Blogs

The next member of the "My Run " team for you to get to know better is Co-Producer Christine Redlin, who is an experienced marketer in both the film and music industries.

One of the most beloved documentaries that has been winning both festival awards and rousing audience support has been "My Run ", based on the true story of Terry Hitchcock, who in 1996 at 57 ran 75 consecutive marathons in 75 days to draw the public's attention to the plight of single parents.

Hamlet: "To be or not to be… that is the question." Well, Hammy my boy, here we are! Living in LA now for nearly 2 years and this will be my first entry to finalize the concepts I was perusing through in 7 Notes when I first started this blog back in December of 2008 and since then, plenty of amazing experiences have befallen me as well as many I fell right into.

If you enjoyed the first part of my Q&A with Karen Worden from Film Courage read on. Karen continues to inspire in Part 2.

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I really resonated with Director Patrick Hoelck's interview. He directed "Mercy " with Scott and James Caan. Patrick is a celebrity photographer and has directed music videos in addition to "Mercy ". Hearing his story of being a kid on the streets for a short time, battling drug addiction inspired me because he didn't give in. It would have been so easy to. Patrick's spirit was alive. He said he looked forward to waking up in the morning and greeting each day. Just seeing that someone had an opportunity to quit where the odds were stacked against them, but didn't, encourages me. It's hard to come up with excuses in life when you hear a story like this

One of the best shows for filmmakers to grace internet radio is Film Courage, which airs every Sunday at Noon PT on LA Talk Radio. Co-hosts Karen Worden and David Branin have been building a supportive and devoted following by featuring informative and entertaining guests on their program, so I thought it would be fun to turn the tables and interview them. Unfortunately, David was unavailable because of his current time commitments to the duo's two movie projects
"Night Before the Wedding " and "Goodbye Promise ", but Karen graciously shared some of her thoughts in Part one of my Q&A with her.

The second part of my Q&A interview with Producer/Actress Charlene Blaine-Schulenburg concentrating on her point of view as a film producer.

One independent film that has caught the attention of fans and film festivals alike is the drama "Reach for Me ". The heartwarming story about the inhabitants of a hospice featured a stellar cast including Seymour Cassel, Alfree Woodard, Lacey Chabert, Johnny Whitworth, Adrienne Barbeau and actress Charlene Blaine-Schulenburg, who also produced the film, and was directed by LeVar Burton. Recently I had the pleasure of doing a Q&A with Charlene and finding out more about her and the film. Since there is so much interesting information I've broken the interview into two parts. Today's piece centers on her award winning movie, which received the Breakthrough Accomplishment at AARP's Movies for Grownups Awards 2010.

Steve Marra, Director of the independent film "Amanda", had reason to smile last May as he celebrated the movie's red carpet premiere along with cast members Ariana Dubynin (Amanda) and Bill Bannister (Bob Bender) at the Giordano Theatre housed in the Las Vegas Hilton.

Developing marketing plans for independent features and shorts is becoming a necessity for filmmakers, especially in view of the current financing and distribution challenges facing them. As co-producer of "Accused " I've been handling promotion, which has proven in some ways to be a juggling act. At this point we are in the final stages of editing on this project and I have recently begun working on a preliminary campaign for another short that's in pre-production, so I thought I'd share a few observations.