“Lord we need an army of believers…Lord call us to battle. Raise up a generation that will take light into this world…raise ‘em up Lord, raise ‘em up!”
– Miss Clara, “War Room”
As the lights dim and the big screen comes to life, viewers realize that they are in for more than an exciting night at the movies. As the credits roll, the applause returns with full force. Some audiences give the movie a standing ovation. Some pray over each other before leaving the theater.
God is using “War Room” to start revival across this nation. As Chelsea Byers, McKenzie Cranford and Nick Burt read these stories on Facebook, they sit back in amazement, knowing they have contributed to something eternal, and that it all started on Ouachita’s campus with a Skype call in Lile hall, room 230.
During the spring 2014 semester, the Ouachita graduates took the Christian Communications course led by Trennis Henderson, vice president of communications at OBU. Henderson provided the class the unique opportunity to Skype with Christian filmmaker Alex Kendrick (director of “Fireproof” and “Courageous”).
At the end of the conversation, Alex hinted that he and his brother Stephen had a fifth film in the works, and were seeking to hire several college interns to be part of the project. Heavily involved in video production at Ouachita, the chance to work on a Kendrick Brothers movie had been a desire of Nick Burt’s for a long time.
“When I was a freshman at Ouachita, I emailed the Kendrick brothers after seeing ‘Courageous,’ and asked them if they ever had interns work on their movies,” Burt said. “At that point, they only hired within their church, so my dream did not work out at the time.”
The only three in the class to take advantage of the opportunity, Burt, Byers and Cranford sent in their applications and resumes to Stephen, and waited for a response.
While Burt received his confirmation email from Stephen during the weekend of Tiger Traks, Byers and Cranford continued to hold their breath. Finally, during the last week of the semester, their patience was rewarded.
“I was walking through the Maddox hallway and I got a call from Stephen asking me to work on the film,” Cranford said. “He warned me that working on a film is not glamorous, but I told him I was up for the adventure and accepted the internship on the spot.”
Byers was on a picnic with her little sister for Ouachita’s Big Brother/Sister program when her exciting news arrived.
“He [Stephen] was super excited about it; I was super excited about it. I called McKenzie right after and we were freaking out,” Byers said. “It was a very exciting moment for me because it had been so long since we submitted our applications. We thought we may have not gotten the internship, so the call was unexpected.”
Embarking on the summer of a lifetime, the three traveled to Concord, N.C. in June to begin production on what they could only refer to as “film number five.”
Working as a Set Production Assistant under Alex, Burt’s freshman fantasy had become a reality. His responsibilities during the 30-day shoot ranged from grunt work, to keeping the set quiet. Whether it was intense commotion or the slightest whisper, there could be no extraneous sound while the camera was rolling. He was also the extras coordinator.
“It was my job to place people evenly across the set. I would cue the extras to walk at the correct time, which made the scene feel real. If we were shooting in an office, you wanted to make it look and feel like you were in an actual office,” Burt said.
The cast and crew worked long, 12-hour days in the scorching North Carolina heat.
“On a movie you can’t have any noise, period. So we had the air conditioning off while filming,” said Burt. “The indoor shoots were just as hot if not hotter than the outdoor shoots.”
The production team started working at 10 a.m. and did not finish until 4 a.m. the next day, with only two 30-minute breaks to eat.
“The most valuable knowledge I gained was learning how films are made and how they work,” said Burt. “Pretty much all of my video experience had been with television shoots at Ouachita or at my high school. All of the terms they used, how a set worked, it was all new to me.”
While Burt worked on set with Alex, Byers and Cranford had the chance to tag-team under Stephen as Production Office Assistants. The day-to-day activities of the cast and crew would not have been possible without their efforts behind the scenes.
Their shared obligations included general paperwork, driving into Charlotte to run errands for various departments and picking up/dropping off cast members at the airport. Their most important task involved printing out “dailies” for the cast. These were scripts for specific scenes that the cast would be shooting on a given day.
“There would be script changes once or twice a week,” Byers said. “The crew would make edits and email us the revised scripts. We took the scripts from all the cast members, took out the old pages and replaced them with the edited, colored pages. Each script change had its own color. It was a very tedious process.”
While Byers managed the paperwork organization, Cranford was in charge of coordinating the meals for the crew. A professional caterer served breakfast and lunch during the day, and on most nights, local churches would volunteer to provide dinner. Once a church was scheduled by the volunteer coordinator, she would make sure that the church knew when and where to bring the meal, and at what time.
“I learned how to work with a wide variety of people. There were over 100 cast and crew members, and they were all different, with different personalities. I had to learn how to work alongside them, even the ones that were difficult to work with,” Byers said.
While the experience was anything but relaxing, the three interns had a blast working with the Kendrick brothers, and learned a thing or two along the way.
“He (Stephen) would come by with coffee and ice cream and tell us stories, talk about relationships and answer our questions,” Byers said.
Burt’s feelings on working with Alex carried the same beats: “It was kind of like stardom at first. Here’s this guy I’ve seen in all these movies, and here I am meeting him. I could tell from day one that he was 100 percent sincere. He’s not in it for the money. He’s all in for telling the story and spreading the Gospel.”
“War Room” is a gripping reminder of the importance of prayer in our walk with Christ. Emphasis on prayer during the film’s production penetrated the hearts of the three interns, and was as valuable as the experience itself.
“I grew in prayer, ironically, because the film is about prayer…I started to more fully understand the power of prayer. That was something that the Kendrick brothers emphasized on the set of every movie they’ve ever made,” Byers said. “There would be many times that we needed something, or something would go wrong, and we would get together as a group and pray, and God would take care of the need. Before this internship, I hadn’t been putting much importance and emphasis on prayer in my own life. After, I had an entirely new view on the power and effect of earnest, faithful prayer.”
Before they worked on Labor Day weekend’s number one movie in America, Burt, Byers and Cranford shined in Ouachita’s communications department. Byers was awarded Television Producer/Director of the Year at the 2014 Arkansas College Media Association convention for The Rundown, a student-led sports broadcast that she created. She also received ACMA recognition for her work as Sports Editor for The Signal.
“With Communications, definitely use personal initiative to your advantage. There are a lot of people that want the same job as you. Find that thing that sets you apart and take advantage of it,” Byers said.
Cranford was integral in restarting the International Association of Business Communicators at Ouachita with student Chelsea Whelpley, and represented the group well as vice president. She wrote for the OBU News Bureau, served as the media director for OBU Enactus her senior year and interned with the Arkadelphia public schools communications office.
“Don’t limit yourself to what you think you want to do because the communications industry is so diverse,” Cranford said. “For example, I had zero film experience before working on the movie, and it turned out to be one of my favorite experiences ever. Also, send out as many resumes as you can and don’t give up if you keep getting negative responses because eventually you will land a job.”
Burt produced numerous videos for the university during his time as the Ouachita Video Editor. He also shot video for Gov. Mike Huckabee during three trips to Israel. His on-screen credit in “War Room” helped him to land a two-day job with ESPN Films as a Set PA. He is currently doing freelance videography, and feels called to serve in church media.
“Never think any job is too big for you,” Burt said. “While I was at Ouachita, I thought that I would score a few local gigs, maybe work for a local news station. Never in a million years did I think I would work for a big box office hit. You never know where the Ouachita Circle will take you.”
Burt, Byers and Cranford are living proof that God is raising up a generation of difference makers at Ouachita, an army of believers from every academic discipline that will take light into this world generation by generation.
“Raise ‘em up Lord, raise ‘em up!”
By Evan Wheatley, features editor
