These guys know Media is perfect place for horror
Media, the exact place I’m sitting as I write this column, has the chance to be seen in a feature film that is competing with 72 others to be pitched to the Duplass Brothers, known for various movie and TV projects such as “The Skelton Twins” and HBO’s’ current “Room 104.”
The chance depends on support from folks who tell the Duplasses to give native Delco producers Omri Dorani and Jeff Ayars, and their film, “This is Our Home” consideration in a nationwide contest, “Seed and Spark.” A vote includes a contribution that could be as small as $10, and earn you a “thank you” credit on “This is Our Home.” It seems a small price when you think how far any participation will mean for giving Omri, Rob Harmon, Jeff, and their collaborators the dream of making and starring in a movie while highlighting their hometown.
Jeff Ayars comes from a TV family. His dad, Robert, is an award-winning sports producer who earned a lot of Emmys for Comcast SportsNet before he moved to Connecticut to work with a sports network there. His mother, Rebecca, is an effective public relations pro and a great booster of dance wherever she is.
Jeff Ayars grew up primarily in Media in an 18th century farmhouse Bob and Becca owned. That house is where he and Omri Dorani and began putting their fantasies about the old house perhaps being haunted into acted scripts. The friends would shoot home movies in and around Media and shared hours watching classic movies and television shows together.
That’s how Media became the setting for “This is Our Home.” Omri and writing partner, Harmon, in association with Jeff and actress, Simone Policano, put together a story about the anxieties of modern relationships and added a note of horror to them. Jeff and Simone, who have performed together as actors in New York, play the leads in “This is Our Home.” Dorani directs.
Oh yes, the horror genre accounted for a lot of the movie watching Jeff and Omri did in the Ayars farmhouse.
Dorani, an Israeli director with Delco roots, talks in a “Seed and Spark” blurb explaining “This is Our Home” about wanting to produce a “relationship psycho drama” that would be scary but also speak to the mores of his generation, which he calls “indecisive” and “swipe-happy.”
When “Seed and Spark” came along, and interest mounted about Dorani and Ayars’s film, Jeff brought up that Media is known as “Everybody’s Hometown.”
As I look out, first on Baltimore Pike and later on State Street, I see what he means. My perception is helped further by a shot of State Street stores in the preview reel for “This is Our Home.” Dorani adds Media is historically “America’s First Free-Trade Town,” and he looks forward to buying props and other materials from local stores if “This is Our Home” is fully funded.
One thing Dorani may not know is what a great job Jesse Cline and Roger Ricker, of the Media Theatre, have done to train young actors right on State Street. With Jared Reed, Susan Wefel, Mark Swift, Zoran Kovcic, Brock Vickers, Penelope Reed and others nearby at Hedgerow Theatre, the producers won’t have far to go to recruit local talent for any parts that might need filling. Not to mention Jeff Coon and others who live in Delco.
The Seed and Spark web site, www.seedandspark.com/fund/thisisourhome#community gives a lot of information about “This is Our Home” and its creators. A visitor can support the movie via a pledge, read the bios of Ayars, Dorani, Harmon, and Policano, see a wish list about things they need to make their movie going faster, and see bits of “This is Our Home” while Dorani narrates a promo reel.
As I write, “This is Our Home” is in fifth place among projects competing for the Duplasses’ attention. Any standing in the Top Ten earns it a shot at completion and Media a potential place on national screens.
Watching some good music
Readers know Channel 12’s “On Your” and “Friday Arts” are among my favorite programs, not only because they introduce viewers to musicians and other performers they have a good chance of seeing live but because they represent local production of a kind no other station is doing.
“Friday Arts” attracts more attention than mine. It earned a recent Mid-Atlantic Emmy in the Outstanding Magazine Program category.
Both shows are produced by Trudi Brown and launched their seasons this past weekend.
Two of the first “On Tour” installments for this season were shot at the Ardmore Music Hall. Next’s weeks programs, airing 9 p.m. Oct. 19 and noon Oct. 22, feature Donavon Frankenreiter who is not only a musician but a world-class surfer who says his time among the waves influence his songwriting. Shows that aired this weekend headlined Melvin Seals. Keep an eye out for that show in rerun.
Ubiquitous musician-arranger Paul Jost and visits to nearby music venues are also mentioned by Brown as she talks about this program year. Brown, who was at Channel 10 before her near 30-year tenure at ‘HYY, was recently inducted into the MidAtlantic National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences’s Silver Circle Society for her career of broadcasting achievement.
More premiere’s this week
This is premiere week for the CW Network, seen locally on Channel 57.
Among shows making their season debuts this week are “Supergirl,” “The Flash,” “DC’s Legends of Tomorrow” and “Arrow” for comic book lovers, “Riverdale” for the melodrama fan, and a reincarnation of the ‘80s ABC hit, “Dynasty” starring Grant Show, Elizabeth Gillies, Nathalie Kelly, James Mackay, and Alan Dale for nostalgia fans.
The CW also offers a new show, “Valor,” airing at 9 p.m. tonight. It takes place an army base at which soldiers are trained for special op helicopter missions.
Personally, I am eager the new season of “Mr. Robot,” starting Wednesday of the USA Network; a pair of Netflix offerings, “The Meyerowitz Stories,” which features Dustin Hoffman, Ben Stiller, and Adam Sandler as a father and half-brothers, and “Mindhunters,” both starting Friday; and “White Famous,” with Jay Pharoah as a black comedian of the brink of fame, debuting Sunday on Showtime.
Fixing Comcast
Another mea culpa. I misunderstood something while writing last week at Comcast stations changing their names to show Comcast’s affiliation with NBC.
Heck, Comcast owns the Peacock.
The confusion concerns Philly and Philadelphia.
No need going into the mistake. The important thing is the web site for the new NBC Sports Philadelphia (once Comcast Sports Net) is www.nbcsportsphiladelphia.com and the site for NBC Sports Philadelphia Plus (once The Comcast Network) is www.nbcsportsphiladelphia+.com. “Philly” appears nowhere in either moniker.
Something tells me that as Flyers and Sixers season proceed, everyone will get used to the change and know the difference.