What indie films might lack in budget they make up for with heart. While filming Qasim Basir’s semi-autobiographical feature To Live and Die and Live, actor Skye P. Marshall learned that indie films are indeed a labor of love — and she has the receipts to prove it. “Amin and I had to do a scene late at night, right by the water, and it’s freezing,” she told Vulture, referring to her co-star Amin Joseph. “And now we gotta be on rocks, and [Basir’s] like, ‘Are you okay to walk?,’ and I’m like, ‘With heels? On rocks? Sure!” She does the scene, like a professional, “and by the time we wrap, it’s like two, almost three, in the morning … My next scene is at sunrise,” she continues. “So they had to shoot Cory’s scene in between, and I had to sleep in the truck.” Co-star Cory Hardrict thinks indie budgets are a luxury, not a hindrance. “She brings all that to camera,” Hardrict explained. “And that’s the luxury that you have of doing independent filmmaking.” Above, cast members discuss the rewards of indie filmmaking, plus:

➽ What inspired Basir to make the drama
➽ How many decades the cast members have known one another
➽ Which actress plays a fictionalized version of herself

To Live and Die Star Skye P. Marshall Scaled Rocks in Heels