The on-screen comedies and real-life tragedies of silent screen legends Fatty Arbuckle, Mabel Nomad, Buster Keaton, and Charlie Chaplin leading up to Hollywood's first celebrity scandal.
Five scripts have been chosen from this year's group of Semifinalists and Finalists in the Screenplay and Teleplay Competition to be read aloud in our Script Reading Workshops. Selected scripts will be performed by a group of actors in an intimate setting.
Two soldiers, two bankers, a war overseas and a war at home. Beau Willimon's WAR STORY explores how we navigate the battlefields of our past as we confront an uncertain future.
Directed by: Beau Willimon
Featured Cast: Glen Powell
The Last Supper (1996) Presented by Dan Rosen
(USA, 92 min)
Writers: Dan Rosen (in attendance)
Director: Stacy Title
Stranded student Pete (Ron Eldard) gets a lift from racist trucker Zack and repays the favor by inviting him in for dinner with his roommates, Jude (Cameron Diaz), Luke (Courtney B. Vance), Marc (Jonathan Penner) and Paulie (Annabeth Gish). When Zack praises Hitler and pulls a knife at the table, the roommates kill him. Rationalizing their actions as a favor to humanity, they bury Zack in the yard and begin to invite other offensive types to a string of similarly murderous meals.
Imperfections
(USA, 109 min)
Writer/Director: David Singer (in attendance)
Cast: Virginia Kull, Ed Begley, Jr., Marilu Henner, Ashton Holmes
Desperate to save enough money to move to Hollywood, struggling actress Cassidy takes a job working as a runner for an importer in Chicago’s diamond district. When she realizes the money is trickling in too slowly for her to put a stake together, she conspires with the owner’s son to stage a robbery and keep the diamonds—using her former boyfriend as the fall guy.
A look inside the volatile, and surprisingly vulnerable, mind of Tonya Harding exposes how 90s pop culture and media inspired and ensnared her and Nancy Kerrigan into an epic and infamous rivalry.
Screenplay by: Amy Talkington
Directed by: Charlie McDowell
Producer: Matt Smith (Circle of Confusion)
Featured Cast: Zosia Mamet, Alexandra Daddario
Writer/Director: Louisiana Kreutz (in attendance)
Cast: Alex Dobrenko, Fede Rangel (both in attendance)
When Quakers get married, they ask every wedding guest to sign their marriage certificate. It’s a sweet tradition that signifies the importance of community. But when Joe and Emily want to get divorced, that sweet tradition creates an unexpected challenge: now every guest must cross off their name to make the split official. In this off-beat comedy, these two would-be divorcees hit the highway to track down friends and relatives, revisiting old feelings, and discovering new ones along the way.
They Call Us Monsters
(USA, 82 min)
Director: Ben Lear
In California, violent juveniles between 14-17 years old can be tried as adults. Typically, they are accused of heinous crimes—murders and attempted murders—that leave their victims’ families shattered. And yet, they are still kids, with a greater capacity to change and one day return to society. Behind the walls of their prison, three violent juvenile offenders are writing a movie as they await their trials. It’s the story of their childhoods with the ending rewritten.
(USA, 90 min)
Writers: Michael Gallagher, Steve Greene
Director: Michael Gallagher
Cast: Logan Paul, Peyton List, Lia Marie Johnson, Calum Worthy
The Thinning is set in a dystopian future where population control is dictated by an aptitude test in high school. When two students (Logan Paul and Peyton List) discover the test is all smoke and mirrors hiding a larger conspiracy, they must go against the system to expose it and take it down.
When a woman’s binge-watching addiction nearly gets her ousted from her own company, she reluctantly checks into a social media therapy center to kick her habit; however once there, she quickly starts bingeing the lives of the other patients.
Five scripts have been chosen from this year's group of Semifinalists and Finalists in the Screenplay and Teleplay Competition to be read aloud in our Script Reading Workshops. Selected scripts will be performed by a group of actors in an intimate setting.
The year is 1999. Grant Wagner is 17 years old but still hasn’t gone through puberty. His youth-obsessed father doesn't want Grant to grow up, but Grant needs to figure out how to become a man before his crush sees his tiny hairless penis.
Five scripts have been chosen from this year's group of Semifinalists and Finalists in the Screenplay and Teleplay Competition to be read aloud in our Script Reading Workshops. Selected scripts will be performed by a group of actors in an intimate setting.(USA, 23 min)
Writer/Director: Westin Ray
A Catholic priest makes an unusual discovery in a confessional booth, setting off a chain of events that not only affects the lives of his parishioners, but also tests his own sense of right and wrong.
(USA, 95 min)
Writer: Noah Oppenheim
Director Pablo Larrain
Cast: Natalie Portman, Peter Sarsgaard, Billy Crudup, Greta Gerwig
JACKIE is a searing and intimate portrait of one of the most important and tragic moments in American history, seen through the eyes of the iconic First Lady, then Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy (Natalie Portman). JACKIE places us in her world during the days immediately following her husband's assassination. Known for her extraordinary dignity and poise, here we see a psychological portrait of the First Lady as she struggles to maintain her husband’s legacy and the world of "Camelot" that they created and loved so well.
(USA, 102 min)
Writer/Director: Kelly Fremon Craig
Producer: James L. Brooks (in attendance)
Cast: Hailee Steinfield, Haley Lu Richardson, Woody Harrelson
High school junior Nadine is already at peak awkwardness when her all-star older brother Darian starts dating her best friend. All at once, Nadine feels more alone than ever, until the unexpected friendship of a thoughtful boy gives her a glimmer of hope that things just might not be so terrible after all.
Imperfections
(USA, 109 min)
Writer/Director: David Singer (in attendance)
Cast: Virginia Kull, Ed Begley, Jr., Marilu Henner, Ashton Holmes
Desperate to save enough money to move to Hollywood, struggling actress Cassidy takes a job working as a runner for an importer in Chicago’s diamond district. When she realizes the money is trickling in too slowly for her to put a stake together, she conspires with the owner’s son to stage a robbery and keep the diamonds—using her former boyfriend as the fall guy.
Writer/Director: Louisiana Kreutz (in attendance)
Cast: Alex Dobrenko, Fede Rangel (both in attendance)
When Quakers get married, they ask every wedding guest to sign their marriage certificate. It’s a sweet tradition that signifies the importance of community. But when Joe and Emily want to get divorced, that sweet tradition creates an unexpected challenge: now every guest must cross off their name to make the split official. In this off-beat comedy, these two would-be divorcees hit the highway to track down friends and relatives, revisiting old feelings, and discovering new ones along the way.
They Call Us Monsters
(USA, 82 min)
Director: Ben Lear
In California, violent juveniles between 14-17 years old can be tried as adults. Typically, they are accused of heinous crimes—murders and attempted murders—that leave their victims’ families shattered. And yet, they are still kids, with a greater capacity to change and one day return to society. Behind the walls of their prison, three violent juvenile offenders are writing a movie as they await their trials. It’s the story of their childhoods with the ending rewritten.
Writer/Director: Louisiana Kreutz
Cast: Alex Dobrenko, Fede Rangel
When Quakers get married, they ask every wedding guest to sign their marriage certificate. It’s a sweet tradition that signifies the importance of community. But when Joe and Emily want to get divorced, that sweet tradition creates an unexpected challenge: now every guest must cross off their name to make the split official. In this off-beat comedy, these two would-be divorcees hit the highway to track down friends and relatives, revisiting old feelings, and discovering new ones along the way.
(USA, 109 min)
Writer: Andrew Eisen
Director: Joel David Moore (in attendance)
Cast: Frank Langella, Billy Crudup, Christina Applegate, Mary Kay Place, Josh Lucas
When Brian’s secretly ailing 82-year-old father in law Raymond announces he’s made arrangements to be euthanized in his home state of Oregon, Brian is tasked with chauffeuring him for the trip. Accompanied by Raymond’s wife, Estelle, Brian must convince the old man to forego pre-arranged death before they reach their final destination. The story becomes an intimate trek through the tribulations of Raymond’s life and serves as a wake-up call to Brian in his own journey as a man, father, and husband.
Closing Night Film
(USA, 116 min)
Writer/Director: Ben Younger (in attendance)
Cast: Miles Teller, Aaron Eckhart, Katey Sagal
BLEED FOR THIS is the incredible true story of one of the most inspiring and unlikely comebacks in sports history. Miles Teller (Whiplash, Divergent) stars as Vinny “The Pazmanian Devil” Pazienza, a local Providence boxer who shot to stardom after winning two world title fights. After a near-fatal car accident leaves Vinny with a broken neck, he is told he may never walk again. Against all odds and doctor’s orders, renowned trainer Kevin Rooney (Aaron Eckhart) agrees to help Vinny return to the ring just a year after the accident for what could be the last fight of his life.