A few years back, my pals at Reactor 88 Studios asked me to lend them a hand with their latest project, a horror-comedy film based upon InSpectres, a brilliant indie roleplaying game by my friend Jared Sorensen. I came in and wrote a new draft of Jeff Dohm’s original screenplay and served as one of the film’s producers, and I even played a lone zombie covered in melting makeup on a blistering Chicago summer’s day. Director Darren Orange did most of the heavy lifting with making the film actually happen, and I got to have a ball working with the actors and the rest of the crew.

The film debuted last fall and had a short run in a big theater in Chicago. Now Reactor 88 wants to release the film for people to enjoy at home, and they’ve launched a Kickstarter to make that happen. Head on over and check it out, and chip in if you like screwy fun. Like this:

If you like your steampunk wrapped in an American flag, be sure to check it out. It’ll give you a good taste of what you can expect from the full game when it premieres this summer.

I co-wrote the screenplay for this with Jeff Dohm, and it’s a funny adventure film with some great actors and a fantastic crew. I also play a zombie in the opening reel, which may be worth the price of admission all by itself. Each level of contribution comes with a number of cool perks too. If you’re interested in investing anywhere from $10 on up to $5k, go ahead and check it out.

I spent the first couple hours at the Reactor 88 office, sitting for makeup. The talented and lovely Margret Ebert labored over me to make me uglier than I’d ever been, and she did a hell of a job. In advance of the shoot, she bought a suit at Goodwill and did horrible things to it, including tossing matches at it when her butane lighter ran out of fuel. When I got there, she made me look worse than the suit.

Once I got on the set, I had the easiest job of any of the actors. I had no lines, not even “Brains!” I just grunted and groaned a lot.

The strangest part of the day was lunch, when I weirded out everyone in the local Subway. Then I realized I couldn’t eat a sub without messing up my makeup, so I made do with a cookie and soda instead.

The trickiest part of the day had to be the fight scene I had with Brian Barber. We mixed it up pretty good, and the weather was so hot at one point that my makeup started to melt off of my face and drip onto his. This only inspired him to scream louder, so hopefully it comes out even better in the final cut.

The cast and crew and director Darren Orange were all fantastic and clearly there to have fun and make a film. Everyone was excellent. I made some new friends, played a little Guillotine while waiting to be called to the set, and then groaned myself hoarse. Good times.

We should have a rough cut of the film to show at the Reactor 88 event at Gen Con: Reactor 88 Studios: Behind the Scenes. That’s at 7:30 PM on August 6 in the Westin, Capitol III. I hope to see you there.