RIESTER

Timothy Hutton and India Ennenga in Multiple Sarcasms by Brooks Branch.

Skip Branch is a senior partner at RIESTER. His son, Brooks Branch, is a film writer and director.

“It’s a real movie…an honest to God movie!”

That’s what I told my son on location in New York City two years ago while he was directing his first film.

I remember him looking at me oddly when I said it and have since heard about my improper comment during one of the on-going sessions with him, his brother and sister–when they gang up at my expense.

You see, on May 7th, 2010, Brooks Branch’s movie, “Multiple Sarcasms,” will premiere in New York, Los Angeles, Seattle and Salt Lake City.  He wrote and directed it.  It stars Timothy Hutton, Mira Sorvino, Dana Delany, Stockard Channing and Mario Van Peebles.

Brooks wrote the script five years ago while he was creative director at the licensing division of Paramount Pictures.  He didn’t know much about script writing so he would ask friends and associates how to go about it.  After a few revisions, one of his cohorts said they thought the script was good enough to consider selling it.

“Sell it?” he pondered.  “I don’t want to sell it, I want to direct it.”

The snickers and laughs he got from the audacity of his comment motivated, rather than discouraged, him.

I won’t take you through the litany of experiences from there.  Let’s just say that when I flew to New York City and visited him on an Upper West Side filming location and witnessed the film being made, the quote at the beginning blurted out.

I took a cab from the airport to the designated location.  The driver let me off at the end of the street because it was blocked off for the shoot.  I thought: How do you close down a street in New York City?

The street was filled with power lines, lights, trucks and people.  A lot of people. I  tip-toed around and through to see if I could spot my little boy.  As I got closer to the center of things, I saw a half dozen director’s chairs set up behind a camera. Getting closer, I saw Brooks (easy to spot, he’s 6’ 5”) surrounded by people asking questions, giving him advice, having him sign stuff and more.

He saw me, grabbed and hugged me, introduced me and showed me to one of the director’s chairs, just for me.

The day was amazing.  I first met Jacek Laskus, the award winning cinematographer, who was in serious discussion with Brooks and others about the set up for the next shot, how it would work from beginning to end, and so on.  Then I met Academy Award winner Timothy Hutton. Tim (as I can now call him after our day together), was genuine, down-to-earth, and very admiring and respectful toward my son. Equally charming was India Ennenga, an early teen actor who stole everyone’s heart.

“Action,” someone other than my son shouted, and India (Elisabeth in the movie), bursts out of a school door, followed by Tim (Gabriel in the movie and her father) apologizing for embarrassing her.  It was a 45 second scene that only took about three hours to shoot.  Not only was there take after take but adjustments to lighting, camera, extras, and even extraneous noise from a helicopter overhead.

And, all the while, many of the 60 or 70 people on the set, kept coming to Brooks for confirmation of this and a lot of that.

We broke for lunch where the conferences and interruptions with him continued.  I don’t recall if he ate anything.

There were two or three other scenes shot on that same location before they wrapped for the day.  I was exhausted.

The overall take away for me was watching my son handle himself and other people.  He had no attitude.  He listened to every person who approached him. He calmed people down. He built people up.  He was charming, and more important, kind.

“Multiple Sarcasms” is indeed a real movie.  It opens next month in 70 theaters across the country.

There is a screening this Saturday at the Phoenix Film Festival. Visit their website for more details.

Watch the trailer and some behind the scenes action on YouTube.

Stockard Channing and Dana Delany in Multiple Sarcasms.