Baby Roger on the Move

It's been an eventful two months, Roger-wise, and I think the estimated date of premiere at the end of September is pretty realistic. Here's what's happened on the project since the last posting.

I auditioned a lot of really talented kiddos to read the poems throughout the film. Since the original reading, though, I've found a few more pieces I want to include in the film and need to have some re-reads and new auditions. That's on deck for the next few weeks. Just need to call back some folks and get the space booked.

I spliced together a quick DVD of the piece, giving the general tone and some examples of the work which I presented to the doc group of RI Film Collaborative. Got a lot of valuable feedback there, and reworked the script based on the best advice and brought it to my mentor in Boston the next week for another set of eyes. We went over the script and really tightened things up.

At that point, I put out a call for VO talent in NEFilm.com. So far the response has been lively and I continue to hunt, but I need to contact all the original respondents to get them going on solid auditions. I'm mainly looking for mature voiced actors, who aren't as easy to come by as you might think.

In the meantime, I've visited the Roger Williams Park Museum archives and have had some marvelous help there from one and all. Great images of the park and zoo really make the footage pop! Am arranging to get back up to the Park sooner rather than later...

And lastly, I went back to primary sources for the Roger story, spending a day with the archives of the Providence Journal, 1893. I was shocked. I thought I had done a thorough research job, but found that I hadn't gone back quite far enough before. Everything I thought I knew about how the fund raising got started was a lie!!! Now I have to rewrite that into both the book and the script. Am scrambling, as I have given myself a rough cut deadline as the end of next month.