Premiere Update

The Premiere of NEWTON'S DISEASE went very well last Thursday. I only got to leave work at 4pm so it was a mad dash to get everything packed up & ready to go and to get down to Minneapolis by 7pm.

Our screening was at the Riverview Theater and if you haven't been there and live in the Twin Cities, I highly recommend it. It is a fabulous "old school" theater decorated in pure 50's/60's fabulousness. I loved it! If I lived in the neighborhood I would go there all the time. Yes, I rented this theater without ever having been there. I only had heard good things and saw their pics online - check it out! (www.riverviewtheater.com)

Our name was on the marquee w/our showtime. We weren't on the BIG marquee but at least we were up there. We also were able to hang a poster outside in one of the "now playing" slots as well as right inside the lobby.

The audience was trickling in and I was a bit nervous initially that we wouldn't even make our rental fee back but at 5 minutes before showtime the lobby was full and we had to herd people into the theater.

The theater itself seats about 700! Yikes. Well, needless to say we didn't come any where near that. We had 105 come. Not as many as we DREAMED about but enough to cover our buts for the theater & the beer/wine for the after party. Whew.

I lost a round of "rock-paper-scissors" to Jason (the film's director & my producing partner) so I had to get up there and welcome people to the theater and the WORLD PREMIERE of Newton's. It was not that big of a deal but I would much rather get up and do a song & dance on stage then have to "talk" to people. Yuck. Oh well. it was fine.

The movie got a really great response! People were laughing! People were engaged! People were dead silent during the more intense moments. It was really cool.

One thing about NEWTON'S DISEASE is that people generally seem to respond better to it when they see it in a theater setting. I think it's easy to get distracted when watching it at home and when you're amongst other people you maybe laugh more or think more or ponder more. I don't know. It's very interesting.

After the screening we sold a few copies of the DVD and chatted with friends, cast members, family & strangers who turned up for the showing. It was a lot of fun. Our after-party was unfortunately not very close to the theater so we lost a lot of people along the way (to a wine bar across the street) but we still had a good time at the party.

It was more like a college reunion to me as a lot of college/theater people were there. It brought back many memories and was such a treat to be OUT! And RELAXED! And have the huge weight of the premiere off my back.

This week we have 3 screenings in Duluth at The Playground. A 75-seat black box theater which we're hoping we can fill on more than one occassion. There will be a party on Saturday night after the flick with leftovers from last weekend.

If you're in the area - come on down! we'd love to have you. :)