Masked, armed men piled out of a vehicle across the street from the courthouse in downtown Shawnee.
And yet, most of Shawnee continued to go about its normal activities as if nothing particularly out of the ordinary was happening that day in 2020.
The group of men? Actors on a film shoot for writer, director and producer Kyle Kauwika Harris’ latest production and first feature length crime thriller, ‘Out of Exile’.
The City of Shawnee was already aware of the film’s presence in town, due in part to conversations between the film’s producers and Stacy Cramer Moore, director of Shawnee Tourism Department, and now director of the Shawnee Film + Music Office.
“They are absolute professionals,” Moore said. “They really knew how to organize their cast and crew, and just made the whole experience very enjoyable.”
Harris said he enjoyed the process of collaborating with the city and tourism department. “They were so excited
“They were so excited about helping out, and I think that’s, it makes it fun for filmmakers— like me anyways—when people are excited about the project, and they want to help out and support you,” he said.
Out of Exile was filmed in approximately 20 SAG (Screen Actors Guild) union days, and roughly a third of the film was shot in and around Shawnee, including at locations such as the department of tourism’s Visit Shawnee offices, and a residence on Broadway.
“This [Shawnee] is really a gem in the state that a lot of people don’t know about,” Out of Exile lead actor Adam Hampton said at a private screening of the film, Oct. 1. “And frankly, I’m super protective about it because I don’t want people coming into this place and taking advantage of the hospitality. This is an amazing place to film.”
A graduate of Dale High School, Hampton is a longtime resident of Pottawatomie County, and the host of the Grand Casino Hotel & Resort’s award winning Play It Loud series.
He and Harris had already worked together on a short film—Prone To Violence—which was created for a 48 hour film challenge in 2019.
“I was having dinner with Adam [Hampton] and Wilson [Navas], who plays Marcos in Out of Exile,” Harris said, Friday, “and we’re having dinner and they’re like ‘Why don’t we just make this into a feature?’ and that’s sort of where I started thinking like, okay, you know, I’m gonna write this movie.”
The conversation sparked the idea of making a similar but separate feature film in which Hampton and Kyle Henry would play brothers, like they did in Prone To Violence.
“I loved Kyle Henry. I loved how enthusiastic he was,” Hampton said, “and it’d turned out he had messaged me years ago and said ‘Hey, I think we should play brothers in something’.”
The feature film in which Henry and Hampton played brothers, eventually developed into Out of Exile.
The decision to film Out of Exile in Oklahoma, and partially in Shawnee, came from several factors, including a need to keep costs low, the challenges of the Covid-19 pandemic, and Harris’ desire to direct the film himself.
To prepare for filming, Henry, Hampton and other cast members practiced the action sequences together regulating prior to shooting the film, under the supervision and training of the film’s Armorer & Weapons Trainer, Matthew Moulton.
“Being trained by Matt gave us confidence with the firearms, but also, it’s also a very good bonding experience, so that when we step on set, we already feel a kinship,” Hampton said.
This sense of kinship was especially important because of the themes of brotherhood and complex sibling relationships that underscore the movie.
“The time that you spend with people preparing, that nobody knows about, it really is the beauty of a shared experience that unless you’ve done it, you really—it’s very unique. It’s hard to explain it,” Hampton said.
Estranged family relationships occur in many of Harris’ scripts.
“All the stories I write in some ways have to do with like fathers and sons who are disconnected or family that’s disconnected and they’re trying to understand each other,” Harris said. “And if they would just listen they would probably just work things out.”
Out of Exile’ primarily focuses on Gabe (Adam Hampton), a “recently paroled thief” who is trying “to balance his life and mend a troubled family as a determined FBI agent hunts down him and his crew,” according to the film’s imdb page.
“He [Gabe] really has tried to bury the more violent aspects of his personality and his baser capabilities. He’s good at being bad and he’s trying to not be,” Hampton said.
The Shawnee Film + Music Office hosted a private screening of an unfinished edit of the film at Cinema 8, Wednesday, Sept. 29, followed by a Q&A with several members of the cast and crew.
However, the film’s public release date remains under wraps as it finishes post-production, since it is still in negotiations with potential distributors.
Harris said he is hoping for a March 2022, world premiere and both he and Hampton said they hope that future audiences will be impacted by the story.
“I hope that they feel that it was an authentic story told with sincerity and grit,” Hampton said.
Additionally, Harris said plans are already underway for future projects.
“They are anticipating shooting more in the Shawnee area and we welcome them back just because they were such a good group to work with,” Moore said.
