Casting and Scouting and Fundraising, Oh My!
A lot of filmmaking, especially independent filmmaking, is “hurry up and wait.”
We’ve been waiting for a while, but this past weekend the time came to hurry up. Saturday was devoted to casting and Sunday was devoted to location scouting.
Katie, Lameese and Josh took charge of Saturday’s casting session. The session focused on one major role from each film. For Oakdale, the goal was narrowing down the potential actresses who would be playing Mrs. Wallace, one of Chuck’s neighbors. For Alone Together, the goal was the same for the character of Alex.
Auditions lasted almost all day Saturday. In total, there were 17 performers auditioning, 12 of them for the role of Mrs. Wallace and 5 for the role of Alex. That’s not to say that we only got 12 people who were interested in auditioning for Mrs. Wallace and 5 for Alex overall, we actually got more. A lot more.
For Mrs. Wallace, we had 144 actresses express interest and for Alex, we had 294 actresses express interest.
That’s obviously way too many to see in one, two, or probably even three weeks worth of days so our Casting Director Lameese sorted through hundreds of headshots and self tapes to get to the best of the best, then contacted those actresses to set up auditions.
She did a great job sifting through the applications because many of the actresses at the casting call did very well. Come next Monday, we’'ll have callbacks under our belt and have more updates ready for you.
Sunday was also a big day for us. When you’re shotting a movie, you need a place to shoot it. Since Katie and I have both been busy with other things, Josh was tasked with finding locations that fit the interiors and exteriors of our films. He spent hours scrolling through sites like Giggster and Wrapal and eventually found 4 locations for us to visit.
We set out early Sunday morning and drove to the San Fernando Valley to see what he found.
Once again, we were in luck. We found one place with an interior that looked like it was straight out of the 50s and another with an interior that looked like it could pass perfectly for your average Midwestern abode. There will still be some challenges. There were some locations that we know are well out of our budget. The school that Alex attends, for example is well out of our budget even under the best case scenario, so we’ll have to rely on production design and camera angles to sell something like an empty studio as a high school gym.
It won’t be easy but it’s not impossible. We have a good team. Many of the people (to whom you’ll be introduced eventually) are doing this for the love of the craft, and that’s passion that can be seen in the finished product.
Between callbacks, more auditions for other roles, a little more location scouting, a trip to purchase art supplies and furniture, a fundraising party and a Kickstarter campaign kick off, we have many busy weekends ahead of us. The next big obstacle we’ve got to tackle is the fundraising party.
What do we have to tell you so far? The fundraising party is in late April and we won’t just be raising money for the film, but also for a local charity. We’ve put a lot of work into the party and the campaign itself, and we can’t wait to show you what it’s all about. If you want more details on that, though, you’ll have to come back next week. I can’t show all the cards in my hand.
-Megan