Director's Statement
As a Director and Playwright, is difficult to describe the feeling of sitting in an audience and watching your creation come to life on a stage. But it is even more fulfilling when the story has purpose. In my play, Of Shadow’s Lost, the main character tries to bring dignity to the developmentally disabled. I wrote Nathan about a family dealing with the difficulties of having a child with cerebral palsy. Now, as much as I’ve enjoyed the process of writing and directing a feature film, its purpose goes far beyond my own personal satisfaction.
We wrapped the shoot 6 months before the Hollywood harassment scandals and the #me too movement began. Our story goes back a hundred years before, to the beginning of the first Hollywood actresses. A quote from the last line of our film, “In a hundred years, it seems that nothing has changed.”
We discovered in our research for the film that there have been hundreds if not thousands of actresses who have shared this common story. Some so tragic and horrific that it is almost not believable to put into a script. In the 1920’s, they became millionaires in their teens, broke and on drugs before their twenties and dead from suicide or overdoses. Alcohol was the common drug and almost every single one became alcoholics, which eventually killed them. Since there is such a commonality to these actresses it was our choice for one single actress to represent them all by portraying 13 of the most known.
Silent & Forgotten is not a big film with million dollar special effects. But it is a big story. We are proud of the crafting of our film. In each screening to date we have heard from the viewers that they became obsessed with research, wanting to find out more about these actresses. It is our hope that a new generation will discover the beautiful and tragic stories of these movie pioneers. Maybe we can learn from the past.
John Lewis, Director
We wrapped the shoot 6 months before the Hollywood harassment scandals and the #me too movement began. Our story goes back a hundred years before, to the beginning of the first Hollywood actresses. A quote from the last line of our film, “In a hundred years, it seems that nothing has changed.”
We discovered in our research for the film that there have been hundreds if not thousands of actresses who have shared this common story. Some so tragic and horrific that it is almost not believable to put into a script. In the 1920’s, they became millionaires in their teens, broke and on drugs before their twenties and dead from suicide or overdoses. Alcohol was the common drug and almost every single one became alcoholics, which eventually killed them. Since there is such a commonality to these actresses it was our choice for one single actress to represent them all by portraying 13 of the most known.
Silent & Forgotten is not a big film with million dollar special effects. But it is a big story. We are proud of the crafting of our film. In each screening to date we have heard from the viewers that they became obsessed with research, wanting to find out more about these actresses. It is our hope that a new generation will discover the beautiful and tragic stories of these movie pioneers. Maybe we can learn from the past.
John Lewis, Director