Ghost Town

Ghost Town began as I’m sure many scripts do, in a bar over drinks, talking about the stories we want to make. This night was three years ago, and as my 20s began to fade and my 30s grew closer and closer, the world felt like it was shifting. My responsibilities grew bigger, no longer was it acceptable to head to the bar after a shoot and tie one on with the crew when your fiance was waiting for you at home. Suddenly, the morning after started getting tougher and tougher. Work began to slide, relationships began to falter, and I began to close off. I began to notice something different in me. I was ordering a little bit more than everyone else. I realized that I was instigating these plans and doing everything I could to block out anything that got in the way. 

It was that night at the bar when the idea for making a short film about alcohol addiction struck and, as it turned out, my hometown had all the pieces to scratch the neo-western itch that I have been obsessed with. 

Fast forward a year and my drinking had only increased. I wasn’t just drinking when I went out anymore. It was every night alone in my office, stumbling to bed and my whiskey breath waking my wife up in the middle of the night. The only good that came out of that time was the first-hand insight into who these characters were and how they felt as I began to piece the script together. 

As the year went on, my addiction got better, it got worse, it stayed the same. The chaotic ups and downs and intense self-work trying to battle this thing started to weigh heavily on me and, I felt the only way I could truly understand and process this situation was to express my feelings through the characters of Rick and Claire. 

As my addiction came to a head and I began to see that I was truly addicted to alcohol, I realized that Rick and Claire were equally helpless in his addiction. That it would take Rick making the choice no matter what Claire did. However, feeling the love and support of others who have stayed by your side even when you’ve done everything you can to push them away, acts like a machete. Chopping away at the limbs and branches that addiction encases your brain with and shows you that choice is a lot simpler to make than you thought. 

I’m happy to say the journey of making this film, the absolute emotional dismantling of my life and addiction, has been an immense inspiration in my path and pilgrimage into sobriety. 

- Ryan