I Love You Because: September 2013

Cody Dubson, Samantha Dubson, Tonya Denmark, and Jomarie Elmoulakate

One of the advantages in adapting a play into a film is that the new medium (film) allows the filmmakers to expand the world of the play as well as to open up the often confining nature of a play. By necessity-as are many plays-9 months (the play ILYB is based on) is confined to only a few locations (this was ingeniously managed by simply moving flats and adding or detracting furniture), however, with film, those few locations can be turned into a dozen or more. Scenes that take place in a house can be moved outside, split into different scenes, the possibilities are endless.

An example of this sort of expansion is Scene 58 in I Love You Because. In the play, the lead character inadvertently scares off a group of trick-or-treaters who come to the door on Halloween. Because of set constraints, audience members were only able to see one side of the scene; the lead scaring the trick-or-treaters, and could only hear them scream as they ran away. In adapting the scene to film, we were able to show both sides; and since our resident writer, David Brown, does his best to make sure that every character has his or her chance to stand out, the scene was expanded to show the trick-or-treaters arriving with their parent, going up to the door and getting scared away.

Knowing that due to scheduling, we would only be filming the shots with the trick-or-treaters in them, and since these setups are relatively simple, we chose this part of the scene to be our first day of production. This is often done because simple scenes with uncomplicated shots are a great way to get the cast and crew into a rhythm and get used to working with each other.

Our first day of production on I Love You Because was a great success. Shooting went smoothly, the actors knew their lines and we were able to get all of the setups completed in a short amount of time. Thanks to the cast for making it such a fantastic experience!

A Note On The Cast:

We discovered Jomarie Elmoulakate, and Samantha and Cody Dubson (the trick-or-treaters) through auditions. All three are competent actors and took direction well. Whenever we asked them to change the way they said a line they did exactly as asked without any problems. Samantha, Jomarie and Cody were a pleasure to work with and we would recommend all three of them to anyone seeking young and talented actors. a large part of auditioning child actors includes auditioning their parents. No matter how great the child is to work with, the parents could make it a nightmare experience, so one wants to make sure no problems will arise on set with parents. We are pleased to say that Marissa Veles, Rick and Loretta Dubson were also a joy to work with and have on set. They stood to the side while filming and did not interfere in the slightest with filming in anyway. We also recommend these delightful parents. Don't hesitate to have any of these charming people on your film set.

We met Tonya Denmark (Trick-or-Treaters Parent) when she stage managed Death Trap, which David co-directed at The Moonlight Players Theater. We had never seen Tonya act, but when we were thinking of people to cast in the role, she was the first person we thought of, and she did not disappoint. Tonya knew her lines, took direction well and gave us exactly what we wanted when we asked her to change the way she was delivering a line. She even offered to stay longer and miss out on her son's game so that we could shoot shots with just Cody, Jomarie and Samantha in them first so they could leave earlier as all of them had a long distance to travel home. If you're looking for a talented actress who is great to work with, definitely consider casting Tonya in your film or play!

Here is a sneak peak at Scene 58 from I Love You Because