JULIAN GRANT (Sweet Leaf) wrote and is directing Finding Hope, a drama about a man fighting to win back his wife after a tragic accident, produced by Two 9 Productions and currently in production.
“The man’s challenge is intensified when his wife becomes entrenched in the very faith that he has turned his back on,” says indie filmmaker Grant, a professor at Columbia College.
Finding Hope is a dramatic love story that centers around love, values, family and faith.” This is a bit of a departure for Grant, whose recent work has tended toward exploitation fare (F*ckload of Scotch Tape, Arkham Sanitarium: The Soul Eater).
Shannon and Suzette Brown (of Two 9 Productions), Robyn Coffin, and Sean Patrick Leonard star. Michael Bussan is executive producer. Kyle Dones is DP. Production designer, Jessi Walsh.
Two 9 Productions is coproducing with Canal Productions, and Cyber Tiger Studios. Filming began in early June in Chicago, Aurora and Oswego.
BONNIE AND IRAMI OSEI-FRIMPONG of Another Chance Productions, are producing a pilot for a dramatic series Disciples, about the peculiar place religious institutions play in American politics, set in a Des Moines Protestant church and featuring its senior staff.
”There is a large segment of the population that will talk to their pastor, rabbi or Imam before they inform the police, their lawyer or doctor,” says Irami Osei-Frimpong.
“Disciples also tells stories with dramatic stakes similar to those in legal, medical and crime series, but ours is set in a church.”
They start principal photography in July at Augustana Lutheran Church and the United Church of Hyde Park. DP is Mark McKinney.
With Aja Wiltshire, Joyce Porter, Regina Whitehead-Mays, Bruce Spielbauer, Linda Terborg, Maggie Scranton, Demarco Smith , Kate Cornelius-Schecter, Allison Harris,Zach Dries, Michael Manning, Pete Navis and Chris Nugent.
PRODUCER/DIRECTOR BEN-HUR URIBE of Cinelens Productions wrapped filming on his debut feature Night of the Throne. Jeff Winner and Eclipse Theatre artistic director Nathaniel Swift (Blue Surge) stars in the psychological drama as a family man who loses his job and enters a life of crime.
Uribe’s 2006 short Por Amor won the Audience
Award at the IFP/Chicago Flyover Zone Film Festival. With his background in community organizing, his company Cinelens, has produced videos for the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights, Habitat for Humanity, Illinois Dept. of Public Health, and the People’s Music School.
RAFAEL RANGEL of Grizzwold Productions is directing the web series Rezist, starring Sean Skala and Elena Chernyakova as a brother and sister fighting to overthrow the corrupt government that killed their parents. With Duane Fisher and Amber Reedus. Josh Smith wrote the script. Amanda Schroeder is production manager. They’re filming in Genoa, IL.
CUTTERS EDITOR MICHAEL LIPPERT is making the sci-fi short Reversal, about “a meticulous time traveller who loses his sanity as he struggles to prevent his wife’s death over multiple scenarios.”
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