Newtown Photographer’s ‘Forgotten’ Film

Is Coming To Bank Street Theater

By Nancy K. Crevier

For Newtown resident Don Leonard of Masterpiece Video Services, photography and wedding video production are a fun way to fill in free time, since retiring from IBM.

“As a retiree, I can do as much as I like, and not over-do,” he said.

Although he retired from product development and planning, part way through his career at IBM Mr Leonard found himself with the opportunity to be involved in shooting television commercials for product promotion.

“They were looking for someone with marketing and development skills who could speak about this new product in layman’s terms. It gave me the unique experience to shoot ads for TV on some of the biggest stages in Hollywood,” he recalled. “At the time, I was on the client side, but the experience gave me background in how a film is made.”

Combined with his lifelong interest in photography and video, what he learned from watching the experts in Hollywood led him to start his own video service after retiring, and also led to a filming experience in 2007 that has resulted in a film that will be shown at the New Milford’s Bank Street Theater on Sunday, July 25, at noon.

A Dance For Grace is a 92-minute movie filmed in various locations, including Jamaica, New York, Georgia, and Connecticut. Produced and directed by Orville Matherson and Junior Powell, Mr Leonard served as the directors of photography during the filming in New Milford and Newtown.

“The summer of 2007 I saw a Craig’s List ad from Tower Isle Production, looking for a director of photography. Ever since I was young, I have thought it would be cool to actually make a film, so I responded to the ad, thinking it would be a great way to expand my knowledge of the business,” said Mr Leonard. He met with the producers in Shelton, where they were filming at an abandoned Shelton high school, and found himself involved in a two-way learning experience, giving as much as he received.

“The most valuable thing that I learned was about some of the new camera technologies,” he said. “The camera they had shot on a digital memory card. The advantage to that is that it is extremely high quality and easy to transfer the imaging to the computer for editing,” Mr Leonard said. “I found that very interesting.”

What he found the crew to be lacking was a camera dolly. “It used to be that the camera was in a fixed position. Today, there is a lot of camera movement when filming, and lots of quick cuts. So I built them a camera dolly, to give more interest to the movie,” he said.

Since his goal has never been to be a high volume, money making venture, he got on board with the filming crew and began filming in the Bronx, in Trumbull, at New Milford High School, and in a barn on Mt Pleasant Road owned by Paul Allen.

“I was driving up Mt Pleasant and saw the barn out of the corner of my eye, and thought it would be right for the dance scene we needed,” said Mr Leonard, so he pulled in and a “very gracious” Paul Allen agreed to let them film there.

“I thought it would be kind of neat to have our barn in the film,” Mr Allen said this week, recalling Mr Leonard’s request three summers ago. So he let the production group clear out a portion of the landmark barn built by his grandfather in the 1920s and rounded up some of his three teenagers’ friends to serve as extras, and the filming began.

“It was just a fun event. They were there the entire day prepping the set and filming until 11 pm at night. It all boiled down to about four or five minutes of actual film, I’m told, for all that work,” Mr Allen said.

Mr Allen and his wife, and their children Andrea, and William, Dominique, and Helen all plan to see the film this coming Sunday in New Milford.

“Knowing what our barn looks like, we were able to spot our scene in the trailer on-line,” said Mr Allen. “I don’t know if we’ll see the teens in the finished film or not, but just the fact that the barn and our kids are in it will be fun,” he said.

Although the crew asked Mr Leonard to continue on to Georgia and Jamaica for further filming that summer, he declined, due to personal and professional obligations.

“I never heard from them again, and I kind of wrote it off as just a fun experience that I learned from,” said Mr Leonard. Then last month, her received an e-mail from Dale Foti, associate producer and production manager for Tower Isle Productions. “Just an exciting announcement that Orville Matherson recently returned from the Las Vegas Film Festival,” wrote Ms Foti, “held at the Las Vegas Hilton from June 4th through June 6th, to receive our Silver Ace Award for Outstanding Filmmaking.”

He also learned that A Dance For Grace had been well received at film festivals in New York, Jamaica, and California, and that a trailer was online at ADanceForGrace.com.

“I haven’t ever seen the film in its entirety, and had never seen the whole script, even,” said Mr Leonard, “so it will be a real thrill to see it on July 25. I had almost forgotten about it, thinking it would never see the light of day.”

Because the only reward those involved in the filming of A Dance For Grace agreed to receive was a credit line, Mr Leonard is particularly pleased that the film was finished and has done well on the festival circuit.

“It is nice to see that they were somewhat rewarded,” he said.

The film, about teens from a town in Georgia who decide to enter a national dance contest in hopes of winning enough money to pay for the needed surgery of a beloved local woman, Grace, is described on its official website as “an exciting, uplifting, fast moving tale of courage, redemption, community and the will to succeed against all odds.”

Newtown residents who see the film may find themselves recognizing some of the cast.

“We were very low budget and constantly scrounging for extras,” said Mr Leonard, “so I recruited a lot of my neighbors from Liberty at Newtown, where we live. My wife and some of our neighbors also appear in the salon scene.”

Don Leonard admits he has no plans to become the next Martin Scorsese, but is thrilled to have had the opportunity to get involved in actual filmmaking.

“It seems strange to think back to being a kid and wanting to make a movie, getting the background, and then being asked to help make one. Maybe, in some way, we evolve to doing what we hope for, in this life,” he reflected. “At any rate, it was just a lot of fun.”

For more information contact Bank Street Theater at 860-354-2122.