Interview With Alex Essoe, Star Of ‘Trim Season’

A horror movie about weed and its trimmers working on a marijuana farm and a witch? Count me in! Thus is the premise of the new film by filmmaker Ariel Vida (read our interview with her HERE), Trim Season. I didn’t even know this occupation was a thing, but I guess it’s a real job. Who knew? The trailer hooked me in immediately and the resulting movie is bloody, trippy, funny, a bit campy, and just so much fun all around.

A group of young people go to a remote marijuana farm where they hope to make quick cash. But they discover the location’s dark secrets and now must try to escape the mountain on which they are trapped.

To celebrate the release of the film, I chatted with star Alex Essoe via Zoom about the film, working with the fantastic cast, why people love horror, and more!

PopHorror: Trim Season (read our review HERE) was a lot of fun so I’m super excited to talk to you today.

Alex Essoe: Ooh, good! Yes!

PopHorror: What intrigued you about the script and made you want to be a part of the project?

Alex Essoe: Oh, man. What a cool idea! And I’m a veteran pot smoker so I was like, “Yeah! A movie for me! Hooray!” But what also appealed to me was the cast that Ariel put together. I was super excited to work with Beth (Million). I was attached early because I did this JPEGMafia music video with Ariel like a year or two before and we remained friends after that. I thought she was so cool and so self-actualizing. She’s done all of this on her own. No one has done any favors for her. She literally just spent all of her money on a camera and started shooting videos for people. 

PopHorror: Wow!

Alex Essoe: I had so much respect for that. So, anything she wants me to be in, I will happily join her. Then I also just thought it was a cool opportunity for me to try something new. I’ve never played “the best friend” before and I really wanted to lean into that, to real friendship. What is the devotion of a best friend? My job is to be a support for Beth. That’s my job. My job is to love her and support her and protect her as much as I can. I loved Beth immediately. I thought she was just the best. I mean, I loved everybody. I have to say, not to sound like it’s a platitude or something but it was such a great cast. It was such a great group of people and I’m still more or less in touch with all of them, which is pretty good for me because I’m terrible at staying in touch with people. Bex (Taylor-Klaus) was fantastic. I was already a fan of theirs. I had seen them in Dumplin’ and a couple other things before then and I thought that it was really very brave of them to sign on for this and to expose themselves.

PopHorror: I thought so too.

Alex Essoe: Internally as well, from inside. I learned so much about their experience and I think it’s really important for people to see this and embrace it and accept it as this is part of the storytelling world. I thought that they gave an extremely brave performance and without spoiling anything, everything that happens to them, for me, was one of the most emotional parts of the film. I really had to take my hat off to Ariel for giving that aspect of the story so much care and attention and respect. We were all in tears when we saw that for the first time, when we saw that aspect of the story. It still kind of makes me emotional to talk about it. Bex is a pro. They’re a master at this point.

PopHorror: I have to applaud their bravery because it can’t be easy. 

Alex Essoe: And to be the first person to do that! No one has done that. No one has been that nakedly honest in a film about who they are and what their experience is. I think it deserves a lot of attention.

PopHorror: I agree. I thought it was pretty phenomenal. 

Alex Essoe: Oh my god. And the connection between their character and Mona’s son. It’s so beautiful and so wholesome and so innocent, this genuine connection that the two of them form. It hits really hard.

PopHorror: I really loved that. Was there anything that you were adamant about bringing to your character?

Alex Essoe: Adamant? I mean, yeah. Well, I was adamant about sort of bringing the reality of a pothead. That’s what Julia is. That’s fine, that’s kind of the whole point, is that these are people who smoke pot and are chill about things and like, “Oh, that sounds fun! I’m not going to ask any questions about that.” As someone who smokes weed myself, you do that. You get very comfortable where you are, you get comfortable with whatever’s going on. I can’t imagine going through a situation like that sober. But high? I would be like, “Can’t I just go find someplace to take a nap?”

PopHorror: I spoke to Ariel earlier this morning and she said the same thing, that she couldn’t imagine that type of situation sober but even with smoking pot, there’s still paranoia and loss of time. I was like, that’s why I don’t smoke because I will lose hours and I get super paranoid.

Alex Essoe: Oh, sure! Totally! You’re completely right. I’ve smoked weed for a long time and I’ve definitely reigned that in. For me especially, it was the only thing that would quiet my mind without a bunch of chemical side effects. Any medication I’d been prescribed, SSRIs, they would just destroy me, so weed was really the only thing that would help. It’s true for a lot of people, but the downside to that is that it does kill your motivation. And it does, like South Park says, it does make you okay with being bored and not really doing anything, and that will hold you back if you can’t control that. I’ve known people who are high powered lawyers who smoke weed everyday and I’m like, “Fuck you. How dare you? How do you do that? Are you psychopaths?” I can use it. It’s great for inspiration, it’s not good for motivation. That’s what I say. It’s great for coming up with ideas but it’s horrible for executing those ideas.

PopHorror: I can agree with that. So, you do a lot of smoking in the movie. Are you actually smoking weed? What are you smoking?

Alex Essoe: We are smoking… There’s sort of like this industry standard fake smoking stuff. I want to say it’s cornsilk or something like that. We were definitely not actually smoking weed because I would not have been able to remember my lines. But after we wrapped, yes. 

PopHorror: This isn’t your first foray into horror. The phenomenal Starry Eyes, people still talk about it today.

Alex Essoe: Thank you!

PopHorror: That movie just sticks with you. You were so great in it. I see it constantly being recommended.

Alex Essoe: Hell yeah!

PopHorror: Why do you feel so many people connect with horror?

Alex Essoe: Oh, man. Horror, kind of like metal, is such a great release and I think that’s why horror fans and metalheads are such sweet, lovely people. Many very gentle souls love horror and love heavy metal. I mean, let’s be honest. Life is really kind of fucked up. Like it’s kind of a fucked-up proposition. It’s heavy with suffering for the majority of people. Even people who live kind of easy lives end up suffering because of that. Everybody has to contend with a void inside of themselves, and everybody has to contend with the very unattractive truth that we will all be dead and everyone we love will be dead, and there will be no exceptions made for anybody. What a cosmic joke that we’re given all of these things and the awareness that it will all be taken away from us and then it is indeed, taken away from us.

PopHorror: I’ve never thought about it that way but that’s so true. There are no exceptions at all.

Alex Essoe: No, no. No matter how much money you want to throw at it, and people do. The immortality industry is a multi-billion-dollar industry because everybody wants to at least look younger like it’s Brave New World or something. And everybody just wants to be fuckable until they die. You know what I mean? And it’s simply not the case. If you really think about it, if you really want to get morbid, it shouldn’t be the case because there would be no point to creating new life. There must be a changing of the guard and the fact that it’s fleeting is what makes it precious. It’s what makes us appreciate it at all. I think that horror touches that in an unconscious way. And also, I think horror is a community. That doesn’t exist in other genres. There’s no action community. There’s no drama community. There’s comedians and their scene, but there’s no comedy community. Why is horror specifically a community? Why is it unique to that genre? And I think it’s because it’s the place where every person is welcome.

PopHorror: Yes!

Alex Essoe: You don’t have to feel like you fit into a certain mold to appreciate it. Not that you would necessarily, but like romantic comedies aren’t necessarily accessible to everybody. Not everybody can relate to them.

PopHorror: And they’re not very inclusive.

Alex Essoe: Hell no! I think that slowly people are trying to make a step in that direction. There are steps being taken but the realm of horror really is for everybody. I do horror conventions sometimes. You get everyone from every walk of life! Doctors, musicians, everybody loves it, and nobody cares what your background is. Everybody can come. Everybody is welcome. That’s one thing I’ve always loved about it. It’s not like I set out to only act in horror movies or anything like that. I’m a trained actor. I want to do anything and everything that I can, but I’ve always had a very special place in my heart for this sort of outsider genre of films. Also, because there aren’t as many rules. There’s no rules! It’s limitless! You can do whatever you like, you can explore whatever you want, and I’ve been very lucky that the most dynamic roles I’ve had are in that genre.

PopHorror: And we appreciate that!

Alex Essoe: Aw, I appreciate you, man. 

PopHorror: I have just one last question for you today. What is your favorite scary movie?

Alex Essoe: Oh, man! This is a doozy. My favorite scary movie… There was a movie I watched recently that really actually scared me. What was it? This is why I need to stop smoking weed. I’ll just pick a really obscure one that I used to really like in high school. It’s this Australian movie called The Ugly. It’s really interesting from a storytelling perspective but it’s also very interesting from a visual perspective. My friends and I found it in a video store back when those still existed. It was really good.

Thank you so much to Alex for taking the time to speak with us. Trim Season is now On Demand!