Indie ‘Where Sweet Dreams Die’ Sets Cast; Rom-Com ‘They/Them/Us’ Wraps Shoot During COVID-19; Danny Trejo & More Star In ‘The Shift’ – Film Briefs
Zachary Laoutides, Jaime Zevallos and Alexander James Rodriguez have been cast in Where Sweet Dreams Die, the Ave Fenix Pictures Studios dramatic thriller being directed by Mirza Esho. Production is now set to get underway in November in Chicago and New York with COVID-19 protocols in place.
The pic follows an Italian American on the verge of losing his restaurant and wife to cancer. He becomes obsessed with a Middle Eastern immigrant looking to take over the restaurant on the path to achieve the American Dream. Marius Iliescu and Emmanuel Isaac co-star in the movie, the latest from the Monica Esmeralda Leon-founded Ave Fenix, which is also aiming to start production next year on And They Called Her Paradisa, Fields of Aaru and City of Cathedrals.
Laoutides (Black Ruby) is repped by CAA, Zevallos (Marvel’s Cloak & Dagger) by Buchwald and Untitled Entertainment, and Rodriguez (Missing Link) at CESD Youth Talent.
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Joey Slotnick (Nip/Tuck) and Amy Hargreaves (13 Reasons Why) are toplining They/Them/Us, a romantic comedy directed by Jon Sherman that just wrapped production in Columbus, OH, after having received the greenlight to shoot under the new SAG-AFTRA COVID-19 protocols.
In the screenplay from Sherman and Melissa Vogley Woods, Slotnick and Hargreaves play single parents who meet on a dating site and blend their family of teenagers, with the film diving into the difficulties of balancing an adult sexual relationship with the demands of parenting four difficult teens.
Chadd Harbold (Most Beautiful Island) and Garrett Bates (The Atlantic City Story) are producers. Tim Perell (Last Chance Harvey) is executive producer.
Slotnick and Hargreaves are both repped by the Artists and Representatives Agency, with Slotnick managed by Sweet 180 and Hargreaves by Smith Talent Group.
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Danny Trejo (Machete), Jessica Tuck (Little Fires Everywhere), Brittany Curran (Dear White People), and Toni Trucks (Seal Team) has signed on to star in The Shift, an LGBT centric short film from Eyeris Entertainment. Jade Tailor is directing the pic, which is set at the very beginning of the COVID pandemic and tells a deeply human story, through the intertwined vignettes of seven individuals, as they experience a paradigm shift in what was once their everyday lives.
Brooke Maroon (Kingdom Come), Skyler Davenport (Pokemon Masters), Moses Muñoz (Jurassic World), and Aidan Bristow (Hollywood) co-star in the short, which explores shifts in perspective, shifts in expectations, and shifts in society as a whole. Curran and Sarah Wylie are producing with Tailor serving as an exec producer. The three are simultaneously fundraising for LGBTQ+ youth in crisis during COVID-19 and have partnered with the Los Angeles LGBT Center.
“Even the most unexpected elements of filmmaking have changed,” said Curran. “We took a group shot at the end of filming with the incredible Danny Trejo. With our masks on, we scattered ourselves all over the garden we were shooting in, and somehow managed to get the whole crew in one shot while staying totally compliant. Then Danny whips out his phone and says that he’s FaceTiming Mayor Garcetti because he wants him to see this. It was a singular moment.”
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