"About a Donkey" Start of Principal Photography Recap

Thanks to all who supported our successful crowdfunding campaign, we were able to start principal photography on our second feature film, About a Donkey, this past weekend. You can check out this blog post to find out more about the film and see behind the scenes of our first unofficial production day back in January. I'll be sharing more about the experience of making this film, the creative choices behind it and how we're able to do it on $20,000 in 12 shooting days after we wrap production. But in the meantime, I'd love to include you in our progress through a bit of behind the scenes along the way via a weekly blog post. Here's the first.

We'll be shooting the film over four weekends through April 2nd. This was our first (three consecutive days), and it was a huge success! We're running on 12 hour days and I'm proud to say that we not only made our day all three days but made them early! This is a testament to the talent and skill of our small in quantity but mighty in quality crew & cast (or film-family, as we like to say)!

On Friday (thanks to my cousin Lauri, who loaned her house for the shoot), we shot scenes set in Annie & Paul's kitchen. See BTS below. 

And check out a couple raw Stills from the day:

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On Saturday, we shot scenes set in the nursery for Annie and Paul's soon-to-be baby. See BTS below. 

And check out a raw Still from the day:

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On Sunday (thanks to my mom Marlene & stepdad Jay for loaning their home), we shot scenes set in our main picture house, the home of parents Ann & Tim. See BTS below.

And check out a couple raw Stills from the day. 

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This weekend we'll be jumping back in shooting a scene set in a hospital waiting room on Friday and scenes set in (grandma) Farrah's nursing home on Saturday. (We're skipping Sunday because our pilot "Two Gays & a Girl" is premiering at the Queens World Film Festival that afternoon!)

You may be wondering where the titular donkey is in all this production. Well, stay tuned!

-Christina 

We Did It! (Seed&Spark update)

We did it! Our campaign just ended and we made our full goal thanks to all of you! Thank you for believing in us and in this project. We're so excited to have you as part of this filmmaking journey! More love to send in the coming days. But we're going to be able to shoot this film (starting next week!) and donate 5% of cash raised to The Trevor Project. This film will matter in as many ways as we can make it - thanks to you!

We put together this silly video of our attempts at our thank you jingle incentives. Enjoy! 

And find the actual thank you jingles on our Facebook page.

-Christina, Kelsey & the team <3

We Got the Green Light! (Seed&Spark update)

Good evening Wonderful Supporters, 

We're down to the last 3 days of this campaign. It ends at 11:59pm EST this Friday! Thanks to all of you, we just got the Green Light, which is the 80% threshold required to receive the funds we've raised! 

Our goal is definitely to hit 100% so that we can deliver on all our promises, including being able to donate 5% of cash raised to The Trevor Project; but now that we're past 80% we know we can get through production and make this film. Thank you! Let's keep the momentum going tonight!

Suggested Tweet: 

The #aboutadonkey team got the Green Light on @seedandspark! Now let's get 'em to 100% & make this inclusive comedy! http://bit.ly/2m4Z4wO

Thank you, thank you, thank you,

Christina, Kelsey & the team

Meet Cinnamon, our titular Donkey! (Seed&Spark update)

Hi everyone, 

We're at 30% with 25 days left, thanks to all of you! We're so excited to keep pushing forward to bring this film to life, and are so grateful to have you along on the journey with us. To celebrate hitting this milestone, we'd like to introduce you to Cinnamon, who will be playing TG, the donkey, in our film! 

When brainstorming how we'd get a donkey for the film, we knew we wanted to avoid reaching out to any petting zoos or pony ride type companies that would potentially exploit or abuse their animals. We set out to find local sanctuaries and rescue groups. Thankfully, we came across this NY Times article (video included) about Donkey Park, a non-profit in Upstate NY that takes donkeys to nursing homes and schools for the disabled as therapy for both people and donkeys. (The article explains more about their mission.) 

We reached out to the founder Steve Stiert, and he was just lovely. He was very excited by our film and the opportunity to promote the loving nature of donkeys to more of the world. I think there is also some parallels with his own story and that of Tim, the father in the film. He agreed to let us use one of his donkeys for the film once he verified we were the real deal and aimed to care for the animal as much as he does. Cinnamon is about 8 years old. She and her mom, Susie, are rescues. If Steve didn't take them in, they would have been slaughtered for meat. 

Donkeys are companion animals. They tend to bond strongly to another. Steve said that even if Cinnamon and Susie weren't mother and daughter, he'd still bring both to set because they're best friends (kind of like me & my mom!) and need to be together. So lucky for us, we'll get to have both cuddly cuties on set with us for three days at the end of March! 

In the film, TG is just a donkey being a donkey. Cinnamon will only have to act natural and be herself. But we do have some moments where we'll need her to look or walk in a certain direction for the camera. Steve let us shoot some video to demonstrate how he's been training her with positive reinforcement to get her to learn some cool stuff. 

We'll have more videos of her training later, exclusively for all you supporters. And even though Susie won't be in the film, she'll surely be in our behind the scenes videos with Cinnamon from set!

Our big push now is to hit 50% by the end of this week. Please keep spreading the word so we can reach more of our audience and get this film made together!

Sample tweet:

Meet Cinnamon, the donkey from #AboutADonkey! Want to see more of her? Support the project on @seedandspark: https://vimeo.com/202790888.

Thank you,

Christina, Kelsey & the team

Table Read Video (Seed&Spark Update)

Good morning, 

I'm just going to start every update with THANK YOU because you're all awesome and we can't thank you enough. We're at 24% and moving at a nice pace. But getting to 30% as soon as possible is pretty key, so we're looking to reach a lot of people today!

If you missed yesterday's preview of the first scene of the film, it now lives in the media section of our campaign. Hopefully you enjoyed it. Please do share it with anyone you think might dig it too!

A few weeks back we had our first reading of the entire script. It was a very low key get-together for the cast and core crew. We recorded it for our own purposes, since Kelsey and I were still revising the script at the time. But we decided to throw together a super short highlight reel to share with you all. I doesn't reveal much, just a quick intro to the ensemble. 

We've got more videos to come! Stay tuned.

-Christina