3 June Festivals - in NYC, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh

As we head into summer, we're gearing up for 3 festival screenings this month: 

The Pittsburgh Independent Film Festival, where we'll screen on Sunday June 16 at 6:40 PM at the Father Ryan Arts Center.  The screening will be followed by a q&a with writer/producer Mara Lesemann.

The Manhattan Film Festival, screening on Saturday June 22 at 7:15 PM at the Quad Cinema, 34 West 13th St. in Manhattan.  The screening will be followed by a q&a with director Laura Thies, writer/producer Mara Lesemann, and several cast members.

The Philadelphia Independent Film Festival, screening on Saturday June 29 at 4:00 PM at the Philadelphia Academy of the Fine Arts, 118 North Broad St., Philadelphia.  The screening will be followed by a q&a with director Laura Thies and writer/producer Mara Lesemann.





You can contact us at info@survivingfamily.us with questions on these or any other screenings!

Great Time at Trail Dance

Writer/Producer Mara Lesemann

Festival Director's Award &

Sarah Wilson's Best Actor Award

Surviving Family had a great screening at the Trail Dance Film Festival in Duncan, Oklahoma!  We had a large and (very) enthusiastic audience, which included many local film lovers in addition to the filmmakers who were attending the festival.  Their questions and (very) positive feedback extended through the q&a session and into the adjoining snack bar.

At the Saturday night awards ceremony, it was great to receive the Best Actor Award for Sarah Wilson (Trail Dance gives one award among both the men and women) as well as the Festival Director's Award, which goes to his choice for best combination of high quality movie plus audience buzz.

This is definitely a festival that will be on the list for the next movie project.

Next up:  the Green Bay (Wisconsin) Film Festival the first weekend in March, followed by Los Angeles Women's Film Festival , sponsored by the Alliance of Women Filmmakers, which takes place March 21-24.

A Fest, 3 Nominations, & a Trailer for the New Year!

We're delighted to kick off 2013 at the 7th annual Trail Dance Film Festival in Duncan, Oklahoma.  Surviving Family will screen there on Saturday January 26 at 2 PM, at the Simmons Center Theater.  To make the occasion even better, we've been nominated for 3 awards:  Best Feature Drama, Best Actor (male or female) - Sarah Wilson, and Best Director - Laura Thies.

To mark the occasion, we're rolling out a new trailer this week; you can check it out here:

Some thoughts on mental illness and suicide



Lorraine Sage as Lucia Giaccone Malone receives
electric shock treatment in a flashback scene.  Barry
Salmon, who also composed the score for Surviving Family,
plays the doctor and Nedra McClyde is the nurse.



Katherine Hughes, pictured at right (with Sarah Wilson,who stars as Terry Malone) plays Lily Fulton,
a teen ager recently diagnosed with bi-polar disorder.



Surviving Family is first a drama - with a dose of comedy - about Terry Malone's upcoming marriage to Alex D'Amico.  But it's also about Terry's mother's mental illness and the emotional scars that the entire family carries  from her suffering and suicide.  It's about both the failures and the successes of psychiatric treatment, and the hope that things will improve.

The National Institue of Mental Health recently reported that 20% of adult Americans suffered from some form of mental illness last year, and that 8 million adults seriously considered suicide (see this article for more).  It's an issue that impacts my family, my husband's family, and many of the families that I know.

I wrote Surviving Family to take on some of these issues - not as a documentary, and not to lecture or preach.  But to support the idea that, with proper treatment (whether prescription drugs, or therapy, or a combination of both), many people with mental illnesses can and should be productive members of society. 

The failure of treatment is represented by Terry's mother, Lucia Giaccone Malone, who is wonderfully portrayed by Lorraine Sage.  And my hope for the future is shown in young Lily Fulton, played by the terrific young actress Katherine Hughes. 

"Surviving" in Kentucky & Munich



Writer/Producer Mara
Lesemann with PJ Stokes,
director of the River City Festival
of Films, Owensboro, KY

 Mara Lesemann & Laura Thies
answer audience questions
in Munich, Germany



The Neues Gabriel Kino
Theater in Munich, German



Director Laura Thies introduces
Surviving Family in Munich



Surviving Family had its European premiere on the evening of November 7 at Munich's Neues Gabriel Kino theater, in front of an enthusiastic full house.  Director and Munich native Laura Thies organzed and hosted the event, which was attended by indie film lovers and filmmakers from around Germany and as far away as Switzerland.

We were thrilled to confirm our expectation (and hope!) that the story and characters do truly cross borders.

A few days before Munich, it was great to introduce Kentucky audiences to the Malone family at the River City Festival of Films in Owensboro, KY.  Festival director and filmmaker P.J. Starks put together a terrific event that offered the opportunity to network with filmmakers from throughout the region.

There's No Place Like Home: The Joys of a Local Festival



Left to right:  Director Laura Thies,
Festival Director Bill Sorvino, &
Best Supporting Actress nominee
Tara Westwood



Above: great turnout from cast & crew

I've loved taking Surviving Family to film festivals over the past few months:  we premiered in Massachussetts, and have since screened in Florida, Ohio, Washington, California, Arkansas, and Toronto.  But as Dorothy says in The Wizard of OZ, "There's no place like home."

We had our local premiere on Friday night October 12 in the Landmark Loews Theater in Jersey City, as part of the Golden Door Film Festival to a large and enthusastic crowd.  Many of the NY-based cast and crew were on hand, as were friends, family, and indie film lovers from the area. 

At the awards ceremony on Sunday night, we were thrilled to pick up 4 awards:  Best Actress (Sarah Wilson), Best Supporting Actress (Phyllis Somerville), the Alice Guy Blache Female Filmmaker Award (director Laura Thies), and the Best Local Movie.  We were nominated for an amazing 11 awards in total:  another Best Supporting Actress nomination for Tara Westwood, Best Director, Best Feature, Best Cinematography (Timothy Naylor), Best Editing (Laura Thies), Best Screenplay (Mara Lesemann), and Best Costume Design (Cortney Hillman). 

Adding to the fun of evening, actor Paul Sorvino, best known for his role in Goodfellas and the uncle of festival director Bill Sorvino, was on hand to present the Spirit of New Jersey Award to actor and artist Federico Castelluccio, who is well known to fans of The Sopranos for his role as Furio, the Italian hitman who caught Carmella Soprano's eye.

It will be great to take the movie back on the road - next on the agenda is the River City Festival of Films in Owensboro, KY in early November.  But it was GREAT to be the home team for the weekend!

Awards and Audiences

Director Laura Thies

Writer/producer Mara Lesemann

Executive Producer Carlo Fiorletta

We survived our marathon weekend of 3 film festivals in fine form, and even prospered.  Executive Producer Carlo Fiorletta brought back from the Indie Gathering not just the Best Actress award for our leading lady, Sarah Wilson, but also the Audience Favorite Award.  And we were thrilled to receive the Best Narrative Feature award from the Columbia Gorge International Film Festival.

Labor Day weekend brought another screening, this time at the terrific Central Florida Film Festival, where Surviving Family was a finalist for the Best Narrative Feature Award.

Director Laura Thies even made it home to Germany in time for her brother's wedding!

But the best, the most rewarding part of these festivals has been the audience reaction at each and every one of them, which has made us realize that yes, we really do have a good movie here.  What matters are the two women who grabbed me after a screening to tell me how much it meant to them, and how much it touched them.  And the people who were thrilled to find out that a second screening had been added, because they had missed the first one and their friends had loved it.  And the guy sitting behind me in a theater who laughed at each and every one of the humorous parts - even the one that comes so early in the movie that most viewers haven't yet realized that this is a movie where it IS OK to laugh.

Next up is the Toronto Indie Fest - we screen at the Toronto Underground Cinema at 186 Spadina Avenue in Toronto on Monday evening September 10 at 6 PM.  The beautiful and talented Tara Westwood, who stars as Jean Malone Fulton, will join me for this one.

More soon....