Penngrove brothers premiere roadtrip comedy

Gabriel and Jesse Adams are very funny guys.

And by now, they very obviously know it.

They are funny enough even when apart, but when they happen to be together in one room - or, say, on a movie set - the Penngrove-raised brothers are pretty much hilarious. The obvious affection and pride the two brothers display in each other’s mutual accomplishments is entertainingly offset by a playfully teasing sibling banter that seems to be based on years of enthusiastic practice.

On a recent Friday afternoon, this was on full display as the Adams brothers took a few moments to talk about their new movie, “Up the 5.” Filmed last year, and still being tweaked as this conversation took place, the movie is an outrageous road-trip thriller/comedy/western, and will be having its world premiere this weekend at the Phoenix Theater. Gabriel, now based in Los Angeles, kicked off the conversation with a quick description of the film, which he wrote and directed, with Jesse producing and composing the musical score.

“Here’s what it’s like. It’s like if the guys from ‘Planes, Trains and Automobiles’ were chasing the girls from ‘Thelma and Louise,’” he says. “That’s the simplest way to describe the plot - and that’s pretty much the whole movie, which is basically ...”

“It’s basically about a guy who falls in love with the girl who steals his car,” Jesse Adams steps in. Jesse is best known as the keyboardist, co-founder and energetic ringleader of the popular local rock band Royal Jelly Jive. “So, the guy’s got no car now, and so he hitches a ride with this …”

“He hitches a ride with a John Candy-type journalist character,” Gabriel jumps back in, “who’s all quirky and lonely. And then those two characters have to chase these two sisters who are robbin’ and killin’ and stabbin’ and stealin’ their way up the I-5 freeway.”

“Which is why the movie is titled ‘Up the 5,’” Jesse interjects.

“And for what it’s worth,” says Gabe, “’Planes, Trains and Automobiles’ and ‘Thelma and Louise’ do have a lot of similarities. They’re both buddy movies, for one thing.”

“They are both road trip movies,” adds Jesse.

“And they both have a lot of things you never thought you’d see in a movie till those movies did those things,” says Gabriel. “This movie is like that too.”

“But with a really, really, really low-budget,” Jesse adds. “We seriously had the lowest ‘low-budget’ budget you’ll ever hear of.”

“But it’s still really good,” allows Gabe. “I mean, I don’t think it’s the kind of movie that looks like it’s so low-budget because it had to be low-budget. It looks like it’s low-budget by, I guess, artistic choice.”

That’s true, actually, since Gabriel paid for the film himself with savings earned from his job as a Hollywood set-builder, set-decorator and art director. And while he says he could have waited till he had even more money to make the film with, after gestating on the project for years, he was so ready to make the thing he decided to move ahead and film it with whatever he had in the bank.

“Which was still a pretty good chunk of change, for a blue-collar guy,” he says. “But not a big chunk by usual movie-making standards.”

“Basically, it was a ‘passion project,’” Jesse jumps back in. “And whatever Gabe paid for it, and the cast and crew put into it, we all got so much more in return, because the experience of making this movie was so absolutely mind-blowing and great.”

“And now it’s done,” says Gabriel. “Well, almost done.”

“It’s 99.9% done,” counters Jesse. “And we’re already making plans for the next one, because this one was such a great experience.”

Gabriel Adams’ work in Hollywood has included contributions to such television shows as “Boardwalk Empire,” “Gotham” and the current hit “What We Do in the Shadows.” His first film as writer-director was a short film, made in Petaluma, titled “The Comeback.” Jesse Adams, mainly associated with his work in Royal Jelly Jive, has worked on films before (though never as producer), having contributed to the scores of projects like Gabe Sunday’s six-part docu-comedy “Dope State” and the Shakespearean-themed teen comedy “Messina High.”

The Adams brothers both count the Phoenix Theater as a significant part of their artistic evolutions, since that’s where each of them received initial encouragement to follow their dreams.

“We weren’t, like, ‘Phoenix kids,’ but we hung out with ‘Phoenix kids,’’ says Gabriel with a laugh.

“We were there a lot,” says Jesse. “Gabriel painted murals there, and I played music with people there. It was an important place to both of us, which is why we wanted to have the world premiere of ‘Up the 5’ there, as a fundraiser for the Phoenix. To give something back.”

As Gabriel explains it, when he first departed Sonoma County, about five years ago, heading off on his drive to Los Angeles to begin the next step of his life as a professional film artist, a number of thoughts and feelings happened all at once as he got on the freeway and began his journey south.

“I was having a lot of emotions as I started to drive down to L.A.,” he says. “I had all of these thoughts going through my head. And as I merged onto the I-5 I thought, ‘You know, no one likes this highway at all, this long, boring, empty nothing of a highway. It would make the perfect spot for a western.”

That was the genesis of what would become “Up the 5.”

“That first inspiration, of taking a spot that is universally hated, and trying to turn it into an interesting place to tell a story, that’s such a cool thing,” says Jesse. “That’s so like Gabe. And then, when we shot the thing, we were actually living out there on I-5 in the middle of nowhere - by which I mean we were living in Buttonwillow. It was the cheapest hotel we could find. It looked so bad, but it was great because we could film in it. And it all came from Gabe driving down the freeway having the idea for this movie.”

“We spent about a dollar on locations,” admits Gabe. “We used old gas stations, old fire trucks, old people who’ve lived in Buttonwillow their whole lives and were really excited to be making a movie with us.”

At the beginning, Jesse was on-set just in case there was anything he could do. But when the film’s original producer dropped out of the project, Jesse stepped up to the plate.

“We became actual co-makers of the movie at that point,” Gabriel says. “We collaborate really, really well. He’s good with the actors because he’s a musician and he’s into performances, and I’m good with cameras and sets and lights and art department stuff. We’re like two sides of one brain, so that’s nice. And then we each have our own brain, in addition to the one we share, so that’s nice too.”

“There was a real naturalness to the flow of it all,” Jesse recalls. “We improvised a lot. We had to, so it turned into an even cooler movie.”

Says Gabriel, “The movie is what it had to be, because …”

“Because the limitations we were working with forced us to be on our game and think on our feet,” Jesse says. “That it turned out so well is kind of a magical thing …”

“… A weird, magical thing …” grins Gabriel.

“A weird, magical, sort of miraculous thing,” adds Jesse.

“Yeah, that,” concludes Gabriel. “That is pretty much is exactly what it was.”