People can unexpectedly find themselves embarking on a transformative, coming-of-age journey later in life after a tragic event calls their decisions into question. In his first feature film leading role in the drama ‘Moonwater,’ actor Matthew Wayne Roberts showcases how his reclusive protagonist of Peter Goodman finally realizes how his addiction is not only affecting him, but also his family.

William Tyler Wiseman made his feature film writing and directorial debuts on ‘Moonwater,’ which is based on a short he scribed and helmed that’s driven by the same story. Besides Roberts, the movie also stars Michael Lee Joplin, Dannica Terry and Liz Meinders, the latter of whom also served as a producer.

‘Moonwater’ follows Peter, who’s struggling with alcoholism, as he discovers his late father’s old dilapidated moonshine still in the woods behind the small cabin on their family farm he’s currently living in. As he sets out to revive it for one final batch, he reconnects with his brother, Thomas (Joplin), and their father’s legacy, and strives to rebuild his relationship with his niece, Amaya (Terry), in the process.

‘Moonwater’ had its World Premiere during Dances With Films: NYC 2024 on Sunday, December 8 at 4pm. The screening was held at Regal Union Square during the festival’s third annual event in New York. Wiseman, Roberts Joplin and Meinders generously took the time to sit down for an exclusive interview at the Regal theater the afternoon of the drama’s screening to talk about penning, directing, starring in and producing the movie.

FF: Thank you all for taking the time to talk about your new movie, ‘Moonwater,’ during this year’s Dances With Films: NYC festival. Tyler, you wrote the script for the drama. What was the inspiration in scribing the screenplay for the movie, and making the project overall?

William Tyler Wiseman (WTW): I actually started as an actor. I moved out to L.A. to become an actor and went to theater school. When I was out there, I met all of these people who are phenomenal actors, cinematographers and directors. I was like, there’s all of this talent around me that needs a place to go.

So I started rallying people and was like, “Oh, I’ll act in it.” I then quickly realized that I didn’t like it once I started studying it.

I never thought I could be a filmmaker. I thought all of the great writers were dead, you know what I mean?

Once I stared helping those people out, I quickly realized that they needed a script. So I started writing stuff and thought, this is the most fulfilling thing that I’ve ever done. People can still do this – I can do this!

So I started writing a screenplay for myself. When I got about half-way through, I thought, I’m definitely not an actor anymore, especially in L.A. – I’m a writer.

They say to write what you know and to what you have. I have my family farm, and I wanted to write about what I grew up around, as I know them better than anything.

At the time, I was listening to folk music about moonshine stills. I was like, what a metaphor. Distilling is about taking the essence of something and purifying it. I thought that was a really good metaphor for the search for identity and figuring out your most essential sense of self. Michael in ‘Moonwater’ is searching for his essential sense of self. So that’s where the idea came from. I wrote it all based on what I had.

Since I realized that acting wasn’t for me, I showed the script to friends. They said, “This is actually good. You should make this.” I was like, “Wait, let me do a short film first. Maybe I’m not even a director.”

So I developed a short film that’s based on the screenplay. We then shot that, and it was the most fulfilling thing that I ever did. So I was like, “Okay, I guess we’re making the feature film.” So the script for the feature is the first thing I ever wrote, essentially.

Liz Meinders (LM): I worked with Tyler with three random short films before we shot this feature. We made them just for him to warm up to shooting this feature!

WTW: I didn’t even finish those because I made so many mistakes! (Roberts and Meinders laugh.)

LM: But that was part of the process that made the experience fun.

WTW: Yes, that’s true!

FF: Matthew and Liz, you both star in the film. What was it about the script that convinced you both to sign on to appear in the feature?

LM: I would say that Tyler himself is one of my biggest inspirations because he’s always just going for it. He always keeps going, and I’m like, “Let’s do it!”

He told me about this idea while we were working in a shoe store together. We wouldn’t do our job, as he would talk to me about ‘Moonwater.’ (Wiseman laughs.)

WTW: Yes, I would be storyboarding with her in the aisles. There would be customers asking us for help, and we’d be like, “Excuse me, we’re talking story.” (Group laughs.)

LM: We quickly left that job! (Group laughs.) I don’t think they wanted us.

One of my favorite stories about making the film is that Tyler had given me the script and asked me to play Emma. I was reading it in my acting class and sent it to my acting teacher, so we were workshopping it.

He said, “Do it in the group class,” so I said “Okay.” I brought it in and asked Matthew to read it with me. I read it with him over Zoom and was like, “This is going to be so good!” I then told Tyler, “You have to take his audition! He is so good!” He was so amazing in that moment.

Matthew Wayne Roberts (MWR): Yes, we dove right into it during the workshop with our coach. He really helped us pick it apart. I had no idea what it was; for me, the scene we did over Zoom was out of context. But it was a really special scene.

I didn’t realize the enthusiasm was there for me to audition. Liz was just like, “Yeah, send a tape in if you want.” So I was like, “Okay, I’ll have a read.”

She then ended up sending me the whole script, as well as the audition sides. So I went ahead and read the script.

I didn’t know Tyler before going into this, so I had no bias to impress him or anything.

LM: You do now!

MWR: Sure, yes! But it’s not very often that you get a script that you actually like. (Roberts laughs.) But the delicate story in this script was so well written. One of the things that drew me to the script was that it wasn’t afraid to sit in stillness and silence. That comes through very well in the movie itself.

Since I loved the script, I thought, I have to at least try. So I sent in the tapes, but didn’t hear anything for a few weeks. So I was like, “Alright, it wasn’t for me.” I didn’t know that behind the scenes, Liz was going to battle for me, as was Momma Wiseman. (Meinders laughs.)

LM: We saw so many tapes, but I was like, “None are as good as his!” (Meinders laughs.) I was so stoked about it.

MWR: What we did in class was a pretty special scene. It was the one scene that I was really looking forward to doing the entire time – the scene where I got to work with Liz.

LM: Shooting it was so fun, too. It was one scene, so the day entailed me being out in the mud, doing producing stuff, and then shooting the scene as an actress, and then going out back into the mud. (Meinders laughs.)

WTW: Since she’s also one of our producers, she was out in the mud, pushing one of the trucks that got stuck, and then she was the actress. It was a crew of like, nobody – we only had about seven people, and we shot out on my family’s farm.

LM: It was one of the most beautiful and communal experiences that I think you can have on a film set.

MWR: Very much so. It was the first time I felt like that. You always hear people say, “You become a little family on set.” The rag-tag team of the 12 or 13 of us definitely did feel like that for a solid three weeks while we were filming. Everyone was very close-knit, and became that way in a very close fashion. It was really great.

FF: Speaking of the fact that you also served as a producer on the drama, Liz, how did you approach producing the project?

LM: This was a lot of favors. It was on the backs of a lot of favors. We paid who we could, and everything we could rent out in town was favors. The house and buildings were favors.

WTW: We like to say it was a sheer force of will. We were like, “We’re making this, so you’re coming or you’re not.” There were some people who couldn’t make it, so I was like, “Okay, you’re out, we’re going forward.” That’s kind of what you have to do.

I read an interview with Matthew McConaughey about Dallas Buyers Club. He said, “If you so much as flinch, the movie’s not going to get made. So you just have to do it.”

So we just did it, and we made a lot of mistakes. We didn’t know what we were doing, but through sheer force of will, we made it happen.

LM: Like how we got the truck out the mud was sheer force of will.

WTW: We also had a 25-foot light stand that fell over. Someone had to run and buy a bunch of plywood so it wouldn’t fall again.

MWR: There was even one day that the cows got loose!

WTW: I grew up on the farm, and one day all the cows did get loose. They were all like, “What do we do?” I was like, “Relax, guys. All you do is take a little bit of feed and put it in a bucket and shake it. Then they all coming running like pigeons in a park.” They were all like, “He’s like the cow whisperer!” (Group laughs.)

(Joplin joins the interview after arriving a few minutes late.)

FF: Michael, thank you for joining us, as well. Matthew and Liz spoke earlier about why they were interested in starring in ‘Moonwater.’ What was it about your character of Thomas that convinced you to take on the role?

Michael Lee Joplin (MLJ): It’s an awesome script. Getting the opportunity, as they probably already talked about, to go to that part of the country and really be in nature, and have it be a family affair on Tyler’s family farm, was a real dream.

I liked the brother angle, as I’m a brother. So I understand the story. In my own life, I’m probably more on the other side of things, as opposed to being the brother who has his stuff together. (Group laughs.) So it was really fun to be a part of that.

To be a part of it from the beginning, when it was just a short film, was also really cool. Also, to be able to film the short on the farm in California was really cool. I didn’t even know that that kind of area even existed in California.

I remember when we then went out to the Waverly area in Pennsylvania and New York, I thought, wow, they somehow matched the tone of the short, as well as the location.

LM: Yes, when you watch Michael in the short, you think, nobody else can play this role. I feel that way about Michael 100 percent of the time when I watch him in anything!

FF: Speaking about the location, the movie takes place in a old dilapidated moonshine still that’s deep in the woods. Tyler, for you as the director, why did you feel your family’s farm was the right spot to shoot the film?

WFW: Well, the inspiration to shoot the feature at the farm came from the fact that as an indie filmmaker, I knew I would have a homebase there and free locations.

I was also going through a reflection of my own. Subconsciously, it was a thing I had to come to terms with in the same way that the character does in the movie – I had to remember that this is where I’m from, and this is my home. Although I moved o L.A. to try to become an actor, this is always going to be a part of me. It’s not always pretty, and sometimes it’s rough.

But it’s you, and you have to incorporate it into yourself. What better way to do that than in your home, in the thing that you know most intimately?

In the movie, the landscape and forest are captured in such a beautiful way. I grew up in those woods. I used to run and play in the spot where we shot the scenes at the moonshine still. My dad taught me how to bow hunt there, and I used to play hide-and-seek there with my friends…We captured the landscape in such a beautiful way.

LM: There weren’t any maps on that farm, so if you weren’t with him, you better remember where you were!

FF: Once everyone was cast, how did you work together to build the characters and overall story?

MWR: There wasn’t much rehearsal time.

WFW: We had time for two takes.

MWR: For me personally, this being my first lead in a feature, it was as exciting as it was daunting. (Roberts laughs.) But the fact that we didn’t do much of the dialogue scenes over the first two days allowed us to ease into the process together.

We learned how everyone works. So by the time days six and seven rolled around, we were off running. We pretty much became a well-oiled machine by the end of production.

MLJ: I feel like that was everyone’s experience. It was also beneficial that a lot of us were staying at the same house in the town. I got to be roommates with my brother (Matthew) and spend some time together. We also had some drinks together in L.A. before we went out to the location.

But it was good to be bunking together as brothers, with some other members of the crew, as well. We were experiencing a bit of the life in the town of Waverly in New York and Pennsylvania – it runs right through state lines!

WTW: Yes, South Waverly is the town in Pennsylvania, and Waverly is the town in New York.

MLJ: Most of the country thinks of this area as flyover. But these types of stories are real. So I think there was value in the fact that on the days when we were off and not shooting, we would go into the town and eat at the diners and meet some people there. We all went to a couple of diners together that had good home cooking.

One place that I found that I enjoyed is the record store, as I’m an avid record collector. When I went into the store, I was like, this is the best record store I’ve ever been to – the prizes were so cheap. The guy who runs the store is also the mayor of Waverly!

Those experiences really did something to help me tell this story. It helped me show that these are real, important stories to tell.

MWR: To speak to the home aspect, as well, for me in particular, I grew up in Central Illinois. So going to Waverly was honestly like going home. It was basically like my hometown. So it was easy for me to ease right in.

FF: ‘Moonwater’ is having its World Premiere here at Dances With Films: NYC 2024 later this afternoon. What has the experience of gearing up for the premiere at the festival been like? What does I meant to you all that the drama is playing at the festival?

LM: I’m grateful it’s in New York. Tyler and I, specifically, have a lot of family out here – I’m from New Jersey, and he’s from Upstate New York/Pennsylvania. (Group chuckles.)

It’s a really great area to come to in order to celebrate this movie with everyone. We did this on the backs of our families. They were really the ones who came through to us, as well as our friends and neighbors – they all showed up for us. So it’s really nice to be here at the festival.

WTW: But it’s also kind of nerve-racking, as I still haven’t the movie shown my family. They’re going to watch it for the first time in about an hour-and-a-half. They kept asking, “When are we going to see it?” I was like, “You’re not going to see it unless you’re with me.”

It’s incredible that we get to show it in a big theater at a big festival like Dances With Films. It’s a dream to be able to share it with them in this way.

To also have so many other filmmakers here to support us has been a dream. It’s also a little bit anxiety-inducing, as it’s the World Premiere, but overall, it’s a dream scenario.