So, okay, here's the story.
A couple of months ago, our friend Lisa came by the house with some CDs she just bought. She pulled out an album by an artist I'd never heard of, Zoe Keating, and said, "You guys should hear this."
And we did. And it was really, really good -- if you like cello music, you should check Keating's music out. Anyhow, Braunbeck wanted to find out more about her, so he Googled Keating's name. Up popped a site called Stranger Things which shows short movies made by a guy named Earl Newton and his merry band of filmmakers. They mainly distribute over iTunes, and Zoe Keating wrote/performed the main theme song for all their podcasts. So Gary started watching the movies, and he was impressed with their Twilight Zone flavor.
On a whim, Braunbeck emailed Earl to ask him if they ever adapted short stories for their films. Why yes, replied Earl. So Braunbeck sent him a story entitled "Rami Temporales" that originally appeared in Borderlands 5 a couple of years back. He didn't expect to hear anything back for weeks or months, but a mere three days later Earl emails him to tell him he loved the story, and to ask if he could make a film based on it.
Hells yes!
So Braunbeck's story was adapted into a script called "One of Those Faces", and Earl started filming. Real Life promptly got in the way of making a straight dramatization of the story. The film crew discovered they couldn't get permission to shoot in a park that they wanted to shoot in, so the location of the climax of the story had to be moved. And then the actor who was cast to play the main character Joel had to drop out of the production the day shooting was supposed to begin. The part was quickly recast with an actress who was originally just going to play a small role, and Joel became JoAnna. She was more than happy to take over the lead at the last minute. (As if any actor or actress is going to say, "No, I don't want to be onscreen from first shot to last; I'd prefer to not star." Yeah, right.) Braunbeck didn't balk at the lead character being changed from a male to a female, because storywise, the sex of the lead character doesn't really matter.
The Florida production got delayed more because of heavy thunderstorms that prevented filming some exteriors and required the shutting-down of computers during editing.
But they're on track to have the film done in early August, and we're terribly excited. "One of Those Faces" is the most ambitious film they've done to date. Last night they posted a song they commissioned for the movie.
Excuse me while I geek. Braunbeck has a theme song! Well, his story does, anyhow.
Can't wait for August. I wanna see the movie.