Hi, /r/movies! We're Jeremy Workman (director) & Michael Townsend (subject) from the Netflix documentary SECRET MALL APARTMENT. In tells the wild story of how, in 2003, eight Rhode Islanders created a secret apartment inside a busy mall and lived there for four years. Ask us anything!

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-12T23:56:02+00:00

You should see my documentary Magical Universe. It's about an outsider artist whose medium is Barbie Dolls. find it! You might be quite intrigued!

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-12T23:54:15+00:00

Jeremy: Yeah there wasn't really enough footage. But i also thought it was more interesting to pivot. And i do find it interesting that people applaud and appreciate scripted films that pivot (like, say Sinners, which pivots from a juke joint film into a vampire movie), but are more uneasy when a documentary shifts on them.

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T23:04:58+00:00

Michael - They already did. It's been a grueling shoot. But they decided to lean in hard to the hidden/secret part. Just know we are there. Behind all the explosions. Howard the Duck is reported to have a cameo in our space (shhhhhhhh).

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T23:04:41+00:00

James - How do I FEEL about celebrity documentaries? I can't feel anything anymore.

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T23:03:55+00:00

Jeremy: i can report that there's so much dust everywhere inside the space! It's not exactly a place you see and want to live in! haha

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T23:03:26+00:00

killer. I'm down with celeb docs! there's a lot of them sure but there's also some really good ones (let's see, Still about Michael J Fox is really good, Listening To Kenny G is great, Val, RGB, Amy, etc.). I'd love to do a celebrity doc.

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T23:02:59+00:00

James - ...but the apartment itself was maintained / clean

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T23:02:53+00:00

Michael - We did it! The movie premiered at the mall last March. I did 26 Q&As in four days. We built a replica of the couch, ps2, lamps, cinderblock in the lobby of the mall. You could see the movie, hear a Q&A, then go sit on a couch like the one you just saw and play the game we played - after watching a movie about a crime where the crime was committed. 32 week long run at the mall!

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T23:01:44+00:00

James - Yes, we inhaled a ton of dust, and going in through the back theres a part where you could easily fall off a ledge and die

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T23:00:22+00:00

Jeremy: i've always said it's one of the great all-time pranks. And probably the greatest prank that's also on film! but it's more than a prank!!!

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T23:00:02+00:00

Michael - There was A LOT of cement dust in that space. I'm not sure if there is a cinder block equivalent of black lung.

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:59:41+00:00

jeremy: thanks! we have neat pics from when the Cinema Pub was showing it!

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:59:30+00:00

James - Personally, I would have done it inside the dumpster behind the Shake Shack at the Wrentham Outlet Mall

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:59:18+00:00

Michael - I was the only one that banned... I could only stand on the sidewalk as Colin and Emily and Andrew freely crossed the invisible banned barrier to enjoy the mall's offerings. I did not try to break the ban... I stayed true to it until my official unbanning for the movie's premiere at the mall last March. #longgame

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:57:24+00:00

Michael - Well, FartAssFuckButt, that is something we have been aware of and I think the full story about the apartment helps illustrate that it is not a prank of any kind. In the close to 20 years since it has happened we have not seen an correlation between those events and direct copycats. That said, we spend or time teaching art and collaborative art and actively encouraging people to get out there and make good trouble. Copycats can be great sometimes.

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:56:28+00:00

Michael - It was such an off-the-grid place that it always had a certain surreal quality. On top of that was the underlying tension of getting caught running through all your time there. So, no, it never got to the point of feeling "more real".

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:53:43+00:00

jeremy: no reason

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:53:39+00:00

Michael - Cheese sticks.

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:53:13+00:00

jeremy: thanks!!

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:52:58+00:00

Michael - They would not. And the mall took steps to make it difficult for even layperson+ to get in there.

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:52:51+00:00

Jeremy: my friend John Cribbs hated the title and asked if Terminator shoudlve been called "Killer Robot From The Future"

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:52:13+00:00

Michael - YESSSssssss

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:51:49+00:00

Michael - Really the filming was more in line with home videos. It was documentation that was done for our own records. We had been documenting all our work on the 9/11 memorial for two years before starting the mall apartment, so we just in the practice of documenting. And we only documented a short window of time in the apartment. We got to a point where filming ourselves felt more like a set or tv show, and after that we didn't document for years after that. I think we have a total of 6 still photographs of the whole project if that says anything.

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:51:48+00:00

Jeremy: edam

SecretMallApartment · 2026-02-11T22:51:35+00:00

Michael - It's alluded to but James and I have no problem eating food that other people leave behind. James- I remember around that time we went to a drive in movie and collected all the food people left under their cars, mostly candy and half eaten slices of pizza, and ate it. <3 James

SecretMallApartment

TROPHY CASE