Candy Eye Factory Blog

We spent another morning sleeping in (well, 7:45) then headed to the Spotted Frog to post our blog. We were delighted to see that our cinematic adventures were mentioned by our hometown press, The Star Tribune.

We caught a shuttle into town to see the Slamdance $99 Specials (films made by Slamdance alums who’ve been given a $99 budget to make films under 5 minutes long). The offerings were campy, silly, crowd pleasers and truly low budget filmmaking at its core.

Since Park City is mostly a ghost town lately and the Slamdance staff was busy packing up the office, we amused ourselves with a trek to World Market and TJ Maxx. Not really blog-worthy material, but we were mega-bored.

We didn’t see any new celebs but we never did share with y’all that we also spotted Billy Baldwin and Jason Dohring of Veronica Mars during our trip – both in the lobby of Slamdance HQ. Did you know Billy Baldwin is actually really tall? You do now.

We planned once again to meet up with Duncan Ferguson, our favorite Virginian, for a dishy dinner. Tonight it was bowls of noodly Vietnamese soup and talk about art schools. We all got fun fortunes in our cookies, but William’s seemed the most apropos.

We headed to the TM Inn for the awards ceremony and closing night party. The Main Screening room had been converted into a festive party room, and the thermostat was cranked to 117 degrees.

We soon learned William’s Fortune Cookie fate was indeed accurate. Guess which film won the 2007 Spirit of Slamdance Award?

The Mallorys Go Black Market did! Chosen by the 2007 filmmakers, The Spirit of Slamdance Award “is presented for exhibiting passion and talent as a filmmaker, commitment to the independent community and enthusiastically embracing all Slamdance has to offer.”

Thank you to all our fellow filmmakers for voting for us and becoming our friends. You’re Foxy! Thanks to the Slamdance staff for including us in the 2007 program, and embracing our lo-fi, little project. And thanks times ten to our families for always enduring and supporting our chaotic commitment to cinema. Most importantly, thanks to Lizzie, Tina, Allison and Ben – the best and brightest cast we’ve ever had.

The prize for The Spirit of Slamdance was 3 bottles of whisky. Since we’re totally tee-totalers at Candy Eye we offloaded our bountiful booze to a handful of our new filmmaker friends.

Once home, we’ll be sharing joint custody of Sparky, the Slamdance dog statuette who’s making the trip home to Minneapolis via carry-on luggage tucked safely in a boot.

This trip has been the ultimate emotional rollercoaster. Such highs, such lows, such twists, turns and over so fast. We’ll never forget this ride and it was great to share it with you our bloggy buds.

If you’re dying to find out what happens to us next, sign up for our Candy Eye Circular which will bring you the latest Factory news 3-ish times a year.

Later, gators – for now!

J.F.F. – Here’s the complete list of Slamdance 2007 Award Winners.

(more…)

They say the early bird gets the worm, and Candy Eye couldn’t agree more. Rising with the rooster accomplished the impossible for us – scoring 2 golden tickets to a Sundance Festival screening at last!

We boarded the 7:46 am shuttle to the Library Theater to view Snow Angels, a dramatic feature by David Gordon Green whose bittersweet love story All The Real Girls is a Factory fave.

Angels was extremely powerful but bruising-ly bleak in a Sling Blade sort of way. Starring Kate Beckinsale, Sam Rockwell, and Amy Sedaris, it was a violent and stressful story to sit through, but glimmered with moments of sensitivity and humor that we adore in Green’s film work. The Sundance staff was unsure if director Green would be in attendance for a post screening Q + A, but the pic below proves that he was!

Yes, we were about 19 miles away from David when we snapped that pic, but on a shuttle back into Park City 2 hours later -

Celebrity Sighting Nineteen:
The Stars: Snow Angels director David Gordon Green.
The Spot: The shuttle headed to Main Street.
The Style: Film student casual, with crinkly Tom Petty eyes.

David was sitting right behind us! When he hung up his cell phone, JoEllen whipped around to tell him how we had just seen his film and how much we enjoyed his work. He was kind and talkative, enjoying rather than just enduring his conversation with us mere mortals. He’s heading back to L.A. to lend his talents to a non-indie, big blockbuster-styled film starring James Franco and Seth Rogen, co-produced by The 40 Year Old Virgin and Freaks + Geeks god Judd Apatow.

We rushed up the street for our goodbye lunch with our new B.F.F. Jamie Travis, director of The Saddest Boy In The World. It was tasty to just sit with Jamie two on one, and get to know him on a quieter, more intimate level. As we hugged him goodbye, we all knew it would be only a temporary separation, and we’d reunite again somewhere, someday for more sassy fun.

The goodbyes kept coming. See ya later, Amy Pelling. We’ll never forget your rainbow-bright wardrobe and knack for naughty fun. Au revoir Scott Kravitz. Your gently felt animation Loom was superb and your stint as a child model (thanks for the demonstration of your runway skills, by the way) is amazingly endearing.

We rounded out the night with Sushi with Duncan Ferguson and his producing powerhouse mother, Judy. Duncan is bursting with excited ideas and his wide-eyed enthusiasm and self-depreciating wit is Candy Eye approved. He’s a breath of fresh, funny air and we’re glad to call him our friend.

So, guess what, bloggy buds? You’ll never believe who we’ve been pen-pal-ing with. A few weeks back we wrote to the ironic muse of our Mallorys movie – actress Justine Bateman who starred as shopaholic Mallory Keaton on the 1980s sitcom Family Ties. We wanted to thank Justine for the inspiration and share with her our stylish little flick.

Now a clothing designer herself, Justine took time out of her crazy California life to send us a note just moments before our big Park City Premiere. Justine expressed how fun she thought the movie was and offered to autograph for us a silly photo of her as Mallory Keaton from the 80’s.

It was so surreal to see her name sitting there in our e-mail inbox, and it was really classy and cool of her to take time out of her life to give us and our movie her blessing.

The thing about Slamdance is – you never know who’s gonna strut across your path.

-Us

For the first night since we arrived, we both slept well, hard, and late. AKA 8am.

After a slow-motion morning, we hopped on the shuttle to the beloved Queer Lounge, but were stunned to find that it had vanished completely! Where there was once pulsing Goldfrapp songs, long, flirty stares, and free “Sarah Jessica Parker waters”, we found only silent, dreary hallways and dull condo units void of feather boas as décor.

When we headed up Main St. and the Fred Segal department store was dark and empty as well, we realized Park City was a sinking ship, and the bold and beautiful had already escaped. The festivals weren’t over just yet, but the famous faces and the frenzy had definitely disappeared.

We cheered ourselves up the only way we knew how: with some seriously serious shopping. The underground Mary Jane boutique enticed JoEllen with its whimsical shoe selection, a seaweed-colored satin belt, and an expensive but adorable shirt with an Owl screenprinted on it. Nothing was purchased but plenty was admired.

Then, proving there was still some sort of pulse in Park City’s quasi-corpse…

Celebrity Sighting Sixteen + Seventeen:
The Stars: Oscar winner Cuba Gooding Jr. and never-ever nominated Matthew Lillard.
The Spot: Slamdance’s Main Lobby.
The Style: Not as stunning as our own. (duh!)

We soon attended Slamdance’s Animation Competition, right after William and Slamdance Director of Programming, the sassa-licious Sarah Diamond, completed an extensive and highly conceptual photo shoot – utilizing Bic Pens as pretend milkshake straws. When Laura Linney and Scott Speedman leave town, you pretty much have to make your own magic. But can’t you almost taste the sweetness?

The moon hit the sky and William crashed home, nursing his sore throat and mushy mind with some goopy snorts of Zicam. Jo rocked it hard in Park City a few hours longer – partying it up with The Jamie-Amy pair, where she and the two Canadians came face to face with…

Celebrity Sighting Eighteen:
The Stars: Kung-Fu master, David Carradine.
The Spot: Pre-party for Homo Erectus.
The Style: As creepy in person as he is on film. Yikes and a half!

The parties may be further and far between these days, but don’t worry your little heads, bloggy buds. We’ve still got 2 days more to dish on every last drop of Park City deliciousness.

-J + W

We set our alarm early to prep for our 10 am encore Mallorys screening. Before the show, Allan Moyle, the bald and bubbly director of Weirdsville, told us how much he enjoyed our film. We had heard, on opening night, he was laughing the entire time, elbow-ing people in the ribs and repeating “This is great. This is a great film!” over and over. It was good to hear such nice things from such an accomplished director.

The second screening was even better than the first.

The most consistent laughs in both shows came any time “It’s Foxy” whispered on the soundtrack.  Our Q & A was more lively this go around and we felt we could have more fun with our responses.  After the screening we signed our very first autographs, for our brand new fan Sharon. She was a delight.

We headed to another fireside chat – this one focused on screenwriting. We both came down with a bad case of the Zzz’s, and rushed home for an afternoon nap. It felt such a relief to have both our screenings over.

We headed back into town around 7pm for a filmmakers happy hour and again several people came up and told us again how much they liked The Mallorys and how silly Wool Ewe B. Mine and Subtle Tease are for brand names. More than anything that’s happened to us in Park City, it is most rewarding to have viewers genuinely enjoy our film.

We rushed through dinner at The Moose Bar & Grill. Our Brazilian waitress was able to grasp the concept of Pineapple Juice when William ordered a glass, but was intensely stumped when JoEllen requested some Cranberry Juice? “Cranberries, cranberries, you want some cranberries? What, cranberries? Cranberries…Wait, what?” was as helpful as our waitress was in that. Somehow though moments later actual cranberry juice arrived to our table.

We hopped back to Slam HQ for a screening of Red Without Blue. The film follows twin gay boys as they grow up in Montana and focuses on how their relationship changes as one of the now adult boys transitions from male to female. The subjects of the film were at the screening and it is hard to imagine being so brave as to share such an intimate and difficult part of your life with the world. It was a great documentary that felt earnest and, for being such a unique story, touchingly universal.

We headed home on the midnight shuttle, surprised that for once, we weren’t completely exhausted.

We spotted no celebs today, but we’ve been saving some in our back pocket for you.

Celebrity Sighting Eleven and a Half:
The Star: Daphne Zuniga
The Spot: Glued to her cell phone at Moo’s Ice Cream Parlour.
The Style: Straight out of her Melrose Place character Jo Reynolds’s closet. Black, sullen, and sleek.

Celebrity Sighting Nine and a Half:
The Star: Film critic Leonard Maltin.
The Spot: Being interviewd in the heart of Park City.
The Style: Anchorman boring.

We enjoyed a peaceful morning near our condo filled with “ape-pri-cot almond” scones and organic hot cocoa. A little bit of napping, then shopping for mint shampoo and honey-scented lotion.

Back in Park City the many Mallorys posters we had tacked up in the last days had been buried under 25 newer layers of Queen Latifah and Dakota Fanning movie posters. We fought back with a fresh layer of our own and were caught on camera while doing so.

Moments later…

Celebrity Sighting Thirteen:
The Star: Mike White (director of School of Rock, The Good Girl, and Chuck & Buck)
The Spot: On the sidewalk near Taste of Saigon
The Style: Albino bland.

We headed back to Slamdance HQ for a fireside chat/panel about Production + Distribution outside of NYC and LA – minus the distribution part, unfortunately. Nearly everyone we meet is from the coasts, and nearly everyone we meet thinks we’re from New York.

Immediately after the fireside chat we were interviewed by Clint, a cameraman from Hollywood Video! Clint was the guy who’d filmed us hanging up our posters earlier in the day. He grilled us on camera, we charmed him with our responses. We’re totally media pros now, man!

Heading back down Main for the first of many meetings-

Celebrity Sighting Fourteen:
The Star: American Pie and Election stud Chris Klein.
The Spot: Park City’s sloping sidewalks.
The Style: Sunglasses and sherling.

Two and a half heartbeats later-

Celebrity Sighting Fifteen:
The Star: Hair product pro Paul Mitchell.
The Spot: Posing for fan photos outside a trendy Park City bar.
The Style: Signature slicked ponytail.

We headed off to another party but were whisked suddenly away to an industry pitch meeting. Things are rollin’ now, friends. Those are all the specifics we can reveal for now, though. Hollywood is a circle of secrets.

We topped off our busy, biz-y day with a happy dinner at Bangkok Thai. Crab + Apple Spring Rolls and brand new buds were a perfect ending to our whirlwind of a day.

First off, for those of you skeptical that we so fortunate as to have seen Dustin Diamond three magical times since our adventure began, we offer this photographic evidence.

The beauty of it hurts almost, doesn’t it?

Anyway, we started our day off with a video interview for imeem.com.We’d never heard of it either, but hopefully that will change for all of us. The crew was cool, and our interviewer had a lot of sharp questions about our movie and about vintage fashion.

We then dashed off to a sponsored Queer Brunch at Grubb Steak. We accidentally arrived fashionably late and missed out on receiving swag bags. The Ginch Gonch underwear was the most coveted freebie, so JoEllen and our new bud Jamie Travis rummaged through abandoned bags, hoping to sneak a pair or two. But no such luck.

Jamie is silly, savvy fun. We exchanged favorite Rosemary’s Baby quotes on the shuttle ride from Grub Steak to Main Street.

Jamie’s favorite: “Do I get a gold star, Daddy?”

Our favorite: “It has an undertaste,…A chalky undertaste.”

Celebrity wise, the day felt like déjà vu. Again we saw Christian Slater, Scott Speedman, The L Word girls, and of course Dustin D. Our only newbies…

Celebrity Sighting Eleven:
The Star: Food Network goddess Giada De Laurentiis (the rat)
The Spot: The middle of Main Street.
The Style: Mafia wife chic.

Celebrity Sighting Twelve:
The Star: Tom Arnold
The Spot: Interviewing God knows who at the bottom of Main Street.
The Style: Tom Arnold and style are two topics that really have no business whatsoever intertwining. Let’s just move on…

We were ushered in secretly to Slamdance Shorts Block 5 and enjoyed a double dose of our friend Duncan Ferguson. First, in his directorial debut Farmboy, and then as the star of The Famous Joe Project. Duncan came to Slamdance with his producer/mother, who is as silly as Duncan is and who took this photo of the three of us, looking like we matter.

A quieter day, but it was nice and necessary.

One final fact – The gang at Slamdance has now nick-named us “The Mallorys.” Nick-names rock!

The Festival scene is beautiful but brutal and Saturday morning we were beaten down. We hadn’t eaten a real meal our entire trip, our backs were bruised from hauling around 90 ton backbacks, and our neurotic self-focus had turned our minds frazzled and fried.

We vowed to take better care of ourselves and headed over to the festival’s posh Queer Lounge. Of course the Queers would know our souls were aching for some chic white leather couches, some free trendy juice drinks, and a Tori Amos and Pink soundtrack.

We were then invited to have our photos taken for a Six-Degrees-Of-Gay-Separation type mural where we mugged for the camera just moments after the cast of The L Word. So boys and girls:

Celebrity Sighting Five + Six:
The Stars: Leisha Hailey (KD Lang’s former main squeeze and Yoplait spokeswoman). And Kathering Moenning (Gwyneth Paltrow’s cousin).
The Spot: The OurChart.com photoshoot.
The Style: Alpine casual. Ultra-skinny thermal tees and fluffy, fat boots.

Always remember that little Willie Rees was the first gent to be posted to the mural – it may be a Trivial Pursuit question some day!

Feeling remarkably refreshed we sauntered up Main Street in the gently falling snow with plans to visit the Fred Segal store. Little did we know we were headed straight for Celebrity Sighting Central!

Celebrity Sighting Six:
The Star: A chestnut-tressed Laura Linney.
The Spot: Sundance theatre next to Fred Segal.
The Style: No clue – it was so crowed with paparazzi we saw but a glimpse of her.

Moments later….

Celebrity Sighting Seven, Eight, Nine + Ten:
The Stars: Queer As Folk’s Robert Gant, The O.C. hipster Adam Brody, Fisher Stevens, and snaky Shane from Survivor season 12.
The Spot: Sundance theatre on Main Street.
The Style: No one was dressed to impress, let’s put it that way.

We trudged up the street and but moments later…

Celebrity Sighting Ten:
The Star: Christian Slater.
The Spot: The gutters of Main Street.
The Style: Classic Slater hair, and Park City’s preferred accessory: a pair of buff bodyguards.

Finally arriving at Slamdance HQ, we started to feel a bit like celebrities ourselves. Again and again, people rushed up to us to say they had seen The Mallorys and absolutely loved it. Whispering “It’s Foxy!” had become the catchphrase of the festival’s staff and rumor had it Allan Moyle, director of Weirdsville, was absolutely tickled by our piece.

We then attended the screening of Shorts Block 4 – featuring The Cow Thief, The Monarch Cage, Alan & Samir and our roommates’ delicate film, Dentist Visit. It was the first Slamdance screening we were able to attend other than our own and it felt great to just sit back, enjoy the work and get a taste of something other than Candy Eye.

After a lovely dinner of butternut squash soup, cranberry walnut salad, and an ultra-soothing bread pudding, we returned to The Treasure Mountain Inn for a Happy Hour wing ding.

There we were bombarded with a pile of brand new friends and fans of The Mallorys. It was surreal and touching to see how cultishly passionate people were about our film and our approach to storytelling. The proudest, most perfect night of our filmmaking lives – mos def!

We’re ultra excited and honored to have befriended Saucy, the stylish photographer from Australia, Duncan Ferguson, the funny first-time filmmaker of Farm Boy, and Mika and Kaori from (sometimes) Japan – a duo who couldn’t be more chic or sweet, and who we insisted on being photographed with.

Everyone we met had big plans for The Mallorys, dying to give DVDs of the film to their friends as belated Christmas presents, or to hipster stylists in L.A., or to shop owners in Tokyo and Paris.

Watch out world, cause here we come!

The big fests began!

We spent the morning e-mailing fresh, hot press contacts from Elle magazine and MTV news. Followed that up by plastering a fresh layer of Mallorys posters around Park City, then dropped off our much coveted promotional pins on tables outside the Slamdance main theatre. Who doesn’t need a little mom-ish or im-mature in their festival wardrobe?

Leading lady Tina T. and her dashing boyfriend Tom breezed into town and spotted both Catherine Keener and Gary Coleman (in a cowboy hat no less!) during their first few moments on the scene. Former child stars can’t get enough of Park City, apparently, and who can blame them?

Dolling ourselves up for the big premiere was an event in and of itself, of course. Tina opted for a sleek retro look. Jo nixed her original plans for a dress over jeans, and instead settled on a simple, smart vintage blouse, and William chose to try to be cool by not trying to be cool and kept on what he had been wearing all day: green velour vintage pants and a silver belt.

Dressed to the nines, we battled intense festival traffic to arrive for the big red carpet event.

Celebrity Sighting Three:
The Star: Scott Speedman
The Spot: The Steps of Slamdance Headquarters
The Style: Perfectly tattered sneakers, perfectly slouchy thrift store pants, perfectly tousled hair, and most importantly, a perfectly goofy grin.

To think our film was playing along side his was dreamy divinity (for William at least)!

Our screening was sold out, packed with press and fashionistas. The audience got a genuine kick out of our movie, the silly clothing, and all the characters.

Biggest laugh: Meg moaning, “Well, I wish I could’ve been on the cake ‘n stuff then.”

Second biggest laugh: J.J. whining, “I always always wanted something Foxy O’Clock. And I know I would like that coat way more than the poorest Russian girl.”

Our Q+A was short, sweet, and wonderfully void of awkward silences. It was a top notch World Premiere!

Next up was the opening night feature Weirdsville by the director of Pump Up The Volume and Empire Records. It was vibrant, fun, silly and stylish. A great match for our similarly-minded short.

The Weirdsville Q+A included our beloved colleage Scott Speedman plus his big name co-star, which brings us to…

Celebrity Sighting Four:
The Star: Wes Bentley
The Spot: Weirdsville post-screening Q+A
The Style: Your Midwestern cousin on his 5th day at college.

Wes stopped us after the screenings to shake our hands and tell us how much he liked The Mallorys. He was utterly sweet , genuine and un-Hollywood.

We headed across the street for late night cranberry juices with a festival posse. Girls who had seen our film were aching for posters and pins and seemed to have really connected with the story and spunk of our project. And that, kids, is what it’s all about!

It was William’s birthday today, but it never really seemed like it…

We both woke up at 4am to prep for our crack of dawn flight. After hastily shifting things around in our overweight suitcases, we boarded our first of two Frontier flights.

The trip was instantly boring for us two travelers and we cursed ourselves the entire way for packing too many stirrup pants. The planes both had mini-TVs in the headrest of the seat in front of us and not even VH1 classic videos from Prince or Terence Trent D’Arby perked us up. But then…

Ladies and Gentlemen, our first Celebrity Sighting!

The Star: Dustin Diamond (Screech from “Saved By The Bell”)
The Spot: Our flight from Denver to Salt Lake.
The Style: Dustin was sporting a very machismo beard and geek-chic eyeglasses.

We couldn’t tell if he would’ve enjoyed being recognized or not. What goes on inside the mind of Dustin D, we couldn’t stop wondering?

Our condo in Park City is a stone’s throw from a Panda Express plus a Linens ‘n Things. It’d be pathetic to complain about anything, right? We met up with our L.A. based roomies Yves + Flo and trekked up to the festival action on Main St via the confusing shuttle system.

Celebrity Sighting Two:
The Star: Olympic Gold Medalist Shawn White
The Spot: The steep hills of Main St.
The Style: Creamy parka and even creamier skin. (Surprisingly not that freckly-faced.)

The Slamdance peeps drowned us in praise for The Mallorys, plus free Doc Martens boots, Luna bars, and black puffy parkas. The smallest Men’s style didn’t suit or fit William so he opted for a Women’s Large. Drowning in 95 tons of swag we attended a few more meetings, met some of our fellow filmmakers. It was all awesome but ultra exhausting.

After some short-lived R + R back at our condo, like frozen zombies we waddled back up to Main Street for the Slamdance Kick Off Party at The Star Bar where “Golddigger” welcomed us with its bassy thumping. At the top of our lungs we introduced ourselves to other filmmakers and got to know the festival staff more intimately. No real rubbing elbows with any big wigs yet, but everyone in and behind Slamdance is deliciously kind and down to Earth.

Taxi Man John drove us home at 12:30. We hit the hay and hit it hard. Our big premiere was the next day!

Photos coming super soon!

-love Will & Jo

Follow our cinematic adventures through Candy Eye land, beginning with our touch down in Park City, Utah for the Slamdance & Sundance film festivals!

We’re bringing the Cherries On Top pullover and the Keep M. Guessin’ sleeveless blouse (as seen in The Mallorys movie) so it’s bound to be a beautiful trip.

The Factory blog launches this Thursday so check back soon!