From the creative minds of Big Lettuce Productions and sketch comedy group YRK, comes “MILE House 69,” a buddy cop film wherein two campus police officers are tasked with shutting down a meal swipe cartel based in MILE house 69. There are two campus police officers; one is an old corrupt veteran (played by writer, director and producer Jamen Meistrich ‘24) and the other is a by-the-book rookie (played by Evelyn Carlin ‘24). Their comedic dynamic unfolds as they try to take down the leader of the meal swipe cartel, who believes in free food for all students.
YRK is a sketch comedy group made up of four Muhlenberg students: Nico Correa ‘24, Nathan Thoman ‘24, Emilio Ramirez ‘24 and Meistrich. In addition to acting in the film, Correa, Thoman and Meistrich produced the film while Ramirez is its cinematographer. Through Big Lettuce Productions, YRK has been able to take their ideas and turn them into a film.
When one walks into Thoman and Correa’s MILE house, they become fully immersed in the alternate reality of “MILE House 69.” The house isn’t a house anymore but a set. The walls are covered with newspaper and graffiti, lights are hung everywhere, and extras in pink masks and white tank tops are milling about, coming in and out of the house with props.
“It’s really rewarding because I love to work with people and put people together so everybody can shine in their own areas.”
-Nico Correa ’24
In between takes, members of YRK were able to explain what went into planning this film. Thoman said that the idea for this movie “came over a year ago during our freshman year. I remember the four of us were looking at the map of the College which has all the housing and buildings numbered. We were looking through them and saw that there’s a MILE house 60. I was like, ‘I wonder if there’s a mile of 69?’ So, we go down to 69. And there isn’t. It’s a different type of housing. We’re like, that sounds like a buddy cop movie. MILE house 69.” Meistrich jumped in, adding, “It’s true, I remember writing down on a piece of paper ‘MILE House 69,’ old cop evil violent or something and new fresh face cop.”
Thoman continued, “Jamen [Meistrich] wrote the whole script over the summer, and we wanted to do it our sophomore year, but the amount of ambition that this project was going to require just wasn’t available. We didn’t have the available funds, the MILE house and the time to be able to do it. So, we started this year and by week two, we decorated this whole house and prepared it for the takes that we were going to do and it’s been like this for like a month and a half.” They incorporated their entire MILE house for the shooting of their film and in total, it took about 16 hours to put together the set.
The making of this film isn’t associated with the College, it is an independent project. Thoman explained that, “This ambitious project is something that can’t be done through the school’s outlets, through the equipment that they have and the budget. We have 10, 30, 50 people involved in this, students from all over, actors and not, who want to be in movies and want to do film but that outlet doesn’t exist. The equipment isn’t there. Their budget isn’t there. If we could go through the school’s channels to get funding and make this more legitimate in the eyes of the school, we would. It’s not even about jumping through hoops, it’s just like—those hoops don’t even exist.” The four of them had to create a Go-Fund-Me to raise about $5,000 for the equipment they needed for the film. YRK also chose not to petition to the Student Government Association (SGA) for funds. Meistrich explained, “We don’t find that the SGA is supportive of artists generally and we didn’t feel like explaining ourselves and our vision to them when we can just do it without their help. Their input was not welcome [nor] needed.”
The equipment being used in this film is worth thousands of dollars and are the kind used on professional sets. There are dozens of students involved. They have a script supervisor, camera operators, students controlling the lights and sound. Outside of shooting they have editors and social media managers. Larry Meistrich, father of Jamen Meistrich and executive producer, commented that “This is becoming a professional shoot and the school should know more about it.” Thoman expressed that, “So many different creative outlets are being put into this, and if anything I think that’s why this is so important, because of how many creative fields are culminated in this project and how many people can shine through this because it does take a village.”
Meistrich then proceeded to add, “It’s not a short process that you just say, ‘Hey, let’s get everybody together for a couple hours on a weekend.’ This is heavily prepped, and now there’s an endless stream of people coming every weekend. There were 20 extras here today.” In regards to having so many students involved, even if they’re an extra, Meistrich explained that “It’s hard. You gotta text people and reach out and ask for people’s schedules.” He has an entire system on his laptop dedicated to schedules and planning the goals for each weekend in terms of the scenes he wants to get done. He also added that working on this project has “been hard, it’s been stressful, it’s literally all I think about. I’ve woken up dreaming about shot lists.”
Correa said that working on this is “a lot of fun. It’s really rewarding because I love to work with people and put people together so everybody can shine in their own areas. It’s also exciting to learn [a] new craft because I’ve been doing film for a while with YRK but ultimately, it’s new to me because I’m more of a writer. And it’s also rewarding to be there for the beginning part of the process and watch something develop and grow.”
Carlin, who plays the role of Deanna McMeat, said, “It’s really fun seeing how much effort the crew and the cast has been putting into this film and this production. It’s been a lot of fun. It’s been pretty crazy and hectic, but we always get the job done at the end of the day.”
As for advice for students wanting to make their own film independently, Meistrich ‘24 says to “Do it. Don’t be afraid, just do it. Even if it’s bad, do it again.”