Show me the Money!

JB is on the telephone. “Our checking account number is 55521211212. When? Monday? That’s great!”

I am so happy. I’ve just gotten off the phone with a distributor, who has gotten us the financing for a film we’ve been trying to sell called “Avalon of the Heart.” “Avalon of the Heart” is an erotic romance piece. Oh, did I tell you why we wrote an erotic romance?

FLASHBACK – SIX MONTHS PREVIOUS

I was working with a longtime partner of mine, Eran. He had produced and directed a film called “The Rook,” which had done very well at festivals, and not quite as well as a sale. I was the line producer on that film, and we had been both friends and business partners ever since.

We were sitting around with the traditional indie filmmaker complaint – why can’t we sell our film when all these lousy films are out there. Well, we decided, if we couldn’t sell a quality art film, we’d write something commercial that was easy to sell. Neither of us were into violence, so we went the other way – sex.

Not porn, mind you. We figured that we’d write one of those R-rated movies that show up on cable at one in the morning. Of course, being artists, we couldn’t write just anything. It had to mean something. It had to have substance.

Thankfully, people seem to realize that now, because the distributor is transferring two million dollars on Monday to our account to make the movie!

Oh, right. The script. Well, they love the script. The story is about a beautiful young interior designer, who winds up in a romantic triangle. She falls for a Hispanic businessman who has come back to his old neighborhood in Brooklyn, and has bought the townhouse of his dreams. While shopping for the house, she meets an older, gruff German sculptor who shows her an entire world with S/M touches and control issues. Oh, its deep. It has sexual tension – we don’t see the lead female naked until the second act. Acts? Of course it has acts! We’re artists. That’s why we were able to get Michael Rappaport for the male lead.

What did you ask about the male lead? Well, yes, I did write him as Hispanic, but we needed a sellable name for the male lead. Let me explain.

You’ve written a great script. You’ve polished, framed and honed the script. The first thing potential distributors will ask? “Who is in it?” So, you go about attaching talent. What is the first thing their agents ask? “ Is it fully funded?” You tell them that it will be funded if their actor signs on. Click.

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