Transcript

Listener Pitch: A Hallmark Movie-like Story

[0:00] Hello, friends. Welcome to another episode of Tell Us a Good Story.
Today, we get to talk to a listener of the show.
He reached out to us via our website, KevinandSteph .com, to pitch us his story.
Friends, meet Mr. Dwayne Abel. You guys, this man’s story is like a Hallmark movie.
During COVID, he wrote a romantic comedy script called The Green Oak Guardian that was turned into a feature film and currently streaming on Amazon Prime.
He agreed to have a production company turn his script into a movie based on two conditions. One, it had to be filmed in his hometown of Carrollton, Ohio.
And two, he had to be cast in some type of supporting role.
And to his surprise, the company agreed to both. And during the conversation, Duane invites us to do something that just blew our minds.
So kind of him. So much fun, you guys. We can’t wait for you to hear our conversation with Duane Able.
I’m Kevin. And I’m Stephanie. And during our marriage, we have dealt with an electrocution, a brain tumor, brain surgery. Then doctors telling us that children were not in our future, followed by miscarriage, and then Kevin’s cancer diagnosis.
However, today, we live a life completely healed and restored with three healthy children who doctors said were not possible.
And we’re here to tell stories that inspire, give hope, and brighten your day.
Welcome to Tell Us a Good Story.

Importance of Subscribing and Sharing

[1:20] Okay, friends, before we get to this episode, just a friendly reminder to please hit the subscribe button on YouTube and Apple podcast or give us a review five stars, please.
In our world, this is super, super important, because it will help with the algorithm to make it easier for people to find us.
And thank you for sharing our post across your social media that really helps with engagement and with us getting guests.
Yes. So hey, if you want us to keep working our way up to talking to Chip and Joanna, please share us with your friends. But regardless, thank you for listening to tell us a good story.
[1:53] All right, Steph, this is going to be fun. So much fun.
Our next guest is actually a listener of the show. Oh, I am so excited about that.
And he reached out to us via Kevin and Steph .com. How cool is that, Kevin?
Yes. So cool. Absolutely. Well, friends, our next guest is a professional newspaper cartoonist who has been creating a family friendly comic strip called Z for the past 28 years.
During COVID, he wrote a romantic comedy feature film called The Green Oak Guardian, which is currently streaming on Amazon Prime.
But like something straight out of a Hallmark movie, he agreed to have a production company turn it into a movie based on two conditions.
One had to be filmed in his hometown, and two, he had to be cast in a supporting role.
And to his surprise, they agreed to both. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to tell us a good story.
Mr. Dwayne Abel. Dwayne Abel. Thank you very much. That was a wonderful introduction.
My only job now is to live up to all of those amazing words.
[2:52] Well, Dwayne, thank you for saying yes to us. Yes. Absolutely.
I’m curious, how’d you come across Tell Us a Good Story? Like I said, you’re a listener. You reached out to us via kevinandstuff .com.
How’d you come across us?

Dwayne Abel’s journey as a listener and guest

[3:03] You know what? It was just sheer happenstance because when I’m traveling, I travel a lot speaking to schools all across the country, presenting an assembly about goal -setting, literacy, the importance of education.
And when I’m traveling, I cannot stand listening to the radio.
It drives me nuts. I always want to have a good podcast and I want something positive and something from Ohio, which we share that in common.
I had to dive in. I had to give it a listen and boy, I was not disappointed up until this very podcast right here.
I think having me as a guest is where you’re going to jump the shark.
[3:37] No, not at all. This is going to be fantastic. So it sounds like you live and breathe Ohio, like you’re proud of your city that you’re from.
You’re proud of the state of Ohio. Where did that come from?
That came from my family. Most of all, it came from my grandfather.
My grandfather loved his hometown so much.
He loved his house so much that he lived in the same house his entire life.
Oh my gosh. He just changed rooms every now and then.
Okay. So you’re from Carrollton, Ohio. Where is that at? you Carrollton, Ohio is a little bit south of the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton.
I always say if you want to find the area, go to Canton, go south.
When you start hitting cows, you’re in the right neck of the woods.
And as I described this to the production company when they never heard what a Carrollton, Ohio was, I said, just imagine if a Norman Rockwell painting and Mayberry got into a fight and we don’t know who won.
That’s my hometown of Carrollton, Ohio.
Oh, Americana at its finest. I read about it.
It’s like less than 3 ,200 people, I believe. And they all know who I am.
[4:44] Right. I’m sure they do. I’m sure they do. Are you a small town hero now?
You have to be. Not one bit. I’m still Earl Abel’s grandson, and my grandfather’s been dead for 15 years, so. Huh.
I would think you’d be a hometown hero. Why aren’t you running for mayor at this point with everything you’ve done there? Oh, no, no, thank you.
There are people that are much better suited to that kind of job.
And I don’t think I’m one of them. Whenever I speak to someone I’ve never met before, I always let them know in advance.
I’m a cartoonist. I don’t know how to do anything, but talk too much and draw cartoons.
[5:19] Okay, so here’s what I think I want to do, Duane. There’s so much information about you from your website, from some articles.
So I just want to do a list of fun facts. And that is going to jog your memory on some stories.
Okay? And Steph is not aware of any of these. Okay, so we do this for all of our guests.
And so I want to get a list of fun facts here about Dwayne. Fun fact number one, Dwayne joined the ranks of professional cartooning at the age of 13.
[5:45] Selling cartoons to several small magazines and regional publications.
Okay, so how does that work? Do you just do a bunch of drawings, comic strips, and you just start sending them to all kinds of newspapers, magazines, and just hope that one connects? How does that work as a teenager? future.
Well, I’ve been doing this for almost 30 years, so my first cartoon when I was 13, I’m 43 now.
So when I first started selling cartoons to magazines, they were small supermarket tabloids.
Remember those? Those are the ones of all my cartoons about Bigfoot and aliens at McDonald’s.
You would just draw up 10, they’re called gag cartoons, they’re just one panel cartoons, you’d send them out into the world.
And then a few weeks later, you would get a lovely rejection letter.
And that happened over and over and over again. It happens so much that I tell kids now, I say, my parents gave me the greatest gift of all, they let me fail.
Because every day I would come home, there’d be another letter, in essence, a failure, just waiting for me to open.
So I developed a very hard skin to the point that I don’t understand the word no, or I don’t care about the word no that much. I just keep going until I hear the word yes.
So eventually, after almost a year of sending out these cartoons with no hope in sight, one little magazine said, yes, we’re going to buy your cartoon.
They sent me a check and in true Charlie Brown fashion, they spelled my name wrong. Awwww! On the check.

Overcoming Rejection: Dwayne’s Persistence in Cartooning

[7:10] So, okay. So how many rejection letters, Dwayne, do you think you got before you got that first yes? Over 100?
Hundreds. Absolutely. Absolutely. Because what I did was, what you’re allowed to do was you would make photocopies.
And then once you’d be sent to one magazine, you might send it, this is back in the mid 90s where there were magazines all over the country that were still publishing cartoons.
It’s dried up a lot since then, but you could send cartoons all over the place.
So on any given day, there would be a pile of rejection letters just waiting for me with my return drawings.
So where did your love of drawing cartoons develop?
Oh, simple. When I found out there was a man in California and his only job was to sit in a room at a slant drawing board and draw Charlie Brown and Snoopy, Charles Schultz, I knew I did not want to be anything else the rest of my life.
My course was set from kindergarten on.
And that made me two things. It made me a very focused, very driven child.
That’s the good news. And the a very focused and a very driven child.
Because whenever I told a teacher, hey, look, I’m never gonna need this.
[8:24] First of all, don’t ever say that to a teacher. Second of all, I was always right. As you’re doodling in their class, right?
All these pictures, I’m sure.
Now, did you always wanna do like a comic strip cartoonist or did you wanna work for Disney or Hannah Banana or what was that? Hannah Barbera. Hannah Barbera.
Yeah, did you wanna do anything like that? Well, you know what?
I never did. I always wanted to draw a comic strip.
To this day, my heroes, the ones I look up to the most, are the ones that draw in newspaper comic strips.
So whenever I hear that it’s a dying industry, it’s a dying profession, I don’t necessarily believe that.
It might evolve like anything else does, but there’s always going to be a need for people wanting to have a quick three seconds of laughter because Because the great thing about a comic strip, it’s a purely American art form, number one, and someone pours their heart and soul into it for an entire day’s work, just so you, the reader, has 10 seconds of laughter.
And to me, I couldn’t wish a better life for myself than to draw my comic strip until I can no longer put a pen to paper.
Okay, so next fun fact. At the age of 15, Dwayne walked into his hometown newspaper with a comic strip, Zed. Dwayne soon was offered a syndication contract and became the youngest syndicated cartoonist in the country.
However, right before launching the first comic strip the syndicate went out of business. No!

Overcoming Rejections and Snatched Opportunities

[9:53] So again, all these rejections, you finally become the youngest cartoonist in the country, and then it gets snatched away from you, right?
[10:04] Hey, you know what? It could always be worse. It could always be worse. And I’ll tell you why.
I just found out recently going through some newspaper archives that my great, great grandfather died at the age of 80 -something in the 1930s.
He died fighting a rabid ram on his farm.
So hey, as long as I’m not being attacked by a ram, it’s a pretty good day.
So to this day, do you still draw by hand?
Are you doing this on a digital pad? It’s all done by hand.
Whenever I speak and do my assemblies, I hold up one of my originals And I tell the kids, no computers, no scanners, no printers, no iPads, no Chromebooks.
This was all done by hand.
And I’ll tell you why that’s a good thing. Because last November was Charles M. Schultz’s, would have been his 100th birthday.
So the National Cartoonist Society asked all cartoonists, hey, if you want to dedicate your work this week to the memory of Mr.
Schultz, that would be amazing.
So that’s exactly what I did for my weekly comic strip.
And lo and behold, the Charles Schultz Museum saw my comic strip, and they asked for the original.
So I’ve only given away one original in my entire life. All the others I possess, I have them stored.
But the one original I did give away because it is drawn on paper, is now housed inside of my hero, the Charles Schulz Museum in Santa Rosa, California.
Oh, wow!
[11:31] That’s fantastic. That’s special. Hello, friends.
I’m Craig Clausen, and I help Kevin and Steph with all the tech stuff for the show. But today, I have a request for you.
Kevin and Steph will soon be recording their 200th episode. In the podcast world, this is a big accomplishment.
According to Forbes, only 8 % of podcasts uploaded over the past week had created more than 10 episodes, let alone 200.
And we want to celebrate with you. We would love for as many listeners as possible to give us a call at 614 -699 -0604 and leave them a voicemail.
Let Kevin and Steph know what Tell Us A Good Story means to you, or tell them what’s been your favorite episode or story.
Or just call to congratulate them.
It’s easy to do. Just give them a call at 614 -699 -0604, listen to the cute voicemail recorded by the Mason kids and then leave them a message.
And even better, your message might appear on air for the 200th episode.
I will put the phone number in the show notes for you, and please call by November 30th, 2023.
And, as always, thank you for listening to Tell Us a Good Story.
[12:48] Where do you get your inspiration from for your comic strips every week? You know what?
I don’t claim to be the sharpest crayon in the box, so pretty much it’s mostly sitting around going, okay, what dumb thing have I done this week?
And I always get an answer.

Finding Inspiration for Comic Strips

[13:04] Always, without a doubt. Something I did that was not the smartest.
Or another little trick I use, I read this from Ray Bradbury, and he said, just write down 10 nouns. 10 things that come to your mind as fast as they can.
And that’s going to spur a little bit of a brainstorm and that’s all you need.
Otherwise, I’m just sitting in a room, tapping a pencil all day.
You just have to put pen to paper and just go.
Alright, next fun fact. Dwayne graduated from Carrollton High School before going to college on a full theatrical scholarship to the University of Akron, where in his word stuff, he majored in overacting and scene stealing.
However, while in college, he toured in a one -man theatrical production as the school mascot Zippy the kangaroo. Oh!
[13:51] You are Zippy! Duane, do you have any good stories for being the University of Akron’s mascot? Oh, you have to.
How hot is it in one of those costumes? Oh my gosh.
Well, I will say, thank goodness I was not the mascot that has to be outside during the football games in the sweltering heat. I had a pretty sweet gig.
They saw me in a musical overacting and stealing scenes, I am shameless.
And the next day I was calling into the Dean’s office and they said, hey, we have this program that tours elementary schools.
It tours for about two weeks. We feature Zippy the kangaroo.
We would love for you to be Zippy.
And I said, you know what? I’m really busy right now. I just don’t know if I have the time.
And then they said, you’ll be on a tour bus with 10 female dancers.
And I said, we should have went with that. But I’m listening.
I’m ready. Let’s entertain some offers.
Start with that first. Right.

Funny Stories from Being a Mascot and School Assemblies

[14:49] Okay. So do you have any fun interactions? Because we’ve talked to some people who used to be like Brutus the Buckeye. Right.
He can’t go 10 feet without a child coming up for a picture or someone, hold my baby, whatever.
[15:03] So what’s it like when you’re in character and you can’t talk?
Well, the good news is I was in a controlled environment.
I was presenting to students, so I wasn’t getting rushed from all sides.
But whenever they come up to you, your field of vision is a couple inches in front of your face, that’s where the nose is. You can’t look down, you can’t look to the side.
So if a kid comes up and hug you, you might feel it. But when you bend down to look, you’re gonna hit him in the head with your nose.
So right away you feel terrible about doing that.
Second of all, the tail has a little bit of weight to it.
So if you start swinging your hips left or right in any direction, you’re going to knock over kindergartners this way and that way.
But how I trained to be Zippy the kangaroo. Someone found me at the university, they knew where I was going to be, and they dropped a big duffel bag in front of my feet and they said, here you go, but breeze it once a week.
That’s all the training I got to be Zippy the kangaroo.
So the great thing is, is that whenever you see Zippy, whenever you go to a U of A football game and Zippy is laughing, Zippy is actually trying to push up his head so he can breathe because The mouthpiece is right here.
It hits you just above the sternum.
So whenever you want to breathe, you have to push that head up to grab up to there, and then you drop it back down. So there’s a little trick right there.
And also Zippy is, I think it’s only one of two mascots in all of NCAA that is a female.
[16:26] Zippy the kangaroo is a girl. I didn’t know that. I didn’t know that either.
I love that they tell you to Febreze your costume.
[16:33] Like, don’t stink. Oh my gosh. That’s the one thing we want.
We don’t want you to stink. No kidding.
And plus, with this guy being in theater, it would probably be tough not to talk.
With kids coming up to you, that would be so hard not to talk to these kids.
You just gotta emotion everything.
Very much so. Very much so. But I’m used to being an over -actor anyway and talking to the back of the crowd.
So to put on a kangaroo costume felt very natural to me. I didn’t feel like anything was being inhibited too much.
[17:03] All right, Steph, next fun fact.
In August, Dwayne celebrated the 28th anniversary of the comic strip series Zed.
Zed currently appears in over 60 weekly newspapers nationwide and has been collected into several books, including two new Zed comic strip books that were released in September last month.
So on average, when you’re doing a weekly newspaper, how many ideas, how many comic tricks do you have to pitch to a newspaper for them to use one or two?
How does that work? I don’t pitch any to them. They’re not my gatekeeper.
They are my client newspapers. This is the product. This is what you agreed to run.
So here it is. The only person I have to get by is my editor.
And my editor is my wife because I’m going to lay something on the line for you right now.
The entire world of the Sunday funnies as we know it is not controlled by cartoonists working from their homes.
It’s controlled by the spouses of cartoonists.
They’re the ones that are the editors.
They’re the ones that you have to pass mustard with them.
They are, as Stephen King put it, the ideal reader.
Stephen King, he will not let anything go out into the world unless it’s been approved by his wife.
So if my comic strip doesn’t pass mustard, it doesn’t go any further.
I just go back to the drawing board and have some new ideas and send them, give them to my wife and she’ll go, yeah, that’s the one. And off we go.
Steph, you and I would not do well. I would hand you something like this is garbage.
[18:33] Go back. Yeah. Keep trying. Let’s work a little harder, babe.
Okay. For our listeners who are not familiar with Zed, can you tell our listeners who Zed is?
[18:44] Absolutely. Zed is three and a half feet of walking, talking, dryer lint. He’s a little creature that lives in the very tunnels underneath of washing machines.
And the reason I draw Walking, Talking, Dryer Lint as the center of my comic strip is because everyone that ever loved me.
Put me in a basement to draw cartoons. When I was 10 years old, my mom and dad got me a great big drawing board. I still use it to this day.
And they put me in the basement. What’s in the basement?
Washing machines, fabric softener, dryer lint. And then when I moved away to college to live with my aunt and uncle, which I’m their favorite nephew, I’m their only nephew.
And where did they put me? In the basement, not far away from the washing machine.
So now I’ve graduated, I’m the dad, I’m the husband, and my entire family that loves me more than anything else in the world has put my whole studio in the basement beside the washing machine because the world of the Sunday Funnies, it’s made up of men and women who draw their comic strip and these men and women have one thing in common.
We are allowed to work wherever our spouse tells us we are allowed to work.
All right, next fun fact.
A big part of Dwayne’s career has been as a professional speaker, speaking at school assemblies, corporate events, retirement communities.
He has traveled to over a thousand schools presenting a motivational assembly title, Draw Your Destiny.
[20:07] So going to over a thousand schools, Dwayne, do you have any good stories from a school assembly, something gone wrong, a funny moment, dealing with kids?
[20:17] I have two that jumped to mind. Please share. Number one.
I was speaking in front of 500 students and normally the only thing I have on stage with me, I have an easel, I have a pad of paper, I have a marker.
That’s it. No technology is on stage with me at all.
And I made a broad motion and my marker never happened before or since, knock on wood, exploded.
It exploded all over my shirt, my tie, my pants, my hand. and here’s where school custodians do not get paid enough money in my eyes.
There was a custodian on that stage before I knew it with a rag and some kind of solution that he wrapped around my hand and then he cleaned up all around me.
I never missed a single word of my assembly.
So that’s story number one. And thanks to that custodian.
The second one, I was at a school in Kansas And the principal was very proud of his pilot program.
The program was, they had a barn in the back and this barn housed all sorts of animals.
I’m not used to seeing one walking into the gym when I’m giving my assembly because the back doors were open.
It was a beautiful day and it was hot like most school gymnasiums are.
So they opened up the doors and the fiord is right in front of me.
The barn is right there. And that cow just walked right up, sat down right at the door and watched my entire assembly.

The Distracting Cow and the Unfazed Audience

[21:46] And boy, is that a surreal moment. Was everyone distracted by the cow?
No, not one bit. They were used to that. They’re used to it.
And they could barely see it because the risers were on either side.
They didn’t know the cow was there. The only person that saw it was this guy right here. Oh.
Were you distracted? Did your attention keep going to the cow?
A little bit, a little bit. And another presentation I did, there was kids in front of me and all their shoes, the bottom of their shoes were facing me.
And it was when everyone had those light -em -up shoes, and they were all lighting up and going off at different times.
And I wasn’t sure if I was having a stroke, if I was blacking out.
I couldn’t maintain focus with all those different shoes coming at me.
[22:31] All right, Steph, I’m going to test you again here. What is your favorite book of all time? Obviously, it’s the Bible, Kevin.
Yes. Nailed it. Very good this time you didn’t say the book we wrote called you met her where but it’s still a really good book That is true, and it would make a great gift for friends or relatives on their birthday or for Christmas friends You can order your copy of our book titled you met her where at Kevin and Steph comm and we will make sure to personally Sign a copy for you or whoever you want and as always thank you for listening to tell us a good story.
[23:01] All right stuff during the pandemic, Dwayne’s travel schedule completely dried up, as you can imagine.
Okay, and he got bored. So he decided to audition for some feature films that were being shot in the tri -state area, and was almost immediately cast in an independent feature film titled Christmas Collision, which is on Amazon right now.
So can you share with us? What is it like being on a movie set, Dwayne?
We’ve never been on one. Is there a drama that goes on? Do you have a chair with your or name on it, do you have your own trailer?
How does that work? Well, you know what? All the sets I’ve been on with the production company that I work with a lot, United Front Films and Garnet Films, they have zero drama sets.
Really? Everyone there gets along, they’re all there to do the exact same thing.
These are independent films. You are helping out as much as you can.
Oh, and by the way, the next film that’s hoping to go into production in my hometown again, And this January, knock on wood, we’re hoping we can make that happen.
It’s another Christmas movie. So if you guys want to be extras, hey, come on up for the day. Come on up. You will be in a Christmas movie.

Excitement builds for the next Christmas movie in Dwayne’s hometown

[24:12] Are you serious, Dwayne? I’m totally serious. Absolutely.
[24:16] Oh, Steph. We’re going to make it happen. Absolutely.
We’re going to make that happen. That would be fantastic. Oh, that would be amazing. Steph, don’t look at the camera. Just get like…
I’m going to check my good side. If we’re talking about scene stealing, this woman right here would be.
The first day I was on set because I had never been on a movie set before, so I just stayed quiet as much as possible and I tried to learn as much as I could.
And they were making me up so they make sure your hair is perfect and do your makeup and then they wire you up with a microphone.
[24:49] And right before the director yelled action, the thought that rang in my head was, someone better ask me if I know what I’m doing.
Because I know the answer and they’re not going to like it.
So I hope they just yell action and then we’ll take it from there.
I thought I was gonna be found out the entire time because it was a very small part.
I was only on set for three days and one of the reasons that the director, Lana Rhee, told me that I got the part is because when I auditioned, I self -taped, just like I’m doing right now, off of my cell phone and I had to have a reader feed me lines and the reader that I had was my wife, Coral.
I’m actually in her ballroom dance studio right now.
And right before we began, I make sure to ask my wife, I say, are you ready? She said, yes. I said, are you nervous?
Or do you need to take a moment? And she said, no, we can go ahead and go.
And because I was nice to my wife, that’s why I got the part.
They said, he’s a nice guy. He wanted to make sure his wife was okay and not too nervous.
Cause even though she was off camera, Now, my wife can get pretty nervous sometimes, so I wanted to make sure she was okay first.
So just from being a nice guy, got me my first role in a movie, and then here’s my master plan.
[26:02] I’m gonna be such a nice guy on set that they’re gonna ask what else it is I do.
I’m gonna tell them I draw a comic strip. They’re gonna ask if I do any other writing.
They’re gonna fall in love with me so much that they’re gonna wanna see the next script that I write, And then they’re going to love that so much, they’re going to want to film it in my hometown.
[26:23] And long story short, that’s exactly what happened.

Dwayne’s journey from screenwriter to co-star in “The Green Oak Guardian”

[26:28] Yes. Wow. That’s literally my next fun fact, Dwayne.
So he was the screenwriter, co -producer, co -star for the feature film called The Green Oak Guardian, which has been called by Rotten Tomatoes as one of the best Romania comedies to come along in a while.
The movie was filmed entirely in Carroll County in the spring of 2022, and can be seen on Amazon Prime.
So like you just said, they reached out to you and said, Hey, is there anything else you’ve written?
Can you take the story from there? Because I think you just you wrote for like two straight weeks or something, right?
[27:02] Yeah, and I had two weeks because summertime was coming up.
I had to make sure I got my writing done before my kids were going to be home most of the summer.
So I dedicated two weeks beginning of May and I wrote from 11 o ‘clock in the morning until 1 o ‘clock in the afternoon Two hours a day I did that for 10 days and I was averaging about 10 pages a day in a spiral notebook a 25 cent notebook that I Got from Staples.
So I just wrote longhand and then after two weeks I had over a hundred pages and then I started typing it into the proper format that’s when it gets boring because that’s a long process because I’m not the strongest typist in the world.
That’s another week on top of that.
Two weeks later, it was Memorial Day, and the producer, Mark Stewart, called me on the phone and said, we’re going to go forward with this.
And I said, great. When are you going to come up to Carrollton, Ohio, so I can show you around?
So you negotiated, it has to be in your hometown, and you have to be a casting role.
Absolutely. Was there any pushback on either one of those, especially in your hometown?
[28:07] Well, here’s the thing. Like I said, I’m not the smartest guy around.
So I just invited them up for the day because I said, you know what?
I just had this really weird idea.
I think My Neck of the Woods is going to look beautiful on film.
So I took them to specific areas that I knew would look beautiful on film.
And those are the places that they saw.
And most of those places, most of those locations ended up in the final movie because they just fell in love with it so much and the entire community rallied around it.
The best part is, is most of the funding for the budget came from most of the local business leaders in my neck of the woods.
So all the executive producers were from my neck of the woods, they’ve known me my entire life as Earl Abel’s grandson.
So they trusted this project, they trusted my family name, and my only job was not to besmirch the good name that my family has given me up until this date.
So how did you find out that Amazon Prime picked up your movie?
I was sick in bed.
[29:15] Because, you know, when you have a kid, the same cold that will knock down a kid for say 20 minutes knocks you out for about a week.
So when it was told to me that it was gonna be picked up by Amazon Prime and it’s also on Tubi by the way, a great streamer, Tubi, just type in the Green Oak Guardian it pops up entirely for free.
And when it first premiered, I was sick in bed and I just got an email from the director and the production staff that it is now live, congratulations and that was it because we didn’t have the official in -theater movie premiere for another month.
And that is another event all in its own. Because here’s why my wife is the smartest cookie in the jar.
She looked beautiful for the movie premiere. She looked absolutely gorgeous.
Here’s how she came upon getting that dress. She went to a department store on a Monday when it was completely dead.
And she would try on a dress, go outside of the dressing room area and walk around, hoping to get the attention of the security guard.
And one dress, his head was kind of down like this.
Another dress, her head was kind of down like that. On the third dress, two security guards popped right up.
She got their attention. She said, that’s the dress.
So that’s funny. That’s how you pick out a dress.
[30:38] I have a lot of questions from this. First off, when the local people there in Carrollton, Ohio, find out, okay, there’s a movie that’s going to be filmed here.
Does everyone come out of the woodwork, Dwayne, and they’re trying to be an extra? Or can you film at my business or my store?
Does everyone just start calling you?

Misconceptions about Filming a Movie in the Area

[30:58] Yes and no. Okay. Because when we were telling people that we’re going to bring a movie to the area, people thought it was going to be me with a camcorder in my hand.
That’s what they thought a movie meant. But when they saw the lights, and they saw the cameraman, and the crew, and the cast, That’s when a few people started murmuring around town going, hey, we think something’s going on right now.
So we got some extras, we accomplished everything that we needed to, and then people are still finding out about it.
They say, oh, that wasn’t all completely shot in Carroll County, that’s a rumor.
No, it was. So you know how these rumors persist, but I’ll tell you two stories about what happened on set that you’re gonna love.
Story number one is we were getting ready to film my scenes and I’m going up against, his name is Houston.
He is an amazing actor, has a lot of credits to his name.
He was on Brooklyn Nine -Nine. He was on the new Hawaii Five -O. Gray’s Anatomy.
[31:57] Gray’s Anatomy, did a couple of Christmas movies that my mom has seen.
And right before we get ready to shoot, my mom throws her hand up in the air and she wants to stop recording. And she goes, wait, wait, wait, I have a question right now.
I said, okay, mom, mom, we’re getting ready to film. What’s your question?
And she said, I’ve seen that guy, haven’t I?
I said, yes, mom, you have. She said, he’s very handsome. I said, yes, mom, he’s a good looking dude.
And she said, then why is the camera on you right now?
And I said, mom, they filmed the ugly people first. So that was just a way to get me out of my own head and get me to laugh a little bit.
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The Story of the Green Oak Guardian Begins

[33:08] I Like where did that story come from?
The movie is all about a comic book character known as the Green Oak Guardian, and it’s about to be made into a Hollywood live -action feature film, and a hot young Hollywood talent is going to be cast in the role, and the creator does not want this actor cast in the role of the Green Oak Guardian.
Here’s the twist. The world thinks that the creator of the Green Oak Guardian is a grisly old cartoonist that lives in the woods.
The actual twist is that the creator of the Green Oak Guardian is this grisly old farmer’s daughter, who is a single mother.
And of course, the Hollywood actor and the female cartoonist who draws the hottest superhero have to fall in love.
They have to get together. They have to break up. They have to fall in love at the end. It’s a romantic comedy.
Oh, I love that. So on set, I believe what I read was there were 30 actors and production people. Then there were 30 extras.
[34:22] How long did you film this movie? It was just a couple of weeks, I think, right?
It took, filming was wrapped up within 15 days.
15 days for an entire film. Yep, they run a very efficient, a very tight ship.
Sometimes they were working many more hours than I would have liked to, which is why I was so happy that they filmed in my neck of the woods.
Because if I was up early going to set, by the time it got to be five, six o ‘clock, I’m an old man at heart. I got grumpy.
So I would just say, whoa, gee, I’m sure I need to go do something.
My son has to be picked up from somewhere.
So I’m gonna go. I’ll see everyone else tomorrow morning. Have a great night.
Have a great shoot. Many more hours of work.
Ma, see you tomorrow. So that’s why being a screenwriter is the greatest job on the whole film. Wow. 15 days.

Dwayne’s Hometown of Carrollton and Future Movie Plans

[35:14] That’s amazing. All right. Final fun fact, Dwayne and his wife, Coral, are proud parents of two boys, Zachy and Clayton.
And Dwayne was inducted earlier this year into the Carrollton High School Alumni Hall of Fame.
Oh, of course you were. Of course you were. Obviously.
It’s like, what took so long? It only took us making a movie about our hometown folks for that to happen.
[35:38] Yes. You answered it earlier. I was gonna say you have to be the hometown hero at this point for bringing Carrollton into a movie.
And I believe this is the first time Carrollton, Ohio has ever been spoken on film, correct? By me. By you.
Yep. And then your goal is to have multiple movies in Carrollton, right? Across all the seasons?
Right. I want every single season represented on film, shot in and around my hometown of Carroll County, Ohio.
Like I said, the next one is a Christmas movie.
And we’re crossing our fingers that we’ll be able to start filming in January.
The script is written.
So we just have to get some investors and other financial things in place and we’ll be able to rock and roll in January.
That’s awesome. Wow. Okay. So what was the feedback from people in Carrollton once they saw the movie? Were Are they very proud to get that on film?
This is what the town was like in 2022.
[36:40] For some, it was very surreal, because this was their hometown, and I wanted it portrayed in a very good light.
And the feedback has been absolutely wonderful.
The love letters that we’ve been getting from viewers that view it all over the country and all over the world has been absolutely amazing.
They’re so nice. You would think my mother wrote most of them.
The only feedback that we ever got that really bristled me the wrong way is there was a critic that said there’s no way that a cartoonist Studio is that clean?
And I’m throwing up hands right now because I’m the one that dressed that set.
I knew where everything was for the cartoonist studio in the film.
And if there’s a studio that’s much cleaner than the studio that was on film, it’s my studio.
Cartoonists can be very neat. We don’t have to adhere to the stereotype that we’re messy cartoonists and things are strewn about all over the place. I’m not that guy at all.
That’s the one critic that really bristled me the wrong way was coming at me and saying, oh, his studios are not that neat for cartoonists.
Yeah, they are. I’ve been in one for 30 years.
[37:54] Well, listeners, you can watch The Green Oak Guardian.
Like we said, it’s currently streaming on Amazon Prime. Also, for more information about Dwayne, you can go to social media pages.
Instagram and Facebook is at Quirky Comics.
Also, his website is quirkycomics .com, and we will put links in the show notes on our website, so you can go right to those social media and webpages.
So, Dwayne, thank you so much, sir, for reaching out to us and being a guest here on Tell Us a Good Story. You’re absolutely fantastic.
And yes, Steph and I are absolutely going to take you up on the offer to be an extra on January.
[38:31] Yes, I’m already trading. Oh, you know, I’m the co -producer of the movie.
I’m still trying to figure out what a co -producer is and what a co -producer does.
But apparently it lets me know that if I want an extra on set, hey, we’ll make that happen. So. Oh, that’s amazing.
Count us in. Count us in, Dwayne. We’re there, Dwayne. Plus, love to meet you in person, too. That’d be fantastic. Absolutely.
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