Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
A podcast focusing on the perspectives, lives, and stories of Kansans to provide greater insight into the state we all call home.
AAK_Ep47
===
TikTok Tree Controversy
---
[00:00:00]
Sydney Collins: We've had some controversy on the TikTok, which is funny because we posted this video on all the platforms, you know, reels, shorts, all this. Mm-hmm. TikTok, iss, the one that's mad the most. TikTok iss the only one that has actually gone somewhere. Everything else has only got like 400 views.
Gus Applequist: Which one was it?
Sydney Collins: it was the trees.
Gus Applequist: Oh,
Sydney Collins: so there's mixed controversy of if there were trees in Kansas or not. So. We will be bringing on a tree expert,
Gus Applequist: specifically like, like before settlement. Before settlement. English before European settlement.
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: For their trees in Kansas.
Sydney Collins: So we will get a, get to the bottom of this, I promise, just for you.
Gus Applequist: My, I got a text from my sister about this. Like, that's, that's the level that it's gotten to, so yeah, we're gonna have to settle it once and for all.
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
[00:01:00]
Podcast Intro and Guest
---
Sydney Collins: Welcome to Ask a Kansan,
Gus Applequist: a podcast, connecting, uncovering, and Amplifying Kansas.
Sydney Collins: So today we have, the next installment in our series about a film in Kansas, and it is Kiki Bush.
Gus Applequist: Kiki is, uh, an actor, uh, now a director and an advocate for film in Kansas. And, um, yeah, this conversation, uh, is an exciting one just 'cause she's kinda at the forefront of what's going on in Kansas.
Sydney Collins: And the best part is she is homegrown here. And so, um, you'll learn more about that. Um, but, so for
Gus Applequist: without any further ado, here's Kiki.
Sydney Collins: Here's Kiki.
Meet Kiki Bush
---
Sydney Collins: Hello.
Gus Applequist: Welcome.
Sydney Collins: How's it [00:02:00] going? How's it going? Doing? It's good. It's nice to see you. Same. Have a seat. Get comfy. Thank you. This is.
Kiki Bush: Like a small stuffed animal
Sydney Collins: A little bit.
Gus Applequist: Yeah, you can, yeah, you
Sydney Collins: can adjust. How neat. How you need.
Kiki Bush: It's a little bit different than the one I've got in my recording studio.
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Well, welcome to ask of cans and thank you for, uh, being on the podcast today.
Kiki Bush: Thanks for having me.
Gus Applequist: Yeah, it's
Kiki Bush: lovely to be here.
Gus Applequist: We like to start by having our guests introduce themselves for our audience. Okay.
Kiki Bush: My name is Kristen Bush, but since I turned 40 and since I moved back to Kansas, I am going by Kiki.
That was a kind of unwitting, um, but, but deliberate choice. And it's how I introduce myself now, and it's how, um, my husband refers to me. So I am, I'm Kiki in Celine County.
Gus Applequist: Lovely. Yeah. I love, I love, that's such a fun name.
Kiki Bush: It is. And it's how I referred to myself when I was little. Apparently I [00:03:00] couldn't say the word Kristen, and I called myself Kiki, and it's been, it was my first, email address.
Sydney Collins: Oh yeah.
Kiki Bush: kikiBush@aol.com was our family. Yeah. Email address. And I still have it, which is kind of funny. Oh, really? Nice. Yep.
Sydney Collins: I probably couldn't go by mine. Mine was like Syd Stir 92.
Gus Applequist: I knew that. That's weird.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. Syd Stir is my like, go-to screen name if I need anything. There you go.
Kiki Bush: Syd Stir. Syd Stir.
a nice one.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. Real classy.
Sterling Roots and Theater
---
Gus Applequist: So you grew up in Sterling, is that correct?
Kiki Bush: Sterling, Kansas. Yeah. Where the quality of life shines. It's true.
Gus Applequist: Is that, is that like the, the marketing
Kiki Bush: That's the motto. Yeah. I remember there was, there was like a. A town wide search for the motto.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Kiki Bush: And um, yeah, that one won out.
I think the sterling, you know gold? Mm-hmm. Shine. Oh,
Gus Applequist: I didn't even
Kiki Bush: think of that. Yeah. The sterling and gold.
Gus Applequist: That makes total sense. Okay.
Kiki Bush: Yep.
Gus Applequist: So, and you grew up across the street from the Sterling College Theater.
Kiki Bush: You guys have [00:04:00] done your homework? Yes. and that's why
Gus Applequist: I became an actor. That's how you became an actor.
So yeah, just describe what that was like.
Kiki Bush: Well, Sterling College. It is one of the reasons why Sterling is so special. I think it really speaks to why Sterling is remarkable in terms of being an exemplary rural town in Kansas. I think little towns can either make it or break it, depending on these little colleges.
And Sterling got lucky because of the college and they had. A really beautiful, community theater that they would, in the summertime, they had some Sterling College, um, theater folk who stuck around and became my forensics coach and my English teacher. And, um, her husband became the academics or, or the dean of admissions at Sterling College.
But they formed a troupe and they would put on not one, not two, but three different shows in the summertime. [00:05:00] It would be a comedy. And a drama. And then they would put on the musical and it would always take this big group of kids to be in them. And I would be, you know, eight or nine and we would go over to see them.
And I would sit in that seat and I would watch. And if I could have levitated up onto stage, onto the stage, I would have, I honestly, I think I am trying to replicate that. I think I will always try to replicate that feeling of that communal aspect of the audience plus, you know, whatever is happening on stage.
So that was, that was where my love for all sorts of theater was born. And they didn't just do the Annies and the Olivers, which are very important. They did things like Eleemosynary and The fried green tomatoes and what's Steel [00:06:00] Magnolias? And, and the classics. They did Shakespeare, they did Tennessee Williams.
I mean, I just absolutely fell in love with, with theater in Sterling, Kansas, USA. Wow. So that's, that's where it all began. And not just for me for a whole. Grouping of people in that town. So I'm really, can you tell I'm proud
Gus Applequist: of town. No, that's great. My
Kiki Bush: town.
Gus Applequist: That's great. You should be, and we should all be proud of our town.
Kiki Bush: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: So did you go to Sterling then?
Kiki Bush: No.
Gus Applequist: No. Okay.
Kiki Bush: No, I, okay, so I love Sterling. Mm-hmm. But I also couldn't wait. To get outta it. Yeah. I mean, you guys are from Salina, right? That's normal. It's a normal Kansas thing. Like we couldn't wait to get out. Yeah.
KU to England Drama School
---
Kiki Bush: and I did, I went to ku. But then one of the cool things about um, Sterling is we had this beautiful little library and in the corner of the library they had, VHS tapes that you could rent.
Mm-hmm. And I, I don't know about you, but um. In our library. I still remember how the floor would creak.
Sydney Collins: Mm-hmm.
Kiki Bush: If you walked over it in certain areas. I [00:07:00] remember choosing Emma Thompson movies and Helena Bonum Carter movies. I wanted to be them, and I developed this total love of English movies. I became this Anglo file without even knowing it.
I went to KU and my professors there, said, well, you should go to, don't go to Chicago like everybody else. You should go to New York. You're ready. I wasn't ready to go be an actor in New York. I wanted to be trained. I wanted to have KU taught me some things. I had some of the best professors of my life.
I felt like I really learned how to be an actor, but I wanted to have training. I wanted to know how to speak well and how to use my body, and I wanted to learn how to. Dissect text well and that kind of thing. I wanted to be English. All right. I want, I wanted to, I wanted to be a proper classical, classically trained [00:08:00] English actor, so I auditioned for drama school in England and got in.
Gus Applequist: Wow.
Sydney Collins: Oh wow. I did not know that.
Kiki Bush: Yeah, I went to England for three years and uh, and was the only. I feel like I'm like doing one of like, um, know, like a Christopher Guest movie where they're like trying not to. so I was the only American in my class in at the Guild Hole School of Music and Drama for three years, and it was seminal and wonderful.
I feel like I'm talking an awful
Gus Applequist: lot. Well, that's the point how this works of the
Sydney Collins: podcast is we get to know you.
Gus Applequist: You said you were the only American. Mm-hmm. Wow. How, how was that?
Kiki Bush: Bloody brilliant.
Gus Applequist: Did you feel stereotyped or, you know,
Kiki Bush: at times, but honestly I just felt like one of the gang. I mean, that's
Gus Applequist: awesome.
Kiki Bush: I truly having to come back home and I didn't want to, I got, I got cast and. Sir Peter Hall's play, he founded the Royal, he founded the National Theater. He was a Royal [00:09:00] Shakespeare company like Sir Peter was Big deal. Um, he cast me to understudy his daughter Rebecca Hall's, in production, in a production of As You Like It.
Um, and I desperately wanted to do it. It was touring in the States, but I couldn't do it because of all sorts of, uh, legalistic sort of reasons coming back home. To the states felt like ripping off the world's biggest plaster, as they would say, world's biggest bandaid. I, I wanted to stay there. I remember my last year of, of Guild Hall flying into Heathrow, and I felt like I was coming home.
So, yeah, it's, you know, one of the greatest chapters of my life, but I had an ex-boyfriend once tell me that I had to get over it, so screw him.
Gus Applequist: Oh. Exes in the things I say.
Kiki Bush: I know, I know. Gosh, that's so funny. I know. I don't have to get over it. I just have to incorporate it. It's one of the most gorgeous [00:10:00] chapters of my life. I still have. Three of my best, my best mates live there. Um, because Rolfe, my husband teaches in Paris every year. One of the biggest joys of my life is I get to go over there every summer and get to see my friends.
It's beautiful. Mm-hmm.
Gus Applequist: so much I want to ask you about today. Um.
Career Highlights and New York
---
Gus Applequist: But you've had just in this incredible career so far, and, and I don't have time to go through every element of your career, but could you just give us like some of your highlights of the things you've done?
Kiki Bush: first of all, thanks for acknowledging that.
Um, I have to say at 46 and a half, sometimes it doesn't really feel like it. Since I've hit 40, it's been ouchie, um, to use a really silly term. So it's nice, it's nice to hear that. Uh, I got out of drama school. I peripatetic doesn't even really kind of sum it up quite. I've bounced around so much. My dad jokes that he should have gone into a moving company.
Gus Applequist: this is what parents are for. He's tough. This [00:11:00] move.
Kiki Bush: Yeah, it's so true. Bless their hearts. I mean, they, they've been so supportive. Um, so supportive. I could not have done it without them. Mm-hmm. And it probably should have been a lawyer just saying that, dad, just acknowledging that, um. got back from England.
Didn't know where to go that, oh, uh, my first movie was, uh, that made me SAG eligible was a little film called Something's Wrong in Kansas, filmed in Lindsberg.
Sydney Collins: Really? That's
awesome.
Kiki Bush: Yeah. start of my horror film career. I don't, I think you can see it, but I wouldn't advise you see it. Um, I think there was blood thrown on me.
I was chained to a tree.
Gus Applequist: From like, from like classical acting to horror, to to
Kiki Bush: horror.
Gus Applequist: That's,
Kiki Bush: it kind of makes some sense.
Gus Applequist: Does it,
Kiki Bush: you know. It requires you to really go there.
Gus Applequist: Sure.
Kiki Bush: And, you know, think about like Macbeth and, you know mm-hmm. All those huge motions, but yeah. Maybe the text isn't quite on par, the
Gus Applequist: speech.
Yeah.
Kiki Bush: Um, but then I ended up in New [00:12:00] York and, and got an agent and
Gus Applequist: Wow.
Kiki Bush: Uh, a highlight would be playing Cordelia to Kevin Klein's, king Lear at the public. I played Rosalyn Franklin in a play called Photograph 51, that um, uh, Australian actress who's done a lot of weird stuff to her face. Nicole Kidman.
Sydney Collins: Oh yeah,
Kiki Bush: it was in, on the West end. I've done 20. 30 episodes of tv. I shaved my head for Law and Order. I was in the pilot of Suits. Um, I was in a play at the Lincoln Center that extended twice, almost went to Broadway, but there wasn't a Broadway house open. I don't know. It's hard to reduce it down.
Gus Applequist: Sure. Mm-hmm. I,
Kiki Bush: I think doing the off off-Broadway stuff when I would get into, into a role and do back to back stuff, I think the best moments, if I had to sum it up. When I was doing a lead at Manhattan Theater Club, knew that I had a gig at Lincoln Center coming up, had a, you know, a guest star [00:13:00] and I could pay rent, in New York.
I think those were the moments that were the most beautiful. And I think, I really don't wanna cry, but I think if, if there's anything that that makes me feel. Really vulnerable. It's that I don't think I knew that that's, that it was really lovely then, and that it was fleeting.
I was in my thirties and I don't think that's gonna come again.
Maybe it will, but I don't think it will
Gus Applequist: But I understand too, I, I've heard somebody talk about that of like, we need somebody to tell us when we're living in our golden moments. Yeah, yeah. 'cause we don't always recognize them for ourselves.
Kiki Bush: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Yeah.
Kiki Bush: And yet I wasn't happy.
Gus Applequist: Mm. That's,
Kiki Bush: you know, I think I was really kind of miserable in some ways, and I think I'm [00:14:00] much happier now.
it's so strange. It's a
Gus Applequist: journey.
Kiki Bush: Yeah, it is. It absolutely is.
Acting Calling Moment
---
Sydney Collins: do you have a moment in your life? I'm kind of going back to like early years that you were like, acting is gonna be my thing. Do you have like this pivotal moment?
Kiki Bush: It was, I mean, I kid you not, it was Oliver age 11 eating cold sausages on stage. I think the silver lining for how difficult the career was was that I always knew that I wanted to do it.
that was it. I've never wanted to do anything else. Um,
Gus Applequist: you don't have to ask that question of what if I had done the thing that I'm passionate about?
Kiki Bush: No. Mm-hmm. Uhuh
Gus Applequist: nice.
Kiki Bush: and that's a relief, you know, at least I'll be in my, on my deathbed knowing that I gave it my all. Now, there are times when I wish.
I love that I like brought a script of things that I was gonna maybe talk about.
Gus Applequist: Sorry.
Kiki Bush: We can, it's not, not even that, it's just like actors need their [00:15:00] lines. Yeah. It's like our security blanket. Like what if I forget to say this thing, but you guys know what you're doing,
Pandemic Homecoming to Kansas
---
Gus Applequist: so the pandemic. Brought you back to Kansas.
Yeah. Yeah. Can you talk about homecoming?
Kiki Bush: Yeah. I was living in Berlin for reasons that I won't necessarily go into. They had to do with, well, whatever, it doesn't matter. first marriage, not great. and I wanted to get outta New York because New York is really hard to live. Have you lived in New York before?
No.
Kiki Bush: Have you paid? I have. I have heard a
Gus Applequist: lot
Kiki Bush: about the rent.
Gus Applequist: Yeah.
Kiki Bush: Visiting it is lovely. I could not have. Afforded a si an apartment this size anymore than I could have afforded the Taj Mahal. I mean, it, it's just very, very hard. And it's constantly like money comes in, money comes out, money comes in, money goes out.
I mean, the last gig I was doing in New York, I worked on my day off on Monday. I worked in a wine shop. Wow. I didn't absolutely have to, but that extra a hundred bucks a day was really, really helpful. Um, in addition
Gus Applequist: to an h show [00:16:00] week
Kiki Bush: in addition to an H show week.
Gus Applequist: Wow.
Kiki Bush: Yeah. so I came home.
My folks were like, what are you doing in Berlin? Like, that's a great question. Um, so I came home and we were blessed with a, a really good pandemic. I also should say that I am not, I'm not a business person. I don't say that with any sort of, I'm not proud of it. I didn't take a business class at KU much to my dad's consternation.
yeah, I'm crap at it. I think a lot of actors are. and I'm also, I stand by my decision to not be on social media. I think it is deleterious to most people's psyche and souls, and I have only been on it for a very short amount of time. And the short amount of time that I was on it, I was like, I can't.
Do this anymore. All that is to say as a precursor that when I came home after the honeymoon period with my parents of [00:17:00] like watching TV and making cookies and walking on on the campus, I, I was like, I gotta do something. So I did go online and after, you know, scrolling through the kind of funny. No offense.
I can say this. I'm from there. You know, my hometown did not have a lot of, um, matches. I I came across this one guy that was like, you're not for real. And a year later I met him, or a year later I met him, a year later I married him. Um, and he's the man who's sitting over there skulking in the corner. In the shadows.
In the shadows. Um, and he's the reason that I, uh, stuck around.
And it's, it's remarkable. And I, I still kind of have to pinch myself. Had you told me that I was gonna end up in Salina, saline County, we don't live in Salina, Kansas, I, I would not have believed you. I also, in [00:18:00] preparation for this, I watched some of the episodes.
I think what you guys are doing with this podcast, I think what's, what's happening in Salina is really exciting. It's a really special place. and I think it is worth celebrating. Uh, and I for one. I don't think I could have chosen a better midsize town to, you know, marry into,
Sydney Collins: that's such a true statement.
Like, I technically didn't marry into McPherson, but like, I sort of did, like I moved there, I started dating, um, my husband and then we're like, okay, we're staying here, type of deal. So yeah,
Gus Applequist: sometimes our towns choose us and those things, we get to choose them. So, yeah.
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Hmm. Um.
Life in Saline County Now
---
Kiki Bush: And apparently the timing as well.
[00:19:00]
Sydney Collins: we hit, we hit pandemic, you've moved to Saline County. What's kind of your day to day right now? It's so weird.
Kiki Bush: The anchor is these. So we live out in the country, we don't have children. Um, we've got these crazy animals that we, that kind of are anchor, but Rolf travels a lot. So we've got, we've got that going. for his work a lot. I did get a gig that took me out of, outta town in Chicago, and I have voiceover work in my little studio.
It's nothing like this. Um, with my, I don't do it in German, but with a lot of German companies. Oh, wow. Still. And, I audition not every, every day hardly, but on a weekly basis. I'm getting into writing it. All I'm trying to say is it's very up and down. You know, we do not have a set schedule. You feel like, of an actor.
It is. Mm-hmm. But you know, it really goes with the wind. I wish it were more set. [00:20:00] I love rehearsals because it's like I'm, I am needed at this time. Mm-hmm. And I know, I know what the schedule's like, but when I'm not in rehearsal, my gosh, every year it feels like, okay, this year is gonna be the year that I have a schedule.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Kiki Bush: Every year I break it. Mm-hmm.
Fighting for Film Incentives
---
Gus Applequist: you have been busy despite your schedule being all over the place, and one of the things you've been doing is advocating for tax incentives in Kansas.
Kiki Bush: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Could you tell us about, first of all, how you got involved? Yeah. In kind of that advocacy and then, and how it's developed over time?
Kiki Bush: a year ago we had the pleasure and the honor of showing, Rolfe and my short film, the game camera at the Capitol, which is really cool. As a part of that advocacy, you know, honestly I think it might have been through Josh Swattie, who is this kind of Kansan extraordinaire, um, who introduced me to Stuart Little, who is the, one of the biggest advocates for Grow Kansas Film, the organization who's working on trying to get, this bill passed for, [00:21:00] uh, bringing film tax incentives to Kansas. And he put me in touch with him. And look, I am not a policy wonk.
I am not, again, didn't, didn't take a. Business class in college. But I if, if, if given a script, I can stand up in front of, um, the two chambers in, Congress and talk to them as I did in the Kansas House and Senate last year and two years before, and advocate on, on behalf of tax incentives for films coming.
38 states. Have them, all the states around us have them. I just feel like, I think you guys have talked about this in other podcasts. We've got this kind of ho-hum approach to feeling like a Kansan and it's like, well. You know, we've got other, other folks think of us this way. You know, there, there are ways that we could really advocate for ourselves.
And one way is bringing film crews in and showing people just how pretty our state is. It's not hard to do. And the crazy thing [00:22:00] is, is we're not asking for a lot of money. It's kind of a symbolic drop in the bucket at this stage.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Kiki Bush: And the sad thing is, and I can't speak to the real politics of it, nor do I want to, the support's there.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Kiki Bush: I think we just need to move the right people
Gus Applequist: mm-hmm.
Kiki Bush: To, uh, get the vote in place. And I think, I think we can get it done, but the time is now because the governor, we believe will vote for it. But if, if it she's done after this, this session, if we can't get it, passed right now, then she'll be gone.
We'll have to redraft a whole start. Completely different Bill.
Call Your Legislators
---
Kiki Bush: So if you're interested, contact your local government officials and, um, you can contact me. I'll give you talking points. It's quite easy.
Gus Applequist: I, I actually did this.
Kiki Bush: He did,
Gus Applequist: it was
Kiki Bush: beautiful
Gus Applequist: 10 days ago or something, and I heard back yesterday from other people.
Had a good conversation over email about Fabulous. About the, the, [00:23:00] yeah.
How Film Tax Credits Work
---
Gus Applequist: The legislation and we've maybe talked in a previous episode a little bit about tax incentives mm-hmm. And what they actually mean. Right. Um, like of course we're probably, most people are familiar with, with tax incentives that bring, let's say, sports teams to a state.
Kiki Bush: I'm glad you, I'm glad you brought that up actually,
Gus Applequist: but, but how does this work within film and television? Like, what do these incentives actually mean?
Kiki Bush: It actually goes hand in hand because the chiefs are coming to town, well to state. You know what? The Chiefs employ a lot of film and television.
Wouldn't it be silly if the Chiefs are in Kansas, but they've gotta drive all the way back to Missouri Yep. To use their film crews, their actors, all the rest of it. It just doesn't make any sense.
Keeping Kansas Creatives Home
---
Kiki Bush: and we also say that we wanna have, well, we're tired of all the brain, the creative brain drain.
Well, shocker Studios, for example, down in Wichita. Mm-hmm. Has this. State of the art. I mean, they've got all sorts of stuff. It's all
Sydney Collins: the things.
Kiki Bush: And they've got students who are cla, I mean, Justin Rohrbaugh also an amazing Kansan who's doing incredible stuff to, um, [00:24:00] keep these students in the state. The students don't have work.
Gus Applequist: Yeah.
Kiki Bush: You know, if we don't have incentives to keep, uh, bringing work here, I mean, preaching to the choir, you guys know what I'm talking about. we've gotta have places for kids to come or to stay rather. Mm-hmm.
Making The Game Camera
---
Kiki Bush: Rol and I made a short film. The game camera, we, we raised a lot of money for it. We had 50 Kansan women and their partners contribute money.
We put in some money ourselves. It takes a lot of work to do it. Look, we were gonna do it without incentives, but I'll tell you, I would be a lot more inclined to make another one. Mm-hmm. If there were more incentives available to us, because it takes, it takes a lot of work. And we had to ship in a bunch of crew from Arkansas because my director, although she was born, um, or she was raised in Kansas, now teaches down in Arkansas.
Gus Applequist: So, which, I mean, I guess, I guess it was to your benefit that there was a crew relatively close that could come, but it would've been even better if it had been a key. Of course.
Kiki Bush: Yeah. Yeah. [00:25:00] And we, you know, we were, I could have, she said, why don't we shoot it down in Arkansas? I didn't want to, I love Kansas.
Mm-hmm. I wanted to, you know, we, we wrote a Kansas story
Gus Applequist: mm-hmm.
Kiki Bush: How many times, and Rofe can speak to this, um, when you guys talk to him, I'm so tired of seeing Kansas portrayed as this, lame place or, or like shot in a different part of the world and, and like this is set in Kansas, but filmed somewhere else.
It's just, it's high time. We put an end to that, I think especially when you've got cameras that you can. Rent for cheaper. And people can learn online how to, how to shoot a film. So much easier now, you know,
[00:26:00]
Gus Applequist: I appreciate you kind of making the case for film incentives in Kansas. I want to like now move away from that just 'cause you have other things to talk about.
And so you've been mentioning the game camera.
Kiki Bush: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Could you talk about kind of the origins of that project? Uh, and your desire to do it?
Origins of the Story
---
Kiki Bush: I think so much is born out of frustration. Honestly. Frustration and and love, I mean, truly. It was born out of meeting Rolf and when you meet, when an actor meets a writer, you put him to work.
we had this glorious period of time during the pandemic where he, he was like. Have I shown you these pictures from my game camera? I'm like,
Sydney Collins: no, we live on 30. I mean, that was a pickup line apparently, [00:27:00] but we live on 30 acres.
Kiki Bush: Oh God. And, and before I got there, he. When he had moved out there with his family, he had bought this game camera and he was like, I wanna know what he's from, which he's a city guy, so he's like, I wanna know what's out here.
So he put up the game camera and would check it intermittently. And sure enough, the usual suspects were there. You know, the coyotes, the raccoon deer, the raccoons, all the rest of it. The feral cat. Yeah, the bobcat one time. And then lo and behold, he checked it and the time code said three o'clock in the morning, there was some dude's legs.
Sydney Collins: Nope.
Kiki Bush: Yep, yep. Exactly. And you know, hard
Sydney Collins: know for
Kiki Bush: me, horrifying. I think it was around then that I started locking the doors. You know, I'm Sterling Kansas girl. We didn't lock our doors. We started locking the doors and that was the genesis for the film. And, no, I don't remember the log line. You can remember it for me.
It's like when a grieving woman. Installs a night vision camera in her mini horse's pen on her [00:28:00] Kansas Ranch, the specter of a human legs for, makes her reconsider her husband's death. so that was the, that was the idea. Hmm. And then because, you know, we couldn't afford a, a feature film, meaning a longer film, we were like, let's make a short film.
Mm-hmm. Can. That's more palatable. so you've got to get in quick. Mm-hmm. Meaning it's got to hit an audience pretty quickly, so it would probably have to center around loss.
Sydney Collins: Mm-hmm.
Kiki Bush: Meaning, okay. What's a, what's a unifier? Well, death and so she has lost her husband. Obviously I'm going to play the lead, otherwise, what's the point?
Sorry.
Equity On Set
---
Kiki Bush: Um, but for me, And this is statistically speaking, women's roles in front of the camera as actresses drop after 30, whereas men's roles peak at 35. There is a lot of statistical evidence for this. and also [00:29:00] behind the scenes, behind the camera, women just don't get a fair shot. I mean,
Gus Applequist: I have your 22%.
Kiki Bush: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: Is the number of women. Yeah. In Wow.
Kiki Bush: Yeah. And you can think about it like how many women have won Best Director two.
and it's the same with people of color. They've got, it's just, it's, it's really rough. So I was incredibly driven and very proud when we were able to put five out of seven actors as female.
And, most of the crew were, Women and a lot of them were people of color. It was something that we were really passionate about. I've ne I've worked on maybe one set with my same director who's a woman, my Kansas friend, uh, and director. Another set with her that was largely women, women based. And I'm not saying that female sets are always great at all.
And I'm not saying that women work better together. I'm not [00:30:00] saying that, but I am saying that I think that we should try to aim for more equity. There's nothing wrong with that. And I also think that it's all right to wanna tell stories about women who get older too.
Sydney Collins: Mm-hmm.
Gus Applequist: Totally.
Kiki Bush: Dudes get too. Why shouldn't women get to, there's nothing wrong with that.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Kiki Bush: That's, I don't think that that's a shocking thing to say.
Sydney Collins: Mm-hmm.
Aging and Beauty Standards
---
Kiki Bush: And I also think that in England when I was there, I got to see these just absolutely
killer women who got to age and not have to do anything crazy to their faces. Judy Dench, Maggie Smith, all of these women it doesn't matter what, I think everyone has an opinion about this. I, but I don't know what we're doing as American women to our faces, and I guarantee you little girls don't grow up if they didn't have all this stuff that they were looking at.
Don't [00:31:00] grow up thinking, I hope one day I can put a bunch of stuff into my face so that someone will love me. I know that if that weren't trickled down to us. We wouldn't be doing that. Look, I, I reserve the right to say that I'm gonna do something to my face someday if I, if it gets unbearable, but I'm not, haven't done it yet.
And I, and I would like to hope that we can ban together as women to say we don't need to. Wow. Sorry, I went on a bit of a No, I
Gus Applequist: apologize.
Kiki Bush: No, I'm not going to apologize. You're right. Thank you. Thank you.
Gus Applequist: When you think about the women that have affected the state and our country, they certainly didn't stop doing it after a certain age.
Kiki Bush: No.
Gus Applequist: And their stories need to be told and need to be told with people that can represent them well, you know? No,
Kiki Bush: absolutely.
Gus Applequist: So, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
Kiki Bush: I read a statistic in preparing for this, like, I'm gonna bungle it because it's not in front of me, but like women over [00:32:00] 50 represent a certain group and their, their stories are only being told by a certain percentage point and most of them are, you know, to show a mother or whatever.
And there is nothing wrong with portraying mothers on camera. I mean that, but why not show a mother going through all. All variations. Mm-hmm. You had Leslie,
Sydney Collins: Bishop.
Gus Applequist: Bishop,
Kiki Bush: yeah. Bishop on, and I watched her. What an incredible person.
Sydney Collins: She's amazing.
Kiki Bush: And I wanna say that I would love to be, I would love her as a little girl's role model.
Just like take me or leave me like,
Sydney Collins: yeah.
Kiki Bush: You know, like, I think that there's something so freeing about that. Yeah,
I need to work more on that as I get older of just being like, I. I wanna be more that, and I was thinking of more like, there are so many women in Salina that, that are in leadership roles.
And I'm, I, because I'm not, I'm new to town and I don't know that much about the [00:33:00] city government, and I know mm-hmm.
That that was something that she was talking about as being lacking. But there's a lot of. Female leadership in the arts that started with like the Martha Rays and the Sidney Soderberg, and I just think that's awesome. That makes me really proud as a new implant too, you know? Yeah. Mm-hmm.
Gus Applequist: So, and I, I say pretty often that I think Salina over the last five, 10 years.
Two things really stand out to me. One is that organizations are working together in ways that are new and creative and didn't happen as much before.
Kiki Bush: Adrian Allen, sorry,
Gus Applequist: another one. Yeah, totally. And, and second, that there's a lot of women in leadership that is, that are causing that first thing to happen.
Kiki Bush: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: And that there's still plenty of room for men in leadership in this community.
Kiki Bush: Totally.
Gus Applequist: And, uh, yeah. It's, but it's, it's, it's really remarkable to see the things that have happened and continue to happen here. Yeah. Yeah.
Why Kansas Stories Matter
---
Gus Applequist: I have a quote here from you, you said,
Kiki Bush: oh gosh.
Gus Applequist: I believe our landscapes and our people's stories are worthy enough to compete with other states [00:34:00] and that our stories are worthy enough to film.
My question for you is, what do you think the rest of the country and maybe even Kansans themselves are missing when Kansas stories aren't told on screen?
Kiki Bush: First of all, I don't think I said that. That sounds way too
Gus Applequist: really. Oh, I'm
Kiki Bush: so sorry. Erudite. No, I, no, I, maybe I did it. It just sounds very, very smart. Um,
Difficult Beauty of Kansas
---
Kiki Bush: I'm gonna invoke another Kansas author. Um, Chloe Cooper Jones who talks about something called what? Easy beauty and Difficult Easy beauty. And Difficult beauty. And I think that this actually ties into what I was talking about with women and aging, if I may,
Sydney Collins: with Kansas in winter and seeing.
Kiki Bush: Different shades of brown.
Mm-hmm.[00:35:00]
When you see a woman who's preternaturally old and doesn't age in the way that your grandmother used to,
Gus Applequist: you
Kiki Bush: are like, what's up with that? And you don't quite something doesn't quite compute.
like that's easy. Colorado is easy, and don't get me wrong, my heart belongs to Colorado. The bright lights of New York is easy. The crashing waves of Maine, easy white sands of easy. There is something difficult. About Kansas, but I think it is beautiful. But you gotta look for it. You gotta stick around for it.
You gotta go away for 20 years and then come back.
Gus Applequist: Mm.
Kiki Bush: And I think you have to
[00:36:00] think, you might have to watch the people you love
come and go here. You know, we just, I drive by my grandparents' Graves every time I see, go to see my parents. We, we, um, buried, we sprinkled Rolf's mom's ashes in the ground on our property this year. I think, not that you can't do that in other places, but I think there is something very difficult about Kansas and I think a lot of people.
Not to blame them. I think a lot of people drive on I 70 to go skiing or to go to Joshua Tree. And then what is this?
I think there's a sort of metal, M-E-T-T-L-E that we, that we gain by sticking around and, and seeing the different shades of brown. [00:37:00] I dunno.
Gus Applequist: That was one of the great answers of our podcast. Yeah. Wow. What a, what a beautiful answer.
Kiki Bush: Well, it came from me thinking about what you said,
Sydney Collins: that was episode number one.
Gus Applequist: Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's a deep cut for us. Yeah.
Sydney Collins: That's when Gus was still just a. A figment over, over the
Gus Applequist: side of the
Sydney Collins: studio.
Gus Applequist: Yeah. We had a strange format that first episode, so please forgive us if you go back to watch it.
Sydney Collins: It is a good one. Yeah.
Gus Applequist: to end on, not that we haven't been hopeful, I think absolutely. This conversation has been
Kiki Bush: Yeah.
One
Gus Applequist: in the future. And I,
Kiki Bush: you're right, I think. I think it's, IM imperative to be hopeful.
Choosing Hope and Grit
---
Gus Applequist: So as we're in that spirit of hopefulness, The future of, of storytelling in this place. Yeah. And what it can enable not just for our industry or for us individually, but for our society as Kansans. what, what things do you hope for and what, what things do you imagine?
Kiki Bush: Yeah. [00:38:00] Well, I think that that's the spirit of your company, and I think it is such a, it's such a worthy one.
When you're married to a writer, there are certain, I feel like I might have this branded on my forehead. He always, Rolfe always talks about things from a narrative standpoint, and I think I am starting to see things from a narrative standpoint, but I think, look, it's easy for me to fall back on our motto.
As Kansans, but I do think we've got one of the best.
Gus Applequist: Oh, it's great,
Kiki Bush: don't we? Yeah. And I think we get so little as Kansans mm-hmm. That I kind of love to rub that in other states noses. And if you don't know what it is, then look it up. but I do think that there is such a Okay. It's gonna be hard.
Gus Applequist: Yeah.
Kiki Bush: It's either gonna be. Blowing 60 miles [00:39:00] out an hour outside, or it'll be blazing hot or maybe
Gus Applequist: 20 or 110.
Kiki Bush: Yeah, exactly. But tomorrow there might be this beautiful and metaphor. Metaphor. There might be this beautiful period of time at around six o'clock where the wind stops and you can go outside and I mean, you know, you might not notice that the wind has stopped if it hasn't been blowing all day.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Kiki Bush: I'm not advocating for more adversity at all, but I am. I do think that maybe sticking to our motto a little bit more during these tough times might be useful
Gus Applequist: and allow the difficulty we face to sharpen us.
Kiki Bush: What else is it gonna do? Well, I think, I mean, Obama, I mean, my favorite president always talked about just choosing hope over everything else.
I mean, what are you, what else are you gonna do? Are we gonna fold? Are we not gonna make any more stories? No.
Gus Applequist: I could talk to you forever. [00:40:00] Uh, I, I love, uh, the sincerity with which you talk about the things you believe in, and you're not shy about sharing what you believe, which is really cool. So thanks for doing that with us for a little bit today on ASCA Ksan.
Kiki Bush: Thanks for what you're doing, you guys. I'm really honored to be here with you.
Thanks for, for bringing me on.
Post Interview Takeaways
---
Gus Applequist: Well, we hope you enjoyed that interview with Kiki Bush. Um, yeah. What, what's your takeaway?
Sydney Collins: I, again, I love that she is homegrown here in Kansas. [00:41:00] Mm-hmm. Doing really cool things that other, like little Kansas girls can be like, yeah, I can do it.
Gus Applequist: Kiki is not a shy person.
Sydney Collins: No.
Gus Applequist: she is, she knows what she thinks about things and she's not afraid to, to share them with you, which is honestly kind of refreshing.
Yes. Uh, many of us in the Midwest tend to kinda hide behind our feelings and Kiki's not like that.
Kansas Hot Takes Game
---
Sydney Collins: Which actually, um, kind of leads me into my segment today. Are you ready?
Gus Applequist: Okay, sure.
Sydney Collins: These are Kansas hot takes and I wanna know your hot takes about Kansas things.
Gus Applequist: Oh, how exciting.
Sydney Collins: So
I'll start with easy. So just the first thing that you know comes to the top of your mind. You know, you're a kans and win. We've had this question before. Fill in the blank.
Gus Applequist: I'll go, I'll go with an easy one. Uh, cinnamon rolls and chili. Like if you eat cinnamon rolls and chili,
Sydney Collins: you know you're a kansan when you like cinnamon rolls and chili.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Sydney Collins: Okay.
Gus Applequist: Like together in the same
Sydney Collins: way, together In the same thing. Yeah. I get it. My first thought when someone mentions Kansas is,
Gus Applequist: yeah, like the fill in the blank would for [00:42:00] me. Uh, boring. Flat fly over. Something to do with Dorothy or Toto.
Sydney Collins: Kansas gets misunderstood because
Gus Applequist: most people haven't actually been here.
Sydney Collins: Yeah, there you go. Kansas Pride means what to me.
Gus Applequist: Hmm.
Sydney Collins: I know I'm kind of putting you on the spot today. I didn't prep you at all.
Gus Applequist: Kansas Pride means, being willing to share what we've got here. I guess I, yeah. I don't feel like I have a great answer to that one.
Sydney Collins: Um, you wanna ask me some of these? You wanna go through my list here?
Gus Applequist: Sure.
Sydney Collins: Do you wanna turn the tables?
I feel that way You're not just on, on here.
Gus Applequist: Who's, who's gonna have the better hot takes? In all honesty. the one thing Kansans always show up for is
Sydney Collins: each other.
Gus Applequist: Yep. I agree. Um, if you need help in Kansas, blank happens.
Sydney Collins: If [00:43:00] you need help in Kansas, blank happens when you need help in Kansas, it will happen.
Gus Applequist: Yeah.
Sydney Collins: How about that?
Sunsets Sunflowers and Pride
---
Gus Applequist: everyone should experience Kansas blank at least once.
Sydney Collins: Sunsets.
Gus Applequist: Good. Good. I was like, if, if you weren't gonna say it, I was, um, uh, the most underrated thing in Kansas is.
Sydney Collins: It's people.
Gus Applequist: Oh,
I agree. Uh, Kansas moment, I'll never forget is,
Sydney Collins: oh gosh, Kansas moment. I'll never forget.
Probably taking my kids to the Sunflower Patch, sunflower Field patches. They always, it's like, it's like. Uh, you can go to a pumpkin patch pretty much anywhere Yeah. In the us but like you go to the sunflower patch and it's a very different experience.
Gus Applequist: It is special,
Sydney Collins: especially when you can't see above them.
Mm-hmm. And it's wild.
Gus Applequist: By the way, do you ever look at a sunflower field, like when it's time to harvest?
Sydney Collins: It looks real [00:44:00] sad because they have to let 'em dry out and they get all droopy and sad.
Gus Applequist: Uhhuh, it's super sad.
Sydney Collins: Sad. And you're like, oh,
Gus Applequist: yeah. So if you're planning a visit to Kansas and you're going to see the sunflowers, just plan accordingly.
Mix,
Sydney Collins: plan accordingly. Like there is a certain time because they do have to, it's kinda like corn, like sometimes they leave corn to dry.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm.
Sydney Collins: Because that's, um, feed and all these mm-hmm. There's agri. That's a word.
Gus Applequist: By the way,
Sydney Collins: add things that I don't
Gus Applequist: know, I don't think we mentioned this and I'm surprised we didn't when we had Gragg Peterson on my second cousin.
Yeah. From the Peterson Farm Brothers. They, not always, but sometimes they have a sunflower field that you can go to and take pictures. Oh. Um, at their, they have like an event center.
Sydney Collins: Yeah.
Gus Applequist: We'll have to put a link in the notes about what it's called. Yeah. I don't remember off the top of my head. Hmm. Um, but it's really cool.
It's also within, you can see Coronado Heights from there.
Sydney Collins: Oh, that's cool.
Gus Applequist: So you can kind of like. Do the, the double day activity and Linberg is like two miles away. Okay. Sorry, I've distracted this.
Sydney Collins: Yeah, no, I love it.
Gus Applequist: Kansas gives me hope because
Sydney Collins: things [00:45:00] happen here.
Gus Applequist: Yeah, I'd say on that one, like, because people show up for each other here.
Sydney Collins: Oh yeah. That's a good one.
Gus Applequist: Mm-hmm. If Kansas could speak, it would say.
Sydney Collins: Asra. I think that's how it's pronounced.
Gus Applequist: I was gonna be like, like the wind
Sydney Collins: can't,
Kiki Bush: could speak. It'd just be the wind.
Gus Applequist: Yeah. Be whistling. Yeah. Yeah. Very interesting.
Sydney Collins: Yeah,
Gus Applequist: I am, I'm not real good at this, but, but it's interesting to, to think about what our gut reactions are.
Sydney Collins: Yeah. There you go.
Wrap Up and Subscribe
---
Sydney Collins: Well, thank you for joining us for another episode of Ask Kansan.
Gus Applequist: Uh, please go and like, and subscribe if you haven't already. Uh,
Sydney Collins: leave us a review wherever you're listing from
Gus Applequist: and, uh, we have some exciting things we're working on. Uh, if you like, uh, t-shirts and stuff, there may or may not be something coming your way.
Sydney Collins: Yeah,
Gus Applequist: so stay tuned [00:46:00] and, uh, thanks for tuning in today.
Sydney Collins: See you next time.