About the production

A seven-year spiritual odyssey…with a camera crew.

The journey of Rude Awakening began, fittingly, in paradise at a spiritual workshop on the Big Island of Hawaii in 2016. Filmmaker Jonathan Kray and producer Sandra Roggermann were capturing behind-the-scenes interviews when something strange happened: every participant, regardless of age, background or beard length, was describing eerily similar experiences of their awakening.

By 2017, Jonathan and Sandra were back in Hawaii, cameras rolling and chasing the deeper story. The two-person film crew quickly realized this wasn’t just a feel-good montage about meditation or unicorn breath work…it was something much bigger. Something messier. Something with existential teeth. So they ditched the small setup and began building a bolder and more cinematic vision.

They brought on American writer / director Jorge Andrade to assist Jonathan with fleshing out the story, assembled a tiny-but-mighty pre-production crew, and created a 3-minute concept trailer. That trailer premiered at another spiritual event in Slovenia, and there something clicked. The audience erupted. Investors (many on their own self-discovery journeys) started pledging support. It became very clear to them that people weren’t just watching this story…it was their story.

Inspired by this, Jonathan and Jorge dreamed ever bigger but to match the scale of the epic story inside their heads, the team enlisted the help of NSC cinematographer Ties Versteegh. Ties had the professional cinematic knowledge and the visual flair to give this film the polished edge it needed to go toe-to-toe with the big documentary players on streaming platforms.

Production sprawled across continents - Amsterdam, Sydney, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Colorado, Maastricht, Tokyo, and back to Hawaii. At the core: six brave souls sharing the raw and messy truth of their inner journeys. The film weaves their interviews with street encounters and a fictional protagonist stumbling through his own spiritual chaos. The latter was loosely based on the inner journey of the director Jonathan himself, because if you’re going to fall apart on camera, you might as well do it with cinematic flair.

Then came March 2020. Just two days into the final 8-day shoot, complete with a Back to the Future DeLorean car and other ambitious set pieces, Rude Awakening got a plot twist of its own: COVID-19. Production slammed to a halt. What was supposed to be a short delay turned into a two-year standstill. Budgets evaporated. Sanity frayed. Emotions got heated. The dream nearly flatlined.

But, in true hero’s journey fashion, the project caught one final lifeline in 2022 in the form of a last round of funding to finish the film. Jonathan returned to the editing bay with a new perspective, and humbled by Covid, a lot less ego.

In March 2023, Rude Awakening had a closed test screening with over 100,000 spiritually curious viewers. The feedback was clear: Great documentary! But simplify the complex themes, tighten the runtime and lose the repetition.

Jonathan, now the sole caretaker of the project, wrote a new voiceover that was lighter and a more grounded reflection of Jonathan’s personal experience. It also reframed the story to meet people where they are in their journey without introducing any levels or judgement. This was especially true for those navigating the messy intersection of awakening and mental health. The film’s focus also became much more simple:

“You are not alone and you are not crazy, you are just on a journey inwards”

The result? A leaner 97-minute film that lands with both cinematic impact and human relatability.

Now complete, Rude Awakening is ready for its next chapter. Jonathan is currently seeking international representation for distribution, marketing, and sales and has submitted the film to global film festivals and streaming platforms in 2026.