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Writer and director Michael Schoob says he went into the movie business to make films that lead to long talks outside the theater and inspire explorations into larger ideas. His latest film aims to make you question what makes life worth living and whether there are such things as mistakes too big to take back. Road to Everywhere is a travel drama about a Los Angeles cab driver named Jason Schuyler (actor Whip Hubley of Top Gun, Species, Russkies, Driven) and a casino dealer named Jake (Native American musician and flute player Robert Mirabal from Taos Pueblo) who is headed to watch his grandson compete at a rodeo on the Navajo Nation.
It’s Schoob’s follow-up to his 1996 film Driven, which stars Schuyler and the late Tony Todd — who you may know from his iconic role in the horror flick Candyman. Schoob says he’s always thought about revisiting those characters years later, and audiences in Albuquerque will get the chance to do just that May 30 during a special screening event at the iconic KiMo Theater (423 Central Ave NW).
The Director
“The film is about two very different people with very different backgrounds,” Schoob says. “We all have the same concerns, the same fears, the same anxieties, and we’re so divided as a nation right now. I feel like it’s up to artists and filmmakers to really bring us all together and realize we have a common story. I think we want to create a level of humanity which is in peril right now.”
Shoob says the film’s first screening back in January at the Lensic in Santa Fe had more than 600 people in attendance, and they had to cut off the Q+A session because it exceeded their time slot, which isn’t typical. This Saturday’s event will feature a similar chance to chop it up with some of the folks involved in the production, including Mirabal who not only plays one of the leads in Road to Everywhere, his music is featured as part of the film score. Shoob says it was composed based on many of Mirabal’s older songs repurposed for the film, creating a musical journey led by Mirabal that coincides with the personal journey of the characters the story depicts.
“It’s about a journey to the Navajo Nation, so the music is sort of the gateway,” he says. “It’s almost like you’re driving through this tunnel surrounded by the music. I think Robert brings the whole Navajo landscape to life.”
Schoob says one of the reasons Mirabal was cast as the lead was because of qualities he possessed as a musical performer: a kind of a rock star quality with tremendous personal charisma and the ability to truly commit to a persona.
“Robert’s an interesting story,” Shoob says. “He becomes this different entity on stage. There’s a change that occurs, and I thought he could do that same thing with the character of Jake — immerse himself in that, and he really did.”
The Actor
In his youth, Mirabal studied lighting design, costume design, stage combat, jazz dance and other disciplines at Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, Oklahoma. He says that as a stage actor, he was used to playing a role he had rehearsed and honed; but as a film actor, he realized that it was more about the moment. Mirabal says he’s always enjoyed “the impromptuness of being a musician” and the fact that at any given time his emotions might change.
“I think [Schoob] wanted that particular vibe that I put off as a musician and as a performer on stage,” Mirabal says. “He didn’t want me to act or create a new character. He wanted me to just be me: more of an outgoing, flamboyant ‘Johnny on the spot’ type.”
Road to Nowhere is Mirabal’s first leading role, but his real-life history of road trippin’ certainly prepared him for the job. Mirabal grew up on the Taos Pueblo and says two things have been an essential part of his life that he will never let go: farming and music. Today, he lives a lifestyle based on his culture’s calendar, and at any given moment, he’s surrounded by song, dance and ritual. He says, as a young man, he decided to pursue a music career and discovered more than music. Mirabal found adventure.
In his early 20s he traveled as a solo musician with a Japanese modern dance duo named Eiko and Koma. The score he wrote for them received a New York’s Dance and Performance Bessie Award. Mirabal toured throughout Japan and Europe and spent a lot of time in New York. He says during that time he became enamored with different cultures, and after collaborating with various musicians and encountering different musical influences, he formed the band Rare Tribal Mob — an anagram for Robert Mirabal. The band even nabbed a record deal with Warner Brothers.
“It was around the time when the new nuance of contemporary Native music was coming out. And so it was perfect timing for me to start to explore more of a lyrical form within my music,” he says. “And so when I created the Rare Tribal Mob, it turned out to be more of a production rather than just a band going out on the road. At one point, I had all kinds of people with me — two tour buses, dancers, musicians and lighting designers — traveling on the road.”
Mirabal has won two Grammys. He was named the Native American Music Award’s Artist of the Year on two occasions and Songwriter of the Year award three times. He won Album of the Year at the Canadian Aboriginal Music Awards, and his PBS musical production Music From a Painted Cave is an acclaimed accomplishment mingling traditional Native American styles with rock ‘n’ roll. His acting credits include his portrayal of Tony Lujan, husband of Mable Dodge Lujan, in the film Georgia O’Keeffe and television appearances on “Yellowstone” with Kevin Costner and “Walker, Texas Ranger.” He’s been on TV internationally in countries such as Japan and Italy. Mirabal says his one-man-show Po’Pay Speaks was based on a pivotal character in Pueblo culture, the dynamic leader who started the Pueblo Revolt in 1680.
“He just said, ‘No, we can’t live like this or we’ll lose our culture,’” Mirabal explains. “I created a fictional character based around him where he never died, so he has more experiences. It was 57 pages of stuff to memorize. I staged it, directed it and starred in it, and we did a 10-day run in Santa Fe.”
Mirabal says the character he plays in Road to Everywhere is a “tough type of dude when you first meet him,” but he has vulnerabilities related to age including health problems and his share of secrets that are revealed throughout the film. But don’t we all? During their long drive from California to Arizona, Jake and Jason realize they have certain similarities in common, and Mirabal says they “mirror their problems at each other.” The road trip gives them a “heightened sense of awareness” about things everyone deals with in life.
“It shows the Native American aging man as a person, not as a character. And I think in film, far too much emphasis has been placed on Native men as the ‘warrior on the horse,’” he says. “[The film] doesn’t create a stereotypical character, it creates a person that is of today.”
The Film
The Road to Everywhere Road Show is hosted by Shoob and will include a Q&A with Mirabal and castmate DezBaa’ (“Dark Winds,” “Longmire”), who was born in Santa Fe. Rare Tribal Mob will be premiering their new song “Road to Everywhere,” based on Mirabal’s travels in South America. He says the song is influenced by the time he spent with Peruvian dissidents who specialized in a genre called chicha, which he describes as cumbia-based mood music connected with “surf-type psychedelic form of music.”
Mirabal says Road to Everywhere is a bildungsroman or “coming of age” film, but it’s a reimagined version of the genre. The film asks universal questions about the limitations of age, and shows that it’s never too late to resolve unfinished business, especially if you’re smart enough — or maybe still dumb enough — to come to terms with the challenges.
“I think at any given age, we are going through some coming of age,” he says. “It’s a bittersweet, beautiful time in our life where we’re old enough to understand, and our bodies are still strong, and it’s a good time to approach life from a warrior’s standpoint.”
For tickets to the show visit the KiMo on the City of Albuquerque’s website at artsandculture.cabq.gov/8960/8961. For more info on the production, go to roadtoeverywheremovie.com.
Road to Everywhere Road Show
May 30, 7 p.m.
KiMo Theater
423 Central Ave. NW
$22
Never Too Late for Road Trippin’ is a story from The Paper.. Publishing from New Mexico’s largest city, The Paper is your source for local, independent news, covering politics, arts, culture, and events.