Episode 97 - Jon Erwin: No Longer The Underdog
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Filmmaker Jon Erwin has worked his way from operating cameras at sporting events to producing a major motion picture about a sports legend. His move from the sidelines to the studios has been earned through hard work and perseverance. It has also come by way of Jon’s strong desire to draw people to the hope and the truth of the Gospel. On the Faith Driven Investor Podcast, Jon shares about the early days of his career. He also talks about the making of “American Underdog,” how it came to the big screen, and why he believes in the power of strong stories that positively influence culture.
All opinions expressed on this podcast, including the team and guests, are solely their opinions. Host and guests may maintain positions in the companies and securities discussed. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as specific investment advice for any individual or organization.
Episode Transcript
Transcription is done by an AI software. While technology is an incredible tool to automate this process, there will be misspellings and typos that might accompany it. Please keep that in mind as you work through it.
Richard Cunningham: Jon, we are so grateful you're here. I'm actually going to start reason for having me because it's so impressive. And then we'll have you fill in some of the gaps, though. All right. Here's some of the Jon Erwin story. Jon Erwin began his career as a teenager working for ESPN as a camera operator in his hometown of Birmingham, Alabama. In 2002, he founded a production company with his brother, Andrew, the brother were directing videos and producing concerts and television programs for platinum recording artists such as Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith, Casting Crowns, Switchfoot, Skillet and others. They received 11 GLAAD Award nominations and three wins for Music Video of the Year. In 2010, Jon and Andrew began exclusively developing dramatic feature films. The features of all opened in the top 10 box office on opening weekend, and they received the coveted A-plus CinemaScore twice. Some of those titles are October Baby, Moms Night Out and Woodlawn. Additionally, the list also includes the surprise hit 'I can only imagine' which became the number one independent film of twenty eighteen, earning over eighty three million at the box office. In 2019, Jon and Andrew launched the Kingdom Story Company alongside their partners Kevin Downs and Tony Young, and the production company just released the new feature film American Underdog. Based on True, an inspiring story of Hall of Fame NFL quarterback Kurt Warner and his wife, Brenda. So if you don't have plans this weekend, you're going to watch American underdog. There's a lot of your Bible Belt, man. Let's start with the basics. Who are you? Fill it in. Then what has God done in your life to bring you here today?
Jon Erwin: Well, I mean, my name name's Jon. I appreciate you guys having me. You know, I think I'm a living testament that God can use anyone. And we all have unique gifts. I had to do what's done in the bios. I had to do kindergarten twice because I was an ADHD disturbance to the class. It was more everyone else's grades than it was mine, but it was like I was that much of a disruption. And you know, you can't grow up further away from L.A. or from Hollywood than Birmingham, Alabama. So I just think, you know, as the Bible says, God uses the weaklings of the world to confound the wise. And he's given us all gifts and there's nothing more fun and fulfilling vocationally than when you can really find, you know, there's a lot of things that we can do. There's only a few that that we can uniquely do, and I think even fewer that we're sort of called to do. And if you live in your calling and your unique ability and you do it for God's glory and for reasons beyond yourself, vocationally life does not get more fulfilling than that. So I'm one of those lucky people that gets to, I say, the coolest job in the world. And, you know, we say that, you know, we work for the fans. Everything we do is is about the people sitting in the seats and the experience they're having with the movies. And I'm very grateful to have the job I have, you know, and to tell stories for a living. And so we say we're storytellers serving the greatest storyteller of all time. And you know, it's interesting. God is really, really on the move in Hollywood in ways that are really cool to be a small part of.
Katherine Trout: Thanks for sharing that, Jon. I know one question I'm sure you get a lot is how did you get to where you are today and where you just see the hands of a in that? And he started you in a surprising place on the sidelines, operating guys.
Jon Erwin: Yeah, yeah. I can't recommend this story, but I can tell you what happened. It's I mean, first of all, desperation is a powerful motivator. And so sometimes it's like when your only option is to figure it out, you keep going. I've heard it said success is long obedience in the same direction. And, you know, the Bible echoes that that, you know, in due season will reap. If we don't lose heart, we don't quit. Which was really the theme of the Kurt Warner movie American Underdog, which we wanted to do that film. But for me, I started working at a cable station when I was 12. My dad helped show there and he was a radio show. And then when I was 15, I had apprenticed for a cameraman from my church. You know, I think you get big opportunities when you do small things, well, you know? And so I had just carried around Australia and helped them out, and I was super curious, you know, as a kid and try to maintain that. I think if there is a nitroglycerin to success at any level, I've found it's sort of the the two most valuable elements, I think would be just a level of resilience and a level of curiosity, like if you just watch those people that has a high pain tolerance and won't quit. But you also love to learn and love to stay curious. Eventually, you'll figure it out. And so when I was 15, that cameraman was on a University of Alabama football game. I should say roll tide and somebody got sick randomly a cameraman about three hours before the kick off. I lived an hour away, and so this guy, my mentor Mike, called me and said, Get over here right now. Don't tell anybody how old you are. Just don't say anything. You know, lies a strong word, but you know, basically just neglect to inform anyone of the actual truth. And so I went over there and I had the time of my life. I just, you know, 15 year old homeschooled southern Baptist, you know, in the reddest of the states. And all of a sudden it was like joining the circus and I had just a blast and did the game. They pay me $300. We'd have any money. So I had never seen that much money at one time and accruing agent called me the next week and just said, I guess they looked at the list and said, Are you a freelance camera operator in Birmingham? Because it's right in the middle of the assessee? So there's lots of televised games. I didn't know if that was three different jobs or a single job, you know? So I literally just said, yes, that's what I do that that's that's me. And I did a game on Auburn and then just started doing games every week. My brother quickly followed my dad with money. He did not have helped me buy a camera when I was 16 and help me get a loan, which you should be 16 for $10000 for editing equipment. And we just were off to the races and my brother and I, we started making stuff and I like this. There's a Malcolm Gladwell book Outliers that talks about the 10000 hour rule. And, you know, basically that anybody that's really successful has been 10000 hours refining their craft. And that was sort of what it was for me. And we were just we had the good fortune of charging people a little bit of money, like a $500 wedding. We videotaped orthopedic trauma surgeries. You know, we did birthday parties. I mean, anything that you could possibly do just to make stuff and just to refine our craft. And that's how the whole thing sort of began.
Richard Cunningham: I cannot tell you how much I love that story. That is a wild 15 year old sideline of Alabama football game. We have one of the co-hosts of the faith driven podcast William Norvell would be just jumping out of a seat to hear that story. He is a diehard Crimson Tide family. All right, so incredibly humble beginnings. So cool to hear about how your dad also gets involved and kind of help with this passion, this calling. Now it's 2002. You've got this incredible experience, the camera. You're talking about 10000 hours and you and your brother just mastering this craft. You guys decide to go out on your own producing music videos, working alongside a lot of these Christian artists. What was that like? Yeah, I like the fact that
Jon Erwin: sometimes you have to have in life, you know, the courage to leap. You know, my kids go to the school, behold. And you know, they say that in the Bible, it's based on the version of what God says. Behold, I'm doing something new. You know, can you see it? And for me, when there's nothing really left to learn, that's where vocationally I've got to move somewhere. And so I love working for ESPN. It was a great sort of 10 years of my life, but in my early 20s, we were trying to start really get our production company off the ground. And sometimes you can't serve two masters, as the Bible says. And so, like Cortez, had to burn his ships, you know, to motivate his men. And I just remember calling all of the crewing agents and say, this has been a wonderful season of life and I have this dream. At the time, it was to direct music videos and commercials and really going to go for it. And I think I just need to chase it fully, and if I fail, I'm going to call you and beg for a job. But I'm going to I'm going to try and, you know, I have never regretted those type decisions. You know, looking back where I have regretted hesitating, you know, and maybe being afraid of what God could do. And there's been, you know, three or four of them in my life. And so jump to music videos and commercials and did a ton of music, a lot of Christian music videos, some country music videos. And really, that was great fun. I mean, that was really where we found our sort of visual style and voice, and we did some fun videos at the time. The label would submit a song and you would have to typically write a six eight page treatment with a bunch of nonsense and adjectives like amazing and nuanced, and the band's going to look beautiful. And it's, you know, all these words that I don't even know. They mean, you know, just to try to get the video awarded. But we had gotten popular and we'd won via the year a few times. And I remember we did a video. It was a we did a video for Skillet, this Christian band and literally the whole treatment was the band is singing at night. Things start to blow up. Then it starts to rain. Then it rains and things blow up. Then everything blows up the end, you know, and that was just the type of things that were just great fun to just do stunts and explosions and car chases. And, you know, each music video was like this little mini movie. So again, it was a way for us to refine our craft. And then sometimes the questions can be the most powerful agents of change. And I went to direct second unit on a faith based film called Courageous that Sony was doing in this real Cinderella story. A church out of Georgia was making movies. And as luck would have it or whatever George Washington called the Divine Hand, you know Sony was trying to get into Faith-Based films after The Passion of the Christ. And so they acquired these films from this church, Sherwood and started releasing them, and the first one to ten million a football film called Face the Giants. The second one called Fireproof, did like 30, and it was this big sort of thing. And so they wanted to do a film called Courageous, but they were making their films primarily with church volunteers. So it's an incredible story. And so I went into direct because it was a police drama and there were car chases and action sequences and foot chases. You never want to combine car chases with church volunteers. It's like that's where people can die. And so it
Richard Cunningham: was really massive red flag, right?
Jon Erwin: Yeah, yeah. So I had directed all these music videos like the skill at one. And so it was my job to come in with a smaller group of professionals and some people and go do those action sequences in that film. So nobody died. And you know, it's a Southern Baptist church in Georgia. And so, you know, exaltation is a big thing. And I remember Alex, the director of that film, got right up in my face right away and basically said, You know, we don't quite understand you like, what's your purpose and the purpose of your work? And what is the question everyone should ask themselves like? It's a great book. Simon Sinek wrote it called Start with Why and that great leaders and organizations don't begin with what they they begin with why. And they sort of emanate from the wire, you know? And so when you join great companies like Apple, I still I love Southwest Airlines and I just fly. I still stay on that airline just because I love the spirit of the airline and I love the way of it. And so it's a great question, but this question I can answer. And so I for a long time, while doing those sequences on that film, I thought about that question like, why do I do what I do? It all just happened. My career plan was like. Indiana Jones, where like, I don't know, making this up as I go, like from age 15, it it all just sort of manifested and I had gotten opportunities that people that dream of being a filmmaker from like birth and then go to film school don't ever get. I mean, it was unbelievable some of the breaks that I got and some of the sort of the providence involved. And so I really that was my moment where a career became a calling and I realized I could fuze this thing that I had sort of practice for a while with my faith and that, you know, we're this rare generation of Christians, and I think this is why Faith Driven Investor is so important that could actually accomplish the great commission in our lifetime. You know, when Jesus says take the gospel to the whole world, I mean, he said, it's a people that know this content we're on would exist for like 400 years. And so we're this first because of technology generation that can really get it done. They can get the gospel all around the world. And I think the way we would have to do it is really to to harness some of the mechanisms. I love it where Paul says of David and actually serve the purposes of God in his generation, like the gospel never changes. The true truth never changes. But the way you get it to people really does. And so I love that phrase in his generation. You got to sort of own your time in mass media is just a great way to tell stories, a great way to communicate. So I think that that was the turning point where a career became a calling. Functionally, we went from a service company where, you know, sort of like Han Solo. So I got this ship. You need to go somewhere. You pay me and I'm out. I'm done as a service company to an intellectual property company where we were actually developing. You know, that was the business of it all. And that was another huge jump, completely different business. And, you know, like the line where Mike Tyson said every boxer has a plan until he gets in the ring, gets punched in the face. So beginning to sort of raise money for our own films and whatnot. It was, you know, we just you have to just get in and figure it out. But it was definitely we embodied that line for sure.
Katherine Trout: In Twenty Eighteen, that's when you produced the film. I can only imagine which has quickly become a household name and not just Christian films, but films in general. We'd love to hear you share a little bit more about specifically for financing that movie. What was the process like? What ActionScript had you actually taken to get that up and running?
Jon Erwin: Well, from a financial perspective, it was very interesting project. We had raised money. Every filmmaker should. There's two classes of money that you have to pull together to release a feature film in theaters. Now, as we do this podcast, we're at a moment of disruption. It's so fascinating. I could I could talk you off about a very similar COVID is is reshaping the movie industry in a very similar way that Napster reshaped the music industry. It's that sort of level of disruption is permanent behavioral change. It's like ten years of change in 18 months, and it's just so fascinating to be in this moment of rapid and rapid change. But typically, there's two classes of money. There's the equity that it takes to make a movie, and then there's what's called pay, which is printed advertising, which is the advertising budget. And what's interesting is I actually think that failure is actually the great teacher. There's a great book from I think he runs the largest hedge fund in the world radio. It's called principles, and he talks about just the power of a process he calls looping, which is basically just learning incrementally from your failures. And so we had made films that all open in the top 10. All of them had made money. Nothing had broken out, made a ton of money. And then we got to this film called Woodlawn that we did before. I can only imagine. And they say a filmmaker finds their story and tells it over and over again. Woodlawn is where we found the power true stories. And you know, tens of thousands of young people got saved because that movie I remember watching 800 teenagers go forward at a screening of that movie, and it just I feel like a movie doesn't do the work. The movie just sets the stage. It's like, we call it setting a volleyball that other people spike. It's called emotional instigation. And no wonder Jesus told emotional stories, you know, and then explain them. But we spent more on that movie than we ever had before, and then we raised some of the money, but not all of it to market it. And that was the first time we didn't recover the entire investment. We recovered about two thirds of the investment. And film is definitely a high risk, high reward. It belongs in your alternative portfolio. And if you're a filmmaker out there, one of the big moral things to do is just never take money people need. When you make money, you make a lot of money, but it's a volatile game. And so you just have to structure it right. And I think being honest about that upfront is actually a better way to raise money. But it just wrecked me. I couldn't I couldn't sleep at night and I couldn't stop. I just I am hyper competitive, and so I have this thing. I say, either I win or we play again, like, I'm OK losing, but just please, let's just go again. And so we did a five month postmortem on that movie. And really, you know, what's interesting is that I'm in an industry where there is a category of people, literally. Called critics like it's their job to criticize, and you have to separate your identity from the work and understand that's OK. But what's interesting is we never really solicit criticism from people that really care about us and want us to succeed. And it's one of the funny things about business at every level is like because so much of it is just solving problems. And I think we don't ever take the time to say, I wonder what I can learn. And I think a lot of times it's actually worse in faith based film because we sort of back up the finish line to the results achieved. And then what I say is we sort of throw the God card in the sense that we say, well, we got the gospel out. So and we sort of don't ever admit to not accomplishing our goals, and we certainly did with that movie. And it was the first movie that had this sort of burst of evangelical sort of use, but it didn't. We didn't accomplish our financial goals, and so we just confronted that head on. And one of the best things ever on a piece of paper was, you know, Woodlawn failed, and it's my fault, and let's figure it out. And so that led to this sort of study and so much came out of that process of learning. And that led to the way we were able to spot the value of I can only imagine when no one else saw it because of the data and because of what we had learned about theatrical, moviegoing and brands and it being sort of a branded driven event business. And so many people know and love that song. And so we saw value where other people didn't see value. And that's, I think entrepreneurism in general. You have to be looking at the same thing everyone else is and see what no one else sees, and it enables to do that. And then a very innovative financial model came out of that that no one said would work in the status quo of our industry. And basically, it was that these two categories of money, you have this equity category of money and then you have advertising put on top of that, this pay, which is debt, it's last in first out that in the way most people, if you know anybody that ever lost money in a feature film, they'll typically what happens is if the film implodes and doesn't get made well or when it gets released, all of that money that it took to release it sits on top of the equity in your equity. Investors end up buried at the bottom of this totem pole of inequality. And then also, you don't have leverage to negotiate your deals. Like in my business, I've found and I think in any business, the two most important words are control and leverage. And so you have to build cases of leverage. And when you only have the movie but you don't have any money or plan to get your product to a consumer, you don't have a business plan and so that you get into this acquisitions world. In the studio system, these are a publicly traded, diversified companies that can just bleed you out and wait till you're broke. And so the fees were way too high with wood line and distribution fees and a lot of the fees on top of that. And so what we did is we just said, why can't we? We did two things. We said, Why can't we just take this sort of, you know, vertical inequality thing and just turn it over and raise money into a blended vehicle where if you invest in it, 40 percent of your money is deployed. Equity 60 percent is deployed to advertising all your money making money. But it becomes this thing that nobody thought could be achieved, which it was a dollar one return to the first investor and which was not the status quo. And so we actually went out raising money based off informing people of why they would lose money in film deals or had or knew somebody that had. And so it was this sort of whistleblower pitch. And then what we were trying to do about it, and it's funny that honesty is what raised the money. We raised it quicker than we had ever raised money before, and it created this scenario. The other thing we did is I remember sitting my pastor at the time when I lived in Birmingham was Chris Hodges, which I still love him, and he's one of the smartest guys in the church. And I was sitting in church. And I think a lot of business people have this sort of attitude towards nonprofits or towards the church that the business practices aren't. But the Church of the Highlands, which is his church based off just a few very shrewd principles, is one of the most well-run organizations I've ever seen and debt free like a hundred and fifty million dollars in cash and assets. And it's incredible. And his basic principle is this principle of margin. He basically does an annualized budget that's 90 percent of the previous year's spending, even though they typically grow 20 percent year over year. So that leaves this 30 percent margin that they just put away in the bank. So they never do, you know, financial drives. Basically, he plans forward based off where he's been in terms of budgeting, and that hit me like a ton of bricks. I remember that service. I'm like, you know, he's right, and we were so aggressive in where we thought we could grow that we forgot about margin. And so I can only imagine was built based off that principle with this blended vehicle to break even financially break even right at Woodlands box office of 15 million. Well, we did that in two days, and so everything between 15 million and 86 was margin, and so everyone did really, really well, and it led to the Lionsgate deal that we're still in. Joined today, and so I just think that the enduring sort of things to consider are, you know, really take the time to learn from your failures. You know, I love to win, but I've found I don't learn near as much when I when I actually learn a lot more, when I so just learned to micro fail and learn and apply quickly and just ask, you know, just have this curiosity to ask people what they thought, you know, you could do better or what went wrong. And then there are some principles that I love. A friend of mine, Craig Rochelle, is a pastor. He said, When you get around, great people don't learn what they do. Your pride in their business, but learn how they think. And sometimes these simple principles of how to think can be pretty life changing in business. And so that's how we raise the money for that movie. And then it led to the landscape you.
Richard Cunningham: I just we got to stop and point out real quick. Just some of the quotes you've pulled in that you've got a book of acts to Mike Tyson is just,
Jon Erwin: I you know, I'll tell you this if you ever want to give me a birthday gift I collect, I love quotes, I just collect quotes and I have like your notepad on my phone. Is this ever running list? I love a good quote, and it is no
Richard Cunningham: secret you're a storyteller because it is just amazed where you're pulling from. All right, so I can only imagine massive success. You talk about the margin that happened between eighty six and fifteen and just love your humility in the way you all approach that and just kind of thinking through, like, how can we strategize on the failure we had prior so powerful? So the Lord gives you this amazing windfall and this audience right now we're talking to is Faith Driven Investor, as many of you are credited who have probably had a similar situation. An amazing windfall and an opportunity now to steward some success they've been given. We'd love to hear about you and Andrew's kind of mindset. Once that took place post, I can only imagine and say, Hey, how can we use this position of influence capital and how almost maybe our pick of the litter of what we want to do next?
Jon Erwin: Yeah, a really interesting thing happened. Normally in our, you know, entertainment is driven by a power law in terms of economics. And there's some, you know, biotech is like that. And you know, basically it means that it's a winner. Take all game and I love it for this reason. It's a hyper competitive industry. And once you succeed, you know, it's an industry where most things fail. There's this natural inclination to sort of want to guard what you've learned and guard your brain and be like back away and sort of, you know, because it's just so competitive. But I began to think, OK, if the real goal is to really substantively reclaim the imagination of a generation with the gospel, I give the gospel to our generation, our time. You know, that is something to be a part of that's bigger than any one initiative. And what I had learned is these things that these anomaly events in faith film that really tipped like I can only imagine or what's happening now. The great friend Dallas Jenkins and his show that shows and if you hadn't seen it, it's amazing. What a Kellyway that is. You should have him on your show. But you know that or even, you know, Phil's company, the idea that the VeggieTales or even maximale movie The Passion of the Christ, it's like there were these anomaly moments or Divine Franklin's films, the Kendrick's films, but nothing coalesced in the sense that there was no sort of snowball effect. There was no combined effort, and I began thinking about that. And just, you know, normally when a filmmaker succeeds, it becomes all about you. And it's like, What? What do I want to do next? And I just began to think of this question, really that I felt God spit. Some have it in my life where our son, who's eight now and he's great, but he had sort of these health things we couldn't understand up having to have immediate sort of open heart surgery when he was three and I was in the middle we imposed on, I can only imagine and I was actually directing a documentary called Steve McQueen American Icon, and I was immediately sidelined. You know, as they say, the show must go on, and that documentary was slated for the actual release in September. And it was not finished and people were buying tickets to it. And all this happened in June, and I had to recruit and empower another filmmaker, which was not my style. Prior to that, really, you know, I created things myself or with my brother and that filmmaker Ben Smallbone, he did so well. I remember sitting in that premiere thinking he didn't do as good as me. He actually did better, and he took the ideas deeper and I was actually more fulfilled, having helped equip and empower him than I was doing the work myself. And that's the moment that it sort of clicked. I'm like, Oh my goodness, we could scale like we could scale our processes, you know, you could always scale a system, you know? And so I'm like, This is, I think there's a scalable system here, and I think that we could actually incubate and empower other filmmakers. And so I began to look at models like where these singular events, these anomalies, like a movie like Star Wars, actually birthed a company like Lucasfilm or Toy Story, birthed Pixar. And we began to think, what if this was bigger than our name? Because up to that point, it was called Irwin Brothers, and we just kept coming to this name Kingdom. And that led to Kingdom Story Company, which the idea just became this orbiting question. What can we do together that none of us can do alone? And it's a very powerful thing. There's a documentary series that I can't recommend, but it's great, but it's called especially for an entrepreneur. It's called the defiant ones, which is this guy, Jimmy Levine, who did this company called Interscope and Dr. Dre. And they're sort of Jimmy's company. Interscope and RJ sort of rise through hip hop, and they do beats together and sell to Apple. It's really entrepreneurism story. And one of the things that Jimmy Iovine says to Will.i.am and that has become my my season of life that I'm in now that I'm really enjoying, which is, he said to Will.i.am. He said, You're talented enough. If you can just keep your seat at the table, you'll be successful. He said, or become the table. And he walked away and will.i.am was like, What does that even mean? And then it really clicked for him. If you can become the place where the right people can gather. That is a very powerful thing. And so what I realized is because I sort of love the business and love the creativity, and I see the art in the business and the business in the art that I could be uniquely useful at serving the visions of other creatives and really seeing them shine. And that's really what this season of life that I'm in now is I'm loving that more and more, and it is unbelievable when you get a conspiracy of friends together in a common ideal and objective what can be accomplished and God's just moving all over Hollywood. I remember when we did the Lionsgate deal was very good deal, and they dumped a ton of money into our films, our brand. But I was with felt the CEO and I came out and one of the heads of the other divisions was like looking around and he's like, Hey, get over here. And I'm like, what? He said, literally, like, he told me his name. He said, I'm a Christian
Richard Cunningham: and there's a few of us. And I'm so glad you're here.
Jon Erwin: I kind to go, you know, and I'm like, I think this is you can come out about it. Like, I came through the front door. They're paying us to be here. And it's just. But there's a lot of Christians in the industry at all levels that God has placed, and there's just a lot going on. And I'm I'm really happy to be a small part of it, and it's fun to just pull those people together that have never really worked together before. We've been what we call competitive allies. You know, but now we're getting to work together, and it's just an exciting time and exciting thing to be a part of.
Katherine Trout: Wow, that's such a powerful story. And it reflects what the body of Christ is really designed to look like is to be collaborative and to be as one rather than competing against the other. So especially in a place like Hollywood, where it feels really isolating to be a Christian there, having that community is so inspiring, Jon. I also wanted to ask you, of course, about your new movie that's in theaters now. American underdog? Yes, St. Louis native myself. OK, art has been always has held a special place in my heart. I believe that was my first ever football jersey was Kurt Warner.
Jon Erwin: That's amazing.
Katherine Trout: Very exciting.
Richard Cunningham: I did not know this over here. It hit the big screen.
Katherine Trout: So tell us a little bit about what made you decide to tell the story of Kurt.
Jon Erwin: Well, I mean, as a filmmaker, I think you have to realize that you're the first viewer, you know? And so I think, you know, it has to be a story that moves me, that I can't stop thinking about that. I then feel like, OK, this is our story to tell, and there has to be a cause behind the movie that I believe in giving time to. So like I remember with, I can only imagine. I remember asking him because we're documentary filmmakers first. So we do these sort of interviews. And I remember asking Bart, you know, if I were to literally put a gun to your head and say, Is Jesus real? What would you say? And he said, yes, and I said, And how would you know? I'm just always curious to answer that question, he said. Because of the change I saw my dad, he said, I I watch this monster transform into the man I wanted to become and into my best friend. And you know, his faith is the only way to explain that. And so we all know the song I can only imagine is a song about heaven. Come to find out it's a son singing for his father, and I thought it was a very powerful thing. And so the idea and I remember, you know, it's cool. There's actually been over 400000 of these type responses, but there was a woman watching. I can only imagine there's another woman in her and her son leaving, and this woman didn't get obviously couldn't and said, Are you guys Christians? And they said, Yeah. And she said, I'm not. But whatever happened to Dennis Quaid in this movie, I need to happen to me. I need someone to explain it to me. And they they witness to it right there. And so that's sort of why we do what we do. What I love about Kurt Warner is I love the idea of I wanted to make a film. And I think anything I did, especially in the times in which we live. Famous story, well known story, one of the great underdog sports stories. But to me, it was about the audience and making a film so that people could see it and say, You know what, if he can accomplish his calling in life and his dream, you know, maybe I can, too. And if they can stay together and love each other, maybe we can, too. And it's just it. It's just such a thing. You could not be further away from your dream than Kurt Warner was from his, and yet, you know, we all you bought his jersey, you know, and I think that that's the amazing thing and it's just so much of life and success and fulfilling a calling is just never, ever, ever giving up. And you just never know. Funny with I can only imagine my dad when he bought me a camera, a 16, he actually said, Hey, dream ball, dream. Big dream, the impossible. And then he says, if you give 20 years of your life to something, you'll be successful. And it was almost 20 years exactly to the success of I can only imagine. And I think that there's something to that. I think a lot of people give up at your 19 or you're 17, which is where all the work is, you know, and they just don't endure long enough. And you just never know when that breakthrough moment in life is right around the corner. And so I loved the story for that reason, and I also loved the idea that Kurt Warner became a champion off the field and then brought it onto the field. He had the arm of a champion. He had the talent of a champion but didn't have the heart of a champion. He found that in his relationship with Brenda and her son and her kids and their son specifically, who's disabled? You know, I understand that part of the story well, and it was actually him really her faith rubbing off on him and him falling in love with her and her kids and embracing a world that was bigger than he was finding his faith, becoming a Christian, becoming a father and all those things that he learned off the field. And it's it creates as much of a love story as it is a sports story. And they really won together the entitled son of Vince Gill, and we got and seeing as love changes everything. And it really is true for this story. They really won together, but I loved all that he learned. He found his character off the field, and that's what allowed him to become a champion on the field. And I just love that part of the story. And I just want to make a story that reinvigorates the dreams of the audience. You know, we've all had a really tough year and a half, and our dreams have never felt further away. So I wanted to tell a story about someone that was as far from his dream as you could ever be. And yet he still endured and accomplished it. And, you know, willing to give it a platform for Kurt and Brenda to talk about their life and their faith and their love story. And so that was sort of why we did the film, and I don't know if this is like everyone's going to come out, but it's still in theaters and lovely to see it. And then I think it's Super Bowl weekend is when it's coming to pulmonary edema.
Richard Cunningham: Awesome. So fitting come and come to home Super Bowl week and I love that.
Jon Erwin: Yeah. Yeah, yes. Good timing.
Richard Cunningham: Love this. So practical. How can investors invest in a portfolio of faith based films most effectively would love to hear you just riff on that for a second, Jon?
Jon Erwin: Oh man, let me get back to you because it's a, you know, we're we're dreaming about that right now. You know, I was very fortunate in God's providence to get in business with the movie studio Lionsgate after I can only imagine because our next film came out, it was funny. I can only imagine that huge run, never one a minute film of 2018, but we were never number one at the box office. We just sort of like, we're a little Honda Accord that got behind the tractor trailer semi-truck that was Black Panther, and we just glided behind it. But you know, the film we did after that, I still believe, actually is no. The only time we've been number one number one movie the night it opened on Friday, the one in America. But that was March 9th, 2020, and so not the best we can to release a film that, you know. And so everything was shut down and we had to go digital. And what's interesting and you know, I think the thing for those raising money is just always believe fully in everything that you put in front of investors. And you know, what's funny about that? And there's a ton of opportunity in the disruption. But COVID has ended up reshaping behavior in an incredibly fundamental way that I think while it makes one form of getting a movie to people, which is a theatrical movie business much more difficult not only for faith films, reward films and, you know, musicals and Pixar and a lot of the box office. Because during COVID, you know, basically it was the streaming wars. And so for new streaming services were launched. Everybody sort of upgrade their technology very similar to in the music business when the album was pulled apart and you could buy your favorite song for 99 cents. That just reshaped an industry, the revenue still there. It's in different places. So I would say as disruptive as that is to the economics of the moviegoing business in general and the studio business and everybody, it's also opened up some incredible opportunities elsewhere in the home. And so that's what we're really researching right now and really building is I think that there's enormous opportunity and I think there's an extent that we have to no one go where people want the content. And also and I realize this is a very political answer, and I'm sorry. The point is we're building a strategy that really believe in that. I'd love to get back to you on. But I think that when you look at the streaming wars and this mergers and acquisitions bloodbath, that is the entertainment business, the end of that is. Basically, everywhere you consume, content is going to be owned in these sort of super conglomerates, ultimately owned by one of the four tech giants. And I just don't see that sort of Silicon Valley mindset and political worldview sort of allowing overt Christianity in that sort of downstream. So at least my home, I'm probably not the best for controlling my home, but the way I feel is screens have sort of overrun my home. And if I look at the future, I could see three or four years a situation where it would be very difficult to get content on those screens. If we don't act now, we don't act in a very big way. And so I think that that's what I'm really diving into, and I love the moment that we're in the moment in time in our industry because it's that mass disruption that just accelerates change that we'll be talking about for a very long time. And I think if you're willing to let go of old ways of thinking and see where the value is, there's enormous value, but you have to sort of embrace change and embrace change very quickly. So I would say that the current model for what has worked up to this point, that was very difficult for an independent film where all your eggs in one basket. The question is right. You have to sort of diversify risk and, you know, go with a whole portfolio mindset. And then I think there's just a lot of work to do on the economics of how these things, you know, we make money, not off people consuming entertainment. We make money off how they consume entertainment. And so when the how changes abruptly and quickly, it just takes time. And it's these enormous opportunities open up and then other things sort of change rapidly what we're seeing now. You know, just over the last two months, especially after Spielberg's movie, that people's expectations of where they want the content and where they would most enjoy the content are permanently changed. It's got nothing to do with safety. It's now have it loops that have been built, and I could talk your ear off on those just fascinating. So I think that there is an answer to the question, but it's in sort of re-engineering the value chain of where the content is. And I think I wish I could say we're close to being able to say what I really do believe is next and where there is a lot of value for films. But it's going to look all different. The theatrical window will survive, but it'll only be for specific things, and there's a lot of things that were theatrical prior to the pandemic or not. So that's my vague political answer. We've got it. We've got to build a different engine to the car.
Richard Cunningham: Jon, thank you again. Let me ask you this. But again, we are grateful. Thank you for the way you have used the story of Jon Andrew Irwin and the many, many gifts you've given them to Steward and the positions you've given them steward. And finally got it. It is all about your son and may we make much of his name? And thank you for the way people like Jon are doing that in the ever changing kind of spiritual warfare landscape of media. And so we just ask that you would be with Jon and the many endeavors that are in front of him be with all those that are on this call today. Thank you so much for the privilege together. We love you, King Jesus Amen Amen.
Jon Erwin: Appreciate you guys. I wish I could stay. There's so many questions in the chat that I wish I could answer, but maybe next time, but come
Richard Cunningham: back any time we'll take you, we'll take you any time. Thank you, everybody.
Katherine Trout: Thanks, Jon.