Sundance, Moonlight, I Spy a Rapper Tonight...

Last night we headed over to The Actors Gang Theater in Hollywood for a Sundance Institute sponsored screenplay reading. We were invited by our screenwriting maestro John Herman Shaner (Halls of Anger) and joined by other members of the weekly Monday night screenwriting group.

It started out as any theater event would: Schmoozing with fellow students, looking at the portraits of past productions on the walls, smiling at the passerby. Until an extremely familiar face waltzed from a side door into the lobby and smiled a familiar smile in our direction.

Lo and behold it was one of our favorite emcees, Common! After checking the flyer, we discovered that he would indeed be one of the actors reading from the work-in-progress script, "Iraqi Freedom," by Paxton Winters and Emre Mirza. Other recognizable talent participating in the stage reading included Jeremy Renner (S.W.A.T.) and Claire Forlani (The Medallion).

The script was good and the acting was well done especially the seated performances of Jeremy Renner and Anil Kumar. If the script makes it to the theaters, the two of them would provide a very interesting on-screen pairing...

During the reception we mingled a little bit (good Lawd, I was tired!) and handed some ABA postcards to a couple of producers. Shawnee exchanged a few words with Common (who did remarkably well on stage with veteran actors) and we bid our screenwriting group "adieu".


Rapper, Common



--Nelle