{"id":23974,"date":"2025-08-06T16:46:14","date_gmt":"2025-08-06T14:46:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/?p=23974"},"modified":"2025-08-06T17:01:29","modified_gmt":"2025-08-06T15:01:29","slug":"qa-with-brett-michael-innes-writer-director-khaki-fever","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/blog\/2025\/08\/06\/qa-with-brett-michael-innes-writer-director-khaki-fever\/","title":{"rendered":"Q&A With Brett Michael Innes, Writer \/ Director “Khaki Fever”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Showmax has just released the trailer for Khaki Fever<\/a><\/em> ahead of its world premiere at the kykNET Silwerskerm Festival on Friday, 22 August 2025. The R-rated comedy starts streaming on the African streamer two weeks later, Friday, 5 September 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Khaki Fever<\/em>, a group of game rangers set up a challenge to see who can hook up with the most tourists during a season.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The prize? The title of being the King of Khaki, as well as the losers\u2019 collective tips.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The challenge? Outsmarting Anel, the conservative lodge manager, who has made it clear that anyone caught fraternising with guests will be fired on the spot.

SAFTA-nominated Top Billing<\/em> presenter Christopher Jaftha leads the cast as Daniel, opposite four 2025 Silwerskerm nominees Anja Taljaard and Trix Vivier (both Juffrou X<\/em>), Liam Bosman (Een Keer Om Die Son<\/em>), and Ilse Klink (N\u00earens, Noord-Kaap).<\/em> Also look out for singer Abel Knobel, Francois Jacobs (aka Kaalgat Karel<\/em>) and Sean Brebnor (Getroud Met Rugby<\/em>) as rangers \u2013 all dressed by Boerboel Wear, the viral brand that sponsored all the khaki uniforms.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

SAFTA-winning writer-director-producer Brett Michael Innes (Sin<\/em>k, Fiela Se Kind<\/em>) tells us more:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What sparked the idea for <\/strong>Khaki Fever<\/strong><\/em>?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

My husband, Nick, co-wrote the script with me. He loves the bush, and whenever there is a holiday with family, we go to a game reserve. The term \u201ckhaki fever\u201d is one that we always joke about whenever we\u2019re there, especially if there are rangers that come out in those short boere-kinis<\/em>. We always joke about catching khaki fever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019ve had conversations with rangers and with people within that industry about it. I can\u2019t say it was formal research, but we\u2019ve certainly heard some stories from them \u2026 And every ranger we\u2019ve since bumped into, we love to tell them about the movie to see their reaction, and they\u2019re like, \u201cYou\u2019re hitting the nail on the head \u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tell me about writing with Nick? How did you balance the professional with the personal?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, I mean, we\u2019re still married, and we haven\u2019t killed each other! We went in with eyes wide open.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He comes from the world of conservation as an environmental consultant, but he\u2019s had a front row seat to all the films and TV shows I\u2019ve done since Fiela se kind<\/em>, when our relationship started. He\u2019s had quite a holistic film school.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We brainstormed together, and then we stumbled into our way of working. Once we plotted out the main story, I told him to have a bash at it and write the first act. And he was pretty good at it, so he carried on writing the whole thing, and then I also took a pass at the script. We found a good way of making it work, and we\u2019re now already onto our second project together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The dialogue is fast-paced and comes across as very natural. Did that come from the script, or did improvisation from the actors create that flow?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Traditionally, I\u2019m a very curated director, and although there\u2019s flexibility on set, I go in with a very clear vision. But with Khaki Fever<\/em>, we wanted to create a script where the plot and the gags were tight, with some one-liners that could work in Afrikaans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But you\u2019ve got an Englishman and an American making a boere<\/em> comedy, so we knew the kind of dialogue we wanted would not come from us. We specifically prepped the actors that this would be an improv set.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Any time they did a scene, they would do multiple versions of it, which is how Bridesmaids<\/em> was done, and that was a very strong reference for how we created this film. That freedom was what allowed us to create something quite special. You just have to be prepared to catch lightning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is very different from your work, even from your other projects at the Silwerskermfees this year: <\/strong>The Heart is a Muscle<\/strong><\/em> and <\/strong>My f*k, Marelize!<\/strong><\/em> Did you approach the film any differently because it\u2019s a comedy?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019m a fan of different genres, so I\u2019m not a drama snob who looks down on horror or comedy. For me, it\u2019s a case of if I\u2019m a fan of the genre, it also means I know the rules or the expectations of that genre and how to create accordingly. I always saw myself as this type of prestige director, and that comedy wasn\u2019t this space to play in, even though I love the genre. But that changed after my first comedy, Daryn\u2019s Gym<\/em>. I treated Khaki Fever<\/em> like a drama in terms of how I directed the actors. We did the same work around character background and plotting out an arc, and if you look at the film, there are some gorgeous dramatic performances from them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The casting is spectacular. Tell me more about the audition process.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Honestly, this was one of the hardest films to cast. That\u2019s why we made use of Christa Schamberger, who is one of the best casting directors in the country. But we put the brief out wide, and we were upfront about the content; we weren\u2019t tricking people. We made it clear what type of film it was, that it would have the protections of things like intimacy coordination, but that there would be nudity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For some actors, it\u2019s their first time in a film of this capacity, like Sean Brebnor. And then, like Liam Bosman, to see him as charming and comedic, people will see him differently. He and Francois Jacobs had the best gags for improv.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And even Trix Vivier \u2013 no one expects Trix to be in a film like this. I think she brings legitimacy to it as well, and she loves it! Every time we\u2019ve watched it together, she\u2019s just like, \u201cWhat the hell, this is ridiculous!\u201d And Ilse Klink. She\u2019s so good! She knocked it out of the park. She\u2019s brilliant.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The hardest part for me as a director was when they were all together because they got on so well. They would edge one another on and become funnier than the character was supposed to be, so I had to keep them on track with who their characters were.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Part of the casting is choosing people who are lekker and not coming with an ego attached. The actors would come in on their off days just to hang out on set; that was the kind of set we had.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How do you think audiences will react to <\/strong>Khaki Fever<\/strong><\/em>?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We kind of feel that people are either really going to love it or really hate it, and that\u2019s good odds to me. It\u2019s such a subjective type of humour, and I\u2019m very interested to see how the public responds to it. This is a film for people who like filthy comedy with a heart, and if you\u2019re conservative or not into this style of humour, you will know within the first 30 seconds it\u2019s not for you.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I love making heavy kind of social commentary stuff, but I don\u2019t think the world has bandwidth for that now. So, if people walk out of this movie, laughed their asses off, and felt like they\u2019ve hung out with friends \u2013 that is a great gift.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those broekies are tiny, tiny \u2026 How did the actors fit into them?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those are from Boerboel Wear, but our wardrobe designer, Lori Myburgh, shortened them all, and they eventually couldn\u2019t go any shorter because then the pockets would stick out at the bottom.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Showmax has just released the trailer for Khaki Fever ahead of its world premiere at the kykNET Silwerskerm Festival on Friday, 22 August 2025. The R-rated comedy starts streaming on the African streamer two weeks later, Friday, 5 September 2025. In Khaki Fever, a group of game rangers set up a challenge to see who… Continue reading Q&A With Brett Michael Innes, Writer \/ Director “Khaki Fever”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23964,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-interview","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/KhakiFever-Silwerskerm-Showmax-banner.jpg?fit=550%2C425&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23974\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23964"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.samdb.co.za\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}