My Toxic Backyard on TV

My Toxic Backyard finally had it's broadcast debut.  It aired on the local CW channel here in Asheville at 5:30am on a Sunday morning (because that's what I could afford.) I ended up buying air time to have it broadcast and with Diamond Brand as an associated sponsor that really helped defray some of the cost.

I submitted My Toxic Backyard back in July to our local PBS channel, but they turned it down.  They sent a letter telling me how much they liked the documentary and that they thought I was a talented filmmaker, but because it was a "point-of-view documentary," they said they did not "have a place in [their] schedule to broadcast point-of-view programs." They went on to say, "for complex issues, like the topic you tackle in your film, we look for a more balanced representation." I can see where they're coming from.  I could have argued that both the EPA and CTS refused to comment on the record, or grant an interview, or even release a statement to me, but I decided to let it go. 

I also tried to buy air time on another station before I went with the CW, but was turned down by that station for pretty much the same reason as PBS.  They bring up an interesting point about documentaries that I've discussed at length with many filmmakers: does a good documentary have to present both sides of an issue or story?  My answer is not necessarily.  While there is always a desire to represent events and people truthfully, sometimes (like in my case) you can't always get all sides.

If all you had to do to make a documentary is make a non-fiction film, one could argue that a gas station owner who has video surveillance is making documentaries.  Certainly it's possible to make a documentary from surveillance footage, but I don't think anyone would call the footage on its own a documentary.  There must be some selection of shots, some choices on what is presented and once that happens, no matter how objective the author of that content is, you are presenting a version of reality. You are manipulating events. 

I think the key is to acknowledge that you are altering information to create a compelling story while also working to present that information as truthfully as possible.  If you are able to present different perspectives in your documentary, I do think that can make the piece stronger, but I also don’t think a documentary should be abandoned simply because you weren’t able to present multiple viewpoints.

Katie

Rotten Tomatoes and Closed Captions

My documentary found it's way to Rotten Tomatoes! You can check it out here: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/my_toxic_backyard/

and if you've seen it, give it your review by clicking on the stars under "add your rating."  As of this post it's averaged 4.9 out of 5 stars!  

I'm still working on closed captioning for the TV premiere.  What a pain! Next time I will hire a company to do it.  It's so painstaking and tedious, at one point I estimate I was taking an hour per minute of footage, but it's going faster now. 

I've been using adobe premiere CC to do closed captioning and the nice thing about doing it myself is I can really take my time and customize it all with different colors and positions for different people taking over each other. I can add sound FX and music cues and I can export as many different types of files I need. Right now I need two. For TV I have to embed the closed captioning in the movie file and premiere would do that in a quicktime so I making a special quicktime file just for the broadcast. For Amazon they want a separate file called an .SCC (scenarist closed caption.)  So it's been a good learning experience.  My main take away is it's worth it to pay someone else.

Katie

The Perfect Spot

When the production company I belong to, Gorilla with a Mustache Films, won the grand prize with our movie Joint Effort part of the prize was to have free entry into the next year's competition.  Even though we've all been exhausted working on our comedy feature film, One Hell of an Angel, we decided we had to take advantage of the free entry and compete again this year. 

The competition, formerly "The National Film Challenge" re-branded itself this year (probably because it's an international competition and the title is a little confusing) and is now called "The 4 Points Film Project."  Our team created a short film in just one weekend with some new faces on set.  We had the talented and ruggedly handsome Paul Anderson as our cinematographer, Lisa Styles our awesome Canadian Producer friend who we met at the Cannes film festival came down just to help us with this production, Michael Valentino came on board to help with editing, and Eruch Kimball was our fabulous composer.  After a rocky start and a completely unexpected last minute script change, we set off to make a film pretty much by improv.  Luckily our actors are good at that.  While we didn't win any of the awards this year, we were chosen in the top 20 in the world, so not too shabby.  Here it is: The Perfect Spot.

http://youtu.be/CFB0xVCeafo

Film Festival Run Down

You pretty much have a year to show your film on the film festival circuit.  Most festivals won't let you release your film to the public before it screens at their festival and most don't want movies more than a year old.  So a year is about all the time you have for that.  Why?  It's hard enough getting people to attend a film festival, but they keep attendance up by giving cinephiles something different than the mainstream, something new and fresh, and something exclusive.

My Toxic Backyard has had a great run. It's been accepted to 9 different film festivals and even won best film at one of them, which makes this year a great success.  Whenever possible a filmmaker should attend the festivals where their film is screening. I've chronicled my experiences at the Thin Line Film Festival (plus a video here) and on the Southern Circuit (and a radio interview.)  I couldn't make it to the Greenpoint Film Festival but, I was able to send my associate producer, writer and editor Jaime Byrd to accept our award there.

Here is a run down of all the festivals and awards My Toxic Backyard has garnered in the past year:

Winner: Best Documentary Feature, Greenpoint Film Festival
Winner: Best Film, Mountain Express Best of WNC 2014
Nominated: 4 Emmys Including:
      Best Documentary: Katie Damien, Jaime Byrd, Michael Klatt, Bob Peck
      Best Cinematography: (Non-news Photography) Katie Damien
      Best Editing: Jaime Byrd, Katie Damien
      Best Audio Post: Bob Peck, Jaime Byrd, Katie Damien 
Official Selection: Southern Circuit
Official Selection: Thin Line Film Festival
Official Selection: Twin Rivers Film Festival
Official Selection: Reel and Meal
Official Selection: Utopia Film Festival
Official Selection: River's Edge Film Festival
Official Selection: Wild Goose Festival
Official Selection: Compress Fest (trailer)
Official Selection: AAAC Creative Sector Summit

Radio Interview for WRLN Arts Radio

While on the Southern Circuit I was interviewed at a public radio station in South Florida: https://soundcloud.com/katiedamien/arts-radio-interview-with-katie-damien

Katie

My Toxic Backyard Wins Best Documentary Film at Greenpoint Film Festival

My Toxic Backyard just won the highest honor a film can win at a film festival: Best Documentary Feature!  I'm so excited!  What an honor!

http://greenpointfilmfestival.org/

Jaime Byrd (second from the left) speaking on a panel at the Greenpoint Film Festival

A news article about the festival

News article continuted

I Sold My House

My house was so awesome and I had such a great experience living there, but I hated the commute to work.  Some people will probably laugh at the 20 minute drive I had to make, but that drive is a constant in my life and I don't like it.  I want to bike to work, so I'm moving into an apartment that's only 1 mile from my job.  Instead of spending 40 minutes a day, 3 hours a week, 173 hours a year driving to work and back, I'll be spending 30 minutes a day getting a good work out, doing something good for the environment and actually enjoying my mornings and evenings as I come and go from work.  I know selling a perfectly good house seems like an extreme thing to do, but to me it makes perfect sense.  Goodbye house by the trains.  Hello daily bike ride!

 

Second Parent

Adoption law is supposed to be based on the best interests of the child.  I made this short film when I discovered an issue a lot of gay couples must face when trying to adopt a child.  While many states will allow gay couples to adopt children, they will only do so if one person out of that couple adopts as a single parent.  In the eyes of the law, that second parent is not recognized.  What if the adopting parent looses their job and benefits and that second parent ends up wanting to put their child on their health insurance?  What happens if the child has to be hospitalized while the adopting parent is out of town?  What happens if the adopting parent dies? 

http://youtu.be/g8xhVKEQZ90
A lot of talented Asheville folks helped make this movie possible working in front of the camera and behind the scenes.  Thank you for your support and for giving your time to help make this short film happen.

Katie

Poster Designed by: Anthony Abraira http://anthonyabraira.com

Winner Best Filmmaker in WNC!!!

Thank you to everyone who voted for me as best filmmaker for 2014 in the Mountain Express Best of and also My Toxic Backyard for best film of the year!  Wow! I'm so happy for the attention this brings to the community living around the CTS site and long fight they have had for safe drinking water. I'm so honored!

Katie

http://bestofwnc.com/category/arts-entertainment/locally-made-film/
http://bestofwnc.com/category/arts-entertainment/local-filmmaker/

I was Taking Selfies Before They Were a Thing

I was having my picture taken by some local press and I told myself that if I managed to get some dreaded contact lenses in my eyeballs that I would update my portraits.  So I did these.  

I used window light, a tripod, cable release, 50mm film lens open to f1.4, a stand with a sheet of paper next to me so I could see where I needed to put my face to keep it in focus and a yoga mat for a backdrop.

Katie

Magazine Article about Me

My film school Alma mater published a great article about my recent film success and my trip to Cannes:

http://today.ucf.edu/cannes-cannes-cannes/

Because She Cannes Cannes Cannes

Alumna's short film honored at world's most prestigious festival

Cinematographer Katie Damien, '01, started working in film before she was a teenager

Growing up in a family of movie buffs and watching the Oscars every year, it seemed Katie Damien, ’01, was predestined for a future in film. In fact, she made her first movie when she was 12 years old. And, she hasn’t stopped making movies since.

Born and raised in Florida, Damien chose to attend UCF because, in her opinion, it had the best film program in the state.


“Film students could direct their own work, they got to keep all the rights to their films, and Orlando is the perfect place to be for filmmaking, with all the studios nearby and the city being so production friendly,” she explains. “’The Blair Witch Project’ had just come out, and UCF’s film program was the place to be.”


Today, she’s the owner of Kd Multimedia, a writer and director, and one of five producers in Gorilla with a Mustache Films.


Damien started the film company with a team of filmmakers she joined in 2010, in order to compete in the 48 Hour Film Project. After winning the competition’s top prize for their short film, “Touched by Angels,” they decided to make more movies together.

Last year, the group competed in the National Film Challenge. But, instead of competing against other local filmmakers, they were competing with filmmakers around the world. In addition, each team was assigned a genre, a character, a prop and line of dialogue that had to be used in its film.


After a long session of brainstorming, one of Damien’s teammates told a story about a friend who rented a car and ended up with the same make and model someone else at the agency had already rented. He didn’t realize he drove off with the wrong car — until he stopped, opened the trunk and found it full of drugs. So, it got them thinking: What would you do if you suddenly found yourself accidentally in possession of a bunch of drugs? And, again, the group won for its short film, “Joint Effort.”


“I was out of my mind excited [when I learned we won],” Damien says. “I was screaming on the phone with the other members of my team. I was in an office full of people when I found out, and they all started to gather around as I was jumping up and down, screaming like a fool.”
But, the excitement didn’t stop there. The National Film Challenge win sent their film to the Short Film Corner at the 2014 Cannes Film Festival.


“I knew that Cannes was the top prize, [but] I had to get on a computer real quick and look for myself to make sure it was true,” Damien continues. “When I saw the win with my own eyes, that’s when the screaming started [again].”


Not surprisingly, Damien’s biggest dream is to some day win an Oscar.

“But, in the immediate future,” she says, “I’d just like to have a big enough budget that I can do all the things I want to in a given movie, and be able to pay all my cast and crew properly.”


Q&A REEL


Q. Who was your favorite professor, and why?


A. Sterling Van Wagenen was the director of the film program when I was there. He also taught a directing class that I took. He was amazing. It wasn’t just the knowledge he imparted or the extremely helpful real-world advice he would give, but he had a soothing demeanor about him. He had a way of squeezing your shoulder that just made you feel like everything would be okay. And for a stressed-out film student, sometimes a shoulder squeeze was exactly what you needed. Mary Johnson was a fantastic screenwriting teacher! I still use her template for creating characters when I write scripts. Mark Gerstein and Lori Ingle were also amazing editing teachers. I learned so much from them. And, I can’t skip Jonathan Mednick, my documentary film teacher. He gave me the best advice my senior year. I was working on a short documentary, and he watched it as a work-in-progress and told me: “Make it about the people. Tell their story and the rest will fall into place.” He died suddenly and unexpectedly that summer. I will always carry those words with me.


Q. How has your UCF degree helped you in your career?


A. Having a film degree, while not essential in this industry, has certainly opened a lot of doors for me. I think the quality of the education I received helped boost the professionalism of my work by leaps and bounds. I was able to try new and difficult things, take risks and fail, all without losing credibility, because I was in a supportive learning environment.


Q. Describe some of your previous films.


A. I’m just now releasing my first documentary feature film, “My Toxic Backyard,” about a community that has been fighting for clean, safe drinking water for decades since it discovered its water was contaminated by an old manufacturing plant where toxic chemicals were dumped into the ground. I’ve made a few comedy films — one comedy/horror about a vampire with a toothache. I made a short drama, “Second Parent,” about how gay parents can’t jointly adopt a child. And, I made a horror film about a couple that accidentally run over a guy with their car and soon find themselves victims of an elaborate scheme.


Q. Are you currently working on any other film projects?


A. I’m currently in post-production on my first comedy feature film with the same group I made “Joint Effort.” It’s called “One Hell of an Angel,” and it’s about a demon who gets in trouble for asking too many questions in hell and is punished by being forced to work with an angel on an impossible mission to get a washed up rock star to write a song that will change everything.


Q. All-time favorite movie?


A. “Strictly Ballroom”


Q. Worst movie you’ve ever seen?


A. The first movie I ever made as a kid. It was so bad I destroyed it.


Q. Favorite movie genre?


A. Action


Q. If someone made a movie about your life, what would the title be?


A. “The Mad World of a Creative Mind”


Q. What or who inspires you?


A. In the film world, Robert Zemeckis. That man can make any kind of movie and make it well.


Q. What profession other than your own would you like to attempt?


A. Beer taster. I’ve heard that’s a thing…


***Check out Katie Damien’s day-by-day journal of her experience at the Cannes Film Festival.***

Blue Ghost Fireflies

David Ostergaard holding a blue ghost firefly for a long exposure.

Walk in the woods of the Southern Appalachian Mountains as night in early spring and you may be lucky enough to spot tiny fairies carrying blue candles, gliding over the forest floor.  That's what blue ghost fireflies look like to the naked eye.  They are very rare and can only be found in the Southern Appalachian Mountains and in Texas, just North of Mexico.  They're small and shy, but if you're in the right place at the right time and are patient, you may be lucky enough to see a few.  Even smaller than their more common firefly cousins, they glow for long periods of time, sometimes up to a minute.  I went on a hike in Dupont Forest with David Ostergaard and Tina Herring.  David was quick enough to catch one and I photographed it in his hand.  They photographed green, but to my eye their light looked light blue.

Katie

Cannes Film Festival and Romania

I just returned from a whirlwind vacation/work trip to the Cannes Film Festival where my award-winning short film "Joint Effort" screened (see the movie here: In a previous post) and then Romania where I visited Dracula's castle.  If you want to know more about Cannes check out the page I made dedicated to my experiences there: My page about Cannes and stay tuned (I just realized how antiquated that term is.  In the digital age, does anyone tune a dial anymore?) for more on Romania! 

Katie

David Ostergaard, Tina Herring, Lela Winton, Billy Goodrum, there with the award-winning short film "Joint Effort" produced by Gorilla with a Mustache Films.

a bedroom in Dracula's Caster (Bran Castle)

Romania

Peles Castle

I loved Romania!  I traveled to Bucharest on my own and spent my entire trip as a single female traveling around Romania and not able to speak anything except the essentials (which all travelers should acquaint themselves with before traveling in any new country) and I never felt lost or afraid.

The Essentials:

Please: Varog
Thank you: Mull-Too-Mesk
Excuse me: Scuz-At-Zima
Sorry: Um-Me-Parrie-Rew
Yes: Da
No: Nu
Where is the bathroom: Un-De Este Toiletta

I had just wrapped up an action packed week at the Cannes Film Festival and wanted to experience some of Europe that I never had before.  Eastern Europe has been on my list for a while.  I worked with quite a few Eastern Europeans on ships and had heard fabulous stories about the countryside and decided that I should see some of Romania.  I mainly stayed in Bucharest and went on day trips to Transylvania, but now I wish I had made Transylvania the main place I had stayed.  The Carpathian Mountains are gorgeous and the countryside looks like something out of a medieval fairytale.  There were gypsy houses, horse drawn carts and castles.

The Black Church in the town of Brasov

I visited beautiful medieval churches and monasteries.  One of the churches had a mural on the roof of Jesus and God.  I don't know that I've ever seen God depicted like that before, it was really neat to see.

Peles (sounds like Pelish) Castle was the most ornate castle I've ever seen in my life.  The amount of detail in the various carvings and artwork was breathtaking.  My favorite castle though was Bran Castle which is called Dracula's castle, though it wasn't a residence of Vlad the Impaler, but rather the castle that Bram Stoker based his description on in the book.  Vlad Tempes also had a totally different feel in Romania.  He is seen as something of a folk hero.  He protected his people and kept them safe and today they are still grateful for it.

Bran Castle Courtyard

A bedroom in Bran Castle

Bran Castle as seen from the village below

Mt. Express Article on our trip to Cannes

Fabulous article about the trip Lela and I made to the Cannes Film Festival:

Cannes or bust: Local filmmakers report on their trip to the prestigeous film festival

Posted on May 16, 2014 by Alli Marshall

Katie Damien and Lela Winton at Cannes Film Festival

Scroll down for the full week’s worth of posts.

Local filmmakers Katie Damien and Lela Winton are part of the Gorilla with a Mustache Films crew who attended the Cannes Film Festival (yes, the one in France) to screen their short comedy, Joint Effort.
The group spent a week in that glamorous locale, taking in wonderful films, eating French food, imbibing champagne and rubbing elbows with celebs. Damien and Winton sent back updates — e-postcards, if you will. See info on the film at the bottom of the page.

May 24

On this, my final day at Cannes I find myself reminiscing over the time I’ve had. It all feels like a wonderful dream that I don’t want to wake up from. I’ve had drinks on a yacht, crashed parties, met celebrities, seen amazing movies and walked the red carpet. And I’ve made so many great contacts in my time here. Today was a day of movie watching. I saw tons of short films and made it to the last feature film, The Disappearance of Eleanor Rigsby.
 

 I could not have hoped for a better experience here. I am now full of excellent food, Wine and wonderful memories. When I get home I will begin contacting the many people I’ve met here. I hope that every filmmaker has the opportunity make it to the Cannes Film Festival. And I hope to return again soon. — Katie

May 23

Tonight is the 20th anniversary of Pulp Fiction winning the Palm D’Or at Cannes. We celebrated with Tarantino, Thurman, Travolta and Weinstein on the beach at a special screening — so fun! Cannes does these great free beach screenings every night but the special screening of Pulp Fiction was something special. The crowd was ecstatic. People were shouting favorite lines, cheering, whooping and laughing loud together. I could just barley see Quentin Tarantino from where I sat and he seemed just as excited as ever to be showing his film to a crowd.
Most of the festival attendees have packed up and left so there was not a whole lot of work getting done today. Katie and I broke into the press conference area though for some great photos (see above). — Lela
• • •
Things are really starting to wind down for the Cannes Film Festival.  Lela and I went to the Marche du film, but found it fairly sparse. After playing around in the press conference area, we decided to do a little sightseeing. And who should we meet at the top of the tower at a museum, but the very people we were looking for earlier: film distributors (below). We exchanged cards and even showed them our trailer on the iPad we are always carrying around. We ended the day with a beach screening of Pulp Fiction introduced by none other than Quentin Tarantino. It was a great end to a great day. — Katie

May 22

Today a young Frenchwoman (named Alice, pictured below) accidentally spilled her wine all over Lela’s dress. By way of apology, she got us two tickets to a red carpet screening premiere with celebrities in attendance. When Lela and I went on the red carpet before, it was early in the day and there were no celebrities or photographers around. This was the real deal. It was all at the last minute, and because I wasn’t expecting it, I was not properly dressed. I had to literally run to the apartment and back to get there in time. I put on my Ship to Shore dress again in record time. — Katie

May 21

Spent a great day with David and Tina in nearby Antibes while Billy Goodrum did photo shoots, dinners, press functions, etc.  I finally got to wear my Ship to Shore dress for a screening. I turned many a head in it.
At the end of the day Lela and I  reconnected with our esteemed composer Billy Goodrum who you can see in red carpet photos standing next to Sophia Loren! I didn’t get to chat with her, but did speak with her director son who is charming and very nice even though he must have been exhausted. Billy, Lela and I went for drinks with the George Clooney of Italy, Enrico Lo Verso [see photo at top of page]. Oh la la was he handsome!  And so chivalrous, too. He escorted Lela and me home after he broke up a bar fight. What a man. — Katie

May 20

Today we screened Joint Effort for a packed theater.  People laughed and seemed to enjoy the movie. It was great to have David Ostergaard and Tina Herring join us, as well as Billy Goodrum, our composer. Billy also had another movie screening at Cannes. Lela and I went to his other screening, where Sophia Loren attended. She is amazingly beautiful at any age! A full and wonderful day. — Katie

May 19

The most exciting thing that happened today was running into Benicio Del Toro on the street!  Then chasing after him and grabbing a quick selfie. He was just so cool.
Today was my first day to walk the red carpet. Lela and I had to wait in the rain on the off chance there was extra space in an afternoon screening. We were lucky enough to get into a screening of Foxcatcher. Excellent movie.  I have never seen Steve Carell in that type of dark role and he was amazing. The screening was in the middle of the day so there were no stars around to join us in our walk up but still very thrilling to be walking on the red carpet for the first time. — Katie
Editor’s note: Read Entertainment Weekly‘s take on Foxcatcher here.

May 18

I can’t believe it’s only been a few days — I’m starting to loose track. I’ve done so many amazing things at the Cannes Film Festival. Today, on a whim, Lela and I walked past the rows of multimillion dollar yachts looking for a man I flew in with who invited me aboard his yacht for drink. It was a very casual invitation and I wasn’t sure if we would ever actually be able to connect. Not only did he have us come aboard for drinks, but we met other amazing filmmakers, distributors and even a reporter from CNN. We had an amazing lunch followed by cheesecake and the strongest thimbleful of espresso I have ever had. We shared stories and screened a short film by one of the filmmakers. It was a phenomenal afternoon with a fabulous host! — Katie
•••
Third day here at Cannes. Started out great with a red carpet screening of Tommy Lee Jones’s new movie called The Homesman, also staring Hilary Swank. It was a pretty good film over all, though not as good as True Grit, from a few years ago, which it was strikingly similar to. After a huge tank drove down the road with the entire all-star cast of The Expendables 3 sitting on top, drawing all the tourists out to the Coisette and making walking much easier, we then moved onto a great afternoon on a swanky yacht with lots of big movie professionals. Today was full of delicious food and delightful company. Even a few good films thrown and for good measure. More tomorrow! — Lela

May 17

Hi Asheville! Having a great time here at the Cannes film Festival. Today I got my first pass to a grand theater premier: The Homesman by Tommy Lee Jones. His directorial debut! It’s screening tomorrow morning, so wish me luck.

The festival is huge and busy with people everywhere. The Mediterranean Sea is beautiful and incredibly blue. There are people from all over the world and the hotels really know how to do it up in style! Last night I went to a cocktail party at the Thailand pavilion and had some great food and conversation.
Our screening for Tuesday is filling up with 70% of the seats already accounted for. Still have seven days to go at the festival, and have seen quite a few stars and directors. Really looking forward to meeting more people. Tonight we are going to a cocktail party on a quarter billion dollar yacht. #excited! — Lela

•••
The big news of the day was the two parties we crashed at night. Lela and I went to a party hosted by Thailand. It was by invitation only and we were lucky enough to score two invitations standing in line! The princess of Thailand was there, there were live performances and films shown. We sipped our drinks and ate fantastic Thai food. Then it was off to the next big party of the night, hosted by Germany. We did not have invitations and were nearly stopped by security but somehow managed to finagle our way in. We hobnobbed with German filmmakers for a while, then strolled past the yachts before calling it a night. — Katie
•••
Had an amazing night. Started off the evening meeting some great filmmakers who hooked us up with a gentleman who got us in to the Thai national films party. It was a huge deal — very exclusive. Only about 100 people got in. Her Royal Highness the princess of Thailand was there and gave a talk and then there was a live film/Thai boxing demonstration, drinks and food. It was amazing! Then we casually snuck into a beach party for the German film commission. It was a huge party and also very exclusive. After the German Party we headed out to yacht row. The yachts were bumping with parties. Someone mistook me for a star and introduced me to their group as if I was Amy Adams. Now we are back at our apartment getting ready to sleep, because I have a red carpet screening tomorrow morning at 8:30 a.m. for The Homesman by Tommy Lee Jones. — Lela

May 16

Flying in, I had a bit of an ordeal with getting to France. But it turned out to be a match made in heaven when I flew from London straight into Nice.  On my flight [I] saw not only Guy Pierce (who probably would have been completely cool but I was too intimidated by to even approach) but also Matt Smith — the new Dr. Who — who was super friendly and awesome. He was much more approachable, so [below] is his photo. Very nice guy. Finally [to] Cannes and completely jetlagged … will have more tomorrow. — Katie

May 14

Here’s Damien’s first missive, sent as she was heading out of town:
I wanted to get an early start here because I have some Asheville folks to thank before I jet off. My flight is this afternoon.
“For the red carpet, I have on loan a beautiful dress made by local designer R. Brooke Priddy with Ship to Shore. For make up I went to Zack Russell with Makeup at the Grove Arcade and got some fantastic tips, guidance, a whole makeover I wasn’t expecting and great makeup that I’ll be wearing in Cannes.

More about the project, from a press release:

Asheville based Gorilla with a Mustache Films heads to Cannes Film Festival in France this month to screen their internationally acclaimed comedy short, Joint Effort. Winner of the 2013 National Film Challenge, this comedy short tells the story of a gay couple who mistakenly assume they have been mailed a box of marijuana: hilarity ensues. Joint Effort will be represented by two members of Gorilla with a Mustache Films, Director Katie Damien, a five time Emmy award winning Director based here in Asheville, whose recently released documentary, My Toxic Backyard, chronicles the story of the CTS site in Buncombe County, and local Producer Lela Winton.
Cannes is one of the largest and most prestigious film festivals in the world. Attendance is by invitation only. To earn the honor to screen at Cannes, Joint Effort competed internationally and won Best Picture, along with Best Writing for local writers Eruch Adams and Will Eill, and Best Actor for the accomplished local actor and Emmy winner David Ostergaard of Bright Star Theater, who also travels to attend the screening.
Local film buffs should keep their eyes peeled for the Gorillas feature film One Hell of An Angel currently in post-production and slated for release later this year.

About Gorilla with a Mustache Films
Gorilla with a Mustache Films is a production team based out of Asheville, North Carolina.  Originally envisioned by Producer Lela Winton, their diverse crew includes Director Katie Damien, Actor Matt Shepard, and husband-wife Writer team Eruch Adams and Coranna Adams.

My Toxic Backyard in Southern Circuit

So excited to have My Toxic Backyard accepted to the Southern Circuit film screening tour. http://www.southarts.org/touring-arts/southern-circuit/  This documentary is 1 of only 18 films that made it in!!!  I'll be traveling across 5 states to host screenings at different universities and art collectives.