Love At FIrst Bite: A Conversation with Pain in the Neck Creators Lauren and Alyssa
Written by Daphne Bryant
Welcome to the world of Pain in the Neck: a campy and vampy, post-apocalyptic sapphic romcom series that proves falling in love is always a little bit chaotic.
In this Q&A, dwg founder Daphne Bryant sits down with real-life couple and co-creators Lauren payton and Alyssa Eells to talk about their hilarious, slow-burn indie series that premiered on September 17th. read more about their creative process, queer representation in front of and behind the camera, and what it takes to make a modern love story now <3
Daphne Bryant: Hi Alyssa, hi Lauren! I’m so excited to be speaking with you! How have you been?
A + L: We’ve been fabulous! Fabulous and busy! Lauren has been toiling away at her book (Between Us Witches, launching Summer 2027), and Alyssa has been shepherding our Pain in the Neck merch launch and show promo roll out!
Daphne: Yes, yes let’s chat about the show! Pain in the Neck, your vampy (and campy) lesbian series, officially came out on September 17th of this year! I was lucky enough to see the first three episodes this summer, and I just have to say…what a treat! Where did the inspiration for the show come from?
A + L: Both of us majored in writing (Lauren studied Screenwriting & Communications at UPenn, and Alyssa has a BFA in Comedic Arts from Emerson), so after feeling solid in our personal relationship for a year and a half, we decided to test the waters with a joint creative project! Since this was our first project as a duo, we knew it needed to be something we were equally excited about. Lauren has always wanted to write something vampiric (Twilight and What We Do in the Shadows had some BIG effects on her), and Alyssa has always been a major romcom lover (Her Patron Saint is Amanda Bynes.) Combining these two interests, we began to flesh out the world of Pain in the Neck with everything that we would personally want to see in a vampiric romcom (including a chatty zombie neighbor!)
Daphne: Aye, shoutout Emerson. Despite being set in a post-apocalyptic world, Pain in the Neck is a comedy! One of my favorite genre combinations is horror and comedy, because I feel like they—surprisingly—go so well together and use a lot of the same techniques. Would you agree?
A + L: Completely! In both horror and comedy, timing is everything! If you’re screaming OR laughing the entire time, those moments don’t feel as earned. It’s a delicate balance of plot, characters, and jokes/scares. Pain in the Neck veers much more comedy than horror, but the elements of horror we do include ended up being some of our favorite scenes.
Daphne: Now, I know you two are a real-life couple! In what ways did your personal relationship shape your on-screen one? What was it like playing into the whole enemies-to-lovers trope?
A + L: OOO, juicy question! Being girlfriends is the best part of our lives, so we’re happy to talk about it. Our favorite thing to do is laugh together, and Pain in the Neck is a true representation of our humor styles melding! It also definitely influenced our on-screen chemistry! The characters themselves are vastly different from us, and so is their relationship, but it was fun to bring in inspiration from our real lives. Alyssa channeled her strict theatrical upbringing and her penchant for dramatics, and Lauren brought her love of brooding vampires and goofball tendencies. We both brought our delusions of grandeur—because you MUST fake it‘ til you make it!—and that’s something that Ruby, Helena, Alyssa and Lauren all share. It was always going to be enemies-to-lovers because it’s both of our most favorite romance tropes, but for our relationship, we’d categorize ourselves as a TRUE romantic comedy! It was so much fun and very cutesy to get to fight so much in the show, because we almost never do in real life. We’re very much a“ sit down and immediately talk about our problem until we’re more connected than we were at the start of the conversation” type of couple.
Daphne: Ugh, precious, I love that so much! On the topic of connection, the show explores hunger, pleasure and desire, boundaries, and the quite sensual intimacy of drinking blood. Since it’s a bit of a slow-burn, how did you approach choreographing the dynamic between Ruby and Helena, this sort of dependency?
A + L: Choreographing the growing dynamic between Ruby and Helena was hands down the most important part of Pain in the Neck! If they were smooching at the top of the show, we wouldn’t care that they smooched at all. We took deliberate care when writing their love story [so] that we wouldn’t dive too deep too soon. We love the dynamic of them depending on each other, but also hating each others’ guts, so we wanted to be able to live in that for a while. There’s an inherent sensuality to drinking someone’s blood, so even when the girls are fighting, there’s still that desperate need. When it comes to love, partners should make each others’ lives better. But what happens when someone is making your life better [and] also driving you a little crazy? That’s a fun space to play in!
“When it comes to love, partners should make each others’ lives better. But what happens when someone is making your life better [and] also driving you a little crazy? That’s a fun space to play in!”
Daphne: The show is also, obviously, very sapphic, and I feel like sapphic vampires have always been so cool. How does this story and Helena’s character differ from traditional cishet depictions of vampires?
A + L: A big part of traditional cishet vampire depictions is how the outside world makes them feel othered. One of the many fun things about setting our show during the zombie apocalypse is that we don’t really see how anyone from the outside world reacts to Ruby and Helena’s relationship (as vampire/human and as woman/woman). And therefore, we don’t really see how any cishet people react to them at all! In addition to this, Helena is very different from a traditional vampire, and we explore that in depth in the first two episodes. She still experiences some forms of shame, but she feels no shame for being exactly who she is as a vampire or as a lesbian.
Daphne: Ruby and Helena are trying quite hard not to fall in love. As actors, how do you capture those micro-moments of repressed lust?
A + L: Pain in the Neck is a majorly campy show, but we really tried to strip things back for the more emotional moments. Our strategy was to deliver like ten jokes in a row, and then have those small, more tender moments every once in a while to give them that delicious impact.
Daphne: Okay, genius! Now let’s talk marketing: you both have huge followings and really fun online communities. All of the promotion for Pain in the Neck has been so great and I love the social media content you’ve put out for it. Are they any moments, videos, or photoshoots from the promotional cycle that really stick out to you? Anything super funny or sweet or crazy?
A + L: Thank you so much! Oh my goodness—it was a dream to collaborate with Natasha Negovanlis (the titular Carmilla from the Carmilla (2014) web series) on a sketch to promote our PITN kickstarter! That was truly a pinch me moment because Lauren grew up watching Carmilla, and Alyssa watched it during the writing process of PITN to pay respects to the original divas!
Also, shortly after we launched the trailer, Lauren’s family (who live in a different state) had an exterminator come to spray for bugs. He was a mid-20s straight guy, and he noticed a photo of us on their wall. Lauren’s stepmom started talking about us to him (classic mom), and Pain in the Neck too. He seemed intrigued, so she showed him the trailer (classic mom x2). Apparently as soon as the trailer started playing, he pulled out his phone to show Lauren’s family that his fiancé had already put the premiere date in their joint calendar! They’d already seen the trailer and were planning to watch! That was insanely surreal to hear.
Daphne: Oh my gosh, those are both such special moments. I especially love that sort of random run-in with the exterminator, and the fact that his fiancé is a fan! We love to see it. I also really appreciate how many of your crew members are queer or woman-identifying! That’s so special to see, especially with indie film. What do you hope the future of queer film looks like?
A + L: We were the absolute luckiest to end up with the group of people that we did! Being on set with our crew every weekend was truly the highlight of the show-making process so far. To feel such excitement and support in the room really made it feel like we were creating something special for our community. We hope the future of queer film is incredibly broad! As comedians, we’d love to see high budget comedies starring and created by queer people! As actresses, we’d love to see sapphic main characters specifically, [whose] queerness isn’t treated like a tenuous checkmark or something to fear. As writers, we’d love to see queer people written by queer people. And as lesbians, we’d always love to see more lesbians!
“As actresses, we’d love to see sapphic main characters specifically, [whose] queerness isn’t treated like a tenuous checkmark or something to fear. As writers, we’d love to see queer people written by queer people. And as lesbians, we’d always love to see more lesbians!”
Daphne: Okay and last thing: when you were fundraising for the film you included a bunch of backer rewards, and one of them was a digital zine with tons of bonus content about the characters and crew of Pain in the Neck! If you could create a mini-zine about anything this fall, what would it be about?
A + L: The digital zine was so so so fun! Lilian Liu, our Marketing Producer, truly outdid herself, and we have to give her so much credit for spearheading and perfecting that zine. Have you seen Sanctuary by Cher? If not, it’s a catalogue Cher made in the 90s selling gothic and medieval home decor. It would be very chic to create a zine that looks like a fake catalogue selling a mixture of Ruby and Helena’s aesthetics! Early 2000s Romcom x 18th Century Vampire forever!
