By Rob LeFebvre.

Daniel Meersand and Nick Simon met at the American Film Institute Conservatory and subsequently wrote two feature horror films, including The Removal, based on a short they wrote while in school, and The Pyramid, which came out December 5, 2014. Simon is a writer and director, while Meersand stays on the written side of the page.

The Pyramid tells of a group of archaeologists who discover a long-buried tomb in the Egyptian desert. They team is asked to evacuate due to unrest in the region, but they decide to head into the pyramid against their better judgement. What they find inside may spell the end of each of their lives.

What’s the elevator pitch for The Pyramid?

Dan Meersand: So we have a team of archaeologists who are just uncovering this major find, and they dig up one of these pyramids, and they’re about to go in. Then the whole revolution breaks out, so they’re being evacuated and then they decide that they should go in anyway. They send a robot in, basically like the Mars Rover-type thing to investigate it. And then, yeah, chaos ensues. It’s a fun monster movie kind of thing from there.

I looked at the trailer and saw monster movie, kind of a haunted house vibe. That sort of pseudo-documentary thing. What other kind of sub-genres were you trying to get in there?

Nick Simon: I think documentary-style; we’re tying to go for kind of like a District 9 type thing at the beginning. like a big documentary about these archaeologists who dig up this pyramid. Once we go in, it kind of becomes a traditional 3rd person. We initially used that first-person camera as a point of view, but there’s also the 3rd person point of view.

That found-footage; they call it mixed media, I guess. There’s elements of that. We use the elements of that.

And we also worked really hard to have a real practical reason to keep bringing the camera everywhere. James Buckley plays the camera-toting character brilliantly..

Got it. Are there other horror films or scripts that you found inspirational for writing this movie?

Nick: Oh yeah. Dan and I are both big, big genre nerds. So I think everything from Indiana Jones movies — we named the robot Shorty after Short Round from those films films.

Dan: We were taking an influence from Aliens; we watched a lot. Aliens was a big one, plus a lot of the B movies from the Alien rip offs. There’s a creature and there’s a bunch of chaos.

Nick: I would love that. I’d love to watch those B monster movies. And I think [Rec], the first [Rec] movie was a big influence on us.

Dan: The first [Rec] and The Last Exorcism also was an influence

What’s your vote for scariest movie ever?

Nick: The Shining, probably. I like The Shining. I can only speak for me personally, I’m sure there are scary movies, but nothing scared me more as a kid than David Cronnenberg’s The Fly.

Yeah, that’s a scary movie.

Dan: I was way into horror movies since I was like 7, and I saw The Fly when I was like 12. I shouldn’t have watched that.

Nick: Yeah, me, too. My mom let me watch Halloween entirely too early.

Oh, yikes. Yeah.

Nick: So, I think the original Halloween is that for me, also. Even now, The Shining wasn’t as scary to me as a kid, but now as I get older, it becomes more terrifying. That’s why I kind of go back to The Shining for me.

One of the things that’s scariest for me — and we did a bit of it in Pyramid — is whenever a character’s body starts turning against her. You know, it starts deteriorating and rotting, stuff like that. I think that always freaked me out so much in movies. And you have a bit of that in Pyramid as well.

Right, with like the fingernails in The Fly, where he’s peeling off those fingernails. That always got me.

Dan: Yeah. Fingernails and teeth are the two things that I can’t handle. Teeth being ripped out. Fingernails being ripped out.

Nick: People losing their teeth is a reoccurring nightmare that happens all the time. That’s something that people dream about. It’s symbolic, you know. The teeth thing is really brutal because that’s one that gets people all the time.

As a director, do you approach screenwriting differently than you would if you weren’t also a director?

Nick: Yes. Absolutely. Especially with this project because I think at one point, I was hoping to direct it. And then at one point, it became a bigger movie. Then it was like, OK, I’m probably not going to direct it. I think I shifted a little bit at that point. That was the first time that happened. I remember when that happened, I felt like I was totally OK with not directing it because I love producer Alexandre Aja and director Greg Lavasseur. Alex and Greg are two of my favorite filmmakers working in this genre, and having them take the reins on this was fantastic.

Once I knew that, I stopped writing while worrying about how I was going to make the written stuff work onscreen.

It’s kind of liberating in a way. There’s a scene where Alex came up to Dan and I. We had a meeting with him, and he’s had this idea of where he wanted to enhance the scene that we already had in there with these Sphinx-like cats. Alex brought in concept art and all this stuff to show us. We’re like, “Wow, that’s awesome.” But then it was nice because at that point I did not have to worry about directing it. I don’t care how they have to figure out how to shoot the cats.

So Alex says, “I want to add these things.” And he shows you a picture of a scary cat. And we’re like, “Cool.” And then there’s a scary cat. It’s a little liberating as a writer to not have to worry about how you’re going to build something up.

How do you typically approach a new screenplay fresh on the page? What techniques do you use?

Nick: The way it usually works is we’ll start throwing ideas back and forth. Once we get an idea we want, we usually will crunch heads and come up with a 20 page treatment or something like that. We’ll massage that until it’s ready, create a beat sheet.

Dan: One of us would take a first draft or something, and we’ll kind of rewrite each other back and forth for as long as we have to.

Nick: Dan’s being a little humble right there. Actually where he excels at is getting that first draft out. Anyone who’s ever written understands that getting a first draft done and completed is the hardest thing in the world.

So, we’ll outline for a while and make sure there’s a pretty tight B-sheet, and then Dan usually, I would say 99% of the time, 95% of the time, he’ll take that first draft and he’ll hammer it out in 2 weeks.

How do you do that, Dan?

Nick: I don’t know how he does it.

What can you tell aspiring screenwriters about taking a beat sheet and turning it into that first draft? What are your secrets?

Dan: Forget sleeping. Sleeping is overrated. It’s just a matter of basically isolating myself in a room with as few distractions as possible. Sometimes I’ll disconnect the Internet, so I’m not distracted. The biggest bane of trying to get writing done is YouTube or Wikipedia.

Facebook.

Dan: All of the above.

Do you use any specific plot structure tools like Hauge’s 6-Stage plot format when you’re putting it together? Do you use any kind of screenwriting tricks?

Nick: Yeah.

Dan: I”m a big a fan of using Joseph Campbell iconography. Even in the most genre movies…

Even in this movie.

Dan: … it’s always there. Even in movies you wouldn’t think so, the mythical structure is always going to be there if you dig for it.

Nick: I think we stuck that with most of the things we work at.

Dan: Yeah, the archetypes are always going to be there no matter how much they’re hidden. You’ve got to work from a core like that, and then make it interesting.

That’s all.

Dan: It’s easier said than done. But that’s the backbone of what we do.

Nick: And then Dan will come back with the first draft. It’s readable. You read it and you’re like, “Oh, wow, this is everything we’ve been talking about in the last meetings. And then you go, “Oh, this totally doesn’t work. This doesn’t work at all. This part blows everything out of the water.

All of writing is rewriting. Then we just go through rewrites. And rewrites and rewrites. I write with a partner all the time because there’s somebody to keep you in check. I think Dan and I keep each other in check all the time. We’re mean to each other sometimes. Like, “What were you thinking? What are you talking about with this?” It’s important and it keeps us both in check.

Dan: Being mean to each other is fine, but you’re ultimately both working for the same goal.

What was the trickiest part of being mean to each other during this script writing experience? What did you have to tell each other that you didn’t want to hear?

Nick: Well, we’ve known each other for so long. We tell each other anything that comes around. We love each other, so it’s fine. There was one moment where I don’t know if you just were sleeping for like 3 or 4 days and you wrote some crazy shit. I don’t know even know what it was.

Dan: There was one.

Nick: What is happening here?

Dan: There was a crazy time, I did a kind of an insane draft. I think that was the week my grandfather died, though.

Nick: So you have to say, this isn’t working because of this, or that, or the other thing. The suggestions are what we really want, but this isn’t working.

Dan: So then you have to figure out what isn’t working.

Nick: And then sometimes you get notes like, “Can there be more sex in it?”

Yes.

Nick: I was like, “no there can be no sex. There’s really no context for it in the story.” You have to go back and forth with that for a while.

Dan: That was more in the first script.

Nick: Yeah.

Dan: Nobody asked for sex in this one.

You’re genre horror fans; what’s your stance on violence and gore and showing versus suggesting? What’s the relationship between violence and an effective horror script?

Nick: I go back and forth on that one a little bit. When we made Removal, we were trying to do a Hitchcock-type of thriller. I was really more interested in not showing the actual gore. It was all off screen, though you kind of saw parts of it. What you’re not seeing is way worse than what you’re seeing.

I don’t think that really worked well for that movie. I think it may have played better if you got to see the horrible things that were happening. In The Pyramid here, there was a version where they were really trying hard to get a PG-13 rating. The studio wanted that; it’s kind of a PG-13 movie. There’s not any swearing or nudity in it. But there’s a couple of really violent scenes, but it’s all kind of horror-movie violence. Dan and I were watching what’s going on with Walking Dead and Hannibal. Man, that stuff is crazy, what they’re showing on TV. For sure the things we were writing on the script were PG-13 safe. They kept on going back and forth with the rating, though, all because of the blood and gore. They kept cutting it out and cutting it out to the point where they were going to have to dump an entire scene to get it to a PG-13. Finally, Alex and Greg said, “No, forget it. Put it all back the way it was.” Then they actually went out and spent more money on additional gore.

Because it peaked out at an R rating.

Nick: If we’re going to be an R, we’re going to be an R. And I think the gore works really well for this movie because this movie is fun, it’s a monster flick that we would have loved watching as kids. I think the gore in this one works great. It’s funny. I shouldn’t say it’s funny, but it is.

Dan: We both love John Carpenter’s The Thing, where’s it’s just like, “let’s just throw it out there and have fun with it.”

Nick: Dan and I are mentored by Wes Craven, and when we were talking to him about some of the violence in the original The Last House on the Left. There’s that scene where they’re about to chip their teeth out. You see the chisel on the teeth, you see the hammer come up, and then you just hear it. That’s a perfect example of what you don’t really need to see.

Right. You know what’s happening.

Nick: You know exactly what’s happening. There are ways to handle violence differently.

What other types of tips and tricks can you offer our readers as far as taking your story form first idea to final draft? What are a couple of things you really wish you had known when you started out?

Nick: As far as writing goes, I guess I didn’t know how many rewrites you end up doing. I think Dan and I are our own worst judges. We’re constantly rewriting our own stuff before anyone ever reads it. I think another thing is how long things take, too. Once the script is sold, then it goes to movie development, and then it goes to shooting and then post (production). And then it gets lost in the shuffle. In the case of The Pyramid, it started out as very small movie.

Dan: But then 21st Century Fox came on and wanted it. That process took a little longer because it went to a smaller Fox subsidiary first, and then to a larger entity.

How did that affect the writing of the script?

Dan: No. We sold the script.

Nick: It didn’t; it was already done.

Dan: That all happened after the film was done.

Got it. That’s nice.

Nick: That would be a very different situation if it happened during the process. Everything that Dan and I’ve worked on has been pretty much and indie film at some point.

Dan: Patience is a virtue.

Nick: That’s the best part about being a writer, too. When it’s just you and your writing partner coming up with ideas and stories, nobody’s telling you not to do anything. So you get to write whatever crap you want. It can be great. It can be awful. The key is to sit down and do it.

So, throw everything up against the wall and see what sticks.

Nick: Exactly. A lot of times.

Dan: Also, watch as many movies as you can. You’ll learn through watching other movies to see structure, characters, all that stuff.

Nick: The thing that we also took away from getting these movies made is that we really didn’t have an audience in mind for our first script. That was just a movie we wanted to see because we loved that kind of film. I love this type of thriller, and I love these kind of throwback things here. So, ultimately, there was never really an audience in mind. Ultimately, though, if you’re trying to sell something, and you’re trying to make a living at this, you have to have an audience in mind before you write anything. Who’s going to go pay $15 or $12 to see this in a theater?

So you were the kind of the audience in each case, right?

Nick: Yeah, in this case. Ultimately with The Pyramid, we wanted to change something, too. You have to pay attention to what is going on in trends, especially with genre films. In our case, all the current films were all about ghosts, possession, ghosts, possession.

Paranormal.

Nick: Right. So, we thought we should come up with an Egyptian horror movie because we’ve never seen a scary movie using that. Let’s try that.

Dan: I remember saying, let’s do like a fun, straight up, monster movie. Let’s use a pyramid, mummies, stuff like that. “Let’s make it scary” was pretty much the operative thing.

It’s kind of tongue-in-cheek. It’s funny. It’s kind of gory. It’s a monster movie. It’s fun.