ When producer Ken Kragen and I decided to produce a movie called, The 12 Dogs of Christmas, we threw the warning out the window. Like so many of the good things in life, coloring outside the lines’ can be a bit risky, but can often result in something surprising and delightful. The original 12 Dogs of Christmas became a holiday favorite. It has sold well over a million copies and returns to the shelves every Christmas.

“Let’s do it again,” Ken said. I was having dinner with Ken and his darling wife, Cathy at our favorite little restaurant in Beverly Hills.

Images of kids, dogs and snow scampered up from memory and taunted me with the joy and terror of doing it all again. 74 kids who had never been in front of a camera. 57 dogs that had never been trained. Hauling snow from a ski resort 20 miles away when spring came early to Bethel, Maine.            

The parenthetical addendum to don’t make movies with kids, dogs or snow’ is; If you MUST have one or all of these in your movie, make sure you have lots of extra time and plenty of money.’ We had neither on the first movie. I knew that producing a sequel would likewise demand a modest budget and be equally constrained.

The original 12 Dogs of Christmas was based on a children’s book created by Ken’s daughter, Emma. She loves dogs. She grew up with boxers in the house. When she was seven years old, she wrote a parody of the 12 Days of Christmas on the back of a placemat in a restaurant. She made every gift a dog. “On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me, a poodle in a dog house.” On the 2nd day, it was “two Saint Bernards” and so on. She replaced the increasingly grand gifts of the old English carol with canine companions; “Cocker Spaniels, Basset Hounds, Golden Retrievers, Boxers, Huskies, Sheepdogs, , Chihuahuas, Dalmatians and Labs.” On the 12^th Day of Christmas she surprised everyone with “a Cat!”

Ken Kragen and friends

Ken Kragen is the quintessential talent manager and one of Hollywood’s good guys’. The same out of the box creative thinking he used to promote his clients and build careers gave him an idea. He published the parody as a kid’s book with pictures. It sold 600,000 copies! He gave me one for Christmas. I came into my office toward the end of the holidays and found two of my grandkids curled up in my big leather chair with Emma’s book on their lap. The older was reading to the younger even though she was too young to read. The pictures told the story and the lyric was easy to remember. I took a picture and sent it to Ken. He called me back. “Let’s make it into a movie.”

I loved the idea and plunged into a screenplay. To say that the original movie is based on the book’ is true, but the book has 27 pages of pictures and 300 words, most of them repetitious like the folk lyric. The screenplay was based on a story idea by Steven Paul Leiva who had made a first pass by the time Ken called me. I locked myself away in creative seclusion and wrote the first draft screenplay in 14 days. We made changes as we forged ahead, anxious to catch the last of the snow.

It is not as simple as it sounds, but Ken’s call came on January 4. Just 80 days later we were on location in Bethel, Maine shooting a full-length, live-action feature film. We picked Bethel, Maine because according to the almanac they always had snow until late April and the town seemed unchanged since the 1930’s.

12 Dogs of Christmas is a movie about kids and dogs. I’ve had lots of both in my life. My wife, Dagny, and I are blessed with 8 children. Grandchildren are the natural result. In spite of being on the other side of the continent, my daughters brought their children to Bethel to be in the movie. On the day we put them in front of the camera, I quipped that, it was the most expensive family home movie ever shot.’

We called our venture Kragen/Merrill Family films. Emma Kragen wrote the book. One of my sons was 2nd unit director and edited the film. The other son co-produced. My daughter played Mrs. Clancey and Ken’s wife also had a role. A gaggle of grandkids ended up in the movie. Family-related as the first one was, we had no idea that years later we would do it again and this time the movie would give family movie’ an entirely different meaning.

But, here we were, having dinner and considering a sequel. Kids, dogs and snow on a tight budget. We survived it once. Did we really want to inveigle the fickle finger of filmmaking fate again? Knowing Ken I knew the answer without asking the question. When Ken Kragen gets a intuitive notion about something good it is a fait accompli. Ken Kragen’s favorite aphorism is, “It’s easier to do the impossible than the ordinary.” The affirmation is in the remarkable accomplishments of his professional life.

In spite of the daunting challenges, working with Ken on the first movie ranked high on my list of favorite projects. Kids, dogs and snow? Piece of cake. Let’s do it! We brainstormed ideas and I promised him a screenplay.

 

The unreasonably short distance on the first movie between, “let’s make a movie” to being on location with cameras rolling 80 days later rather skewed our expectations. The screenplay for 12 Dogs of Christmas: Great Puppy Rescue took much longer than 14 days. Ken and I were immersed in other projects. We talked about it, I wrote a brief synopsis but the focus demanded for the screenplay eluded me. It was Dagny who got me acquainted with Ken Kragen years ago (that story in a moment). It was Dagny who kick started things once again.

I was puffing my way through a 3 mile workout on my elliptical when she came into the room and stopped me. “You need to write the 12 Dogs of Christmas sequel for Ken,” she said . Dagny has remarkable instincts and an intuitive sense I’ve come to trust. She adores Ken Kragen because she has endured so many movie business wannabes, deceivers or downright crackpots. Ken is the real deal at every level and from the moment he said sequel,’ Dagny pushed 12 Dogs of Christmas: Great Puppy Rescue to the top of her list.

One of my favorite places on the planet is my writer’s cottage.

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It is in the woods of the Sierra foothills surrounded by a rose garden. No phones. No email. It is dedicated to creative seclusion and writing. I went there and started the script that day. My idea was to tell the story in real time’ as it were, by reentering the lives of our characters 5 years later.

The original story was set in 1932. Cathy Stevens runs an orphanage for dogs abandoned by their owners during the Great Depression. The town of Doverville has an ordinance that prohibits dogs within the city limits. The mayor’s bumbling brother is the evil dog catcher determined to close down the Stevens farm and exile the dogs.

Emma O’Conner’s is sent to Doverville to stay with her aunt’ Delores when her mother dies and her father can no longer take care of her. She becomes pals with Mikey Stevens and together they take on the dastardly dogcatcher Doyle to save the dogs. Ultimately, they must change the hearts and minds of an entire town and doing so demands something spectacular. They put on a a big, bold wonderful show called The 12 Dogs of Christmas. The town is turned. The dogcatcher gets his comeuppance and Emma’s father comes in time for Christmas.

In the sequel, Emma returns to Doverville for Cathy Steven’s funeral and is reacquainted with her best pal Mikey. Sudden and unexpected circumstances plunge her into a desperate quest to save the dog orphanage once again. Like the original, the movie is reminiscent of the Mickey Rooney classics of early cinema. “Let’s do a show!” Win hearts. Raise money. Save the dogs.

One of the script notes from a Hollywood producer, was that, the story felt a bit cliche’. Of course it does. The only bad thing about clich is being called cliche.’ The good thing is that a cliche becomes cliche because it’s used over and over. It is used over and over because certain ideas always work. 12 Dogs of Christmas: Great Puppy Rescue replicates the structure of the original. It is a story vehicle often used and always with success. Cliche? Maybe, but this film is filled with fresh ideas, originality and twists and turns you won’t expect.

The characters are well drawn, compelling and brought to life beautifully by an extremely talented cast including Sean Patrick Flanery, (The Adventures of the Young Indiana Jones, Boondock Saints,The Young & Restless), D.B. Sweeney (Lonesome Dove, Fire In The Sky, Dinosaur), Danielle Chuchran (Dr. Seuss’ Cat In The Hat, Minor Details), and introduces Alli Simpson. The audience’s reactions to the film, particularly among the younger, target audience, has been delightful.

The DOVE Foundation has awarded the film its coveted seal of approval. Ken’s intuitive sense that we needed to do a sequel has been vindicated in a major way.

“I don’t do television!” It was the first thing I ever said to Ken Kragen. Of course I had no idea that I was talking to the quintessential talent manager of the world. I was still aglow from winning an Academy Award for Great American Cowboy. I was still suspended in that deceptive ether of celebrity. Still breathing the synthetic oxygen of fame. I thought that I was hot stuff. It was one more call. One more offer. I’d gotten a lot of them since Raquel Welch handed me the Oscar and I got to kiss the sexiest woman in Hollywood. I didn’t care who it was on the phone.

“I don’t do television,” I said again when he explained the project and asked whether I’d be interested in directing the filmed sequences for the big TV spectacular he was producing for CBS – “Kenny Rogers and the American Cowboy.”

“I’m only interested in doing feature films,” I elaborated. Had I known who Ken Kragen was, had I had any idea how that phone call would influence my life for good, I would have dropped to one knee, said, “Yes sir, that would be a great honor.” I’ll never forget the next thing he said to me.

“Feature films? Really. More people will see your work in one night on television than will see all of the feature films you make combined over your lifetime.”

That gave me pause, but I said, “No Thanks.”

“Are you nuts?” Dagny is my pal, my partner, my best friend and my wife. That was her response when we took a walk that night to debrief the day and I told her I’d passed on a show with Kenny Rogers. Twelve years into our marriage she knew I was a little nuts without asking, but she’d mastered a gentle way of slapping me up the side of the head.

“We never say no to projects,” she reminded me. It was true. We had managed to launch our film company and stay in business by doing every worthy project that came within reach. “Call him back and tell him you’ve changed your mind,” she suggested. “So what if it’s television? You love Kenny Rogers and you ARE a cowboy.”

She had a point. I grew up in Farmington, Utah and went to work on a farm when I was 12 years old. I moved cattle everyday from the back of a quarterhorse named Boots. Believe it or not, I spent much of the summer I turned 16 wearing a Colt 45 in a cowboy gunslinger fast draw holster in public like Gary Cooper walking the streets of Hadleyville in the classic western, High Noon. Times have changed, you think?

Dagny has never been wrong. I called Ken Kragen back the next morning. “How many viewers in a single night,” I mused.

“Fifty million or more,” Ken said. I could feel him smiling on the other end. I would come to know Ken Kragen as one of the truly good guys of Hollywood. He was so gracious and enthusiastic. So complimentary. He made it easy for me to find face-saving way to change my mind. To condescend‘ to doing television. I was pretty stupid when I was young. It would be become one of the best projects and associations of my career.

Within days we were wandering the wilds of the vast Spanish Ranch of Northern Nevada. We spent the summer making Kenny Rogers and the American Cowboy. Ken Kragen and I became fast friends. It is a cherished friendship that has lasted from that day to this.

Kragen/Merrill Family films takes on a new meaning with this sequel to 12 Dogs of Christmas. Like the original, the show ends with a huge Christmas Show based on Emma Kragen’s book and lyric, “The 12 Dogs of Christmas.” That is the central creative core around which any story based on the book’ must revolve. And so it does. The kids are older. The show is bigger. With a solid but modest budget, Ken and I knew we needed to call on family to pull it off. It isn’t as much about cost as it is commitment. Not as much about money as magnifying what we can afford into something significantly beyond expectations.

We decided to shoot the film in Utah. Heber Valley for Bethel, Maine. Why not? Our pal, Marshall Moore of the Utah Film Commission enticed us with the generous incentive offered by the Utah Office of Economic Development.

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Not to mention, of course, many of the filmmakers in Utah have cut their teeth on the myriad films I have shot there. Utah was closer for family, and family would be a huge factor in making the movie and making it great.

Emma Kragen shot the behind the scene documentary on the first film as an amateur. She returns as a film professional and assistant cameraperson on her way to a Masters degree from one of the top film schools in the world. In the midst of it all she was accepted to the prestigious cinematography program at UCLA.

My oldest daughter, Kieri Merrill Coombs, began performing when she was 11 years old. She graduated in musical dance theater from Brigham Young University. She became the creative director for Performing Groups for Youth and spent 18 years teaching, training, choreographing, writing and directing live shows. Her performing groups have been children, tweens and teens of all ages. The script for the big show in the final screenplay was only two pages. Nothing more than cryptic notes. But having seen so many of Kieri’s shows, I knew she only needed the seeds of an idea to create one of her inimitable spectacles. It almost seemed as if everything Kieri has been doing for the past two decades were in preparation to help her dad pull of the finale of 12 Dogs of Christmas: Great Puppy Rescue.

Family. Utah. Hmmmm? We had another family ace up the sleeve. Mindy Smoot Robbins married my nephew, Connor. She started performing at 4 years old and turned professional at 16. She has played Maria in the “Sound of Music,” Eliza Doolittle in “My Fair Lady,” Annie Oakley in “Annie Get Your Gun,” toured with “Les Miserables” and performed in numerous other shows. She founded On Broadway Academy and is recognized as one of the finest vocal coaches in the business.

Kieri and Mindy working together! What could be better? Fabulous Talent. Famous folks and family dedication.   A friend of mine used to say “nepotism is the order of the universe.” Only those with a particular belief and understanding will understand the implications, but for me there was no compromise. We were fortunate to persuade these talented woman to tackle the task.    

Kieri and Mindy started with a simple page of script, the lyrics of a song written by a seven-year-old girl who loved dogs and the movie score from the wonderfully talented musical composer, John-Kevin Hilbert. By keeping the original folk tune, adding classic carols and upbeat rhythms of today they managed to mash the past and present into something beautiful. The big show is the finale of the film and features 120 kids and 50 dogs. Kieri and Mindy are magicians.

With Kieri, Mindy and Emma engaged as key members of our team, it was a Kragen/Merrill FAMILY film even before the grandkids arrived. When that happened family film’ took on an entirely different meaning. 12 Dogs of Christmas: Great Puppy Rescue undoubtedly sets a world record for “a filmmaker with the most grandchildren appearing in a movie.” There are 23.

Over the years Dagny has read every script and given her notes. She is always intuitive, always helpful. Not this time. She did not focus on story or structure or character. Her notes were the names of her grandchildren and where she thought they were best suited to the particular number in the big show finale. Curiously, she was right and for every name she wrote, a grandchild appeared and played a role and did a terrific job. If any of this seems outrageous, you need to understand that Dagny started a non-profit foundation for the performing arts 30 years ago. Everyone of the 23 grandchildren who performed in the movie have been on stage as performers in musical dance theater and broadway reviews many times.

Having so much family involved was delightful. It was also challenging. It was hard not to shoot an extra take or two on the couple of scenes where grandkids had a line. The funniest was my granddaughter Brielle. Brielle is 7. She is Kieri’s youngest and has thus grown up either on the stage performing, back stage helping, or on the front row at rehearsals watching her mom direct. She was cast as a reindeer in the nine Chihuahuas chomping number. Watching Kieri choreograph the cheerleaders Brielle decided she needed a bigger part. She came up to me on the set with all the formality of a professional actor and requested a role as a cheerleader. I said, “How about cheering in the audience?” She thought about it.

“Can I have a pom pom?” she asked.

“Of course,” I said. The basketball game and scenes with the cheerleaders were shot in an old high school in Murray, Utah over a couple of days. I was happy to see that Brielle had been placed among the fans and given a pom pom. At the first break I felt a tug on my pant leg. I looked down. It was Brielle.

“When are we shooting my scene?” she asked.

“Well, these are all your scenes,” I explained. “One of our cameras is always pointed at the fans.”

“Yeah, I know,” she said with an indignant tone in her voice that let me know I was not giving her enough credit for understanding how movies are made. “But when are you doing my close up?”

Well, you know the rest of this story. On the last set up of the sequence, I told the B-Camera operator to put on the long lens and feature Brielle. A close up! We did one extra pass to make sure we got it and sure enough in the final edit, there she was. For only two seconds but a big as life close up of Brielle.

In her review of the final edit Dagny sat with her spiral notebook and pen making notes to make sure all of the grandkids who showed up on the set ended up in the movie. Happily no changes were necessary. Our terrific editor filmmaker John Lyde had already managed it. When John finishes making movie he can become a diplomat.

12 Dogs of Christmas: The Great Puppy Rescue has been one of those dream projects. It is a simple story, a warm and fuzzy film with kids and dogs and family values and heads straight to video on October 9. But as the filmmaker who holds the world’s record for the most grandchildren appearing in a movie directed by him – a record I suspect Guinness doesn’t care much about – I have to thank by pal and partner, Ken Kragen for allowing me to give Kragen/Merrill Family Films a whole new meaning, to our families who contributed so much and to Dagny for making sure that none of her precious brood ended up on the editing room floor.