Filmmaker Lightell Chats Fetish to Farce on Manbaby

Local filmmaker Tim Lightell has released a Manbaby into the world.

The film is about Sal and Dana, a married couple who encounter a snag in their relationship when Dana reveals she doesn't want kids. Sal comes up with a harebrained scheme: he pretends he's been transformed into a baby, to try to trick Dana into getting on board with the idea of children. Yet, his plan doesn't work out exactly as he hoped.

Tim and I sat down for a chat about Manbaby and all things filmmaking in Seattle.

Zach Youngs (ZY): What was the movie that made you want to be a filmmaker?

Tim Lightell (TL): I guess… The Wizard of Oz. The Wizard of Oz was the first movie that I was made aware of the fact that there was a production behind the movie. I feel like the switch from black and white to color is the thing where I was like, "Oh, wait, somebody chose to do that. Why did they choose to do that?"

ZY: Where did the story for Manbaby come from?

TL: It's a very mercenary thing. I was working in adult entertainment doing fetish videos as a part time, fun gig. I was looking at the analytics of what was successful, and the most successful in the store that I was working with were the diaper fetish [videos]. [It was] people being diapered and fake mommies, that sort of thing. I said, "Hmm, it seems like there's an audience for this sort of thing." 

This was also something I guess I had learned in school. I had a teacher, Leonard Schrader, my thesis professor, he always said, "[In] writing you take all the shit and negative things and make that into ice cream for people." That's what good writing is. [Turn] all your trauma and psychosexual problems and make that into something you can sell.

I guess pornography is the clear expression of that, but pornography's not mainstream in any way. So the idea behind Manbaby was to make something for everyone, something that's a general audience kind of movie. That's not what [Manbaby] turned out to be, but that was the original thrust.

Still from Manbaby / press kit

ZY: What made you pick a comedian for your manbaby?

TL: That was part of trying to mainstream it. In an earlier draft he was an actor, but [a comedian] is a way to make it identifiable as someone that is sympathetic. I feel like comedian's a pretty hard job and [that makes them] inherently sympathetic to me.  

ZY: How would you describe the genre of the film?

TL: We mainly try to call it a fairy tale in the press materials and not make it a genre. It's advertised as a comedy. I am trying to do a Quentin Tarantino thing where it's mixing genres. I'm trying to do a little horror, a little comedy, a little art. Ultimately it is more of an art film than anything else because it does all those things. 

ZY: What was it like to shoot in Seattle?

TL: Great. I think Seattle's a great place to make movies. I wish more people would make movies here. It's always that spitting misty kind of [rain]. It's nice for filming because it's always that flat light. You don't get the harsh shadows.

[The city of] Seattle makes it very easy. You can get a blanket permit for very cheap as long as you're not blocking streets. [The Office of Economic Development] was very accommodating. 

I've lived here for 15 years now and I can't imagine living anywhere else. What drew me here is the independent spirit of the arts. Maybe I'm being a little bold by saying there's a line from Grunge to Manbaby, but I think there is. We made a movie completely outside of Hollywood, completely here in Seattle the way that Grunge [musicians] were making music completely outside of New York and L.A. Doing something that struck a chord in the whole country. I don't know that Manbaby did that, but that is the same spirit.

Manbaby does have a feeling of Seattle. [Where the film takes place is] not supposed to be Seattle. It's like Springfield [the geographically nebulous town where The Simpsons takes place]. [Though] you can't help that [when] you're shooting in Seattle that local [feel] rubs off on it. The kind of anonymous nature of Seattle fits with the story. The sort of "Anytown" vibes are what I like about it.

ZY: How did you assemble the actors and crew? Were they all local?

TL: Yeah, all local. The only person who wasn't a true local was the other producer and editor [Joseph Campanale]. I got everybody through the usual local channels, Facebook groups and performer call boards. We did the auditions and script read throughs at Theatre Puget Sound. Worked with [them] through casting, too.

A lot of the equipment and crew was provided by the Seattle Film Institute. I'm a teacher at SFI now, but at the time I was not a student, I was just some guy [laughs] who connected with a student there [who] connected me with some of the faculty [about equipment]. We wound up getting a lot of the equipment basically for free because that was part of his tuition. 

ZY: How did the film get onto the streaming platform Tubi?

TL: Another kind of local connection. After the movie was finished, we were [taking] it to distributors and trying to get people to watch it to try and get a theatrical or online release. We had some interest from some companies that are not that reputable.

Poster for Manbaby / press kit

I was on a local film podcast, Around the Reel, when the movie was premiering. [The hosts] loved it, thought it was funny and they told me how they were using a platform [that's kind of] an aggregator. [The aggregator] has no upfront fees and gets your movie in front of all the big streamers, even Netflix potentially. You create a package of the information about your movie and submit it. I would have never known about it in all my research except for these other local filmmakers.

ZY: What's next for you?

TL: I am writing another script. Manbaby took like 10 years to make, so I'm hoping it doesn't take as long to get another one up and running, but you never know. My producing partner [Joseph Campanale] and I are writing a movie about internet culture that we're pretty excited about. I'm hoping to get that script finished soon. It's been a couple of years in the making already. I also have some ideas for some shorts that I would like to try and get to sooner. That's what's in the pipeline.

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Learn more about Manbaby on the official website. The film is available for streaming on Tubi if you’d like to see some real Seattle locations on screen.