Jacobson Brothers reunite for their new drama-comedy

The duo are accompanied by Sarah Snook, Kim Gyngell and Lynette Curran, and play brothers who plot to murder their mother to defend the family inheritance in this eagerly-anticipated film.

After premiering in March at SXSW to rave reviews, Brother's Nest is set for Australian release on 21 June. We chatted to Co-Producer, Director and Co-star (along with his brother Shane Jacobson) Clayton Jacobson about the film, how it brought the brothers closer both on-set and in real-life and what’s on his filming horizon.

What have been some of the challenges and rewards you experienced during filming and how did you manage wearing multiple hats on the set?

The greatest challenge was directing and acting in a relatively low budget production. My character has the majority of the dialogue and the weight of that was never lost on me. But our production team were incredibly supportive of my approach and allowed me a little more slack in the first week of production to find my sea legs. I relied on the vision split heavily for the first few days until we created a rhythm of production. That’s when I was able to trust my instincts more.

We also shot the entire film in sequence which was terrific as it helped every crew member feel the temperature of the films narrative. 

This production was the most enjoyable experience of my professional career. We hand-picked our crew with a view to creating an on-set family and we could not have had a more supportive fabulous hard working crew.  

Two brothers working closely and intensely for consecutive days… how were the personal and professional dynamics between you and Shane?

Working with Shane was the greatest highlight about making this film. We lived together throughout production along with my son Jesse who was on vision split. Not only were they my most trusted critics because they are family and they knew if my performance was false - but it was also fabulous because Shane cooked me dinner at night while I worked on the following days shot lists and game play.

Shane and I are closer now than we’ve ever been - and it was this production that allowed that to happen.

What’s on your filming radar at the moment? 

Jason Byrne (co-producer) and I are very excited to continue what has been a wonderful creative friendship and business venture together we complement each other’s soil set beautifully and we have lined up a slate of projects we intend to put into production. Our next production is a project called The Girls which we have been developing for over ten years now.

Second to this is the fact that I’m now getting renewed interest from Hollywood and I have meetings with major film studios. I’m excited about the scale of canvas my story telling will now take.

Brother’s Nest was supported though Film Victoria’s Assigned Production Investment (API) and Regional Locations Assistance Fund (RLAF) programs.