Acclaimed indie filmmaker Jim Cummings is stepping in front of the camera for the crime thriller The Last Stop in Yuma County. Since making his feature directorial debut with the movie adaptation of his Sundance award-winning short Thunder Road, Cummings has largely made a name for himself as a multihyphenate filmmaker, including writing and directing the acclaimed 2020 horror-comedy The Wolf of Snow Hollow and co-writing/co-directing the 2021 erotic thriller The Beta Test, on which he also was the editor.

With The Last Stop in Yuma County, Cummings is both an executive producer and one of the lead stars, playing a young knife salesman on his way to see his daughter for her birthday after driving around the country for work. When he finds himself out of gas at a station currently waiting for their fuel delivery, he stops off in the connecting diner until it arrives, striking up a friendly rapport with waitress Charlotte. After the arrival of two shady patrons, he quickly realizes they are the perpetrators behind a bank robbery, putting him and Charlotte in a tense hostage situation.

Alongside Cummings, the ensemble The Last Stop in Yuma County cast includes Doctor Sleep‘s Jocelin Donahue, Barbarian‘s Richard Brake, Nicholas Logan, Faizon Love, Michael Abbott Jr., Gene Jones, Robin Bartlett, Sierra McCormick, Connor Paolo, Ryan Masson and Barbara Crampton. The movie hails from debuting writer/director Francis Galluppi, who recently was tapped to write and direct a second Evil Dead spinoff by Sam Raimi’s Ghost House Pictures.

Ahead of the movie’s release, Screen Rant interviewed Jim Cummings to discuss The Last Stop in Yuma County, his pivot to solely acting for the crime thriller, playing a more “cowardly” character than he’s used to, his unique look and why he hated it, and the challenges of indie filmmaking in the current industry.

Cummings Was Thrilled About The Chance To “Be Jimmy Stewart”

While having lent his acting talents to some projects he hasn’t helmed, including being part of the Halloween Kills cast, Cummings found himself hooked on Galluppi’s Last Stop in Yuma County script and his Knife Salesman character. In particular, the filmmaker was thrilled at the chance to channel some classic genre stars, namely Jimmy Stewart and Paul Newman:

Jim Cummings: I read the script, and it reminded me of that kind of ’70s thriller, bag-of-money-in-a-desert kind of movie. I was like, “I get to be Jimmy Stewart.” I would get to be this Paul Newman kind of dude. I was like, “Alright, this is a very small movie, we’d shoot it, but it would be an hour-and-a-half away from my house, and it wouldn’t be too crazy. We wouldn’t be shooting in Eastern Europe. It could be an interesting thriller.”

And then, I met with Francis Galluppi, the director and writer, and we were supposed to talk about the movie and just movies in general, and we ended up spending three hours talking about South Park. And I was like, “I’m in. This guy is my buddy.” [Chuckles] And honestly, it was just meeting with Francis. He’s such a cinephile, and is so craftsmanship-driven, and it shows in the movie when you watch it. But that kind of craftsmanship is absent from most movies, and cinematic experiences that I’ve seen lately.

There’s this drought of good filmmaking, and so literally just talking to him, and seeing his plans and overheads, and all the drawings that he had, I could see the movie before signing up as an actor. And from my experience of being a filmmaker, I was able to say, “Oh, this could be very good.” I kept my fingers crossed the whole time. But I invested well, and I’m very glad that I did.

Despite channeling the likes of Stewart and Newman, Cummings and Galluppi found themselves intrigued by making the character a “coward“, with the actor even humorously recalling discussions with the writer/director about “How dumb can I play this person?”:

Jim Cummings: We talked a lot about what kind of guy hides under a table and a booth when any kind of violence takes place. So, I was very consciously playing a coward, very few other people in the film are as cowardly as I am. [Chuckles] And we wanted to make it a pivot so that when you’re following these other characters, I’m the main character of the film, but then everything kind of lands in my lap, and then I have to either do the right thing or do the wrong thing.

We thought that it’d be very interesting to see someone who is very ill-adept at a lot of this gun-toting stuff to then have to tote guns, we found that to be very funny. So, in reading the script and in talking to Francis about the character, I was like, “Oh, how wild can I play this guy? How dumb can I play this guy?” And that’s always a great conversation to be having. You know you’re on the right steps to make a great film when you’re asking the director, “How dumb can I play this person?” [Chuckles] But no, it was very much on the script, and I just got to come in and make it goofy.

Being A Lead Actor In A Movie He Didn’t Create Was An Adjustment For Cummings

While having full faith in Galluppi’s vision for The Last Stop in Yuma County, Cummings did recall some of his adjustment process for leaving the nitty-gritty details of the production to another filmmaker, humorously having found himself biting his tongue to keep from disrupting things. But while he enjoys directing, he does admit holding a multihyphenate position on a project can be “exhausting“:

Jim Cummings: Yeah, so this is my first time being a lead actor in a movie that I didn’t create, I did not write and direct, so it was a pivot for me. I did have to learn to shut up. Day 1, I kept on being like, “I think the eyeline is — oh, sorry, sorry about that.” [Chuckles] I guess there’s a million little things that you realize after transitioning from filmmaking to just acting, but it was very freeing, and Francis shouldered a lot of the burden that I would normally do in filmmaking.

So, I just got to act, and I didn’t have to worry about tomorrow. I didn’t have to worry about the next day not happening, and running into production meetings. I just got to memorize lines and say them and work in rehearsal. So, it was very freeing, and I now get it. I now understand why people pursue this career, and not try to do everything at once. It’s awful. Oh, it’s awful, it’s so exhausting.

I acted in one of the shorts that’s going to Tribeca that we made this year, I acted, wrote, directed, sound designed, edited, and it’s taken me a year to finish the thing. It takes forever. So much thought and heavy work goes into post that Francis had to burden all of that for the feature. But yeah, I’m not surprised that more people don’t pursue this thing. It’s a crazy thing to do.

Building A Camaraderie With Brake & Donahue Was “Very Easy” For Cummings

With the movie being largely set in one location, Cummings and the rest of the Last Stop in Yuma County cast spent a lot of time together finding the rhythm of their scenes and their character dynamics. When it came to building this rapport with Richard Brake and Jocelin Donahue, Cummings found it to be a “very easy” process, particularly as the villainous star “really loved Thunder Road” and Donahue brought a “lovely” atmosphere to the set.

Jim Cummings: It was great. He and I also had such a camaraderie on set, because he really loved Thunder Road, he really loved the feature of Thunder Road. He and I got to talk about that, and then I get to talk to him about his discography of working with all the top directors of all-time. So, really, lunch breaks were just talking about movies and acting and his experience, and I just wanted to learn so much.

And then he comes in, and the cameras start rolling, and he’s terrifying. [Chuckles] It was like, “Oh, this is my buddy, Richard. This is the guy I talked to about Adam Curtis documentaries.” And it’s like, “Oh, no, this is a man with a gun. He’s shouting at Jocelin, I have to protect Jocelin.” [Laughs] He’s very good when he comes on. As soon as the camera starts rolling, he is a very frightening figure, and then is also just a really lovely, wonderful performer and good friend.

Very easy, it was the easiest thing ever. People always say it’s kind of cheating casting Jocelin in stuff, because she is so angelic and endearing and lovely that you could have her act with a brick wall, and they’ll be like, “Wow, they really have a great relationship, that brick wall and her.” She is so lovely and so focused, and she really couldn’t take part in a lot of the fun that we were having, because she had to be in Funny Games.

The whole movie, she’s held hostage, and is the most susceptible victim in the diner. And then the way that we shot, we always saved her for last, because we were flipping the world, and then she’s usually on this side of the diner, so she had to stay in this kind of frail, downtrodden performance the whole day before we shot with her. But really, she is such a lovely person, it comes across in the movie, she’s so wonderful in the film.

She is very much her reputation, and it precedes her. She’s a really lovely person, and working with her was really great. Just the scenes that we have, even though most of our scenes are not dialogue, it’s just us looking at each other, going like, “Okay, what do we do now?” The scenes that we did have a dialogue, we did get to rehearse a lot, and laugh a whole bunch. She’s really, really wonderful.

Finding The Knife Salesman’s Look Was A Unique (& Hilariously Frustrating) Experience For Cummings

Though never explicitly stated in the movie, The Last Stop in Yuma County is clearly immersed in the ’70s era of the genre classics it looks to pay tribute to. When it came to crafting his character’s look, Cummings was initially thrilled to share his input on everything from his hair to his suit, though the latter ultimately came to life from Galluppi’s vision, much to the star’s hilarious chagrin:

Jim Cummings: It was a bit of both. So I was like, “Well, I’ve never been blonde for a film before, I’d love to be blonde.” And Francis’ wife, Rachel, is a professional hairstylist, so he’s like, “Oh, well come over, we’ll do some tests, we’ll dye your hair,” I’d never dyed my hair before. And we went over and started to do it, and it turned out red, and Rachel goes, “Well, maybe it’s a happy accident.” And Francis goes, “It’s an accident, for sure. It’s an accident.” [Chuckles] And then the more that we did it, it was like, “Oh, it’s interesting. I’m a redhead. I have this kind of Robert Redford thing going, this could be neat. It’s still the period. It’s not Paul Newman, but maybe I could be the Sundance Kid instead.” And it really worked.

And then, for the outfit, I hated it. It was such a stupid outfit, but it’s based on a few characters’ wardrobe from different films that Francis really liked. He thought that it’d be a good fit, and then my idea at the end of the film was to rip the jacket off, because I was wearing that suit the entire month that we were shooting in the desert, and it was awful. [Chuckles] It was so sweaty. I was like, “Can I just please rip this thing off when my character has had enough?” And he’s like, “That’s fine, we can do it.” It’s at the end of the film, I get to disrobe a bit. But no, it was all Francis’ idea of how I should look and feel, and I look ridiculous. The hair is absolutely ridiculous, the comb over, my hair has never looked worse. It’s great.

Cummings Is Uncertain About A Directorial Return During “One Of The Hardest Times In Hollywood”

In looking to the future beyond The Last Stop in Yuma County, Cummings has multiple ideas for returning to the director’s chair, including a “Victorian horror film that’s a buddy-comedy romance” and a Hollywood-driven satire. Despite his eagerness to do so, though, the filmmaker does admit he’s uncertain about what’s to come from these prospects, particularly as the independent movie industry is suffering “one of the hardest times in Hollywood history“:

Jim Cummings: I don’t know, we’re going through one of the hardest times in Hollywood history, and the tech companies that used to finance stuff to compete with each other to make a bunch of stuff are now belt tightening. It’s very difficult to get anything made. The majority of people that are making money in the film industry are the executives, it’s never really creatives. So, I don’t know, I think I’ll probably do another crowd campaign to raise the funds to do something.

I hope to do that this summer, and then possibly shoot this fall and winter. But I don’t know, I would really love to do stuff. We’re talking about doing big stuff, but it hasn’t become real. It’s still just conversations, distracting, seductive conversations. So, hopefully this year, but I can’t say, it’s crazy. It’s usually more genre films, and then genre-fluid films. So, at the very least, you can expect horror-thriller. And then there’s this Victorian horror film that’s a buddy-comedy romance.

It’s really beautiful, PJ McCabe and I — he and I made The Beta Test together — have co-written and want to co-direct it, and it’s really lovely and really gorgeous. We’re talking to some cool people about doing that, but as of now, I don’t know. I feel like I have to make the movie I can make right now instead of daydreaming like I’ve been daydreaming for too long. So, the next thing on our slate is this comedy about an independent film screener leaking from an agency and then everything falling apart. It’s really funny and really poignant.

About The Last Stop in Yuma County

While awaiting the next fuel truck at a middle-of-nowhere Arizona rest stop, a traveling young knife salesman is thrust into a high-stakes hostage situation by the arrival of two similarly stranded bank robbers with no qualms about using cruelty — or cold, hard steel — to protect their bloodstained, ill-begotten fortune.

Check out our other Last Stop in Yuma County interviews with:

• Richard Brake
• Jocelin Donahue

Source: Screen Rant Plus