Hello Last at Bat Fans, First of all, I want to thank those of you who took the time to extend your get well wishes to me and even give a shout out to those of you who said I was a wuss and should not have let a little kidney stone (doctor said it is 7 mm; I say it's the size of a Buick), stop the show last week in Bellbrook. I truly wanted to be there but my wife Marsha, Linda Jordan, my son Matt and my Dr. all said I was an idiot for even considering "going on with the show." Actually what convinced me to finally acquiesce to common sense was I felt I could not give all of you who were going to be part of the show the attention you needed and deserved while on stage. As soon as my next procedure is completed on Aug. 20th, I will be in a better position to estimate when we can put on our show which I am betting will be sometime in mid-September. Stay tuned to our web site and Linda's updates for more info. Even though we were not able to put on our Scripted performance last week, we have nonetheless moved forward in evaluating the baseball talent from our Dayton, Cincinnati and Bellbrook baseball tryouts. As you are aware some of you were better actors than players. Some better players than actors. A few were pretty good at both. At this point I want to announce those players we feel can fill some of the on-screen roles of players in our film given their baseball ability, look and required age. Every player that tried out was given a baseball "grade" that ranged from 0-20. To be as fair and as objective as possible we did not consider a player unless they scored at least a 17 on our evaluation form. As a result, the following players were our selections: Andrew Altenberg Brandon Bennett Olivia Bricker Andrew Brock Andrew Brownley Brian Burkhart Chase Buttery Chris Carson Daniel Cyphers Christian Demko Max Dunaway Christopher Fisher Tyler Forest Tanner Griffin Raheem Hasan Tyler Hicks Nolan Holliday Zachery Holliday Will Holt Deeirow Howard Noah Howell Marcus Howell Tanner Juett Logan Kaas Christopher Kennedy Jordan Kiger Connor Larkin Ben McGrew Eric Morris Joel O'Brien Bryce Plitt Danny Rodriquez Joshua Rogers Sam Runyan Joseph Schaffer Carter Scheben Nick Tackett Noah Vincent Justin from Lord's Gym I think it appropriate that those players who received a score of 19.5 or 20 should be recognized, they are: Andrew Brock Deeirow Howard Raheem Hasan Sam Runyan Carter Scheben Tyler Forest Zachery Holliday Our goal in identifying players for our film is based on a simple premise: Do the players on the field playing Dylan's teammates or opponents look like real baseball players? The answer to that question based on the above group is yes...hell yes. This group can play ball at a high level and we are confident that will be reflected on the screen. The next step in this process is taking place this week-end when we will be finalizing our IndieGoGo Crowd Funding initiative. This effort will be reflected in a new structure for our lastatbatthemovie.com web site which will explain our Crowd Funding plans and direct visitors to go to IndieGoGo and find Last at Bat the Movie. Predicated on the amount of donations and the timing of those donations, we could begin filming as soon as Fall of 2015. If not, I would expect we will begin filming in the Spring of 2016. Each one of you has already donated to our effort in one way or another and we sincerely thank you. That is why we decided to include as many of you as we can in this process as players, actors, extras, stand-ins etc., etc. You may not all make it as movie stars, but we bet you will all have a good time being part of this film making event. Thanks again, Mark Donahue The Process Has Begun! Message from Mark Donahue Hello Everyone! As many of you already know, we have begun our call backs for the Scripted performances of Last at Bat which will take place in Dayton and Cincinnati beginning in early August. We will be confirming venues in the next week and will let everyone know ASAP when the locations and dates are finalized. As previously explained, Scripted is in fact a "table read" of parts of the script that are performed in front of a live (we hope) audience. Those selected to read these parts need to understand there could be as many as 100-200 people in the audience as well as a director, writer, and several producers all evaluating your performance. Given a 2 hour performance window we will be selecting 15-20 scenes from the script that will be read. We simply don't have enough time to read the entire script which is why we have a narrator fill in the gaps of the story for the audience as we move from scene to scene. At this point we are looking to fill the following speaking parts for our Scripted performance:
For those of you who have already been contacted or will be in the next two weeks, understand we will probably ask 2-3 actors to play each role over the course of each performance. In addition to the actual performances, we will have at least one and maybe two rehearsals prior to each performance. You may be asked to come to one or both performances in Cincinnati and Dayton locations. Given the fact this is a "performance" of sorts, we will be allocating 10% of our ticket, merchandise sales and donations received to our "cast." We will be selling seats to each performance for $25. While you may not get rich, hopefully we can raise enough $ to pay for your gas money. Okay that's it for now, but the process is under way and the next step is seeing many of you on stage! Mark Donahue Happy Independence Day! July 4, 2015 Last at Bat Team Last at Bat the Movie |
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