Last Day of Principal Photography

We wrapped principal photography today in Queens with the car fight and “bath house” scenes. It’s been an amazing three weeks with long days and lots of unforeseen challenges and serendipitous discoveries. But that’s indie film production!

Thanks to the cast, crew, and location owners who made it possible to say:

A sweet ending to a wild and wonderful three weeks.

A sweet ending to a wild and wonderful three weeks.

Crew wrap party at Juquila Mexican Restaurant in Jackson Heights, Queens. From left: Gerard Pickett (Stills Photography, PA), Ashley Sather (Production Coordinator), Erin Willers (Wardrobe Supervisor), Nick Carignan (Sound Mixer), Andrea Lessard (PA…

Crew wrap party at Juquila Mexican Restaurant in Jackson Heights, Queens. From left: Gerard Pickett (Stills Photography, PA), Ashley Sather (Production Coordinator), Erin Willers (Wardrobe Supervisor), Nick Carignan (Sound Mixer), Andrea Lessard (PA), Tyler Young (2nd AD), Richard Dalton (1st AD), Jen Kim (Key PA), Carylanna Taylor (Writer/Producer/Director), and Jacob Okada (Writer/Director/DP/Producer).

Meet ANYA’s Leads

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Ali, Motell, and Gil - welcome to ANYA!

We can’t wait to work with you
to bring Libby, Seymour, and Marco to life.

Ali Ahn (LIBBY)Broadway: The Heidi Chronicles. Off-Broadway: The Great Leap (Atlantic Theater Company), Sugar House (Ma-Yi), Twelfth Night (The Pearl), The Importance of Being Earnest (The Pearl), and House of Bernarda Alba (NAATCO). Television: “Th…

Ali Ahn (LIBBY)

Broadway: The Heidi Chronicles. Off-Broadway: The Great Leap (Atlantic Theater Company), Sugar House (Ma-Yi), Twelfth Night (The Pearl), The Importance of Being Earnest (The Pearl), and House of Bernarda Alba (NAATCO). Television: “The Path,” “Orange is the New Black,” “The Breaks,” “Billions,” “Supernatural,” “Odd Mom Out,” “Nurse Jackie,” “Blue Bloods,” “Benders,” “Black Box,” “White Collar,” “Zero Hour,” “Louie,” “Law & Order: SVU,” and “Ugly Betty.” Film: Landline, Girl in the Book, Liberal Arts, and The Dark Side. Training: Yale, CalArts.

Motell Foster (DR. SEYMOUR LIVINGSTON)Hailing from Alabama, Motell is a recent grad from NYU's Graduate Acting program. Recent film credits include: Palimpsest (2019), A Dogs Way Home (2019), Random Acts of Flyness (2018), Suicide By Sunlight (2018)…

Motell Foster (DR. SEYMOUR LIVINGSTON)

Hailing from Alabama, Motell is a recent grad from NYU's Graduate Acting program. Recent film credits include: Palimpsest (2019), A Dogs Way Home (2019), Random Acts of Flyness (2018), Suicide By Sunlight (2018) and an upcoming untitled Noah Baumbach project (2019). Theater credits include: Julius Caesar and Othello in The Public Theater's Shakespeare In The Park.

Gil Perez-Abraham (MARCO)Gil is an actor and recording artist as $antos. May 2018 graduate of the William Esper Studio with Suzanne Esper. TV & Film: Most recently, Gil played a supporting role in Lulu Wang's Untitled Feature starring Awkwafina,…

Gil Perez-Abraham (MARCO)

Gil is an actor and recording artist as $antos. May 2018 graduate of the William Esper Studio with Suzanne Esper. TV & Film: Most recently, Gil played a supporting role in Lulu Wang's Untitled Feature starring Awkwafina, as well as guest starring as Blanca's (MJ Rodriguez) brother Manuel on Ryan Murphy's POSE. Recent guest stars on Blue Bloods, Law and Order SVU, and The Young Pope. Theater: Gil is currently workshopping We Live In Cairo (World Premiere) with the New York Theatre Workshop/American Repertory Theatre (ART), with production slated for Spring 2019 at ART. Gil was a part of the New York Theatre Workshop 2018 Summer Residency.

Casting is underway!

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Anne Davison, Casting Director (photo credit)

Anne Davison, Casting Director (photo credit)

We’ve become SAG-AFTRA signatories so we can began casting for a July 2017 shoot.

We couldn’t more excited to be working with the very talented casting directors, Anne Davison (A Woman, A Part, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Game Change) and John Ort (Ozark, Bull, Younger).

They’re looking forward to assembling an amazing, diverse cast who can make themselves at home in the real world locations where we’ll be filming.

John Ort, Casting Director (photo credit)

John Ort, Casting Director (photo credit)

IVF: First three-parent baby born to infertile couple

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IVF: First three-parent baby born to infertile couple

“A baby has been born to a previously infertile couple in Ukraine using a new type of "three-person IVF". Doctors in Kiev used a method called pronuclear transfer in what is a world first. It is, however, not the first child born with DNA from three parents. The baby girl, born on 5 January, is thought to be the world's second "modern three-parent baby" - another child was created using a slightly different method in Mexico last year. The Kiev team fertilised the mother's egg with her partner's sperm. They then transferred the combined genes into an egg taken from a donor.” (Michelle Roberts, BBC News online)

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CRISPR will be a huge story in 2017. Here are 7 things to look for. →

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CRISPR will be a huge story in 2017. Here are 7 things to look for.

Vox’s  Eliza Barclay and Brad Plumer proclaim that “The gene-editing tool’s potential to upend science is dizzying.” They argue that “designer babies” are “for now, mainly a sideshow.” Instead they turned to Nicola Patron, a molecular and synthetic biologist at at the Earlham Institute in the UK and a variety of other scientists “what they think are realistically the most exciting ways that scientists might one day change the world using CRISPR.” They share some of those ideas from food to Alzheimer’s to fuel in this article.

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Working with “The Exchange” to Find a Creative Collaboration between Filmmakers and Scientists

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Working with “The Exchange” to Find a Creative Collaboration between Filmmakers and Scientists

Carylanna reflects on her and Jacob’s creative collaboration during the development of ANYA with geneticists Ting Wu and Ruth McCole who they found through The National Academy of Sciences - The Science & Entertainment Exchange.

Top takeaway?As a filmmaker approaching a scientist with a fiction project, you’re extending an invitation to play. Make the most of the opportunity and allow for time and space to brainstorm new alternatives for your project. In our unforgettable experience, the result was not just a more scientifically accurate film but more well rounded characters and a better story.

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Stowe Story Labs - Narrative Labs

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Jacob’s first screenwriting training was at NYU. Mine was at Stowe Story Labs - Fall Narrative Lab. The workshops, stories, and collegiality was amazing. The pitching kicked my butt, but helped me identify key script challenges as well as find and articulate the core of our story. Insights from mentors gave me a better understanding of the road ahead. I’m looking forward to continuing meeting with a small group of NYC based writers.

The scientist/writers at Stowe Story Labs 2015. From left, Carylanna Taylor (anthropologist), Matt Minson (physician), and Diandra Leslie-Pelecky (physicist). I’m not sure if the blur is the low light or the Heady Toppers.

The scientist/writers at Stowe Story Labs 2015. From left, Carylanna Taylor (anthropologist), Matt Minson (physician), and Diandra Leslie-Pelecky (physicist). I’m not sure if the blur is the low light or the Heady Toppers.

Illustrations

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To help potential supports envision ANYA, in 2016 we worked with designer/illustrator Sarah Kaiser to evoke a few key scenes. Though the finished film is different, the illustrations were useful in the look book and treatment as well as in helping us refine the look and tone of the film.

LIBBY visits the fertility clinic to pursue IVF with a sperm donor (deleted scene),

LIBBY visits the fertility clinic to pursue IVF with a sperm donor (deleted scene),

His first time in the city, MARCO experiences major culture shock.

His first time in the city, MARCO experiences major culture shock.

LIBBY spots MARCO on TKTS steps in Times Square.

LIBBY spots MARCO on TKTS steps in Times Square.

Curious, LIBBY follows MARCO to the subway (deleted scene).

Curious, LIBBY follows MARCO to the subway (deleted scene).

Pillow talk after LIBBY’s first time with MARCO and his first time ever.

Pillow talk after LIBBY’s first time with MARCO and his first time ever.

The more traditionalist Narval try to stop Libby’s, Marco’s, and Seymour’s attempts to collect DNA from the Narval people.

The more traditionalist Narval try to stop Libby’s, Marco’s, and Seymour’s attempts to collect DNA from the Narval people.

MARCO gathers information from Narval DNA donors (including his mother) while SEYMOUR collects samples.

MARCO gathers information from Narval DNA donors (including his mother) while SEYMOUR collects samples.

SEYMOUR and his assistant ENDO process DNA with flair.

SEYMOUR and his assistant ENDO process DNA with flair.

Chinese Scientists Will Use CRISPR Gene Editing on Humans for the First Time. →

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Chinese Scientists Will Use CRISPR Gene Editing on Humans for the First Time.

“A team of Chinese scientists is planning to use a CRISPR-Cas9 gene-editing treatment on humans for the first time next month. The procedure at Sichuan University's West China Hospital in Chengdu will attempt to treat lung cancer in patients where chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and other conventional treatments have failed. If successful, the trial could pave the way for more CRISPR-based treatments in the future, potentially revolutionizing the way we treat a wide variety of diseases and ailments.” (Jay Bennett, Popular Mechanics)

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Festival of Genomics

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On the advice of organizer Richard Lumb, who Jacob and I had met at the pgEd Industry Forum, I spent a day in Boston at the Festival of Genomics. Part trade show, part conference it was an unexpected opportunity to meet potential production and outreach partners.

The vendors were eager to explain their products or projects. Some even offered us equipment to use in the shoot, a space to film, or a shout out in their publications. I found a science illustrator who seems like a great fit for some conceptual drawings. A geneticist I met from Emory is very eager to organize a screening for the Emory/University of Georgia community in Atlanta when the time comes.

It was well worth the drive to Boston. I also ran into our science advisor, Ting Wu, heard a gene editing talk by George Church that was over my head, and had a great meeting with Richard Lumb about how the festival and his magazine, Frontline Genomics. could help in outreach when the time comes.

I shouldn’t have been, but I was surprised at how easy it was to talk to all the participants. Salespersons, geneticists, genetics counselors, administrators, editors, science communicators… they all seemed eager for a story like ANYA.

Panel Endorses ‘Gene Drive’ Technology That Can Alter Entire Species

Panel Endorses ‘Gene Drive’ Technology That Can Alter Entire Species

New York Times article by Amy Harmon. “A revolutionary technology known as “gene drive,” which for the first time gives humans the power to alter or perhaps eliminate entire populations of organisms in the wild, has stirred both excitement and fear since scientists proposed a means to construct it two years ago. […] On Wednesday, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, the premier advisory group for the federal government on scientific matters, endorsed continued research on the technology, concluding after nearly a yearlong study that while it poses risks, its possible benefits make it crucial to pursue. The group also set out a path to conducting what it called “carefully controlled field trials,” despite what some scientists say is the substantial risk of inadvertent release into the environment.”

Image by Anthony James: Female mosquitoes that have been altered as part of a gene drive experiment.

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"Scientists Hold Secret Meeting to Consider Creating a Synthetic Human Genome" →

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"Scientists Hold Secret Meeting to Consider Creating a Synthetic Human Genome"

This New York Times article now carries the online headline “Scientists Talk Privately About Creating a Synthetic Human Genome.” I’d have to confirm, but if I recall correctly it was changed after the scientists - including Harvard Medical School’s George Church (pictured) who we’ve gotten to know a bit through ANYA - protested that the talks weren’t so much “secret” as discussing private details of a yet-to-be-published journal article. Numerous sites (including this link to The Seattle Times) carry the original title. Reading the article by NYT’s Andrew Pollack, gives an interesting insider’s perspective of how cutting-edge science is done. Comparing the two versions reminds me of how powerfully images can communicate subtle bias: in one, George seems serious and imposing. In the other he is warm and welcoming. Which better fits the heralding of a synthetic genome? Like the Times, I opted to lead with James King-Holmes’ image of sixty trays containing the entire human genome as 23,040 different fragments of cloned DNA.

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Highly efficient Cas9-mediated gene drive for population modification of the malaria vector mosquito Anopheles stephensi →

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Highly efficient Cas9-mediated gene drive for population modification of the malaria vector mosquito Anopheles stephensi

The first mentions of deploying gene modification that we noticed were related to modifying mosquitos in ways that would help eradicate mosquito-born diseases. The headline is from a 2015 PNAS academic journal article. The picture is from a more scandalous 2017 news article “Could this zoo of mutant mosquitoes lead the way to eradicating Zika?”

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Internal Table Read

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We hired a great group of local actors to read through the script. Their comments will be incredibly helpful as we write the next draft.

From left: Jacob Okada (writer/director), Andrea Schirmer, Natalie Hoy, Bill DeMerritt, Alex Emanuel, Noriko Sato, Nicole , and Eliud Kaufman. Photo by Carylanna Taylor.

From left: Jacob Okada (writer/director), Andrea Schirmer, Natalie Hoy, Bill DeMerritt, Alex Emanuel, Noriko Sato, Nicole , and Eliud Kaufman. Photo by Carylanna Taylor.