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West Side Swordy!

· McKay Stewart

Back in 2015 my old Blogspot had exactly two posts, and they were both about the same crazy little movie: West Side Swordy. Post one was the trailer. Post two was me announcing the website. Eleven years later I’m reviving the blog, so it felt right to start with the project I was yelling about back then, and to finally tell the whole thing in one place.

Oh, and the website is back from the dead too. More on that below.

West Side Swordy poster West Side Swordy poster art, from the 2015 press kit (poster designs credited to Alex Lombardo and Julian Martin).

So what IS West Side Swordy?

Picture West Side Story. Now give everybody swords. Now put Deadmau5 in charge.

That’s basically it. Here’s the official synopsis from our 2015 press kit:

“The Jets chase the Sharks through an alleyway and up over a tall fence, when suddenly they find themselves in another world, magically transported into an abandoned warehouse. Where they are controlled by the electronic beat of the world-renowned disc jockey, Deadmau5. This is an LA West Side Story.”

IMDb’s one-liner is even better: “The ‘Jets’ chase the ‘Sharks’ over a fence and land in… a warehouse! With swords in their hands. And Deadmau5 controls them all!”

It’s a 9-minute short (IMDb lists it as a 2015 U.S. short, genres Short / Action / Adventure), made under my company, Origins of Light, and shot in Los Angeles.

The Jets leap through the alley The alley chase. Still from the West Side Swordy press kit (2015); set stills credited to Stephen William, Jay Andrino and Shant Hamassian.

My jobs on it (spoiler: a lot of them)

Per IMDb’s full credits, I:

  • wrote it,
  • produced it (executive producer / producer),
  • played Riff, leader of the Jets,
  • and got a co-choreographer credit.

And I did not do it alone, not even close. Dan Liu directed and edited. John T. Connor and Nate Fu shot it. Nick Lanzisera choreographed. Erin Rogers did costumes. Jason Brillantes played Bernardo (and did stunts), and Jaimie Bess played Anita. Deadmau5 himself was played by Saige Walker and André Van Driessche. The rest of the Jets, Sharks and dancers are all on the IMDb credits page, and every single one of them killed it.

Why swords? In my own words from the 2015 press kit:

“I originally wanted to create a sword-fighting reel to try and help me and a few fellow stunt performers get jobs on the Pirates of the Caribbean movies. No joke! But then, I wanted it to be special, to have real production value, have a story. In essence, a short film.”

And why West Side Story? Also from the press kit: I’d performed in it twice, as Baby John, once in Austin, Texas and once in Redondo Beach. Definitely my favorite musical, by far.

Sword duel in the warehouse Steel under the spotlight. Still from the West Side Swordy press kit (2015).

The trailer (April 29, 2015)

My first-ever blog post was literally just a link: “Official Trailer for West Side Swordy!” Here it is, embedded properly this time:

“West Side Swordy Trailer” on my YouTube channel, uploaded April 22, 2015 (38 seconds).

The tagline in the YouTube description says it all: “A Sword-Swinging Beat-Down Boogie.” It was billed as “a modern fairy tale featuring Original Music from West Side Story and from Electronic Dance Music producer Deadmau5.” World premiere coming soon, stay tuned!

Deadmau5 head in the warehouse set The mau5. Still from the West Side Swordy press kit (2015).

The website (May 24, 2015)

Post number two, word for word:

“Over one year in the making and hundreds of hours of labor, it is finally finished. www.westsideswordy.com !”

Two exclamation points in the title. I was pumped.

And honestly? It deserved it. The site was built by Halo Creative, a Los Angeles design firm, and it was gorgeous: an illustrated, parallax warehouse world with my big ol’ sword and the mau5 head floating out front, a pop-up trailer, a cast “About” page you unlocked by playing a memory game, an RSVP form for the invitation-only world premiere showcase, and the song “Pandora” by composer Pascal Tatipata playing in the background. The homepage even said “Funded in part by Kickstarter.”

What I remember most is that the whole thing moved when you tilted your phone. The layers shifted with you, like you were peeking around inside the warehouse. That’s not just my memory, either. The archived code runs the scene through Parallax.js, a plugin that drives the layers “from the gyroscope output of a smartdevice” (and falls back to your mouse on a computer). Our Awwwards entry bragged about “Gyroscope and mouse-activated parallax animations” and put the build at “over 500 hours of interactive blood, sweat and tears over a period of nine months.”

The West Side Swordy homepage, restored The westsideswordy.com homepage as archived by the Wayback Machine in August 2015, rendered from the restored copy.

It got award love

The design community noticed:

And now it’s back!

The original domain died a long time ago. But the Internet Archive saved most of it, so I’ve rebuilt it from the Wayback captures. Go play with it:

Visit the restored westsideswordy.com

On a computer, move your mouse around. On a phone, turn it sideways and tilt it (on an iPhone, tap once and allow motion access). A few things didn’t survive: the photo gallery images were never archived, and the RSVP and contact forms are closed now. But the warehouse, the trailer pop-up, the music and the tilt are all back.

The warehouse The warehouse. Still from the West Side Swordy press kit (2015).

Where it went from there

West Side Swordy got out into the world:

  • Dances With Films 2016 listed it as a World Premiere, screening in the “Downbeat” program on Friday, June 3 at 2:45 PM (listing).
  • The 2016 Urban Mediamakers Film Festival (UMFF) named it Best International Music-Driven Short Film (UMFF 2016 winners, PDF).
  • The Short Stop International Film Festival programmed it in a music video block (listing).

A sword-fighting reel I wanted to send to the Pirates people turned into a short with a Technocrane, a Deadmau5 head, an award-nominated website and a festival win. Thank you to every single person who bled, sweated and danced on this thing.

Originally published April 29 and May 24, 2015 at mckaystewart.blogspot.com.

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