Canadian filmmaker, Rebecca Snow’s most-recent release, The Boy in the Woods is making waves in North America and internationally.
The film is based on Maxwell Smart’s 2022 memoir of the same name. As a child, Smart survived Nazi rule by hiding in the woods in Poland and details his experience in the book. The two main characters in this film are a young Max played by Jett Klyne, and Yanek, played by David Kohlsmith, the other boy who hides in the woods with him.
The film screened in the Industry Selects program at the Toronto International Film Festival this past fall, and has since screened at more than 30 festivals worldwide, has won audience choice awards, best film awards, and a best director award.
I sat down with Snow over Zoom to celebrate the success of the film, to find out more about the project, and the real-life story that inspired it. Warning: spoilers ahead.
How did you get involved with the project and come to know Maxwell?
I made a documentary in 2019 for History Channel called Cheating Hitler: Surviving the Holocaust. It is a feature-length documentary about three survivors on journeys to retell their stories and get answers about what had happened to the people around them. One of those survivors was Max. He had already written The Boy in the Woods, and working with him on Cheating Hitler made me realize that the documentary was just the beginning. His story warranted a retelling in a narrative film. I first raised it [the project] to him at Yad Vashem between takes for the documentary, and here we are now.
What was it like going from documenting his life and history as a work of non-fiction to adapting his story as a work of narrative fiction?
It’s the first time I’ve done fiction. My background is in documentary, so I’m very used to writing scripts for that genre, but I had never written a narrative script before.
I spent a lot of time with Max interviewing him for the documentary. The guilt and trauma he still holds around his friendship with Yanek and how he tragically died, is apparent. I knew that was something we had to explore dramatically. I didn’t have to stray from the true story because it’s all there. It’s a real roller coaster. Holocaust survivors often say it’s down to a series of small miracles that they survive and I wanted to get that sense throughout Max’s story.
Was the film a collaborative process with Maxwell?
He left it entirely in my hands. He was extremely trusting and generous with his time, and I would occasionally go back and ask him questions. When I wrote the script I knew his story so well and I had read many testimonies by other survivors.
At first, I was very nervous to show Maxwell the script. I made sure to show it to him before we went into production, and he loved it. I expected him to want to change little things, but he was very open. I think it’s partly because he is an artist himself. Maxwell is an abstract impressionist artist and so he understands that in order to speak to and entertain an audience, you can do certain things [that deviate from exact events] and still get the truth out because of how you’re telling the story.
What is the distribution plan for this film? Have you been able to screen it at festivals in and outside of Canada?
I’ve gone to a lot of festivals and most theatres have been packed. Maxwell comes with me when he is able, we went to the Miami Jewish Film Festival together where Maxwell received a standing ovation.
It’s rewarding to hear from audiences during the Q&As, and see how moved everyone is by this story. I’m always relaying these experiences for Maxwell and I take a picture of the audience so I can send it to him. He’s been carrying the weight of this story, and all of the stories of the people around him who didn’t survive, for 80 years. He knows—through the memoir, the documentary, and now this film—people are finally seeing his story and bearing testimony to the people who didn’t survive. It’s huge for him.
Everything originates with Maxwell’s story. My producers said they have never had a funding process go so quickly and smoothly. We got all the funders in place because everyone read the script and said this is a story we need to be telling.
What was it like working with kids as your main actors?
It was amazing! It was my first feature and people tell that joke around becoming a director of fiction: “Make sure your first film doesn’t have kids, or babies, or animals.” And we had kids and babies and animals galore. It was wonderful working with kids, and Jett and David are extraordinary actors. Off camera, they became like brothers, and I think that is visible through the chemistry we see on screen.
Initially, I was worried about how we were going to find a 12-year-old kid to carry this film because he’s essentially in every frame. I got a bunch of tapes from different actors to read for the role and I thought that Jett was possibly our Max. I’d done callbacks with him, but I wanted to meet in person before I cast him. I wanted to see him in the woods, so we met in Stanley Park, in Vancouver, amongst the trees. The way he was leaping around and exploring, excited, and he was exactly Max’s age, he was just perfect. People have said to me at festivals, “Gosh he really reminds me of a young Timothée Chalamet.” Physically and in terms of acting chops. That’s a real compliment.
What are your most memorable moments from filming?
The one that stands out to everyone on set was when Maxwell came to visit and met Jett in person. He lives in Montreal and we were shooting in North Bay so that was a big moment. We didn’t tell Jett that Maxwell was coming so it was a surprise, and he was just blown away to meet the real Maxwell in person.
That day we happened to be filming a very emotional scene between Max and Yanek. Jett was very caught up in the emotion of the scene and found it very hard to come out of the intense sadness that he had invoked in his acting, so I asked if he wanted to see Maxwell. And Jett ran over to him and sort of fell into his arms and they were just weeping together. Maxwell, who had been watching the monitor, said, “You just became me. I just watched you become me.” He is so blown away by Jett’s performance.
Don’t miss The Boy in the Woods now streaming on Apple TV and Paramount+. You can also catch it on Video on Demand on Google Play/YouTube, Cogecoex Store, Bell, Rogers, Shaw, and Cogeco.
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
Canadian filmmaker, Rebecca Snow’s most-recent release, The Boy in the Woods is making waves in North America and internationally.
The film is based on Maxwell Smart’s 2022 memoir of the same name. As a child, Smart survived Nazi rule by hiding in the woods in Poland and details his experience in the book. The two main characters in this film are a young Max played by Jett Klyne, and Yanek, played by David Kohlsmith, the other boy who hides in the woods with him.
The film screened in the Industry Selects program at the Toronto International Film Festival this past fall, and has since screened at more than 30 festivals worldwide, has won audience choice awards, best film awards, and a best director award.
I sat down with Snow over Zoom to celebrate the success of the film, to find out more about the project, and the real-life story that inspired it. Warning: spoilers ahead.
How did you get involved with the project and come to know Maxwell?
I made a documentary in 2019 for History Channel called Cheating Hitler: Surviving the Holocaust. It is a feature-length documentary about three survivors on journeys to retell their stories and get answers about what had happened to the people around them. One of those survivors was Max. He had already written The Boy in the Woods, and working with him on Cheating Hitler made me realize that the documentary was just the beginning. His story warranted a retelling in a narrative film. I first raised it [the project] to him at Yad Vashem between takes for the documentary, and here we are now.
What was it like going from documenting his life and history as a work of non-fiction to adapting his story as a work of narrative fiction?
It’s the first time I’ve done fiction. My background is in documentary, so I’m very used to writing scripts for that genre, but I had never written a narrative script before.
I spent a lot of time with Max interviewing him for the documentary. The guilt and trauma he still holds around his friendship with Yanek and how he tragically died, is apparent. I knew that was something we had to explore dramatically. I didn’t have to stray from the true story because it’s all there. It’s a real roller coaster. Holocaust survivors often say it’s down to a series of small miracles that they survive and I wanted to get that sense throughout Max’s story.
Was the film a collaborative process with Maxwell?
He left it entirely in my hands. He was extremely trusting and generous with his time, and I would occasionally go back and ask him questions. When I wrote the script I knew his story so well and I had read many testimonies by other survivors.
At first, I was very nervous to show Maxwell the script. I made sure to show it to him before we went into production, and he loved it. I expected him to want to change little things, but he was very open. I think it’s partly because he is an artist himself. Maxwell is an abstract impressionist artist and so he understands that in order to speak to and entertain an audience, you can do certain things [that deviate from exact events] and still get the truth out because of how you’re telling the story.
What is the distribution plan for this film? Have you been able to screen it at festivals in and outside of Canada?
I’ve gone to a lot of festivals and most theatres have been packed. Maxwell comes with me when he is able, we went to the Miami Jewish Film Festival together where Maxwell received a standing ovation.
It’s rewarding to hear from audiences during the Q&As, and see how moved everyone is by this story. I’m always relaying these experiences for Maxwell and I take a picture of the audience so I can send it to him. He’s been carrying the weight of this story, and all of the stories of the people around him who didn’t survive, for 80 years. He knows—through the memoir, the documentary, and now this film—people are finally seeing his story and bearing testimony to the people who didn’t survive. It’s huge for him.
Everything originates with Maxwell’s story. My producers said they have never had a funding process go so quickly and smoothly. We got all the funders in place because everyone read the script and said this is a story we need to be telling.
What was it like working with kids as your main actors?
It was amazing! It was my first feature and people tell that joke around becoming a director of fiction: “Make sure your first film doesn’t have kids, or babies, or animals.” And we had kids and babies and animals galore. It was wonderful working with kids, and Jett and David are extraordinary actors. Off camera, they became like brothers, and I think that is visible through the chemistry we see on screen.
Initially, I was worried about how we were going to find a 12-year-old kid to carry this film because he’s essentially in every frame. I got a bunch of tapes from different actors to read for the role and I thought that Jett was possibly our Max. I’d done callbacks with him, but I wanted to meet in person before I cast him. I wanted to see him in the woods, so we met in Stanley Park, in Vancouver, amongst the trees. The way he was leaping around and exploring, excited, and he was exactly Max’s age, he was just perfect. People have said to me at festivals, “Gosh he really reminds me of a young Timothée Chalamet.” Physically and in terms of acting chops. That’s a real compliment.
What are your most memorable moments from filming?
The one that stands out to everyone on set was when Maxwell came to visit and met Jett in person. He lives in Montreal and we were shooting in North Bay so that was a big moment. We didn’t tell Jett that Maxwell was coming so it was a surprise, and he was just blown away to meet the real Maxwell in person.
That day we happened to be filming a very emotional scene between Max and Yanek. Jett was very caught up in the emotion of the scene and found it very hard to come out of the intense sadness that he had invoked in his acting, so I asked if he wanted to see Maxwell. And Jett ran over to him and sort of fell into his arms and they were just weeping together. Maxwell, who had been watching the monitor, said, “You just became me. I just watched you become me.” He is so blown away by Jett’s performance.
Don’t miss The Boy in the Woods now streaming on Apple TV and Paramount+. You can also catch it on Video on Demand on Google Play/YouTube, Cogecoex Store, Bell, Rogers, Shaw, and Cogeco.
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.