How Christian Producer DeVon Franklin Finds Great Stories
By Movieguide® Contributor
Actor and Producer DeVon Franklin appeared on Variety’s Strictly Business podcast to discuss his moviemaking philosophy.
“Storytelling is powerful and storytelling unites us all. And no matter how the mediums change, what doesn’t change is our human connection to great stories,” Franklin told co-editor and chief of Variety, Cynthia Littlehorn. “I just try to stay focused on that, like, okay, finding great stories and then doing my best to find studios and streamers and companies that I can work with to fund those great stories.”
For Franklin, getting the story told is the win. He got into moviemaking because he wanted to make a change in the world. When he went through a difficult time as a child, movies were his therapy; they were how he found healing and what lifted him out of a dark time. He strives to tell stories with that power in every one of his projects.
He pursues projects that he believes will make the world a better place and creating high-quality content is more important to him than where that content gets distributed.
Franklin’s willingness to let the movie distribute wherever it ends up was important for his upcoming film, FLAMIN’ HOT, which didn’t end up where it was originally made to go.
“When I originally sold the project, I sold it as a theatrical and then as we were getting closer to making the film, Searchlight said they wanted to bring in Hulu. And so that seemed to make sense. I could have been upset initially, but I said, you know, I want to be pragmatic and I want to stay agnostic about how these films come to the world,” Franklin said.
“With FLAMIN’ HOT, when the time came to go to streaming, I was like, alright. Now we’re going to be on Hulu and Disney+, which is great,” he continued.
“I’m still going to make a high-quality movie. I’m still going to put together in the best way possible, still going to hire great filmmakers, great actors,” he added.
Franklin was inspired to create FLAMIN’ HOT after meeting Richard and Julie Montañez, the creators of the Cheeto. The Montañez story struck Franklin so deeply because it is an inspirational story of hard work and a family story – Richard and Julia never let the business negatively affect their marriage.
“As soon as [Richard and Julia] finished telling me their story I just felt like, this is why I am here. This is why I’m in this business,” Franklin said. “I’m in this business for people like them, you know, for people who have great stories.”
FLAMIN’ HOT is available now on Hulu and Disney+.
Movieguide® previously reported on Franklin’s involvement in FLAMIN’ HOT:
“I’m honored to be able to produce this movie and bring this story to the world,” Franklin told Movieguide®. “I met the subject of this story, Richard Montañez, I met him about almost seven years ago now and when he and his wife Judy came into my office I said to them, tell me your story. As he told me to hit their story I was just blown away and by the end of the meeting I said to them okay I’m gonna do this and I didn’t know how I was going to get it done but I was so connected to just the uniqueness of his story I just knew that I had to figure out a way to make this a reality.”
