The Day Keeper

A comedy mockumentary about a lighthouse keeper named Cliff who works the daytime shift, when you can’t even tell whether the light is on.

Co-written by and starring comedy veteran Steve Young (Late Show with David Letterman, Maya & Marty, The Simpsons, Bathtubs Over Broadway), The Day Keeper was shot (mostly) on location at the historic Nobska Lighthouse in Woods Hole, Massachusetts on Cape Cod.  Steve and Mark had met at the Woods Hole Film Festival some years before, and while attending the festival again in 2023 they decided to take a trip out to the lighthouse to take some photos.  While they were there, Steve began improvising a silly lighthouse keeper character, and Mark was able to capture some of it on a phone.  This initial kernal of an idea would eventually become a script, and ultimately the short film.

While very different in tone, Robert Eggers’ noir feature “The Lighthouse” was nevertheless an inspiration for some of the aesthetic elements of the film, including the lighthouse keeper uniform, the typeface used for the end titles, the period flashback sequence, and even some of the music.

The film features some local town residents and benefitted greatly from the gracious assistance of the Friends of Nobska Light, the nonprofit organization charged with the preservation, care, and maintaince of the lighthouse, ensuring its future enjoyment for the local community and visitors alike.