At a time when comedy has emerged as one of the few public places where just about anything goes, it’s still ridiculously rare to discover a hilarious comedy duo... especially one with its own unique and immediately recognizable sense of style. Enter MP Cunningham and Jer Jackson. Fresh off the Blaze Media debut of their instant—classic film Agua Donkeys, they’re soon to wrap production on the equally laid back and madcap series Dusty Bluffs. Filmmaker and actress Chandler Juliet hung out with the pair—mid-transition from rascally pool boys to ambitious paper boys—on location in Helper, Utah, and debriefed by phone from the comfort of their respective homes. The result, below, has been edited slightly for length and clarity. –Eds.

I think the biggest thing is not to wait. Because you’ll wait forever if you’re waiting for somebody, you know?

CJ: Watching you work, I’m really amazed by how calm you are on set when you have so many hats to wear. When I have to act and produce and do script supervision on sketches, I’m stressed the entire time ... and it shows! How do you remain so in control?

MP: When stuff pops up you just stay present with, like, what you’re doing at the moment. Problem solve and stay in a good vibe. Right, Jer?

JJ: MP will sometimes calm me down, but if you’re not having fun, then why are you doing it? Because there’s so much uncertainty that comes with it, as you know, Chandler. Nothing’s a good time all the time, but if you’re not enjoying the ride, then you’re definitely in the wrong business.

MP: We’re trying to make a badass structure of people that are making stuff with us. So we can just focus on what we’re doing and the machine is working around us, you know?

CJ: Was it always that way? Or did it take a while to get there over the journey?

MP: It just started from Jer and I making stuff. Being at my house, just hanging out, and it just grew from there. It was always about our natural sense of humor together, just making stuff, and throughout the years we’ve just been kind of adding people around us so we can just imagine exactly what we want to make. Where we can dream up any scenario on the ride and be able to make it because of who we have around us.

CJ: How did you start developing ideas together?

MP: Jer’s brother Luke, who is Rod in Agua Donkeys, and Vance in Dusty Bluffs—

JJ: The leader of the motorcycle gang.

MP: Luke and I worked together and became buddies and he would always tell me, “you and my brother would get along,” and so Jer and I started hanging out. And when I found out that Jerr made stuff, I was like, “I’m making these videos, you should be in ‘em.” And then we started making stuff, right, Jer?

JJ: Yup. With MP, it’s just, you’re hanging out and everyone wants to go to the park and throw a frisbee or whatever, on a Saturday in July, and MP always wants to make stuff. It takes it just one dumb comment or one funny story somebody tells and all of a sudden MP is just, “oh my gosh that’s an idea.” And then, instead of like, “oh we should do that,” MP’s like, “all right, let’s do it.” And next thing you know there’s a camera out and he’s filming. It just happened very organically like that.

CJ: You’ve effortlessly captured the essence of simpler times before technology kind of took over. How much time did it take to recreate that, developing the script and the idea behind the story before getting a camera and hitting record?

MP: I think it was just the natural process of us just starting to make stuff just doing scenes, turning them into shorts, and then submitting long-enough films to film festivals to get the opportunity to have someone pay for something that we think up and make, you know?

JJ: At the point in time that we made the short film of Agua Donkeys, we were working on a project with Warner Brothers, and you know how it is, Chandler, it’s always like, “hurry up and wait.” Like they want something by a certain time and then you don’t hear anything forever. You know, and me and MP were busting our butts to try to try and get the script done, and then we got it sent to them, and then we’re just waiting for their response if we’re going to go to production, but then MP was visiting Utah for the summer, so we could write, because he typically lives in California, and he’s like, “Let’s not just sit around and wait, let’s make something this summer. We’re here.” So we just decided to make a movie where we were pool cleaners.

CJ: Wow, so Agua Donkeys came out of a season of waiting—and not waiting!

JJ: I think the biggest thing is not to wait. Because you’ll wait forever if you’re waiting for somebody, you know? If you just go do stuff, at the bare minimum you’ll be producing content and enjoying yourself and then, if you’re fortunate, maybe someday you’ll come up. But I think the key is just to not wait. Just do it. In this day and age there’s no reason you can’t.

CJ: When did you both individually know that you wanted to be filmmakers for a living?

JJ: When I grew up in Missouri, there was a show that came on—Police Squad, The Naked Gun, those Airplane! guys that are just hilarious. I had seen the show when I was little;, rewatched it again in my early teens. Anything like Hollywood or any of that stuff is just the furthest thing from your mind, but one day it just dawned on me that it was somebody’s job to make that and it just blew me away. I thought, I would love to, like, have a job like that.

MP: That’s kind of what happened with me too. Movies would just blow me away when I was a kid. My sisters and I were always trying to mess around with the camera making stuff at home. It wasn’t until I was around 22 that I kept making stuff and was like, “I’m gonna make movies and stuff.”

CJ: How old were you when you picked up your first camera?

MP: Eight or nine.

CJ: Well, I can’t wait to see Dusty Bluffs hit the screen. It was super cool to get to witness you guys in action.

MP: Everything that could’ve happened happened, you know? That’s usually what happens.

Chandler Juliet is a filmmaker, actress, and recording artist. As the founder of the production and media house Gun Girl Creative, she creates and curates editorial, social, and live experiences for vision-forward brands.