Press Kits

You know, I try to stay away from truly helpful information, 'cause like I need more competition from you effers. Right?

:)

Anyway, a long time ago I remember I had no idea what a press kit actually looked like. My first producer's rep, in a rare move that actually benefitted me, sent me a stack of press kits to get an idea of what they looked like.

My press kits have gotten a little better than what they used to be. I now have them online, which saves money from printing them up each time you have to send a screener out. I just sent a glossy of the poster, the screener, and either a letter directing them online or I throw the whole press kit on a self-booting CD.

Long story short, if you want to know what one looks like, check the link below. Don't copy me exactly, eh? Have some pride. :)

FOC Press Kit

P.S. Please don't pass on that link. If you want to direct filmmakers here, go ahead, but this was never really information I was going to pass on to the general public.

Some pics I found

Found a disc with some pics I never put up. Here's some of them.

This first one was the sign on the "Happy Clown"'s minivan. I added the last line in honor of our Jewish Executive Producer. I thought it might make him laugh, 'cause who the fuck wants a clown for their bah mitzvah?
(side note: I believe my buddy Rich Henn designed and printed this up for me)



Here you see our still photographer taking pics for the press kit. Yes, that's me.


Here you see, from left to right, Dave Mun, Jed Duvall on the ground as "Happy Clown", J.P. Barry as the cop, and Steve Carson, our first A.C.(which, on my set, means you may have to be boom operator also)

Why does my brother Paul look so guilty? I'm not sure. Maybe he knows we're behind schedule and he shouldn't be posing for behind-the-scenes pics.
Just guessing.

November 14-15th, 2005

Okay, I'm starting to have entries regarding FOC2, so I may have to start that blog soon...
EDIT: Link here with new posts soon.

Also, the line in question is when Detective Peters--played by Frank Lama--says, "I'm killing that fucking clown if it's the last thing I do."

And sure enough, people did cheer at the premiere at that line.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

I was just informed by the company that's putting the dvd together that there's no way they can include the "Making Of" I created for the dvd. It's 67 minutes long and pretty comprehensive, but given how many other extras there are and the quality of compression that LG requires of the film, it just won't fit.

They want me to cut it down to 25 minutes. Youch.

So, some lucky people I won't name could be the only people to ever see it in its full form.

Dunno. Maybe I'll put it online someday. That's a lotta bandwidth though...


November 14, 2005

It's 9:51am(I haven't gone to sleep yet) and I just finished another pass on FOC2's script. And I wrote the line. It gave me chills to write it. I can see it clearly. If Frank(who may be reading this so--hey Frank) nails this line, people in the audience will cheer out loud.

Also, a character named Hot Rod may steal the whole show. He seems to have taken on a life of his own.

November 13th 2005

So I remember going to the Annapolis Film Festival--very local. The first night was an opening night thing, and I didn't take a camera. Went with my wife.

I just remember how loud the bar was--where everyone was trying to network. It was a bit comical. I also am notoriously uninterested in networking. It's an anti-social thing.

----------

Local actor Ken Arnold(who I believe helped organize the fest) and local celebrity/news personality Wendy Reiger, who announced the awards

November 13th, 2005
Yeah, been busy attending the Annapolis Film Festival this week(end), so haven't done anything with the blog.

I'll do a blog on the fest when I get back from the "Champagne Awards Ceremony" tonight. And no, I don't expect to win anything.

But getting my ass kissed by all the filmmakers who don't have a distribution deal is kind of an award all by itself, isn't it?

Annapolis Film Festival

So, Friday night my wife and I went to the fest and watched the opening night movie, "Alchemy". It starred the lead actor from that television show "Ed", plus the lead girl from that television show "Scrubs". I could look their names up for you but what fun would that be?

The film was okay. A little slow--and the sound mix was all messed up--but it had some entertaining parts.

After the show we went to the party. Pretty packed, and I'm not sure why they do it but they hire a band that plays incredibly loud. So all these people who want to network and chat end up screaming to be heard over the music.

This pic below is from the awards-show thingee, not the party
(where I didn't have a camera)

To my surprise, the festival director brought the director of "Alchemy" over to meet me, and we chatted for five or ten minutes. He got real interested when I mentioned that Lion's Gate picked up the film.

We left early--didn't feel the need to be there.

Saturday we arrived for the showing of "FOC"--met that goofball Stewie out front and gave him one of my free tickets. When we got to the place they were to show FOC, everybody was leaving--some other movie had just ended.

For five minutes there I thought no one would be at my showing. For once, I didn't really mind. Then people started showing up. All told, about forty of them came.

The flick started and I watched where the audience couldn't see me watching THEM. After a couple of minutes I went upstairs to see how many people were watching the movie that had been put in the main auditorium.

Seven. Niiiiice. But I'm glad we weren't there--my film would have blown the speakers out of the water there.

The crowd was weird. Not laughing in places that normally got a laugh, and laughing at other times I'd never heard one. Of course, there's still one line in the film that always gets the big laugh, and it didn't fail here either.

They'll probably inscribe it on my headstone. (Note: Line in question: "That's the biggest fucking clown I've ever seen.")

The movie ended and I got up to answer questions. This New Yorker says "I got 2 questions for you: First, is the rumor true that Lion's Gate picked up your film, and question 2: How do you justify the way you cheated the audience with the fake ending and then the other ending?"

Nice, easy opening question. It was nice to be able to start: "Yes, Lion's Gate picked it up". I think I was pretty gracious with the second part of the answer.

Anyway, got a bunch more questions which I answered in a more or less intelligent fashion. A lot of the questions were easy because I've gotten them in interviews I've already done.

The New Yorker turns out to be the guy who made the only other movie at the festival that I wanted to see. He wouldn't stop asking me questions and talking to me, even though other people wanted to chat and have me sign posters.

Sunday I got up early(for me) and went to see New Yorker's film with my dad(who digs the Creature From The Black Lagoon also). The film was playing at 2:30 in the big auditorium, and New Yorker was terrified no one would show. He got about 30 people in his showing, which honestly isn't bad considering football's on television and the weather was really nice.

His film was pretty interesting too, though it bogged down about an hour in.

I jetted home and got ready to go back for the awards reception. For once they had some nice food. I skipped the champagne and had a water, then took some pics as they gave the awards to movies I've never heard of, and ones you'll probably never hear of.

Someone asked me if it bothered me that I didn't win. I said I'd rather have the money than the awards.

It reminded me of a cartoon I saw shortly after Spielberg once again wasn't nominated for an Academy Award(before he won one). It had ET walking away from the Oscar statue holding two big bags of money. My feeling exactly.

But I'm serious in saying that every filmmaker who heard I had a deal with Lion's Gate was all over me. They wouldn't leave me alone, asking me questions, saying we should get together and do a project.

The New York guys want me to swing by their place if I get to New York. Interesting factoid: They know Keith David very well(he was the producer of and also narrator of their movie), and being a massive John Carpenter fan, I'd love to put him in one of my flicks. If you don't know, he's the black guy in "The Thing", the guy Rowdy Roddy Piper fights over sunglasses in "They Live" and he was one of the guys in "Prince of Darkness".

So, an interesting festival but I'm glad I'm done with them for this movie. On to the rest.

Wow, look at how fat I was!
(Posing with "New Yorker" Sam Borowski and Matthew Crick)