52nd City

Chris King/Blind Cat Black on "The Wire"

Since Chris King obviously went to a bit of trouble to write up a mock press release for his appearance on KDHX's fantabulous "The Wire" tomorrow evening, I figured, "why not post it up?" Good question!

If you don't enjoy the self-referential (or is this post-self-referential?) then wait for our next blog entry, please:

------------

'Blind Cat Black' director on KDHX Monday 7:30 p.m.
Premiere at Tivoli Tuesday 7 p.m.

Amateur director Chris King will appear on "The Wire" on KDHX 88.1 FM at 7:30 p.m. Monday, July 23 to discuss his first feature film, "Blind Cat Black," which premieres at 7 p.m. the following night (Tuesday, July 24) at The Tivoli Theater in the U. City Loop as part of The St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase.

The Wire is co-hosted by independent journalists and civic instigators Thomas Crone and Amanda Doyle. KDHX FM 88.1 also streams live on the web at
www.kdhx.org.

"It makes sense to talk about the film on KDHX and especially with Crone," said the amateur filmmaker.

"Crone even appears in the film’s closing credits, because he let me move his garden hose and he himself slightly parted a drape on our behalf when we were scouting his house as an exterior location."

King explained that the crew eventually decided against the Crone domicile (located off of South Grand) on the advice of scenic coordinator Lynn Josse. She could find no environmental motivation for the artificial light they would have needed to cast on the side of Crone’s home to shoot the scene, which happens at dusk.

"I'm sure Crone was deeply relieved that we passed on using the side of his
house as a location, since we scouted it for the back-alley blow job scene,
and Thomas is – how to say? – he is less than flamboyant regarding carnal
matters," King said.

King noted that he considered a wall attached to a dwelling Thomas Crone
calls home for such a sordid scene because they were already set up to shoot
next door, in a building owned by Crone’s mother that is rented to Thom Fletcher and Stefene Russell, who were key players in both the cast and crew
of "Blind Cat Black."

"As it is, if Thomas comes to the premiere, he will possibly want to avert his eyes when he sees some of the, uh, explorations that Jason Wallace Triefenbach embarks upon while sprawled across an antique couch positioned
inside a building owned by his mother," King said.

Triefenbach plays The Flower Shop Boy, who can be understood as either a
confused young man going on a gender bender or as an alter ego to The Absent-Minded Tightrope Walker, played by local rapper Toyy Davis. Toyy's
character is further along in her/his gender experimentation and moral skid.
Both are perched on a social abyss symbolized by the freaks and zombies that
comprise most of the rest of the cast, headed by The King of the Zombies,
played by Ray Brewer.

Two of the zombie actors, in fact, were recruited through a community media
course that KDHX had scheduled to help the fledgling production get off the ground.

"Aaron AuBuchon, the key editor of the film, planned to train some people to help us shoot and edit the film, and we did get two production assistants out of the deal, Serra Bording-Jones and Carla Doss," King said.

"The surprise was that we also turned up people who wanted to act in the movie, and both DMari DiGiovanni and Charlois Lumpkin, who we met through
the KDHX class, ended up with considerable (decayed) face time as zombies."

As an unforeseen bonus, the production company behind the film, the local
arts group Poetry Scores, even found an energetic new board member in Lumpkin.

"Conceptually and visually, this is a disturbing film, but the production was kind of feel-good, and it was way more integrated, in terms of white/black, South/North, rock/hip-hop, than you usually see in St. Louis," King said.

"So, it was fitting that KDHX landed us one black actor and one white
actor – for that matter, one black p.a. and one white p.a. – and that it
helped to diversify Poetry Scores by recruiting us a highly motivated African-American board member in Charlois."

King concluded, "It just goes to show that our movie, despite being about prostitution and death – selling your body and soul – is good for just about everybody."

Tickets for "Blind Cat Black" and the other shows in The St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase are on sale now at The Tivoli box office.