LAS CRUCES – During the COVID-19 pandemic, maximum industries were affected and many things are complicated in today’s environment. Making a movie in New Mexico can be one of the hardest.
However, four new Mexico filmmakers have a story to tell and can’t wait to tell it.
Carolyn Graham – born in Short – born and raised in Las Cruces. She is Bulldawg and Aggie, graduated from Las Cruces High School and graduated in journalism from New Mexico State University.
“My father, a real real estate developer there, not to leave TROP behind in my story, however, evolved to Telshor Hills,” Carolyn said. Carolyn’s father, Bob Short, had a wife named Pardner Tellyer, from where “Telshor” derives.
After journalism school, where she met her husband, Steve Graham, the couple moved to Nevada, where she took a job in the press and as a journalist for a while, then moved to Los Angeles.
“Steve worked for the Screen Actors Guild,” he explained. He made a decision he was looking for to get into film, I made a decision that I was looking for to enter journalism on the writing side, and then we made the decision, a few years ago, in 2017, to return to New Mexico. .
Carolyn had the opportunity to paint for New Mexico Magazine as executive director of the magazine.
“So I came back and did that,” he told The Sun-News. “And towards the end of 2018, in early 2019, we founded Goodwest (Productions), looking for paintings in combination in some film projects. it was running (as executive producer, editor-in-chief and director) on a SyFy television screen called ‘Z Nation’, which ended in 2018. »
Goodwest Productions was introduced in February 2019.
In 2016, co-author Donald Davenport was studying under contract with his colleague Harry Musselwhite. While the two were suffering in a few concepts one night, they thought, wouldn’t it be attractive if someone discovered something of wonderful price that could potentially only replace lives.
“But instead of doing that, he replaced a person’s life for the worse,” Davenport said. “Without delay, I had the idea of one of my favorite books, namely John Steinbeck’s ‘The Pearl’. “
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Davenport has lived in Santa Fe for about 20 years.
“And, with the film industry booming, there is the (pain) between us ‘on the line’ that each and every agreement is reached in Los Angeles or New York. Local creatives (writers, directors, manufacturers) don’t even know we’re here. “
The film centers on a single mother who suffers and runs with a type of emotionally challenged son: a divorcee looking to make the end of the month while working as a store clerk.
“She endures the typical convenience store jolgorio: young people with false IDs and held on the night shift,” Davenport said. “But his father, who died recently, was a rare coin broker and taught him the strategies of numismatics (collection of coins).
Look at the wallet three hundred times a night. One night, an old lady comes in, after stealing a pot of coins from her house, to buy something.
“And the employee sees a penny of wheat and thinks, “Well, that’s pretty interesting. “And he has a spare in his pocket, to replenish everything he finds,” Davenport said. “But, that night, he has no replacement in so he takes a penny from the pile of “Take a penny, leave a penny” and put it in the drawer. “
And now things are getting worse.
“Come and locate, this is the weirdest penny ever touched,” Davenport said. “There were only five. It’s a mistake. It was 1943, and the government had begun manufacturing zinc-coated metal coins, but some drafts remained. copper in the machines. So there are only 4 or five cents of copper left in 1943, so it symbolically becomes “the pearl” for her. “
But the convenience store is a small circle in the chain of relatives and, searching the surveillance tapes, the owner, who is known to have unsavory connections, learns the news that one of his cashiers discovered a penny worth $ 1. 7 million while on duty as a cashier for him.
“He makes the decision that once that penny was deposited in the money drawer, it will be his,” Davenport explained. “And it commits, through legal and destructive means, to do so.
Davenport temporarily points out that the story is not based on “The Pearl”, but is animated through the themes of the story.
“It’s México. Es a penny in a cash register, not a pearl, ” he said. “It’s just a kind of inspiration as the story unfolded. “
“The Penny” selected through Steve and Carolyn Graham, co-owners of Goodwest Productions, founded in Santa Fe, who will produce the film. The script co-written by Donald Davenport, who lives in Santa Fe, and Harry Musselwhite, who lives in Los Lunas.
Steve Graham is a manufacturer, screenwriter, director and co-founder of the Los Angeles-based production company Go2 Media. Since 2005, he has produced 111 television episodes and worked on more than a dozen films. In his role as co-executive manufacturer of the television series “Z Nation”, he produced, wrote and directed one of SyFy’s most popular shows. Executive co-producer of the Netflix series “Black Summer”, along with Jaime King.
His wife, Carolyn, is a producer, journalist, editor, photographer and editor, and has worked for regional and special interest magazines for more than 25 years, most recently as former CEO of New Mexico Magazine. Lately it is in progression in “Fork in the Road”, a culinary and cultural program in New Mexico.
Davenport is a producer, documentary filmmaker, director and writer, with credits in films and television. He is most productive known for his critically acclaimed Hallmark films, adding “Expecting a Miracle,” starring Jason Priestly, Teri Polo and Cheech Marin, and “Love Finds a Home,” the latest installment in Janette Oke’s popular Love Comes Softly series, starring Oscar-winning actress Patty Duke.
He also wrote “Christmas in Canaan” for the channel, which he co-wrote with Kenny Rogers and starred Billy Ray Cyrus; maybe it’s a story for another day, but it’s Hallmark’s highest-rated film in 2009, and Davenport sees it. as a defining moment in his career.
Musselwhite is a screenwriter, musician, actor and arranger. He is a veteran of film festivals, as well as a singer, director and guitarist who has directed at Carnegie Hall’s headquarters in Europe’s cathedrals and has directed to match legends such as Vincent Price, in films directed through Oscar nominee John D. Hancock (“The Mirror”) and on television shows such as “Rescue 911”, “Better Call Saul” and “It’s Supernatural”. He is a member of the children’s musical trilogy Martin the Guitar and produced Martin’s audiobooks in 2020 with Davenport.
Musselwhite, in a verbal exchange with the Sun-News, said he was probably a remote relative of legendary blues musician Charlie Musselwhite. Both know each other in their paintings and refer to each other as “cousins”. wrote a presentation for Harry’s book of the Moment, Martin the Guitar.
“The Penny” in the early stages of progression when the COVID-19 pandemic hit New Mexico. Production stopped.
“I’m also guilty of producing sets to hire,” Steve Graham said. “I had a film to paint in May. Obviously, that’s gone. And then we thought the state will open, then pushed in July, then in August, and now we wait for October. And it’s with all the extra precautions for COVID: check 3 times a week, the EPI for everyone. It is very important to check to protect other people at the place of the paintings. , in the kind of paintings we make. “
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The pandemic has stopped everything from mid-March to today, really.
“I didn’t read the governor’s announcement today,” Steve said on August 27. They opened it for pre-production, which means that structure teams can start a few weeks ago.
There is nothing in particular about the public aptitude order that responds to it. Pre-production is still allowed, but Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham has not yet announced when filming will be allowed to resume altogether.
“All unions received a combination and published a document called Safe Way Forward, which outlines very express and strict needs to ensure the protection of everyone on set,” Steve said. “As a production, you want to have a plan in place, and be to show that you have the means, the budget and the personnel to put it into effect. We respect all the rules that ensure the protection of the players and the team, and it is quite a bar. tall “.
As “Breaking Bad” and “Better Call Saul”, New Mexico will have a role in “The Penny”.
“New Mexico, as a character in the film, can get the most sensible place,” Musselwhite said, laughing. “The main male character is a hunting and fishing caregiver in the Apache Forest. He has a wonderful affection for mountains, water and birds.
Steve Graham agreed that New Mexico would play a leading role, in other words.
“Part of the story takes place in Albuquerque, and there’s a lot in the Apache Forest, one of the characters is running,” Steve said. “We look forward to filming there and getting some of those landscapes. “
“I think (the state) plays an important role,” Carolyn added. “The script is written with strong places in New Mexico.
“And the types of characters are also neo-Mexicans,” Steve said. “I think it’s more of a canvas on which this story is painted, and it’s painted with a New Mexico color palette. We love New Mexico and the skill it has. it’s here. “
“(The return) will take place gradually, ” said Steve. ” We hope we’re all working on something until the end of the year. It has disproportionately affected indefinite filmmakers. If you’re Netflix or Amazon, you have shareholders and a big bank. You can absorb some of those charges. If you’re a small producer, like us, it’s literally hard to pay back investors and say, “You know, we said it would be a $10 million task – it’s 13 million. The accepted trust is that you will charge 25% more to produce under COVID restrictions.
The charge of generating “The Penny” is still being determined. Grahams would like it to be available for theatrical release, which would put the budget in the order of $5 million, Steve said.
Currently, the couple continues to look for investments for the assignment and will soon begin to incorporate actors into the film.
“The most productive case, and I’m on my knees for that, is that we can start the film last spring or early summer 2021,” Musselwhite said. “One of the benefits of ‘The Penny’ – and we didn’t do it to the finish line, is that we don’t have scenes of giant crowds, with 50 other people in tight spaces. It’s very intimate, which is a tick when it comes to complying with the (COVID protection guidelines) at the exit of LA Plus, many of our scenes are out. “
Learn more about the film by visiting https://www. goodwestproductions. com/.
Damien Willis is a journalist and columnist for Las Cruces Sun-News, his fortnightly column focusing on the effect of the COVID-19 crisis on Las Cruces and the region. Do you have a story to share? Contact us dwillis@lcsun-news. com or @DamienWillis on Twitter.