ABOUT THE FILM
We did the impossible. Ten and a half days. Three and a half actors. And one location.
Don’t be in a hurry. It doesn’t take a lot of money — it takes a lot of creativity. We reverse-engineered this film from the beginning, starting with the location. I then wrote the script based on the location. Hired a 19-year-old cinematographer who had never shot a feature. Cast three unknown actors and a kid. After that, I scheduled and budgeted ten and a half days to shoot a 90 page script. And now that we’ve done the impossible, others will do it too.
There are a number of people (whom I have never met…) that I have to thank for playing an integral part in the making of this uniquely independent film. Because through “mass media”— broadcasting, publishing, and the internet — they shared the experience necessary for a first-time female filmmaker to see her unusual project through from script to screen.
Dov Simens. After graduating from film school, while I surfed the web at various “day jobs” over the years, I read several posts on game-changer, Dov Simens’ Film Blog, that planted seeds of possibility in my independent filmmaking mind. Posts like, “Why Writers Should Make Their Own Film” and “DIY or DIE: 10 No Budget Filmmaking Musts.”
The entire Coppola family. Watching behind the scenes footage of Sophia directing gave me the first glimmer of hope that I could direct as a woman, as myself, not as a man would direct if he was a woman. Next, I read Eleanor’s remarkable journal, Notes. Moved by all that she recounted, I then found and watched a 10-minute YouTube video, “Francis Coppola’s Director’s Notebook.” With these rare looks under the hood of non-amateur filmmaking — I was sufficiently inspired to both produce and direct Mad Dreams myself.
Eva Longoria. For her brief article, “Why I Love My Lil’ Eva Chair,” about creating opportunities for other women behind the camera. After reading what a director’s chair means to her, saying, “To make a change, it’s important to have a seat at the table.” I bought myself a director’s chair, set it in my living room, and we stared at each other for a couple of years — while I wrote and rewrote the script for Mad Dreams.
Kyra Sedgwick. For her article, “Unreasonable Doubt.” I could relate to having the skills I needed, even if I didn’t realize it yet. Wrestling with the noise in my own head, I too had heard the intuitive voice in my heart say, “You know more than you think you do. I know you’re scared. Feel the fear and do it anyway.” So while I did the pre-production for Mad Dreams — I found the courage to try something new and finally take the leap into directing.
And I can’t forget modern-day prophet, Dave Chapelle. Who in one of his many stand-up specials recommended Iceberg Slim’s book, Pimp: The Story of My Life, to anyone looking to understand Hollywood at its most base (ahem), basic level. Thank you… I’m not gonna lie, it was a bit shocking for a white girl from the suburbs — but an education I won’t soon forget.
These influential people simply put tools out there — in print, on the worldwide web, in cyberspace — that made it possible for me to travel the learning curve from writer to writer-director-producer. There were many steps I had to take along that path, but the knowledge these people revealed was essential to the successful production of Mad Dreams. And I’d never met any of them. That is the power of the world we live in today, an “Age of Information.” We are, for better or worse, a global society now. And nothing unconnected ever happens.
