Never Say Die
I'll be in Winnipeg this weekend for what was supposed to have been the shoot for our next short film. Instead, I'll be hanging out with friends and family and meeting with colleagues, which isn't all bad.
Here's why:
If you're following along from my last, somewhat cryptic and vague, post, you'll know that this short film was unique in that I wrote the script based very closely on the life of an actual person, a non-actor, and the central location was his workplace. The thinking behind this approach is that the performance, and the resulting film, will be more authentic and truthful. It worked for John Cassavetes and Mike Leigh, it seems to have worked for Steven Soderbergh, (even though Bubble wasn't very well received), but it didn't work for us. At least not this time.
In a tragic case of life-imitates-art, the fellow for whom I wrote the script has recently experienced the central event of the film in his real life. It's out of respect for him that I won't go into further detail. Suffice it to say, that he found himself unable to participate in what has since become a parody of his own circumstance.
So, we lost the lead and the central location, but still had the script and the money to shoot it. Within hours of learning the bad news, our intrepid and undaunted producer, Frank Zappia, was in his car scouting new locations while director Bevan Klassen started to recast the lead. I've since made the necessary changes to the script and, in the true spirit of independent filmmaking, we are moving ahead with production, albeit delayed a few weeks.
Here's why:
If you're following along from my last, somewhat cryptic and vague, post, you'll know that this short film was unique in that I wrote the script based very closely on the life of an actual person, a non-actor, and the central location was his workplace. The thinking behind this approach is that the performance, and the resulting film, will be more authentic and truthful. It worked for John Cassavetes and Mike Leigh, it seems to have worked for Steven Soderbergh, (even though Bubble wasn't very well received), but it didn't work for us. At least not this time.
In a tragic case of life-imitates-art, the fellow for whom I wrote the script has recently experienced the central event of the film in his real life. It's out of respect for him that I won't go into further detail. Suffice it to say, that he found himself unable to participate in what has since become a parody of his own circumstance.
So, we lost the lead and the central location, but still had the script and the money to shoot it. Within hours of learning the bad news, our intrepid and undaunted producer, Frank Zappia, was in his car scouting new locations while director Bevan Klassen started to recast the lead. I've since made the necessary changes to the script and, in the true spirit of independent filmmaking, we are moving ahead with production, albeit delayed a few weeks.
