DREAM WEAVERS
Student Showcase puts stardom within reach
When the Florida film community gathered at Lynn University last week to celebrate some local kids done good, an impressive group of other local kids — with nine Grammy nominations, one Oscar nod, two Golden Globes and an appearance in a hit film series between them — joined in with congratulations and some advice.
“You have to be dedicated,” said Backstreet Boy and Orlando native Howie Dorough, one of several celebrities who presented awards to Florida high school and college filmmakers at the annual Student Showcase of Film, sponsored by the Palm Beach International Film Festival and the Palm Beach County Film and Television Commission.
He gathered for a photo backstage with Jupiter’s own legendary Burt Reynolds, Wellington’s Rob “Vanilla Ice” Van Winkle and actor and new Delray Beach resident Chris Hayes, whose movie credits include “Divergent.”
The awards ceremony, featuring a lively red carpet, presents more than $12,500 in scholarship money for local students in a variety of categories including short film, documentary and Public Service Announcements (PSA). Dorough and the other luminaries said they showed up for the kids as living examples of what happens when you start young and stick with it.
“This is everything. This is the beginning for them,” said Reynolds, a yearly fixture at the event and the benefactor of the $2,500 Burt Reynolds Scholarship for one talented high school senior. “If they didn’t really care about what they’re doing, they wouldn’t be here. The last three or four years, the winners had worked on every show made in Florida, and a few in New York. They’re really trying.”
Hayes, whose debut as a producer, a film called “Headgame,” was recently released, said he grew up admiring filmmakers like Steven Spielberg and being “entranced at the world he created,” and takes seriously the possibility of being that for someone else.
“I looked at all the possibilities
and figured it could happen to me, and that’s what I want for them,” he said of the student filmmakers. “It’s so cool to see their faces light up. There has to be an ambition level, that if you keep reaching for what you really want, you’re never gonna stop … You have to have a soft heart and rhino skin.”
Dorough had similar advice, explaining that after entering show business at age 6, it took another 13 years of near-misses and “no’s,” including being rejected from Ricky Martin-era Menudo “because I wasn’t fluent enough in Spanish” before becoming a member of the Backstreet Boys — along with West Palm Beach native A.J. McLean — at the age of 19.
“I always dreamed about this since I was a little kid,” he said. “You have to have persistence and not give up. There’s a lot more rejection than acceptance. Actually, these kids have a way better chance with all of the online opportunities available to them. (But) it’s not going to be handed to you.”