Woody Harrelson gives Stebbings a red-carpet ride

• Writer/director: Peter Stebbings
• Producers: Nicholas Tabarrok
• Production company: Darius Films
• Key cast: Woody Harrelson, Sandra Oh, Kat Dennings
• Distributor: Alliance Films
• Budget: $3.2 million

First-time feature director Peter Stebbings can surely thank star Woody Harrelson for landing a premium Special Presentations screening at TIFF, since most novice helmers see their films slotted in the Canada First! program.

Star power is one of the many reasons that actor-turned-writer/director Stebbings couldn’t have been more stoked when Harrelson agreed to take on the role of a delusional man (who thinks he’s a superhero) in Defendor.

The deal went down at Harrelson’s home in Beverly Hills. ‘We played some pool, ate some of his weird raw food, and at the end of it he stuck out his paw and said, ‘Okay, let’s do it’,’ recalls Stebbings.

Defendor is a dramedy about a man struggling with mental health issues who befriends a young prostitute, played by up-and-coming actress Kat Dennings.

Stebbings says the concept for the film came to him four years ago. ‘I woke up, sprung out of bed with this one idea,’ he says. ‘The script was written in three months and it was pretty ‘steady Eddie’ after that.’

While laying the groundwork for character development, the director says he walked the streets of Toronto with an outreach program ‘handing out crack pipes,’ which he describes as ‘invaluable research.’ Stebbings, who is Toronto-born and raised, shot the entire film in and around the city last December and found that the lack of foreign productions being shot in the province really worked to his advantage.

‘I had the pick of the litter in terms of Toronto’s finest, and that was a great feeling,’ says Stebbings. ‘We had a great crew, a great camera team. What can I say? It was a great experience.’

Stebbings also jokes that he’s ‘really looking forward to the swag room’ at TIFF, but continues on a more serious note: ‘At every stage you kind of hold your breath for the next stage, and I definitely held my breath for the TIFF response. I think if people enjoy it that will be the last peg in the validation process, and I hope it’ll open some more doors for me, too. I hope I get to do it again.’