Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson’s film American Promise is set to screen at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. Below is part 1 of 3 of an interview with them discussing what it was like to get the confirmation call and their next steps in preparing the film for Sundance, among other things. Stay tuned for the following parts in the days to come.
Joe: When we received the phone call from Sundance, we were in the editing room agonizing over how we should end our film. When the phone rang and we noticed the call was from the Sundance institute, I couldn’t bring myself to pick it up so I handed the phone over to Michèle. For a moment, it was as if time stood still. I could hear Michèle say “Hey Shari,” after that, even the sound in my head had been drowned down. I had anticipated this moment for years and the thought of hearing no was now impossible for me to come to terms with, only because of my temporary brain fix. Suddenly, Michèle went airborne, jumping up and down, pumping her fist in the air. Then the sound in my mind came back on. She was screaming the word, “YES!”
Michèle: Perhaps there was some fist pumping and jumping up and down, I don’t know, I think I was numb with elation. I called my mother in Quebec to share the good news, she asked, “What film did you get in with?” She was surprised that a festival as important as Sundance would accept a home movie. Once all the phone calls to crew members were made the daunting nature of what we had to accomplish by January began to sink in. Be careful what you wish for.
Joe: Preparing for Sundance has felt like running a marathon every day for thirty days. We have day jobs and on top of a busy post-production schedule, we are creating a short for NYT Op-Docs and preparing for the Television Critics Association press conference in Pasadena, which just happens to be the same week as the Open of the Sundance Film Festival. We’ve also put preparations for our community engagement campaign into high gear. The campaign is huge and we are so excited about its potential for change. So, this means we’re now working on adrenaline and less than 5 hours of sleep a day until February.
Michèle: We are set on taking advantage of every opportunity that presents itself for the film and our campaign. And in this day and age of new technologies, that means loads of blogging and social media opportunities to develop a following. Our engagement campaign is a part of that build up to our premiere screening. One small piece of that campaign will begin during our film festival tour. It’s unusual to organize a dedicated campaign for a film festival run, so we’re hoping we set a precedent for future documentary films. We came up with this idea because we wanted to harvest any good intention resulting from the screening of the film. Since film festivals draw a general audience, we needed something that anyone could do.
Joe: So, as we travel the festival circuit, we’re going to ask our audiences to help us raise $100,000 and 100 mentors for Big Brothers Big Sister’s Mentoring Brothers in Action program. The goal of this program is to recruit mentors, particularly men of color, and expand the organization’s capacity to serve more African American boys. We launched the campaign the week after Sundance announced our acceptance.
Michèle: Idris and Seun are very excited for Sundance; they are eager to represent the film at such a prestigious event – and are certainly more relaxed about it than we are. Although Seun was initially a bit apprehensive about everything, he is getting more and more excited everyday.
Joe: We decided to prepare the boys for press and interviews, our thought was that we did not want them to became overwhelmed in front of the camera. That’s when both boys said almost in unison, “we’ve been in front of a camera for 13 years. What’s another week.” – I guess the pressure is really on us.
