MR. PATRICK
Writing by patrick on Sunday, 8 of April , 2007 at 2:29 pm
So, I arrived in Los Angeles in the spring of 2002, feeling out the scene and trying to survive living in lovely Hollyhood. I had a few freelance gigs, was the manager of my apartment building, and was writing, writing, writing. A friend of mine was teaching at the LACER afterschool program in Hollywood, but wasn’t feeling it and asked if I’d be interested. I began in 2003 as an assistant to the LACER Poets and Playrights class at Bancroft Middle School in Hollywood. Once the students found out I was a filmmaker, they asked if they could write a script. I said ’sure, but I’m not gonna write it.’ Several weeks later, they had written the script and asked if we could turn it into a film. I said ’sure, but I’m not gonna do it alone.’
By the end of the semester, the students had written, directed and starred in their first film, the action drama CHAIN REACTION. The film screened at the end of the year culmination and the audience loved it. Bancroft’s Program Director, Ciara Franklin, loved it so much she showed it to her father, acclaimed director Carl Franklin, who called me to tell me how much he dug the film (which was pretty f*&^ing cool). Following the film’s fury, LACER’S Founder, Sharon Stricker, asked me if I’d be interested in teaching a filmmaking class over the summer.
Christ, teaching filmmaking to a class full of sugar-amped pre-teens in Hollywood…a scary proposition. But, being the masocist that I am, I agreed. That summer, I created the ‘MovieMakers’ filmmaking workshop, teaching it to a small, volitale group of students at the LeConte Middle School. To make things worse, there wasn’t an available classroom at LeConte, so I was forced to teach the class outside on the lawn. To my amazement, this difficult little group pulled off an amazing little sci-fi drama entitled FUTURE 4.
The accolades continued and I was officially hooked. I dug teaching kids. And for whatever reason, I seemed to thrive at pulling ideas and experiences out of my Hollywood amigos, and by all means, I was vicariously getting my filmmaking jonze through them. I was dubbed ‘Mr. Patrick’ and I spent the next three years making films with the middle school MovieMakers students at the LACER program in Hollywood, the elementary school MovieMakers at the CREST program in Santa Monica, and with the high school MovieMakers at the VOICES UNHEARD program at Fairfax High School in Hollywood. Over those three years, we created 27 short films, 3 PSAs, created and pitched a tv pilot entitled CINEMA TOTS (which nearly got a green light), got one of our PSAs on the New Line Cinema DVD release of ‘Take The Lead’ starring Antonio Banderas, and won numberous awards. All in all, it was an amazing experience, but I wanted more.
It didn’t matter the school, the area, the students…one thing remained consistent, if you opened your ears to the young imagination, magic always succeeded. I wanted to show this on a larger scale. I wanted to show the masses what you could do with a one-chip video camera, a school campus, and a consensus of young minds. Letting them open up and run with an idea, that was what ‘Mr. Patrick’ was all about. Though my disiplinary skills were very much lacking, my ability to rouse up the right side of little brains was very much intact.
I pitched the idea of filming a documentary over the course of a semester to Sharon Stricker, Executive Director of the LACER Program, and she dug. We carved out a budget (albeit very small), then I managed to snag a fantastic DP, Juan Carlos Saizarbitoria, who had just completed the Cuban rap doc ‘East of Havana,’ executive produced by the lovely Charlize Theron. In January of 2006, with the cameras rolling and my new batch of MovieMakers students bouncing off the walls, I posed a challenge…make a film above and beyond anything we’ve done in the past, and I’ll throw you a Hollywood Premiere, red carpet, limousine, at el. Now, I had no right in promising things that I couldn’t produce, but that’s what drama’s all about, right?
So, six months and over a 100 hours of doc footage later, the Bancroft MovieMakers had pulled it off. They had written, directed, and starred in their 70s-styled, punch-you-in-the-face, crime drama, P.I.G. (Police Investigative Group), under the guerilla-esque guidance of Mr. Patrick. I then spent the next frantic three weeks trying to find a Hollywood theatre that would donate its space (yeah, right), a limo company that would donate a stretch for the night (good luck), a capacity crowd to cheer our young filmmakers down the red carpet while sending invites to some of Bancroft Middle School’s more famous alumni, which included Francis Ford Coppola, Brandy, and Herb Alpert.
By the grace of God, a big old Angel (Rivera) at the Screen Actors Guild, Will Seymour, Sharon Stricker, my lovely fiance Dee Smith, and a friendly limo driver with 30ft Hummer, it all came together. With five cameras rolling, Mr. Patrick’s MovieMakers exited a limousine into their red carpet premiere at the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood, greeted by over 400 screaming fans. The bulbs flashed. The lights went down. The packed theater treated to the cinematic labors of 15 bizarre, brilliant, quarelsome, and ultimately unique young minds. Without a budget, locations, equipment, extras, a crew, a cast, the students of Mr. Patrick MovieMakers had pulled it off. On this groundbreaking evening, they had become stars…Hollywood Stars. Over three years in the making, the one-of-a-kind journey of MR. PATRICK & THE HOLLYWOOD STARS will soon be coming to a theater near you…
Category: Tales from Kill City
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is a funny guy. He's won awards. He makes ha-ha-hilarious films. Wicked hot commercials. And writes very strange things. He's taught film to kiddies. They called him 'Mr. Patrick.' They made lots of films. They also made a documentary. Watch out. He's the hottest director in Kill City.