Kh. Frederica Mathewes-Green: Thank you so much for joining me today. Josh Jordan or Josh David Jordan: what do you prefer to go by?

Mr. Josh David Jordan: Josh David Jordan, when it’s all filmmaking; just Josh is fine when we’re hanging out. But, yeah, Josh David Jordan. There’s a Josh Jordan that’s actually a photographer in New York City; he does fashion photography. So I try to separate myself from his talents.

Kh. Frederica: Good thinking. And also Jonathan Jackson, who participated in this film to some extent. There’s just a lot of Js.

Mr. Jordan: There’s a lot of Js.

Kh. Frederica: I feel deprived, actually. I’m going to buy a J next time I get a chance. [Laughter] And Fr. Theophan Warren, I’m really glad to have you here, too, and your role is very important. We’re going to be talking about the movie, El Tonto Por Cristo, which is currently in production, and Fr. Theophan is the liturgical, theological, and all possible intellectual ways authority and guide for this project.

So, yes, I wanted to talk to you, Josh, about your movie, El Tonto Por Cristo, a movie currently underway, in process. Tell me a little bit about—just a summary of the movie. Could you make a one-sentence—? If you had to sum it up, what’s the point or the intent of this movie? Or what’s it about? However you want to phrase that.

Mr. Jordan: We’re still working on all the logline and all the title stuff that’ll go on the poster, but to simplify it, for people in America, I would think—because this is an American Orthodox folk-tale about a musical fool-for-Christ who lives at a monastery on the coast of Texas. A lot of people think he’s maybe not all there sometimes. So there’s a little bit of humor without it being a comedy. There’s lots of that in the film. We shot it like a European cinematic film, so it’s in black-and-white, it’s in the aspect ratio of European cinema, which is 1.66:1. I really wanted every frame to almost be a photograph, because there’s such beauty in the simplicity in the monastery, in the cells and such, and also with the cathedral.

Kh. Frederica: Yes, I’ve seen some little short clips of the movie. I think that the fact that it is in black-and-white is one of the most powerful things about it. The first time I saw that footage of the waves breaking on the southern coast of Texas in the Gulf of Mexico in black-and-white, and hearing it… I don’t know what it is; there just seemed something profound about it.

Mr. Jordan: Yeah, that was something very intentional. Orthodoxy is so beautiful when you walk into a temple, a chapel, a cathedral, and all the iconography, even at our houses and all the iconography—there’s so much beauty in that, and we see that in documentaries that are already made. We see a lot of it. I think people do associate Orthodox with beauty, obviously in icons and paintings. But when you’re in, say, a cathedral, and you’re at a Divine Liturgy, it’s not about just the icons in the room, it’s the smell of the incense, it’s the smell of the beeswax candles, it’s the movement of moving around, it’s the bells. You’re not going to be able to feel that in the movie, so I wanted to take the color away, so you just had the story. You were focused on other things instead of just an icon. The icons are there, but they’re in black-and-white, and they looked very beautiful in black-and-white as well.

Kh. Frederica: They do. They look different, but very beautiful. That’s interesting to me, that you wanted to take away part of the beauty in order really to focus people, to focus their minds a little more closely. As you say, the icons in black-and-white are equally beautiful and somehow even more powerful, I think.

I guess I should say before we go too much further, you are a convert to the Orthodox Church.

Mr. Jordan: Correct. Yeah, for almost ten years we’ve been Orthodox. I was actually making my first feature film when we became Orthodox. I was working on the idea of it. That’s the crazy thing. Being Orthodox for ten years, I kept telling myself, “Maybe I’m not Orthodox enough to tell this tale.” Or maybe that’s why I should make this movie, is because that’s how I feel. It’s that point of view.

Kh. Frederica: Yes, I think there’s value in hearing from people for whom Orthodoxy is still somewhat fresh and surprising. I think that is probably— In my own case, in my book, Facing East, I had only been Orthodox two years, and so it’s the book that I couldn’t write today, but I could write then. It was: walk with me as we encounter these surprising new things.

Mr. Jordan: Wow.

Kh. Frederica: There’s a kind of freshness and originality in that vision, I think, that can’t be faked, once you’re thoroughly down with it. And have you been a member of St. Seraphim Cathedral in Dallas all this time?

Mr. Jordan: I have, I have. That’s where we were baptized and became Orthodox. It’s still our home church. Fr. John Anderson who recently retired is my godfather, so there’s lots of blessings along the way. I’m very lucky to be Orthodox and be a part of St. Seraphim and that cathedral.

Kh. Frederica: Fr. Theophan, you are the liturgical, theological advisor on the film. How long have you been associated with St. Seraphim?

Fr. Theophan: My wife and I moved down to Dallas, Texas, in June of 2017, so about six and a half years we’ve been at the cathedral.

Kh. Frederica: Okay, that’s good. I supposed you are also a convert. Is that right?

Fr. Theophan: I am. I am. My wife and I joined the Orthodox Church about 24, 25 years ago.

Kh. Frederica: About 30 years for me.

Fr. Theophan: Ah, okay.

Kh. Frederica: Wonderful. Well, words cannot express! [Laughter] If I can kind of start with, from the top, with you, Josh— Filmmaking is a very difficult art, and it is unlike any other art form. There’s very little you as an individual can do. You need a huge team of sound people and light people and cinematographers and actors, all of whom have their own ideas about how things ought to go. There’s got to be a very high level of the ability to manage other people and still end up with something close to the vision you had at the beginning. Knowing what a difficult art form this is to manage, to create, what were the reasons you went into filmmaking instead of something easier like poetry, where you can sit in your room and nobody else is there?

Mr. Jordan: I think I’m asking myself that question right now, in the editing room. “What was I thinking?” [Laughter] You’re right. It takes so many people, and just scheduling and organizing these people is like herding cats. Yes, Martin Scorcese says, you write the film three times: you write it when you write the script, then you write the film again when you make the movie because the wheels fall off sometimes and you have to pivot and readjust, and now we’re in the editing process and so we’re writing the film again. But it’s all the process.

I was an actor early on for many years. My dad was a traveling evangelist, and I used to always zoom toward the people who did the church puppets and put on all that. I always wanted to see how those things worked. Then when they were— When my dad and mom were on the road, at school my grandmother—I would stay with her, and she would let me, with one eye open, I think, watch movies late at night. It’s in my gene, in my blood. I wanted to do that. But being in the bootheel of Missouri, how do you become Hitchcock? I don’t know. So acting was the closest thing to do, so I acted for many years.

I would be on a movie set or a TV show, and always there was a little bit of a void or an emptiness, because you were there for maybe a day; maybe you were there for a week. Your part’s very small in telling the story. You don’t really have full control. I was a part of the Ochre House Theater here in Dallas, Texas. Matthew Posey, who plays the lead in El Tonto Por Cristo, was the creative director. I just watched Matt write these plays, and then we would put these plays on. He gave me such good advice that I thought, “Maybe I could write a script. I don’t want to do a play; I want to do a film.” At that time, I was doing a lot of video commercial work, a lot of music videos for everyone. I was like: “I didn’t go to film school, but I’ve watched enough movies. I’ve read enough books. I want to get this to go.” So I made my first full-length feature film in 2020, This World Won’t Break. So that’s out there.

Kh. Frederica: Yes! How did COVID affect the making of that movie? Was that an extra monkey-wrench you had to deal with?

Mr. Jordan: You know, it didn’t affect the making of, but when we were on the film festival tour, promoting the movie, and we were getting more and more higher-end music festivals, me and my wife and the main actor were flying back—we were invited to Glasgow, and our film premiered there, the European tour, and we were flying back—all of our phones start going off, and it says, “South by Southwest just canceled.” I knew then this is going to get weird. By the time we landed, it was all—the world had changed.

But fortunately, on the positive side, people couldn’t make films, because of the pandemic. Everyone was streaming everything, so there was little content, and everyone was watching everything. Distribution companies were reaching out, and they needed content. That was a very big blessing for us, to be in a pickle and then turn around and you say, “Oh, man, now everyone’s going to get to see our film.” So it’s on every platform out there now, and on DVD and stuff.

Kh. Frederica: Tell us the title again.

Mr. Jordan: Oh, yeah, it’s This World Won’t Break. It’s the story of a 40-year-old musician in Dallas, Texas, who realizes one day that he hasn’t made it yet, and what do you do at that point? Do you give up and get a real job? I mean, what is that? Or do you keep going and see if it all works out? I just wanted to tell the story of what happens as an artist when— We put a lot of things on artists who don’t make it, like you have to make it to be successful, but I think just doing your craft and making a living is good enough, so that was the story I wanted to tell.

Kh. Frederica: That’s good. And it was obviously welcomed at festivals all over the world and won many awards and now is, as you say, streaming everywhere, so if anyone looks it up—

Mr. Jordan: Yeah: This World Won’t Break. That’s the thing about filmmaking, is I’m not like a musician or somebody like that. After you work and work and make this movie and it’s your art, you have to give it away, and you’re no longer attached to it, because you’re not— I’m not sitting in everyone’s living room, watching their response. [Laughter] It’s almost like, I guess, being a painter. You make a painting and someone buys it, and it hangs in someone else’s home or gallery.

Kh. Frederica: Yes, or writing a book. You have a hard-copy book, and you can’t go back and strike out a passage. [Laughter] It’s there; it’s existing.

Mr. Jordan: Yes, 100%.

Kh. Frederica: I think losing control of the thing we create is an interesting dilemma for artists of every type.

Mr. Jordan: It is.

Kh. Frederica: You mentioned that actually it was a help in some ways that COVID meant that the networks were looking for content, and that gave you a larger platform to be seen. In the making of this new movie, El Tonto Por Cristo, you had something else that gave you an unexpected boost, which was the SAG actors’ strike. What did that mean for you in terms of the cost, for one thing?

Mr. Jordan: That was my first thought: “Oh, this is like the pandemic, but different.” As everyone knows, actors could not act in anything, and they couldn’t talk about anything, any of the films they were in. So the films that were already made, actors couldn’t go to film festivals and talk about them, so we had to pivot once again. Through the prayers of St. Dionysios and a lot of people, and also a lot of pestering SAG, a lot of emails and calls—they called one day and said, “Okay, here’s the deal: you can make your movie, but you can’t make any more this year, because we can’t deal with you guys any more, because we’ve tried so hard.” Yes, and so I think it was maybe a week before we started shooting, we got it. It’s so hard to coordinate everyone, and so we said, “Okay, we’re just going to coordinate everyone.” We rented all the gear. We had people’s flights. We were praying every single moment that we would get the SAG interim agreement. After the day that we got it, they paused, and there were, like, 1500 films that were trying to get made that were stopped. It was just… It was amazing.

Kh. Frederica: Gosh, it really was. Well, it seems like the hand of God is on this movie and that it was guided through these various hoops you have to jump through. I had been thinking of you, buying the plane tickets and everything—I thought, “Well, that’s stepping out in faith.” But if you don’t know what the future holds, it’s just like stepping out on the plank as the pirate pushes you off the end! [Laughter]

Mr. Jordan: True.

Kh. Frederica: You’re in over your head, and there’s nothing you can do at that point.

Mr. Jordan: That’s true.

Kh. Frederica: It’s wonderful that that worked out so well, then. I’ll say the name of the movie very distinctly—I can’t speak Spanish—El Tonto Por Cristo. Is that how you say it?

Mr. Jordan: Yes. Fr. Theophan says it a lot better than I do.

Kh. Frederica: Say it, Fr. Theophan.

Fr. Theophan: El Tonto Por Cristo, yeah.

Kh. Frederica: Oh, yeah, yeah, that sounds better!

Fr. Theophan: El tonto—tonto can mean dumb or stupid or foolish, so el tonto would be the fool-for-Christ, the translation.

Kh. Frederica: Yes, for Christ. Where did you get the idea of this movie, Josh?

Mr. Jordan: So, being Orthodox, and, like we talked about, being inside a cathedral or a temple of Orthodox, and seeing all the icons in service or at a wedding—you’re just constantly reminded, these lives of saints. That’s the beauty, for me, for Orthodoxy. Even if your attention’s diverted in service, it’s always brought back because of the beauty of the icons. There’s always somebody different that pops up that I maybe hadn’t seen before, a detail. I just thought how beautiful that was, that Vladimir at our cathedral got to paint these things and tell the story. I was like: “I want to tell a story, too, but there’s so many! So many stories of saints!”

So I said, “What do I do?” because I don’t want to… It’s almost like that’s better in documentary form sometimes, to tell a story like that, because you can really show the whole life. Sometimes if you do just one story, it’s hard. So I said, “Well, what if I pull from all my favorite stories that I’ve been reading?” I had so many books. There was a point that I was subconsciously writing, not even knowing sometimes what saints I was pulling from, which made it almost a little bit better for me, because I knew that was true of these books, like the words of the Desert Fathers was really a big impact on me, because it was these things that you could take in and really read about. I wasn’t sure what the story was going to be; I really wasn’t. And then it just started to happen.

I do know I was inspired by Andrei Rublev, Tarkovsky’s Andrei Rublev. And me and Fr. Theophan talked about that film as well, and a lot of people. That’s also a subconscious where the black-and-white came from. I just love the fact that Orthodoxy was not just the background but at times it wasn’t just always upfront. It was always there, and if I could write something that was simple enough, why not the life of this tiny little monastery with these four monks? That felt digestible for me; that felt like something I could do.

There’s lots of places in the movie that we had to shoot in Dallas to make up this one tiny monastery. There was no way—I could not afford to do a Jack Fisk and build one, like Days of Heaven. I couldn’t build the house. So that’s when we had to do some movie magic. I knew I had that in me. I knew there [were] lots of things that I could do, and I had people like Fr. Theophan who could be there for me and really guide me in all the right things liturgically about Orthodoxy that I didn’t want to fall through the cracks because I was focused on maybe an actor or maybe the production design.

Kh. Frederica: Well, that sounds wonderful. As you created this character, the abbot, Fr. John—he is the fool-for-Christ in this story—you were able to take incidents from the lives of the Desert Fathers, from the lives of fools-for-Christ from every nation throughout the history of Orthodoxy. My impression is that Fr. John doesn’t do anything that wasn’t done by somebody in the history of Orthodoxy.

Mr. Jordan: Correct. A lot of the inspiration came from St. John of San Francisco. I couldn’t take on his life yet—I would love to do that one day—so I just said, “Well, Fr. John will have a lot of these moments that I thought were so wonderful.” We had a chance to go and venerate the relics of St. John right before we started filming the movie. So there’s a lot of grace and blessings and prayers in this film.

Like I said, it’s an Orthodox folk-tale in the way it is pulled from all of these saints. I think it’s a really cool thing for people who are Orthodox to find maybe Easter eggs of their favorite saint, these moments that happened, and they’re like: “Oh, that’s probably from—” They’re very recognizable. And if you’re not Orthodox, I think it’s just going to be very intriguing and entertaining to see these things that happen.

Kh. Frederica: Yes. Yes, I was so impressed with Matthew Posey’s performance as Abbot John, Fr. John. I think there are many ways that, in the hands of a less professional actor, it could become cute, you know, or overly emotional, trying to make things as intense as possible. And of course, he’s not Orthodox.

Mr. Jordan: He’s not, and I knew that— I didn’t know any Orthodox actors of that age, and I knew that Matthew could be Orthodox. I was just concerned that someone that was Orthodox maybe couldn’t do the type of acting… Maybe because, if you’re Orthodox, maybe you’d take it too close to the heart and not really be this whimsical fool? And Matthew was only thinking—he researched, and we had so many meetings, so he took it very seriously. He did some things in the film that were— we didn’t talk about, and he didn’t know what he was doing, but it was— When you watch the movie, you’ll know: that’s very spiritual; it’s very touched. Matthew was just portraying the character that he thought Fr. John was.

Kh. Frederica: He picked it up perfectly.

Mr. Jordan: He did.

Kh. Frederica: He very much was an Orthodox abbot who was a soul reader and in some ways a fool-for-Christ. He just put all that together very beautifully.

Mr. Jordan: The other actors— We had Jordan Ross, and he plays one of the monks. He’s on the TV show, The Chosen. He did a lot of his research. Then Frank Mosley’s an actor from Los Angeles, and he watched actually a lot of your stuff and learned a lot about Orthodoxy.

Fr. Theophan: He said he watched all of your [Welcome] to Orthodoxy. He spent a lot of time.

Kh. Frederica: I know! He told me that Josh had suggested some links and things you might look at, and he came up to me and said, “I think I recognize you!” which is like the opposite for an actor, to recognize somebody who’s not an actor! [Laughter] And he said, “I watched some of your videos,” and I said, “Well, that’s wonderful. I’m so glad you did. I hope they were helpful.” He said, “Yes, I watched all of them.” I think there are 35, so… Wow! What a commitment!

Mr. Jordan: He did the most research of anyone, yeah.

Kh. Frederica: God bless him. I happened to be visiting this set the day he did kind of the big scene for his character, and it was astonishing. It was overwhelming and beautiful and tragic and hopeful and everything, without a word. It was a beautifully written scene. I know you get a lot of the credit; the vision was yours, Josh. But, wow, he just brought it to life in such a good way.

Mr. Jordan: We had talked about what I wanted him to do, and he called me one day. “I’m going to do this performance. I don’t want to tell you about it, but we can try it, and if not, we can do what you want to do.” It was like— It was so much better than what I had anticipated or what I had written, and to see that beauty in that scene is really, really great, because his character is named Genesius, which is my patron saint. I put that icon during this break everywhere on set that we went; we always had this painting of St. Genesius. It hangs in his cell; my icon hangs in his cell in the movie, St. Genesius’s icon.

Kh. Frederica: Who is St. Genesius? Why don’t you tell us who he is?

Mr. Jordan: It’s a saint who was a performer during Diocletian’s era. He was not Orthodox; he was not Christian. He was juggling one night, performing a play, mocking Christ, mocking the religion, mocking Christianity. And he baptized himself on stage one night, and it took, and the heavens opened. As the more and more he performed, Diocletian realized it was no more a performance; it was a prayer. He’s the patron saint of comedians, actors, clowns, poets, and lawyers.

Kh. Frederica: Oh! [Laughter]

Mr. Jordan: Just threw that one in there, yeah.

Kh. Frederica: Well, he’s been a good friend to you for at least ten years now, I guess.

Mr. Jordan: Yes, of course he has. I was really glad that Frank was the one to play him. Really, this film— I feel this film is for me— I’m not a scholar in Orthodoxy, and so this film, I do feel a little bit like Genesius, in saying I don’t have everything to offer, but I have this. I have these talents for entertainment.

Kh. Frederica: Yes, yes. Well, that’s wonderful. The other thing that I got to see that day was the actor who plays the visiting archbishop.

Mr. Jordan: Oh, yes.

Kh. Frederica: And he was walking around, wearing archbishop robes, looking, you know— Automatically, I wanted to go up and get his blessing! But he couldn’t memorize the short prayer, “O heavenly King,” that we all know by heart. So you ended up with somebody holding a cue card!

Mr. Jordan: We had cue cards.

Kh. Frederica: I took a photo of him standing on the bishop dias with the camera in front of him, and above the camera is the “O heavenly King” so he can remember the words. [Laughter]

Mr. Jordan: Yeah, that was Max Hartman. He was so nervous that day. He’s a professional actor who’s been in L.A. I think he was the voice of Domino’s Pizza for ten years. He has a really booming voice. I saw— I’ve never seen him nervous. I’ve seen him perform a thousand times, and he was so nervous because of the respect he had for the cathedral and all the people that were around, that were helping out, because we actually had real deacons and subdeacons, and we had Fr. Theophan. So he was surrounded with the real deal, and he took it very professionally.

Kh. Frederica: Oh, that’s wonderful. I know you were praying for everybody, and praying for everybody is how you get the performances you hope to eventually get. If you’re comfortable talking about it, the day I was there—I think it was September 14. Yes, in the morning we did the Feast of the Cross Liturgy, so I got to see some filming that afternoon. A couple of people told me you had just come from filming—not on the island, but just on the coast, where you were allowed to use a hundred-year-old building that looked weathered, but it was very sturdy, and you were going to shoot some scenes inside of there. And unexpectedly it seemed that some evil spirits began to be provoked inside the house and were disturbing to the crew and to the cast and everybody. It was just very agitated.

And Fr. Theophan, I think you did a house blessing as a way of coping with this. I think about those actors thinking, “What the heck is going on?” as you’re going through the incense and sprinkling the water and all. Fr. Theophan, would you be willing to talk a little bit about that, about that day?

Fr. Theophan: Sure, so this is about the house in Tehuacana, which is about an hour and 20 minutes outside of Dallas, southwest. Beautiful old dormitory building that was part of a college in Tehuacana, this small town. It has functioned as a sort of a Christian ministry house for quite some time, where the owner would have Christian conferences and people would come, perfect for people staying in a bedroom, an old dormitory, basically. But what we didn’t know is what had actually occurred in the house in years past. We found out that several horror films had been shot in that house, and it’s old, and rather than it being seen as an Orthodox monastery, men’s monastery, it could be seen as a very creepy place as well, if you were to shoot horror in there.

The first film was shot in the ‘70s, and it was very dark and was about demonic possession as well. They made a second version of that film later on. So when you’re dealing with things like this and you don’t know what all happened— It was a women’s dormitory, but you don’t know the history of a place. But when people start coming to you, and there is spiritual activity, demonic activity, going on—people being wakened in the night by a cold hand, all sorts of different things… One of our crew members who was really important, he lives near the house, and one night when we were away, filming on the island in the Gulf of Mexico, he had a very strong feeling that he needed to go down to the house to check on everyone’s cars and make sure everything was safe. He had a very disturbing sort of spiritual attack that night. So when we returned, I started learning about all these things. People slowly started talking about them. Many of the people were not Christians. So they’re all seeing this, knowing it’s real, because they are experiencing these things. And then there’s an Orthodox priest there that can actually do something about it! [Laughter]

So at a critical moment, I think we decided we were going to do the house blessing. It’s a large, three-storey house with a basement, and we started way up in the corner, which was actually Abbot John’s monastery cell room. So we started in there before the holy icons and worked our way down the entire house and went down into the basement and out onto the grounds. That was a Saturday night, and I had to leave and drive home. I got home about one o’clock in the morning, but I had a text from Jessica, Josh’s wife, the next morning after Liturgy, that she said, “It’s gone, and everyone can feel it,” and they were being extremely productive that day. It was as if something had been keeping us back—not entirely, but you could imagine, if you’re going to bring holy icons and prayer and try to make an Orthodox movie into a place like that, the demons are going to have a problem with it, so… [Laughter] We took care of it, and God blessed it, and we had many saints and faithful praying for us through the whole process. We didn’t discount that at all.

Kh. Frederica: I’m glad they had a priest on hand that could do this work that was so much needed. Yeah, you’re right. You don’t know what’s happened to a building over a hundred years, and a big building, a dormitory building… Time for a good clean-out, I guess. Well, I think things like that might have made an impression on the cast and crew. They weren’t by any means all Christians. They were professionals, most who work in Hollywood, and because of your connections, Josh, after This World Won’t Break—sorry I’m going to say it wrong.

Mr. Jordan: A long title! [Laughter]

Kh. Frederica: You had the connections to call on real professionals who could do an excellent job. I’m sure for many of them it was the first house blessing they ever saw.

Mr. Jordan: Right.

Kh. Frederica: Yeah, I hope that gave them something to think about later on.

Mr. Jordan: There was. I mean, I could tell that they were all very intrigued, like: What’s going on? As we’re filming all the different liturgical things and the things that happen in a monastery, they were very interested, as in: This is very beautiful. How we production designed and dressed all the sets: I would walk by and see them all looking at the icons and kind of studying the icons.

Kh. Frederica: That’s great!

Mr. Jordan: All trying to make sure they sign the sign of the cross the correct way and making sure: “Do I look okay? Do I look Orthodox?” “You do. You look fantastic.” So they were very intrigued and took it very seriously, which I— I was not surprised, but I was very happy with that. They’re all professional. I wasn’t expecting anything less, but really, yes, I was intrigued at how amazed they were and how they were very welcoming to Fr. Theophan. The fact that they could go to Fr. Theophan! I was so busy, running around, nobody really had the time to— There were several people who had several experiences, but I did not know about it, because they were talking to Fr. Theophan while I was on set, so it was a nice— It was a very safe place; I can say that.

Kh. Frederica: I’m touched by how much they respected and valued you, Josh, and their friendship with you. There are certainly plenty of movies, I assume, where people are acting a love scene, and then when the cameras go off they’re angry at each other, or they’re having to say words that then they mock. But it sounds like they were circumspect; they were careful to make sure they treated everything with the sobriety that you were bringing to it, both of you—you, Fr. Theophan, as well. As Orthodox, we express that we really believe this stuff and we value it, and that we are cautious and respectful in dealing with it. Thank God, it sounds like they really picked up on that and were able to reflect it back and follow your example.

Fr. Theophan: I think so. It was beautiful.

Mr. Jordan: I can say many of them did have a Christian background of sorts, and so even for those maybe that had stopped going to church a long time ago or it was the faith of their childhood, this whole experience caused them all to think a lot about what this was and why we were taking it so seriously.

Kh. Frederica: Thank God for that. You don’t know what long-term effects that that might have. I was just thinking about the palpable difference between that building before and after you did the blessing, that even they could feel. Ahead of time, they might have scoffed and [thought] it was mumbo-jumbo, but they could really sense something was different.

It made me think about something I heard recently, which is: Why did Christianity succeed in the Roman Empire? Why did it take over when they went from being a tiny minority that were persecuted to finally the entire city of Rome has become Christian? And I’ve heard theories that it was partly social, that the respect given to women and even to slaves made them eager to join the faith, or that the theology was so compelling, or that we had the best preachers. But I recently read something saying that that really is our 20th-, 21st-century perspective on what we think would be effective, but if you read the early documents, what it was was power over evil spirits.

Mr. Jordan: Amen.

Kh. Frederica: The miracles, the healings, and particularly that Jesus had a power over the evil one that nobody else had. I think even Athanasius says something about that, that it’s like: Well, you know, if you don’t believe, try it for yourself and you will see that the evil spirits flee when you say the name of Jesus. So this is something that, in our post-Enlightenment West, we no longer expect that kind of— Well, we don’t expect that there are evil spirits either. That power is still there.

Mr. Jordan: The pulling down of idols and temples dedicated to the old gods— Yes, we are seeing a resurgence of paganism and sort of a re-creation of old things, but it’s inspiration from the demons again. But, time and time again, we are also seeing people come out of those dark backgrounds and find the light of Christ in Orthodoxy. So it’s still happening. And as the world grows darker, the light becomes that much brighter.

Kh. Frederica: Yes. Yes, it surely does. And our Lord has the ability to snatch somebody out of the center of hell, you know. If he wants to claim somebody, he can do that. I recently heard a story about a man who was a thorough-going Satanist, and he worshiped Satan and he loved Satan. He found himself praying, “Satan, I love you so much that I would give you my life. I would give you my soul. And you don’t have to do anything in return. My love for you is that selfless.” And what happened was Satan’s hold over him broke at that moment, because Satan can’t handle love. [Laughter] It was genuine, pure love in the wrong direction, but that’s something that Satan— His fingers break off…

Mr. Jordan: Wow.

Kh. Frederica: He can’t hold onto that.

Well, we’re in for some interesting years ahead, I think. Thank God we got the good team on our side. [Laughter] Josh, were you about to say something?

Mr. Jordan: I’m just reminded, when y’all were talking about that, that old building, that 100-year-old building has never heard that many Jesus Prayers before, because we had to do so many takes of actors saying the Jesus Prayer.

Kh. Frederica: Wow, that’s great.

Mr. Jordan: That’s a wonderful thing. There were lots of Jesus Prayers! [Laughter]

Kh. Frederica: Well, we know how effective that is, then. It sounds like the making of this movie, then, was a spiritual experience for both of you, a very positive one, one that you came away with, not a lot of frustration or mixed feelings, but that things went about as well as it could, or even better than expected. And you feel some contentment about the final product, whenever we get to see it.

Mr. Jordan: Oh, definitely. It was the grace of God. All the things that could’ve gone wrong, should’ve gone wrong, did go wrong for half a second were removed, and this film— We brought so many people down to the coast of Texas, and that’s a whole ‘nother story about this island that we went on. It’s a primitive island, and you have to get there by boat: 30-minute boat-ride with all of our gear and all the people…

Kh. Frederica: Oh! You had a lot of rental gear in a boat? [Laughter]

Mr. Jordan: Yes, I didn’t put that on the insurance thing, but… We only had a day out there, and we had to get off that ocean, and Jess comes over and she’s like— Jessica’s my wife; she’s the producer on the film. My whole family was involved. I remember she was saying, “We’ve run out of food and we’re about to run out of water.” I was like: “It’s okay because we just wrapped.” So there were moments of… We weren’t given a lot, but we were given just the right amount, every single day.

Kh. Frederica: Given what you needed.

Mr. Jordan: I’m very thankful for all of the prayers of that, for sure.

Kh. Frederica: Well, I can’t wait to see it. When I tell people about it, they say, “Well, when will we be able to see it?” So that’s my question: When will it be out?

Mr. Jordan: That’s a great question. We are in the post section, in which we’re editing the film. My son, Julian Jordan—he’s 22 years old and he’s my co-editor—he and Fr. Theophan got to see a very, very, very rough assembly. The movie is taking place. It takes a long time to make a film, and we’re doing it as fast as we can. We want to be able to hit up all the international film festivals, but we are still in the process of raising money for the movie, because we still have post-sound, which costs a lot of money. The score, marketing, design—we have a long way to go, but in a short amount of time. So people can follow us on social media. They can also go to holyfoolfilms.com and see our progress.

I say sometimes, “If you can’t donate or invest, you can always pray for this film, because I’ve seen it work.” This film, I can’t tell you enough. One of our last days at this house, everyone left, and I was supposed to meet everyone at the cathedral, and I had all the gear: I had the camera, all the lights, and everyone left, and it had just rained that night, and I didn’t realize I was in a sand-pit… I almost didn’t make it to the rest of the shoot! [Laughter] Luckily, one of the groundskeepers came over and pulled me out, and I was on my way about an hour and a half too late. It’s just those moments of praying and thinking, “Is this going to happen? Is this going to be possible?” even “Am I getting out of this sand-pit?” And we have and we will.

Yes, we’re in the editing process. We’ll have updates, and people can go to those places and donate or invest or pray, like I said.

Kh. Frederica: And you have a GoFundMe?

Mr. Jordan: That’s true. We have a GoFundMe. It’s El Tonto Por Cristo, that’s the GoFundMe, and people can go to that. That’s a way to give as much as you want. It’s really exciting. We are so excited. They always say the most important thing in cinema is getting it in the can, and we have gotten it in the can and it’s being edited, and we’re lucky enough to have a composer, Michael Paraskevas, who’s been Orthodox his whole life. He lives out in Los Angeles. He scores Marvel movies and does things like Frozen. He’s so ready. When he was in town, he had the chance to see a rough cut, and his dad’s the choir director at St. Seraphim Cathedral. We’re going to be using the choir for the post-sound. So there’s lots of things we still have to do. When you blink your eye, it’ll all be there.

Kh. Frederica: [Laughter] Well, I’m going to really look forward to that. Is there anything else? [Are] there any questions that I should have asked that I didn’t think of asking? Anything else either of you wants to comment?

Mr. Jordan: I’m not sure. I think you covered so much so well. I’m just glad I didn’t cry during this. I normally get very emotional talking about the movie. I think I haven’t had time to cry. There’s just been so much help, and there’s so many people to thank, we’d be here all day, because it does take an army. A lot of the people in the Orthodox world have contributed. I know that people are talking about it. That’s the most important thing, I think, that people can do, is word of mouth. I think with this film, that’s how I saw Man of God; that’s how I saw Ostrov. It was word of mouth; there was no advertisement. Just talking with our community people, with our parishes and our friends and with social media, just talking about the movie, it makes it happen.

Fr. Theophan: I think I would like to say a few things, Khouriyeh. In particular, film is, as you said earlier, such an intensely collaborative art form that it’s very, very difficult to actually make one. We hope that this film not only becomes sort of an evangelism for Orthodoxy in the sense of, not that we’re pushing Orthodoxy in the film, it’s just shot and told—the story is told within an Orthodox context—but we truly hope that, for an industry that has such a stranglehold around it about who can actually make films and how you can make them—the SAG, everything we were talking about, the SAG permissions, all of that—we truly hope that this inspires Orthodox artists and storytellers to believe that they’re able to also create, whether they’re writing poetry, a novel, visual arts.

Jonathan Jackson has a small film school. He’s trying to inspire young people to realize that, yes, this is possible. But we need to give the Orthodox faithful, not only of America but the whole world, a vision that we need to start telling our stories. This is Josh’s story, as he said. This is not my story; it’s his story, and it comes from his experience of Orthodoxy, and that’s a beautiful thing. These stories should be told, but it does take money, and time and effort and dedication, sometimes risk, but I would really hope that this film gives our Orthodox faithful all over the world the vision that we all need to be telling good stories of the beautiful, good, and true. Hollywood, as we know, has owned too much of it for too long, and it’s a stranglehold of what can actually even be seen in a movie theater. But, as we saw with Man of God, people are starting to get a vision.

Just yesterday, Josh and I were both sent a link to a film coming out about Solovki Monastery in Russia, and it looks absolutely beautiful. I’m looking forward to learning more about that.

Mr. Jordan: Yes, they shot that movie for two years straight. That’s what I was reading about recently.

Kh. Frederica: It’s a wonderful time to be Orthodox. I feel like we’re at the crest of a wave, and so much is on the other side there, so many things we’re going to see, miracles and people being saved and people coming to the chalice, coming to the Orthodox Church and becoming one with Jesus Christ and with us as his body. Wonderful things lie ahead!

Fr. Theophan: I believe that we are seeing miracles. I believe that we are seeing remarkable things happen, and they will increase.

Kh. Frederica: Yes, more and more of them. So how great it is to be at the crest of the wave with this beautiful movie you’re making. People will look back to that. They’ll say, “That was the year El Tonto Por Cristo came out.” It’s going to be a landmark film, I believe.

Mr. Jordan: It’s very exciting. I got lots of texts and emails. Like Fr. Theophan was saying, people are like: “What exciting times! All these Orthodox films are coming out!” And it is. This is my message; this is the way I can show people what Orthodoxy is, and I’m very blessed to be able to do that.

Kh. Frederica: Well, thank you guys for taking the time to talk to me about the movie today. I can just say over and over, I can’t wait to see it! I will have to resign myself to waiting, but I expect something brilliant once it arrives.

Mr. Jordan: I’m excited to see it, too! [Laughter]

Kh. Frederica: All right, guys.

Mr. Jordan: Thank you so much!

Fr. Theophan: Thank you so much, Khouriyeh! You have a blessed day.

Mr. Jordan: Bye-bye. Thanks again.