Chirp Updates and Some Opportunities

Hey There,

Yes, I know it's been a while. This has been a long crazy five months since Chirp opened in theaters in December. We've had a recession pretty much destroy America as we know it, DVD sales are down 32.5% and no one really knows what the heck is going on or how to make any money in the entertainment biz, seeing how basically everyone loves stealing movies and music. I hope Washington is listening, because frankly, more than I give a damn about Chrysler joining with Fiat, I'm really worried that there won't be a legit industry which will churn out all the awesome movies, music and books that I love to consume. Ah well...time will tell.

So what have I been up to, eh? I've been a bit nuts, traveling back and forth all over the place, working on several new scripts and finally sitting down to get things rolling on the next big feature film project (and other projects, too).

1st things first - Yes, Let Them Chirp Awhile will be coming out on DVD. I hear that there might be a blu-ray disc avail. as well, and maybe even a director's commentary and some of the behind the scenes stuff that was shot on set by our script supervisor and videographer E.M. Cady. These things are being arranged in the next couple weeks.

2nd - I've got several new scripts that are ready to launch into production and I'm developing my own web series which will be something like 12 min episodes delivered bi-weekly for your entertainment. No it will not be another ripoff of Curb Your Enthusiasm, It's Always Sunny, or The Office...expect something far more insane, outlandish and not quite so comedic, either. If you're an investor/financier interested in throwing some money my way for producing any one of these little critters, shoot me an email via my attorney (see my website). And if you're an actor or crew person, you can find me on Facebook.

3rd - The tractor beam that is LA is sucking me in, and I should have a new home address there very soon. Stay tuned.

Happy Summer!
Jonny Blitstein

Interview with Blitstein on NYC Magnet

FIRST PUBLISHED ON NYC MAGNET DEC 9, 2008


Jonathan Blitstein has been commended for his film debute and he is most definitely worth all the talk. This young screenwriter and director is one to keep your eye on (for those who like watching movies) and a force to be reckoned with (for those who like making movies).

Although the film was highlighted here on Magnet just a week or so ago, after seeing the cinematic magic in it’s entirety, I can’t help but talk about it some more. The film is full of dialogue and while some predominantly dialogue driven films may cause you to snooze, Let Them Chirp Awhile is sure to do the opposite. Therefore I say, go right on ahead chirping because it is immensely satisfying to listen to, not to mention hilarious in the subtle everyday happenings of the young artists. The camera angles are like chocolate truffles for your eyeballs. One of my favorite scenes, and I have many, occurs when Charlotte and Bobby are strolling down the middle of the street. At first glance there is not much going on, but then your eyes are welcomed by steam seeping through the street vents and the headlights about a block or so behind them cast these resplendent diamonds that dance all around the frame. Beautiful.

Magnet is honored to have corresponded with Jonathan Blitstein himself and he was gracious enough to answer a few of our questions.

Magnet: How did you get Anthony Rapp to be in the film? That was incredible.

Jonathan Blitstein: Anthony visited my high school in chicago for our bi-annual FOCUS on the arts. he talked about new york, and since i had just gotten into NYU film school i spoke to him and he encouraged me to pursue my dream. he had gone to film school but later dropped out because he was cast in RENT. when i got to NYC i got a coffee with him and we kept in touch on and off. then when i was making my film, i came up with the idea, and i sent it to his agent and i said REMEMBER ME? I’M MAKING A MOVIE NOW…and we got in touch, he read the script and agreed to do it. Anthony has been a wonderful friend to me in the last couple years and I’m a big supporter of his work. He’s very bright and talented.

M: Of the whole moving making process, what part is your favorite?

JB: I love the idea process. It’s when you sit in a coffee shop and just take notes and imagine your next film. And after that, I really love shooting. I like having a lot of people around, it’s like being in theater. It feels like a family and if you are kind to people, you can achieve a real wonderful aura on set of excitement. I also love the smell of fresh dry erase markers that the assistant cameraman uses to mark the slate. so being on set is good. I also like the junk food at the crafty table.

M: We have heard that you are praised for your “unique eye”, is it your right or left?

JB: I guess it’s my left because I’m a lefty…i operate and look thru the viewfinder of the camera with my left eye. I wish i was a cyclops though. Mono-vision must be super intense. i can’t imagine being able to walk, but it would be awesome to just have one big eye on the center of your face. You could tell so many great party jokes. But if someone said something like “keep your eye on the prize”, you could just stare at them silently and they’d probably just feel awful…it already sounds like a seinfeld episode.

M: Only eighteen days of filming.. Is that even physically possible? What’s your secret?

JB: Haha, it’s no secret. it’s just economical filmmaking. lemonade out of lemons. I knew I had to do the film in the fewest days possible, so I broke down the script and stacked as many scenes with certain actors on certain days. I decided to cover most of my scenes in 3 shots or less, some with a single shot. I agreed to do 1-2 takes of everything, not much more than that. And then i storyboarded about 450 drawings so when I would arrive at set, my cinematographer and I would know exactly what we were trying to achieve. It saved time. We also just did a lot of guerilla style stuff like stealing shots at night, and not wasting time to get things perfect. if it was good enough, we shot and moved on. that was the only way to do it.

As for “physically possible”…well, I collapsed due to extreme pain from an ulcer in my stomach that i developed on the film from drinking too much coffee, taking too much vitamins, and not sleeping, all on an empty stomach. they hopped me up on morphine at the Emergency room at beth israel hospital in NYC and I directed a scene or two while I was high, sitting in a gown with an IV in my arm, over the phone. so, maybe it’s not really physically possible, but i didnt die, so that’s good Although…Spielberg made “Duel” in 12 days, but they had 3 cameras, a hollywood crew, and like…a zillion dollars.

M: If you could work with anyone in the film bizz, who would it be and why?

JB: That’s easy…here’s my list:

Actor - Leo DiCaprio. He’s a living genius and the best of his generation. He is a real craftsman, one of a kind.

Producer - Scott Rudin. I can only imagine that Scott Rudin is the best script reader alive. Every film he green-lights turns to gold. Not only does he cultivate and allow for artistic expression, he understands how to put together a film that is both commercially viable and also meaningful. If you have him in your corner, you’re lucky.

CHIRP will "roost awhile" says VARIETY!

FIRST PUBLISHED IN VARIETY DEC 3, 2008
By RONNIE SCHEIB

Artistic aspirations and romantic entanglements stalk the East Village streets in tyro helmer Jonathan Blitstein's goofily engaging Gotham comedy, "Let Them Chirp Awhile." Fresh out of NYU film school, Blitstein films what he knows: His tale of a young filmmaker's writer's block gleefully incorporates all manner of antic styles, from Mack Sennett-style double-takes to Felliniesque black-and-white pantomime. That Blitstein pulls off this tiredly self-reflexive conceit with relative panache is due in no small part to the scruffy grace of leads Justin Rice ("Mutual Appreciation") and indie fixture Brendon Sexton III. Opening Dec. 5 in New York, "Chirp" may roost awhile.

Bobby (Rice), attempting to write his first screenplay, lives largely inside his own mind. When not engaging in stream-of-consciousness voiceover to vent his doubts and frustrations, or getting sidetracked by infinite irrelevancies and false starts, he lies about his progress while casually hooking up with current g.f. Dara (Laura Breckenridge), a college frosh some seven years his junior, or hanging out with lifelong best bud Scott (Sexton).

Unlike the idealistic Bobby, Scott always waffles between two extremes -- his day job as corporate marketer and his nighttime work as rock musician wannabe -- and similarly wavers between Michelle (Pepper Binkley), his live-in girlfriend of four years, and Ariel (Amy Chow), his Korean mistress of four months. Most tellingly, Scott's moral compass falls somewhere between Bobby's upright humanism and the cynical egomania of Bobby's nemesis, successful playwright Hart (Zach Galligan).

Encroaching on Neil LaBute/Woody Allen territory with a callowness that almost proves charming, Blitstein maintains an absurdist distance from his characters' hangups that sometimes turns literal, such as when the camera follows a couple's argument from blocks away. At the same time, an "Umberto D"-like subplot, wherein Bobby loses the Jack Russell terrier entrusted to his reluctant care by an ex-girlfriend, occasions pic's most parodic, over-the-top closeup reactions of panic and desperation (no "Wendy and Lucy," this).

But Blitstein's lead actors consistently translate awkward self-consciousness into effortlessly executed soft-shoe. Rice brings a boyish ingenuousness to his role that disarms all comers, and his interactions with Sexton, a past master at self-sabotage of every stripe, transform potentially awkward exchanges into seamless setpieces.

This perfectly modulated control of tone rarely extends much further than the tete-a-tetes where these two thesps hold sway, however. The difficulty Bobby expresses in relating to the world outside his head also plagues his creator. Thus, although a pretentious 9/11-set play by the ever-opportunistic Hart is wonderfully awful, Bobby's shushed expressions of shocked disbelief seem forced, as does the gushing audience's inane praise.

Tech credits are a cut above most location-shot no-budgeters, Blitstein having opted to shoot in 35mm.

More than one option

• (Person) Jack Russell
  Actor, Screenplay, Writer
• (Person) Jack Russell
  Actor
• (Person) Jack Russell

Camera (color), Andrew Shulkind; music, Giulio Carmassi; production designer, Michael Bednark; art director, David Brenner; sound, Josh Neal; supervising sound editor/sound designer, Cory Choy; casting, Blitstein, Heidi Handelsman. Reviewed on DVD, New York, November 28, 2008. Running time: 92 MIN.

Laura Breckenridge to star on GOSSIP GIRL

Laura Breckenridge, the talented actress who plays "Dara" in Let Them Chirp Awhile has been cast on the hit TV show Gossip Girl and is already shooting scenes in New York City this week. Laura will play a new teacher working at the characters' school and EW.com says she will be mistaken for a student early on. Chuck Bass, watch out!

A big congratulations from all the cast and crew of Chirp!

From CHICAGO MAROON - Blitstein on "following your own path"

First published in the Chicago Maroon...

Chicago native Jonathan Blitstein fought against the odds to become one of the youngest filmmakers ever to write, direct, and produce a feature film.

By Ilana Kowarski
Updated: 2008-12-02

Chicago native Jonathan Blitstein is coming back to the City of Broad Shoulders to show his award-winning independent film Let Them Chirp Awhile, and he couldn’t be happier. Just 23 years old and a recent graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts when he made his movie, 26-year-old Blitstein is one of the youngest filmmakers ever to write, produce, direct, and edit his own 35mm independent feature film. “I always dreamed about making something and bringing it back home. That’s everybody’s dream, to do something and bring it home,” Blitstein said.

So when his film won Best Feature at the East Lansing Film Festival, it was just icing on the cake. “I couldn’t even believe I was at that film festival. I kept on thinking they were going to come up to me and say, ‘This movie sucks. This is like a school project.’” Now, Blitstein’s taking his movie to New York, Los Angeles, and a theater near you.

Let Them Chirp Awhile is a coming-of-age story about twentysomethings trying to make it in New York City. Forced at times to choose between their friends and their careers, the characters in this movie grapple with issues of self-reliance, competition, and loyalty. According to Blitstein, this movie is “really about relationships and what we owe to our friends.” He hopes that his audience will come away from his movies with a new perspective on how to strike a balance between their own dreams and their relationships with others.

“One of the big problems of peoples’ lives is that people paralyze themselves, always checking up on somebody else to see what everybody else is doing,” Blitstein said. “The people that do well in life are the people that aren’t so focused on that. What I want to do is convince people to believe in their own ideas and the courage of their own convictions and to stop worrying about what everybody else is chirping about. I know so many people with the entrepreneurial spirit, and I want to really inspire those people.”

Blitstein has certainly followed his own advice. A graduate of Highland Park High School in the Chicago suburbs, Blitstein said that, as a child, he was told that the only ways to make a living were by being a doctor or a lawyer, but from the beginning he had a sense that he wanted to do something different. He fell in love with film and experimented with it whenever he could. Both insecure and independent as a child, Blistein said he felt like an outsider. “In school, anytime there was a chance to make a video project, I would do it. I was that kid with big ideas that always got frustrated. I was an outgoing child in a place that was sort of repressed.”

Although his parents told him they would be supportive of him regardless of what he did, they encouraged him to pursue easier-to-attain goals. Blitstein was undaunted. No shining star in college, Blitstein said he doubted that any of his fellow students at Tisch expected him to go very far. “If you asked them then if I would be a person to make a feature film, I would have been the last person they would have expected to do it,” he said.

With very little funding and less name recognition, Blitstein had to overcome many obstacles. The aspiring auteur relied on the financial support of his family and friends, both to support himself and to make his movie. In order to get actors to be in his film, he began cold-calling talent agencies, at first with little success. But once he figured out that the people picking up the phone were enthusiastic young people like himself, he felt more comfortable, and he was able to convince them to read his script.

After actors read Blitstein’s script and liked it, they agreed to meet with him. Blitstein was particularly shocked when actor Zach Galligan (who played Billy Peltzer in Gremlins) agreed to a meeting. Blitstein remembered watching the movie Gremlins as a child and said it was strange for him to meet the lead actor of the movie he loved. Blitstein confessed, “I had to have two whiskeys to talk to him.”

Even though making his own movie was hard, Blitstein believes it was worth it. “I’ve always been inspired by the people that went out and did things themselves,” he said. “I was really bitten by the bug that to have integrity and be your own boss was really important.”

'BLITSTEIN UNBOUND' (The Making of CHIRP AWHILE)

First Published on WILD ABOUT MOVIES.COM

Wild About Movies publisher Tim Nasson recently asked "Let Them Chirp Awhile" director Jonathan Blitstein to tell you, Wild About Movies devotees, all about his first movie - in theaters December 5, 2008.

We didn't want to burden him with having to write an epistle, and hoped he'd be able to give us the time required to write an intelligent, engaging 500 word essay; which, for you non-writers, knows takes even a writer with years of experience - at least - an hour.

Well, do we have a treat for you... much more than we expected... and a lot more than you did, for sure. We're certain that you'll be running to Fandango, or whatever online movie site it is you use to buy movie tickets in advance, to snatch up your tickets for "Let Them Chirp Awhile," before the seats are all gone...

“Blitstein Unbound”

So, I had gone to film school but was all mixed up and working at a marketing agency in December of 2005, bummed out and feeling low, sitting in a cubicle depressed and stuff. I knew that I still wanted to make that first feature film, as it had been my dream since I was about 15 years old. So I quit the job. My dad told me I was nuts and at this point I’ve just gotten used to that, people tell me that all the time. But I quit the nice paycheck, health benefits, 2 weeks paid vacation, you know, those things that people used to have when jobs were easy to find and the economy wasn’t in the toilet.

Speaking of economy, that’s a solid way to describe the way I think about filmmaking. Even though we ran out of film every day on set and I had to do the film in 1-2 takes for almost every single shot, I think I’d still shoot 15 takes or less even if I had a bigger budget and more time. I care about making sure my crew is happy. It can get tedious and hot on set. And it’s much easier on the editor with less takes. Additionally, I think economically not just in terms of time and budget, but in form and style. I like to determine the fewest shots necessary to cover the scene effectively without drawing the audience’s attention to the camera. I learned that from Hitchcock and Spielberg I think. So, I storyboarded about 450 drawings for the film. These look like something a one-eyed sixth grader would draw, I’m terrible in that way, but I know what the pictures mean, and my DP could decipher it without holding them up to a mirror. Because of the boards, I was able to pre-edit the film in my head. That was the only way to make the film in the few days that we made it in. And it also freed me up, because I came to set knowing exactly what we needed. We never just shot “coverage”. Coverage is what you shoot when you don’t know what you’re doing.

Anyway, lets back up a bit. So I was a free man, broke and eating PB+J and Ramen all day, and started working as a production assistant, pouring coffee and whatnot, and reading a lot of books. I think I re-read a favorite called Hitchcock-Truffaut and also a lot of Dostoevsky. There’s a lot of time to read and worry and question your life when you’re fire-watching a truck filled with equipment. Anyway, I had written some stuff, not really a full screenplay yet, but the last three or four years of my life had been nuts. I saw a lot of my friends struggling, paralyzed and burnt out from fear of failure. The plane that flew into the World Trade Center flew over my head and I saw people jumping out of windows about 10 days after I started NYU as an eighteen year old wide-eyed midwesterner. Not fun stuff. So, the story for the film came out of real life, but none of the characters are “me” and I never took care of no dog in exchange for a sexual favor. And I wish I had so many girls after me like “Bobby” does in the film, but I never did. People always ask that.

I had been thinking about my first feature in theory for four years. The process of developing the actual script was 4 months, and the actual sitting at the computer to write it was 27 days. Let me make something clear. My first choice for an independent debut feature was never a movie about young people in NYC, talking. Man I wanted so badly to make The Godfather or E.T. I just could not afford to make an animatronic robot alien, so my E.T. 2 script just went in the garbage. And Brando was one foot in the grave at that time. I was acutely aware that in order to make a first feature I had to use what I got. “Make lemonade out of lemons” my grandmother would say. I wasn’t gonna sit around and wait for a bunch of money, or move to LA and work my way up by kissing ass to suits so that by the time someone wanted to pay for me to direct my first movie, my soul would be compromised. Hell no. I was dead set on making an indie feature no matter what. If I had to do it on 8mm, I would have. Even when I was doubting myself and thinking of working as an architect or going back to law school or something, I always wanted to be my own boss. That’s something I learned from Bob Dylan very early on in life.

So, right about then, I started obsessing over Kubrick’s Fear and Desire and DePalma’s Greetings, and Cassavetes Shadows, and Fellini’s I Vitelloni. Fantastic early films by some great dudes. I started studying them and thinking about how to make a low budget movie. I kind of enjoyed the fact that it would be a personal film, at least in the thematic stuff. Really I knew at that point I realized I had to make a talky movie with people talking a lot. The budget which at the time was like $12,000 dollars dictated the genre for me. I had to shoot in New York, I couldn’t afford to fly somewhere else. NYC would have to be my set, cuz I couldn’t afford to build one. I have to admit, I tried to come up with a science fiction idea that could take place in one room, but I just couldn’t, so I turned to “slice-of-life” comedy. That’s a natural progression you know, really it is.

The plot came later.

I wanted to make a black and white film, man. I really did. I had a bit of money saved from a waitering job at a restaurant in my hometown, and I was dead set on shooting b+w 16mm. I’m still reticent to do HD. I thought to myself, if it ain’t Kodak, it’s not a real movie. So here’s what happened, I started thinking of casting my friends and making this weird little tale in my apartment and in maybe 2 or 3 locations. I was thinking about Cassavetes and kept telling myself I could do it, I could it. But I still wanted it to feel different than just boring realism. I wanted to make a Hollywood stylized movie on a 12,000 dollar budget. I started sniffing around for some more money and some free equipment and stuff. All the people I ever worked for crawled out of the woodwork like glowing white rabbits and hooked me up like crazy. It was unexpected and I was shocked and grateful. And family and friends threw in some dough too. Suddenly I had a truck full of lighting, vehicles, walkie talkies for my production team and a dude at Kodak was all like “I’m gonna get you a bunch of 35mm color negative” and suddenly this movie was a 35mm color feature.

But I wanted to keep things small, so we had a tiny crew of about 30 people, and there was some cash left over in pre-pro and I thought to myself, “Self, why don’t you get on the horn and see if you can get some real actors in this thing” …but let’s come back to the actors in a second …See, something that people don’t know about me (yet) is that I love style and lighting and camera work. I used to want to be a photographer and there was a while there when I wanted to be a cinematographer too, and a magician like Houdini. And while I love talky movies, I really grew up on Zemeckis and Spielberg and Hitchcock and Lucas and I like stylized action packed stuff. That’s not to say I don’t love a slow paced artfilm. Man, I worship the slowest paced movies like Blowup, but in my deep child-soul or whatever, I like watching Pee Wee’s Big Adventure and Back to the Future II.

So look, this was back in 2006 when the landscape of indie cinema was different. No on was distributing straight to iTunes, and Jimmy takes the Elevator or The Squishy Couch or whatever movies hadn’t been on anyone’s radar. Juno hadn’t even been written yet, I don’t think. In fact there were still a lot of indie distributors still going to festivals and buying movies. (That’s over. They’ve all folded this year due to stupidity and wasteful spending, and bad scripts mostly). So I wanted to make my film really stylized and weird. So my movie has wall-to-wall classical music. It’s lit in a cool way thanks to a wonderful DP named Andy Shulkind who also went to NYU.

The world of Chirp is a crazy heightened reality man, where people steal each others ideas and it’s the end of the world. Anyway, back to the actors…so here’s what happened, I hadn’t heard of this Bujalski dude or Funny Ha-ha, but I had been writing to this teacher at Boston University because I was obsessing over Cassavetes and Herzog films and he was the Cassavetes master and had written a couple books on him.

This professor dude Ray Carney, a really brilliant guy told me I should meet this actor Justin Rice. I looked up his band Bishop Allen, and I saw one photo of him and I said, “that’s the dude to play Bobby”. He was like Jason Schwartzman’s long lost brother meets young awkward Nicolas Cage (see Coppola’s early films). I met Justin for dinner in NYC. We got along and he liked the script and that was that. This was all still before Mutual Appreciation came out and stuff. Had I known then how big Justin and Mr. Bujalski were going to be, and all the stigma attached to the mumblecore movement as a movement, I may never have gone after Justin, but I shouldn’t even say that, because his performance is great and unique and more neurotic in my movie, and I really loved working with him. He’s very talented and took direction quite well. He is also a director himself and a Harvard grad. Working with bright people is always a pleasure. So anyway, I had this leftover cash and I realized I could shoot my film in 18 days and stack the actors on certain blocks of shoot days, so like only needed the “Michelle” character scenes to shoot for 6 days and then “Hart” character for 3 days. So I started cold-calling agents of actors I loved who lived in NYC and talking to their assistants and lying and whatnot and telling them I was going to be the next big important director and they had better read my script because I was a badass dude of some kind. Anyway, they read it and liked it and passed it along and the script got passed to the agents and then the actors.

This was the first point in the making of the film

that I actually felt like my script might have actually been good. Cuz at this point the actors started wanting to meet me for a drink. I remember meeting Galligan, and I was a HUGE, I mean HUGE Gremlins fan. I had to drink two glasses of straight scotch to be able to talk to him. I know that may sound silly but I grew up in this really quiet town in Illinois, and like, I’m still starstruck sometimes. But Zach was a personal favorite of mine. Zach, Downey Jr. and Michael J Fox. Love those guys. Anyway, the actors all thought I was this precocious little psychopath but since they only had to be on set for a few days and since they liked the script, and since they were actually paid and the film was affiliated with the Screen Actors Guild and all kosher in that way and stuff, they were eager to work on it. One of the actors later told me on day four of shooting, that it was about as indie as you could get without it being a student film. I took that like a man, I swear I did.

Once I had actors I started cold-calling companies and trying to get them to let me use their logos and stuff because I hate when you see blacked out logos or fake stuff like Cheerios is written as “Cereal-ios”, it’s so phoney and takes you out of the story. Anyway, Pabst Blue Ribbon beer let us use their logo, and we are the first indie to ever shoot in American Apparel which was pretty neat. I also had to ask Neil LaBute (The Shape of Things) to use his name in my film for this one scene, and he ended up liking the scene and he added his own line of dialogue for Galligan’s character. It was super cool. LaBute is awesome. We actually studied under the same scriptwriting teacher at NYU but about 10 years apart.

So bang, I had my actors and we shot the movie, with about 2 production assistants and we stole shots guerilla style when we had to, and did practically the whole film in a couple takes per shot. And we got it in the can…AND THEN – on the Sunday night before day 12 of 18, I thought I was getting sick, so I gulped down two Airbornes and Emergen-C and then some vitamin-B12 I think and I had a big black coffee from Dunkin and then I took a nap. I awoke 8 hours later and raced to set, and was feeling really bad. It was like my stomach was being stabbed by the Lilliputians in Gulliver’s Travels…little men with spears, poking me. And we got the scene lit and then I collapsed. My UPM took me to the hospital nearby and they put me on a big morphine drip, a huge needle right in my veins, and I was like high man, and seeing little dumbo elephants flapping around in circles above me like some cracked out mobile, and I ruined my girlfriend’s birthday and I was in bed for 8 hours. The doctors told me I had like a minor ulcer and I needed to chill out with the coffee. And then they told me I was born with one-kidney which is actually common, and thankfully my other kidney is slightly large so it’s like one awesome bigger kidney. From that moment on I have been reluctant to both go snowboarding, ride motorcycles and get really wasted.

So I talked the entire time to my DP and I directed one of the scenes from the gurney, no joke. I had the DP tell me over the phone what was seeing in the frame from top to bottom. I mean, I trusted him because he’s very bright and he knew what I wanted, we only had a few days left of the shoot and he knew my style by then. And the actors and I had rehearsed. It was like playing back a tape of what we already had done. That scene came out great. I’m not going to tell you which scene it is. You’d never know I wasn’t on set. I figure that ain’t half-bad, since you always hear about a lot of stupid directors letting their DP’s direct their movies anyway and they get the money all the credit for it. That’s not fair. So if you ever meet Andy, you can thank him for his fabulous direction in that one scene which I’m not going to mention. Anyway, I came back to set and finished the film and ate only bread and water for 6 days and lost about 20 pounds or something. And then I edited the film in 47 days straight on a 12 inch mac laptop that kept crashing. And then post production took forever. And then sales agents from a few big companies told me my film wasn’t commercial enough for sundance because it wasn’t like Little Miss Sunshine enough… and blah blah… that’s a whole nuther story. But then some cool people saw it and said they loved it …I sent it last minute to the Woodstock Film Festival and they loved it and premiered it on opening night, packed the house. I got some great reviews.

Buzz happened, then more festivals…then months of lying in bed wanting to just just take a bottle of sleeping pills cuz I was waiting and waiting for someone to buy the movie, and I dealt with shitty people all along who tried to screw me. Watch out for lawyers who want you to pay an advance, make sure to tell them to buzz off. Anyway, I went out on my own to LA and found a distributor who was amazing and loved the movie but didn’t have any money for the actual distribution. So then I went out and found investors. I figured if I could make a feature, I could find more money on my own. And I did. Maybe my psycho excitement just convinced people. Anyway, I put the investors in touch with the distributor and bang. Movie in theaters December 2008. And the best part is that I still own my negative and all the rights. Not a bad deal yeah? Anyway, that’s the story. You’ll have to excuse me, though, I’ve got to get back to my 450 page screenplay about nanorobots bringing on the singularity. And I’ve got a big pot of ramen on the stove and I’m burning copies of the New York Times to keep the fire going, no heat in my building. And sorry about the 500 words, I guess that’s about 2500 words instead. Sorry, I got carried away I guess.

Yours Truly,
Jonny B

Updates from THE FRONT...chirp-chirp.

NEWS ON THE MARCH...So, my dear friends, lots of news to share this brisk New York morning after Thanksgiving. I just arrived back in the city after a whirlwind journey to my old haunts in Chicagoland, spent the evening with cousins and friends and family, much of which was exhausted by tickling the old ivories to the tunes of Bob Dylan and The Band (old family favorites, of course) and eating too much.

Ah well, here I am now excited to bring you news from the front. Yes, we are opening in four (that's right) F-O-U-R cities. NYC, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Winnipeg (that's in Canada, so they tell me). If things go well, I'm told the movie will screen in other fabulous nooks and crannies hidden away in the vast American expanse. Such hopefuls are Boston, Washington DC, Austin, San Francisco, Philadelphia, and maybe St. Louis. If you want the film to be screened in your city, here's what you can do. Take a knife and put fake blood all over it. Then, use magic marker and write "Program Let Them Chirp Awhile at this theater, OR ELSE" and make sure to write it all squiggly-like so no one knows it's you, then stick the knife through the paper, and jam it right in the wall of the box office. Your local cinema manager will be all "excited", and I'll get a call that they want the movie, and you'll probably be held in your local police station until your parents can bail you out (just in time to see the movie), so everyone wins! Right? No, don't do that. But really, you can call your theater and tell them you really want to see the film screened in your town. Direct them to our website which has all the info about distribution (www.letthemchirpawhile.com)

For those of you down under, we might be doing a screening or two near Sydney and Brisbane, Australia. That's right mate, we could grab some hot brekky at Mackers and then in the arvo head to Bondi Beach for an open-air screening! Yeh? Who's in?

Reviews - those will be coming out this week. Cross your fingers for this little movie. I hear we'll be in Variety.

Trailers - they're on Moviefone, NYTimes.com, Apple.com, and Yahoo! (just in case you haven't seen the trailer, it's everywhere)

Clips - there's a clip from the film that will be up on the Cinematical.com blog I think early next week.

Interviews - I did some interviews. Some will be popping up online next week and in a few papers.

Q+A's - yes, I will be at the opening weekend in NYC and in Chicago and LA for question and answer sessions after the film screenings. In NYC, I'll have a few of the cast members including the fabulous Justin Rice, and my music composer, to answer questions. Zach Galligan will be there on Sunday the 7th of Dec in NYC with me, and if you bring your Gremlins stuff, he might just sign it, if you're nice. Just don't make any jokes about eating after midnight.

News from an apartment in NYC

Howdy. Hopefully if you live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, by now you've seen the posters. They're all over the place. Of course you'd like to imagine I have hired a team of poster-"snipers" as they are called, to paint the town. But no, I'm too hands on for that. (aka, we don't have enough budget). So, the other night, a friend and I rented a car and sped around town putting up posters. Thankfully it wasn't a bitter cold night like the ones we've had all last week. Over the next 48 hours we're gonna hit the East Village and Union Square. Keep eyes out you Manhattanites. Anyway, I'm working from my little home "office" if you can call it that, with the heater blazing hot, and I'm eating Cheerios and making cups of tea to stay calm, before heading home to Chicago for Thanksgiving, and I'll be back in town next week still promoting, literally beating the pavement, not actually expecting anything, I just figure beating my fists into the pavement could be somehow an enjoyable kind of pain to take my mind off the anxiety. I hope everyone enjoys their turkey and cranberry sauce. I'll be in New York for the first week of the opening, then flying to Chicago, then Arizona for much needed R+R, then LA for the opening there. Yours truly, Jonny B. Goode aka J.B. Supertramp aka Honey Ballard aka Arthur C. Fagen.

Giulio Carmassi - Score from Let Them Chirp Awhile

I think Giulio Carmassi is a living genius. Here's why:

(And yes, he is single and under 30)

My joke/response to hilarious Spike.com description

So in my daily travels on the interweb, I found this amazing piece of description for my film, on Spike.com/iFilm based solely on the trailer. I know this because Spike.com hasn't seen the film, they haven't been sent a screener DVD.

The Quote:

"The basic premise of the movie (Let Them Chirp Awhile) is that a bunch of hipsters who are kind of too bored to do anything, but are totally artistic, kind of sort of want to do something -- but really the just have ironic sex with different women. Ever wondered what the hipster's life is like? This is your movie."

Wow. Thanks, Spike. That's really awesome. Sweet. Can I, may I respond to that? Great, thanks, I know you're such a significant cultural force and a leader in film criticism, allow me to prostrate myself before you (removing my sandals as I speak).

1. Thank you for writing off my movie as a hipster parade for hipsters by hipsters. Maybe if you read the synopsis for my film, you'd see it's not that. And wtf is "ironic sex"? That's means nothing. Is that like having sex and liking it, but wearing a frown on your face? Or is it like being really violent but then saying sweet things while you orgasm?

2. I may have been 23 years old when I made the film, but I am not and never have been a hipster. I don't even like the mumblecore movement. I have never used cocaine and I don't own a trucker hat, okay, so there. I'm from the midwest, where they don't know what a hipster is. My favorite writers are Herman Melville, Mark Twain, Kafka, Dostoevsky and Philip Roth. Okay, those are the anti-hip.

3. My film consists of college-educated young people who live in New York. They are struggling because life is difficult. ( If you haven't admitted to yourself that life is difficult yet, I suggest a regimen of therapy, like 3 times a week. ) They aren't hip. They are the opposite of hip. They are afraid to party, they don't smoke and use drugs, they don't dress like Lindsay Lohan, and they go see theater on the weekend. Depressive un-motivated sad confused young people, yes. Hipsters, no. And I don't know any hipsters that like theater. Hipsters lump theater, mainly Arthur Miller/Lanford Wilson, in with classical music and "the outdoors", which they don't understand and thus consider, well, "gay" (their word, not mine). I guess you just see young people in the trailer that don't quite represent the familiar "national lampoon" fraternity movie kids or Apatovian Rogan-ites, so they are automatically hipsters. No, Spike. There's a difference. Depressed New Yorkers who are young aren't automatically hip. You guys have to get that stuff straight if you're going to really launch yourself into the world of film criticism, running. I mean, seriously.

4. And more seriously - why are you criticizing a film you haven't seen based on the trailer? Haven't you learned in marketing 101 that movie trailers are edited to seem like they appeal to mainstream filmgoers, even when the films themselves are actually totally semi-commercial artistic meditations on life and death? (example: Diving Bell and the Butterfly). Also, "The Breakup", which is super depressing and is like a Woody Allen film, but was made out to be some kind of romantic comedy by the studios, to the dismay of millions of young women who dragged their boyfriends to see it on opening night (and went home questioning the validity of their relationships, only to turn on SATC to feel better instantly).

Fortunately, my film is not a meditation on life and death, rather, it is a meditation on why people between the ages of 18-24 might look to Spike.com for advice on which movies to watch, when really, Spike.com's literary voice (if you can call it that) echoes some weird pseudo-corporate Ameri-speak that is supposed to target those same young men that read Beer.com and have multiple copies of Maxim in their bathroom.

Really, Spike.com, what I'm trying to say is...well, I love you. Thank you for featuring my trailer on the homepage of the movies/tv section.

Thank you, and goodnight :)

CHIRP is now opening in LA and CHICAGO!

Today looks to be a wonderful day. Not only is Barack Obama hopefully going to win the presidency and thus at last extract our country from an eight year period of idiocy, but I found out Let Them Chirp Awhile is opening in more cities!

Here's what you need to know:

DECEMBER 12 - CHIRP opens at the AMC Loews Piper's Alley 4 in CHICAGO

DECEMBER 19 - CHIRP opens at the Laemmle Sunset 5 in LOS ANGELES

Tell your friends. Spread the word. (And cross your fingers for Obama).

Halloween @ Bryan Scary's Glitter Odyssey

Happy Halloween to all. I have to say right here and now that Halloween is, was, and always will be my favorite of all meaningless and wonderful American holidays. My birthday comes just a few days before Hallow's Eve so as a kid I used to have all sorts of strange costumed birthday parties. In junior high the transition was made from kiddie parties to trips to Six Flag's Fright Fest. Nothing did it for me more than rollercoasters, haunted houses, and the music from the film 'Halloween'. Costume shops and the scent of autumn leaves burning still sends me straight back to those days in quiet suburban Chicagoland. Anyway, last night I attended the Bryan Scary Glitter Odyssey. For those who don't know, it was the 3rd annual event in which the mad musician Bryan Scary and his "Shredding tears" host a huge bash at their Brooklyn warehouse. Last night's party was the biggest yet, with burlesque dancers, porta-potties covered in tin foil and a giant spaceship hanging from the ceiling. The vodka and beer never seemed to run out and we partied all night. I was dressed as Clint Eastwood's "Blondie" from the "man with no name" western trilogy by Sergio Leone. I'm in a Leone phase lately. Once Upon A Time in America is a masterpiece. Check it out. And start thinking about that costume for next year. You only have 364 days left until Halloween 2009. As for me, my dear friends, I spent today recovering, and taking care of the millions of little things. So much to do and so little time before Chirp hits theaters. Stay fresh. -JB

LET THEM CHIRP AWHILE in THEATERS DEC. 5, 2008 at CINEMA VILLAGE, NYC

Dear Friends and Fans, (and those who have been curiously wondering if this movie will come out)

Let Them Chirp Awhile is getting a theatrical release and a DVD release! What does this mean for you? It means if you live in New York, you better get your ass to the Cinema Village on 12th and University Place between Dec. 5 - 7, and maybe, if you cant make it opening weekend, we can let that slide, and you'll have to be there on the 8th to the 11th...and if we do well in box office, we'll add another week, and you can see it a second time. Of course, this is all in jest as I am overly excited, relieved, thrilled at the fact that this movie I've been working on for about two years is finally getting its shot at the box office, and right during Oscar season.

In the meantime, tell your friends! Add the movie to your NETFLIX queue! Show up! Write about it on Facebook/Myspace/Twitter/Yelp/Dig. Make a Youtube video.

More cities are TBD soon!!!

Chirp Theatrical Release featured in NYPRESS!

Let Them Chirp Awhile was featured in the New York Press this week!

Here's a brief excerpt.

"AUTUMN (MOVIES) IN NY

Forget the buzz from Toronto and Venice! MARK PEIKERT knows the 10 films you should be excited to see this fall

Starring mumblecore star Justin Rice (Mutual Appreciation), Let Them Chirp Awhile is an homage to Umberto D., featuring a month of everyday life in NYC as Bobby (Rice) dog sits, staggers through failed attempts at relationships and finds himself a victim of plagiarism. Mumblecore still hasn’t really taken off, so maybe this movie (featuring a campy morality play about 9/11) can supply the plot the movement so desperately cries out for."

Thanks to Mark P. helping put Chirp back on the radar this month!

Palinator 2: Judgement Day

If you didn't already know, the independent film industry has taken a nose dive over the past year. The revenues from independent film ticketsales have dropped about $100 million dollars each year for the past two years, down now to about $166 million. If you think about the number of indie films that come out every year, that's not alot of money to go around. In addition, your favorite indie distributors like Paramount Vantage, Picturehouse, Warner Independent and ThinkFilm have all gone in the toilet, leaving well, Samuel Goldwyn Films and Focus Features (aka mini-Universal)

Looking at the the box office, superhero movies and whacked out comedies have taken centerstage, and that's all well and good. I love me a great superhero film. But, a lot of speculation has been tossed around though about why this is happening. Why aren't people going to see indie movies? Perhaps as some people claim, they don't have the quality and fearlessness of the 60s and 70s films, well fine. That's probably true to some extent. But that doesn't explain the enormous growth in superhero films and comedies.

If you look back to those lovely Reagan years when all the movies were about getting wasted, hot women getting seduced or men blowing shit up, it's pretty obvious that when times are shitty, we like to see ourselves reflected in the mirror with bigger muscles, more power, laughs, and subjugated women with large breasts.

It occured to me this afternoon that perhaps the downturn in indie ticket sales and the upswing in superhero films and comedies reflects exactly that. Things are screwed up in America. Everyone is freaked out about their jobs, the economy, Iran and whatever else is on their minds. So with all this awful stuff going on, do we really want to go to the theater to see brilliant artistic indie films which cause us to ask ourselves deep psychological questions that might shake up our lives? I do, but that's just me. I live in New York City, the capital of what some idiots call the "elitist east-coast". But, then again, I'm also always worrying about something or other despite whatever is going on around me, so a little shake up can't really do me much harm.

However, 99% of the rest of America would rather watch a superhero movie and remember what it feels like to "win" and to "be strong". I understand and appreciate that on behalf of the rest of the country. Everyone knows what it's like to be uplifted by a movie. Even if it only lasts until you walk out the door and realize your life must continue.

My elusive point, if you're wondering, is this: When times are auspicious, when people aren't miserable, they watch more challenging indie movies and the balance of the great battle between commercial films and little art movies is at last under control for a short while. More people take risks, and more success is found. More investors find companies they believe in, and more jobs are born. The theater of life is filled with a vast array of candy for all of us.

In other words: If the country doesn't turn around in the next four years, you can kiss indie films goodbye for a while. Hint hint.

Chirp selected for MAR DEL PLATA - BUENOS AIRES

Beautiful Buenos Aires. Traveling to South America for the first time in my life is something I've been looking forward to for a very long time. Getting to go there with my film: priceless.

Just got word this afternoon that the Chirp has been officially selected for the main program at the 23rd Annual Mar Del Plata Cine Festival, the premiere international film festival of Argentina.

Franz Kafka. Get to know him!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Kafka

The mad genius of bureaucracy, claustrophobia, and and pain.

When we "artists" feel bad about our day jobs, we can look to FK, who worked until he died of tuberculosis at age 41. He never achieved any acclaim in his lifetime except for the praise of his close circle of intellectual Czech friends.

Metamorphosis - his tale of Gregor Samsa who turns into a cockroach and is considered hideous by everyone, was a metaphor for the way he felt about himself, constantly needing to be taken care of during his depression and health episodes. He considered himself to be a monster.

He died in 1924 and then the rest of his family was executed in Nazi death camps in the early 1940's.

See? Your life is NOT THAT BAD!

Typewriters. Yes, I use one.

I recently traded in my Smith-Corona typewriter c. 1947 which was giving me trouble about 10 clicks into each line. I purchased this beautiful Olivetti Studio 44 c. 1952. The font is a bit different and looks less like typewritten words and more like Times New Roman size 10 from Microsoft Word. Both of these are manuals which I highly recommend.

Why do I use typewriters? First of all, for taking notes, they're better than using a computer. One finds himself painstakingly thinking before committing words to the page. This elicits better diction and syntax in each sentence. It's nicer to look at white paper than a digital screen, especially if you spend most of your day in front of computers. Finally, and this is not the last of the reasons, but the speed of ideas (in my opinion) flows better at the rate of "peck - peck - peck" than it does at tickckckckckckckckckc.

Just another of my abstruse personal habits. But remember, when the power goes out, or I'm in a tent in the woods, I will be typing, and you, reader, will be worrying about your email.

Screeners are in (and going out)

It's a joy in my heart to finally have screeners in from our duplication house. The distributor is sending these out to theater chains across the USA to get our film booked and slated in for exhibition at the beginning of October.

Pretty little discs, aren't they?

'Chirp' To Be Focus of 2008 RIIFF in August

This just in -

Let Them Chirp Awhile will be the centerpiece feature film at the 2008 Rhode Island International Film Festival this August. If you live near Newport, RI, y0u can come check out the 35mm print in a sweet large theater. My NYU short film "The Fisherboy" originally premiered here back in 2005 and the festival people were excited to see my new work. I'm looking forward to be going back to RI.

Rebels on the Bookshelf...

(originally posted on CHUD.com)
On a plane to Sundance I read a really amazing non-fiction book called 'Rebels on the Backlot' which was written by a film-journalist Sharon Waxman. The book chronicles the rise of the central 90's directors like Soderbergh, PT Anderson, Wes Anderson, David O Russell, Tarantino, David Fincher and a few others. The book is one of the most insightful film books I've read in a while and if you want to know where your favorite 90s directors are coming from and where their ideas are born, this book illuminates a lot of the gaps which are often left unfilled in interviews. Did you know that most of these guys had awful relationships with their parents or that many of these guys dated industry insiders in order to weasel their scripts into the hands of the big dogs? Well...it's all here. Some of it quite possibly crossing the line between the personal and the public. One of the most interesting bits in this book is the history of how the Weinstein's began. It's all there. Hope you'll check it out. I even wrote to Sharon a couple months ago and she was kind enough to send a brief but sweet response. Rock on, Sharon!

Bloggin' on C.H.U.D.com

I've been asked to blog for one of my favorite movie sites called CHUD.com. It's a horror/genre film-focused site with great movie news and interviews with many of my favorite directors.

My page is - Here.

Zach Galligan's new blog posts

Hey, if you want to know whats going on in the mind of Gremlins' hero Billy Peltzer, aka Zach Galligan (Hart Carlton in 'Chirp') check out his new blog on IFC.com. He's one of the celeb bloggers of the month.

IFC.com loves us this week!

Zach's Blog

EXCLUSIVE TRAILER PREMIERE ON IFC.COM

You saw it first, reader.

A graphic novel for anyone who likes a good story.

As a kid, I was a big fan of images. I collected baseball cards and Marvel superhero cards, and I had Garbage-Pail Kids, too. I wasn't one of the ones who studied the details, how many RBI's a ball player made, and to be honest, I didn't read the comic books I collected. I spent most of the time just looking at the images. One of my first career choices as a 9 year-old was to be some kind of illustrator. I took some art classes as a kid and got frustrated, sometimes throwing tantrums when I was unable to make an apple on a page look like an apple in real-life. Anyway, I never really took graphic novels (or long-form comic books) seriously. I hate to say it, but it's true. Of course like many kids growing up in the suburbs in the 90's I did read MAUS. Anyway, recently my friend Chris Brandt, who I blogged about a few weeks ago, turned me on to this one: Blankets by Craig Thompson. This is really well done. My only qualm is that isn't doesn't really have a 3rd act, and it ends where it could have kept going for 50 more pages. It's a fast read, the imagery is

brilliant. Thompson's story is autobiographical and follows his personal development in small-town Wisconsin where his battle with his family's rigid Christian morality comes to a head when as a high schooler he falls in love with a beautiful girl. What makes Blankets so brilliant is Thompson's strength in visual metaphor. The world of the protagonist's mind affects the imagery throughout like an Oliver Stone or Brian De Palma surreal sequence. A scene in a bedroom that the protagonist imagines to be biblical, turns into biblical images, a departure that renders the most unique storytelling. The constant back and forth between comedy and extreme sadness make this a cathartic read for anyone, not just comic book fans. Much like a Russell Banks novel, (Continental Drift is one of the best American Novels in the last 30 years) it's laden with twists and moments that reveal so much about a character's heart or a feeling. Sometimes this is accomplished in a single image. The story addresses compelling issues like morality and our attempt to live the lives we wish to live, while not hurting our parents when we break from the path they've set out for us. Craig's passion for drawing ostracized him from his community, church, school and family, and he had to rebel in a significant way to pursue his dream. Since I grew up in sort of rural Illinois outside Chicago, the snow imagery really hit home for me. I read this in one sitting. It's the kind of thing you read and say to yourself, "I wish I made this".