After receiving a welcome benediction from George Rideout, writer of our film's source material - and thus, the man we made "Reader Number One" - we were anxious to hear how Reader Number Two would feel about the screenplay...
We had to wait a little longer to find out this time around though, because Reader Number Two is in fact, a whole bunch of readers - otherwise known as the SODEC development jury.
As those who followed the making of our last film will remember, the SODEC, along with Telefilm Canada, backed The Year Dolly Parton Was My Mom through all its phases - and did so quite enthusiastically. So their positive reaction to the 2nd draft of this script would be significant - as much in philosophical terms as in financial ones. Having their support at this late stage of development would certainly be a boost to creative morale, but would also start to build a bridge from development to - production!
The way the decision process works for this phase is that the jury convenes to decide which projects they'll support in a comparative round table. However, they do this only after each member has had time to analyze the submitted projects on their own, speak to the respective filmmakers and finally make their recommendations for the jury to deliberate.
When Barbara and I spoke with our analyst in mid July, we found out that ours was one of 80-odd projects he was analyzing! But for a man with so many other stuff on his plate, he spent a nice, long time talking with us about ours. The conversation ranged from production philosophy to John Sayles references to second act aggravations. At the end of the three-way call, we felt positive but being that the jury process can go any which way, we couldn't take anything for granted.
We got the good news when we came back from summer holidays.
Reader Number Two is on board!
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