Lullaby Screenplay Staged Reading coming to Sarasota

Award-winning filmmaker, opera director, and Clearwater native Kimberly M. Wetherell will direct a staged reading of her new feature-length screenplay, LULLABY, on Monday, December 12th at 7:00pm at The Florida Studio Theatre (Gompertz Theatre), 1241 N Palm Avenue, Sarasota, FL 34236.

This one-of-a-kind, 'sneak peek' into the inner workings of a developing feature film is an intregrated multimedia event; including a staged screenplay reading, a live musical performance and a short film, and will be followed by an intimate conversation about the project with writer/director/producer, Kimberly M. Wetherell.

LULLABY is the fictional story of Tess O’Keefe, a devout Polish Catholic immigrant living on Florida’s languid Gulf Coast. When she is uprooted to a retirement home after her husband’s death, her granddaughter Kathleen stumbles upon a mysterious box revealing Tess’ secret past as one of Poland’s Hidden Children of the Holocaust, which causes her fragile tapestry of lies to unravel with excruciating, yet ultimately inspiring, consequences.

The December 12th screenplay reading features Orlando’s Annie Kidwell as Tess, and includes local actors Ned Averill-Snell, Greg Milton, Stephen Ray and Francine Wolf among others. It also features operatic soprano, Colleen McGrath. The cast for the film has not yet been announced.

Wetherell says the idea began germinating in 1996 while working on an opera about Don Luis de Carvajal, a converso, or, Spanish Jew who was forced to convert during the Inquisition, and the idea of hidden Jews stuck with her. Ironically enough, after writing an early draft of the LULLABY screenplay, Wetherell discovered her own Jewish roots: her great-grandparents were Polish Jews, but hid their identity and chose to raise their family Catholic after immigrating to the United States in 1915.

The film is intended to be shot in Spring/Summer 2012, with several locations spanning the Gulf Coast, including Sarasota-Manatee county, as well a few scenes planned for New York, where Kimberly herself has lived for the past eleven years. But having grown up in Clearwater, her plan has always been to shoot the film “back home.”

In June of 2010, Kimberly left her Brooklyn home and relocated to St. Petersburg to begin hands-on development of the project. She is counting on community support to make this film a reality. From locations, to catering, to using regional talent both on- and off-screen, Kimberly has high hopes for making LULLABY an entirely local production.

Written specifically for the Gulf Coast of Florida, the film will highlight the cinematically under-represented west-central Florida Jewish community and will feature many recognizeable locations. One, in particular, is St. Petersburg's Florida Holocaust Museum. Wetherell explains: “The granddaughter, Kathleen, discovers that she is the descendant of not merely a Polish Jew, but a Holocaust survivor. Having been raised within a devout Catholic family of intense secret-keepers, she turns to the most obvious and accessible place she can think of – the museum. What she discovers there about her family, and consequently, herself, is the emotional climax of the film.”

Kimberly continues, “That particular scene is drawn from my own experience. In 2006 I began researching the Gulf Coast's Jewish community and was so surprised to hear about the museum. I didn’t even know it existed. I was completely overwhelmed by the permanent collection, most pointedly, the Treblinka train car and the tiny ring found between its planks. I could see that young girl, the ring’s owner, in my mind’s eye. She took hold of me in a way I had never known before. I couldn’t do anything for her then, but I knew what I, as a writer, could do for her today. Her spirit now lives in Tess, the grandmother character. I’ve given that girl a different life, maybe not a perfect one, but a life that I hope will educate and illuminate others for years and years to come.”

Ms. Wetherell attended both Gibbs (PCCA) and Clearwater High Schools, and then went on to The Theatre School at DePaul University in Chicago. Post-graduation, she has spent more than fifteen years traveling the world, first as an opera stage manager and director (including time spent with the Sarasota Opera for the 2001 season) and subsequently, as a film director and producer; collecting several awards for her short films. Her most recent feature film, TODAY’S SPECIAL (as Associate Producer), was written by and stars Tampa Bay’s own Aasif Mandvi (The Daily Show with Jon Stewart).

The Dec. 12th performance is free and open to the public, with a $10.00 gently suggested donation.

More information about LULLABY can be found at www.lullaby-movie.com and is on Facebook and Twitter @lullaby_movie.