| Osawatomie Serves As Backdrop For Film Shoot |
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| News - Osawatomie | |||
| Written by Travis Perry | |||
| Wednesday, 17 March 2010 09:00 | |||
Ever so slowly, the disheveled homeless man ambled through the aisles of the grocery store.  With ratted hair, muddy clothes, dirty hands and paper-thin shoes, his bedraggled appearance stood in stark contrast to the expertly arranged, color coordinated shelves around him. Carefully sidling by an unknown pair of customers, his eyes darted left, then right; his hand quickly shot out of his pocket, snatched a handful of sauce packets and expertly hid them. They could be his only supper that evening. Finally trudging to the end of the aisle, he fumbled with the machine in front of him, its fragrant aroma wafting through the air; his eyes full of hurt, his body begging for a warm drink, he diligently filled the foam cup, doing his best to see if anyone noticed he was there. “CUT!” rang out the voice of Sharon Wright, cracking the steel focus of the crowd gathered behind the camera focused on Paul Campbell; congratulations and suggestions flew through the air as the film crew prepared for their next shot. Such was the scene across parts of Osawatomie Saturday morning when former resident Sharon Wright and her crew rolled into town to begin filming her short screenplay “Change for a Dollar,” a vision Wright said she always intended to have an Osawatomie backdrop. Setting up shots in Moon’s Hometown Market, John Brown Memorial Park or in front of Rockhaven Pastries and More, the Old Country Store and the Grand Loft, the crew dug in early, rolling into Moon’s at 6:30 a.m., and finishing shooting around midnight. While unexpected delays slowed the shoot down, Wright wasn’t deterred; her four to five minute film may have taken nearly a full day to shoot, but feature-length films can take sometimes months or even years. “Setup is the longest time,” Wright said. “Everything has to be perfect, there’s a great amount of detail that goes through it.” Helping add to the already strong Osawatomie input on the film was Amy Walmann, an Osawatomie High School graduate studying film in Kansas City who contacted Wright about helping with the shoot. “I’m so excited, my heart was racing when Sharon called me and said I could be part of this,” said Walmann, a production assistant on the set. “I’m so proud to work on (my first film) in Osawatomie.” For Osawatomie City Council members Tamara Maichel and Mike Moon, seeing the screenplay shot in Osawatomie is an opportunity they saw as a way to continue to show off the many positives of the town. “I think this will be terrific for the community depending on the kind of exposure it gets,” Moon said. Maichel agreed, and said the ease Wright experienced in lining up locations reflected well on the people of Osawatomie. “It says a lot about the community with how much people are willing to help,” Maichel said. “We opened up our hearts to them, we opened up our arms to them.” In addition to the various storefronts and locations allowing the crew permission to film, the Grand Loft served as a home base while they were in town, donating their space and offering the crew both lunch and supper as they went through the day. Final run time for Wright’s film is expected to be four to five minutes. In the coming days and weeks, Wright will spend much of her time editing the footage to form her final vision, which she said she hopes to present at independent film festivals across the nation, and ultimately donate to charitable organizations to use for their own promotion.
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