Check Out RYAN PHILANDER’s Story

Today we’d like to introduce you to RYAN PHILANDER.

Hi RYAN, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
I came out to california to go to college and play soccer and ended up going to film school and finding a passion for storytelling in that world, and started finding work in that field once I graduated so stuck around. After college I worked as a TA at the New York Film Academy (at Universal Studios) and then started editing reality shows, then producing + editing sizzles for A-list talent and production companies to help them sell shows. I’ve continued to write features and long form, pilots and pitch shows from time to time. I’m trying to connect all the dots and make a feature or sell a show and it’s been two steps forward, one step back all the way up the mountain — with the pandemic, the strikes, the fires, just life being thrown at you — but we keep coming back and learning and moving forward. Still trying to create things that I think are interesting and important stories to tell.

Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
It’s been a challenge and most of the people that I went to school with are not working in film. I was lucky to have honed some of my craft in film school, particularly the ability to edit and and tell a story with the footage you have been provided. There are a million ways to tell a story. Editing and writing are things that are solitary but you can continue to get better at on your own, and deadlines provide the right conditions for following through. Writing is harder when you don’t have a team or external accountability to finish the pages, finish the script. I’ve had to figure out ways to set self-imposed deadlines. It’s hard because you get pigeon-holed into one discipline or another, and then it can be difficult for someone who is known as an editor or cinematographer or production designer to be seen as a writer or director or another part of the industry that they might have facility and dexterity in. You have to be like a shark and keep swimming and keep creating. Even if you’re just practicing, doing it for yourself and those involved – it’s still a challenge with the shifting landscape of streamers and networks grinding to a slow crawl and not greenlighting shows or productions leaving LA for tax incentives, but storytelling isn’t going away, even if it is morphing into a new iteration, be-it social, or branded or something else. It’s definitely not a smooth road, but if it were easy i guess everyone would do it, right?

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I’m a bit of a Swiss Army knife. Most of my paid work has been editing or working in a producer + editor capacity, but that is really directing just given a different name in the “unscripted” world. There is no “director” in reality tv or docuseries. Sometimes, someone is given that title on prestige documentaries but the heavy lifting is found in creating the story from all of the pieces that have been shot, choosing what is the most interesting and surprising story within the footage. In creating sizzles for people you might do a deep dive on something for a few weeks on something that you previously had no knowledge about – you hear interviews, find things out about a world, and craft it all – from the writing of voice over, creating of title cards, finding the story, choosing sound effect and music, designing an experience, one that is often retrofit or tailored for a specific viewer or network is a challenge, but can be fun.

The scripts I write are the movies that I want to see and my editing skills make you more efficient on the page. I’ve placed in a lot of contests and have been optioned a couple of times, but it’s hard to sell just a script these days, and getting it across the finish line does take a village. You seem to have to have found a “package” before you show up, despite people loving your writing. Adding a director with a name, and cast with their corresponding dollar signs is always an uphill battle.

What sets me apart from other writers or editors is I’ve done both and the in-between parts. The writer is there at the beginning in the ideation and actual writing of the story – the editor comes in the back half or quarter. They are putting it all together after it has been produced, bought, shot, directed etc – they polish and do a final rewrite. It would be really great to connect the dots all the way through from inception to final completion on a story that you’re passionate about telling and the way you want to tell it. Most of the time each person is just a cog in a big machine. I think the best stories have a singular vision, though.

We love surprises, fun facts and unexpected stories. Is there something you can share that might surprise us?
There’s a certain emotional signature to each piece I work on, the writing or the editing has something of me in it. We are all just arbiters of taste, from your music selection to your shot selection. So the stories I write are constructed line by line by what I choose to put in and what I choose to leave out, same thing with putting together a video. Someone has to choose which shot comes next and the rythym to it all. Your choices are sometimes wildly different from another editor’s, it’s a matter of degrees rather than right or wrong, but when you step back you generally know if something is working or it’s not. Your internal barometer or ltemus test is what you have to go with when you share it. And, of course there is a fine line – you can be sentimental in a piece without being overly precious. You can have a violent edit full of kinetic energy, without it being gratuitous. The music and the audio is often the most overlooked, but that is often what gives something it’s power and emotional punch.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.philanderfilms.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/philanderryan/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ryanphilander/
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ryan-philander-4775307/
• Other: https://vimeo.com/user4689726