My short film will also be screening at Newport Beach Film Festival! I’m so excited!

Details here: Newport Beach Film Festival

Sonny Poster

I’m so excited and proud to announce that my short film, SONNY, will have it’s world premiere on March 22nd at a film festival in Los Angeles. Then it will hit a festival in Austin, TX in April. Then it will return to California for a screening at a festival in Burbank! Here’s the details!

Los Angeles Women’s International Film Festival - tickets here.
March 21, 2013 to March 24, 2013

International Family Film Festival 
May 1, 2013 to May 5, 2013

The ATTIC Film Festival
April 19, 2013 to April 20th, 2013

Well, one of them has been born!

Meet our little girl, Olivia Grace Fritzsche.

Olivia Grace Fritzsche, on her birth day.

Olivia Grace Fritzsche, at 8 weeks old!

She was born at home, weighing 8 lbs 12 oz and measuring 21 inches long. She slept through the night at 1.5 months and is a sweet and joyful babe. We are so blessed to have her!

The other two projects, the short film, Sonny, and the short film, Jerry & Diane, are still in post. We’d hoped to get them done before Olivia arrived but it just didn’t happen. Soon enough!

My film friends, Bryan & Amy Storkel and Jason Connell have produced a film about card-counting Christians who are professional blackjack players called Holy Rollers: The True Story of Card Counting Christians! I’ve been following this film for a while. I’ve seen several pieces of advanced footage and have been honoured to support it’s development in several ways. It’s a fascinating look into a niche world of Christianity and professional gambling! AND IT DROPS TOMORROW!! Check it out on Amazon.com, iTunes or YouTube!

Bryan is currently directing another documentary with Oscar-winning documentarian Daniel Junge called Fight Church. As someone who loves amateur MMA, I’m super excited about this one!!

And I can’t finish this post without noting that Daniel Junge’s Oscar-winning co-director on Saving Face (2011), Sharmeen Ohaid-Chiney, is Canadian (like me)!

Vessie Kazachka in the set of The Artist (first from the left)!

My friend Vessie Kazachka was Second AC on the Oscar-winning film “The Artist” and I remember her telling us while it was being shot that she thought it was a good film and that she was proud to be working on it. This was before the Weinsteins got wind of it.

Vessie also worked on my short film, Sonny! We are so grateful to her for sharing her mad skillz and very proud to call her friend!

I have three projects in their third trimester: two short films and a baby.

Sonny is so close to being finished, I can almost taste it! I’ve even started thinking about what to write for my “director’s statement” and am just giddy with the thought of getting to write one! We’re still finishing the score (with the amazing Joel Davis), and we’ve still got the sound design and final mix to do. Also, Ryan is in the middle of working on the color. But we expect to have all these things finished by the end of March! And then we will begin submitting to film festivals.

Jerry & Diane, the short film we shot just before Christmas (December 2011), is in post. I completed an assembly cut and then handed it off to Ryan, who will put his spin on it, then we will slam-bam-thank-you-maam post it here at home: colour, sound mix and everything. I’m really excited with how it turned out! And am excited for people to see and experience these quirky, funny characters. They’re odd and endearing.

Finally, I’m 6.5 weeks away from my due date with our first child. Even as I type this blog post, the little one is squirming around in my belly. I just had some dark chocolate and I think he (or she?) approves. This is why we’re doing our darndest to get these projects done before April. Because after that, I will focus on the one most important, squishiest, messiest, cutest little project that I’m currently incubating. Literally.

I’ve also got a project in it’s first trimester. I’m working to get a screenplay done before the babe arrives. It’s called Tent City and it’s inspired by a combination of things, such as the short film Sonny to a small extent and to a greater extent the current homelessness crisis in the United States and Canada. It’s currently in outline/treatment form and will hopefully begin to take shape as script pages in early March (second trimester?). I’ve spent the most time crafting the structure and story because I feel more confident with popping out script pages than getting the story right. I’ve just handed off a draft of the treatment to my producing partner (Ryan, again) and am waiting on notes.

I wonder what sort of metaphor I could use Braxton Hick contractions for in the filmmaking process. Any ideas? Perhaps contract negotiations?

I think it’s a cop-out.

To be frank, the kind of life with which I’m familiar can sometimes seem rather boring. I’m a normal Canadian kid from a [somewhat unique] Canadian town. I spent some time in Texas, Oklahoma, Ontario, British Columbia, Los Angeles, and now I live in New York City. My parents are still together. I’m an only child and, for the most part, my relatives are all cordial, at the very least, and loving, during the best of times.

See?

Noah Baumbach would be depressed at the normalcy of my life.

I think the phrase “write what you know” should relate more to theme than subject matter. While I’ve led a normal life on the surface, I’ve experienced pain, fear, pride, insecurity, and, as a quirky Canadian that moved to Texas at thirteen-years-old who played basketball and was a drama nerd, I’ve experienced my fair share of identity issues. I’m also quite familiar with feminism and femininity issues, as a pear-shaped tom-boy (see also: identity issues).

So what do I know? I know universal human fears. I know how it feels to not know who you are nor who you should be. I know the quandary of a person fighting a sense of duty and responsibility with a deep personal passion for something other.

So sometimes I’m writing about 30-something guitar teachers. Sometimes I’m writing about 60-year-old homeless felons. But I’m always writing about my own fears and insecurities. About what I don’t know. About the things for which I have questions.

And ideally, it’s writing that’s honest.

We had the stupendous and fearless Chris Domig playing Jerry.

Chris Domig, JERRY

And the delightful dry and quirky Margaret Rossi Copeland playing Diane.

Margaret Rossi Copeland, DIANE

And our lovely DP, Danielle Campbell, was a wiz with the Canon 5D Mark II.

Danielle Campbell with Canon 5D and Zacuto Rig

One of the things I enjoyed about this process (other than directing comedy) was that it was a 2-day shoot, with two actors (plus one brief cameo) and a crew of four (including me). We had the DP, a grip/AC, and my husband (who is also my co-producer, editor and colourist) recorded production audio. All of us were experienced professionals who’ve each worn many hats so the short hand was effective. We worked quickly and communicated well. My actors were marvellous. They dove right into the material fearlessly and gave me lots of choices and options to cut with. It’s going to be a delightful little film.

My first short film as a writer-director, called “Sonny“, is still in post-production; but I’m pregnant (due in April 2012!), and my hubby and I wanted to get another project in before the baby consumes our time. We’re hoping to have both projects out of post and heading to the festival circuit by the time the baby arrives in mid-April.