Daisy Baby
Genre:
Drama
Synopsis:
Independent, smart and sometimes reckless, Holly’s blazed her way through teen ballerina, model and actress and at the tail-end of her 20s is making the most of pole dancing in a strip club.
When she finds herself pregnant and single, she tries to imagine a new life as a regular mom. She longs for a family, but her wild world seems like no place for a child.
So she hits the road on a small-town dance tour, looking for adventure, and enough money for a new beginning. But her plans go sideways when a one-night hookup lands her in the home of a sexy drug dealer trying to go straight, his troubled teenage son, and the kid’s pregnant 16-year-old girlfriend. The rural McMansion in a chain link compound is no white picket fence dream -- but they need Holly, and for once she finds she has something to give.
But as her new boyfriend’s world of crime threatens to destroy the life they’re building, Holly must use her strength and wiles to protect something that matters: the family she never imagined, but now can’t live without.
Bio:
Elaine Littmann's writing has twice landed her the highly competitive Praxis Screenwriting fellowship. Her short fiction has been published in anthologies and journals, and was nominated for the Journey Prize. Recently, "DAISY BABY," made it to the quarter finals of the 2009 Nicholl Fellowship. A graphic designer by day, Elaine is knee-deep in her latest screenplay: a Cinderella story of an ordinary girl who sets out to rescue a teenage prince ... of darkness.
Elaine Littmann
elainelittmann@gmail.com
604-255-5513
Doubleblind
Genre:
Mystery/Thriller
Logline:
A man investigates the cause of his father’s violent death.
Synopsis:
A five-year-old boy witnesses the violent death of his father. After forty years of successfully repressing that memory, David Stone's life begins to unravel as he realizes the reality he has created is held together by a web of lies. David begins a search for truth that eventually destroys the carefully constructed myth of his past.
The discovery of a lost diary coupled with the intense need to know how and why his father died drive David Stone to abandon his marriage and his fear. Spurred on by the disturbing contents of the diary, he begins his own investigation into the "closed case" of his father's "accidental" shooting. With the tenacity of a dedicated detective he uses the contents of an old love letter, newspaper files and his own memory to piece together the events that occurred on a cold fall night in 1968.
David soon discovers that a little knowledge can be dangerous. Strange things begin to happen. He meets the son he never knew he had and foils a blackmail attempt. He is stalked by a mysterious stranger and his home is ransacked. His suspicions of foul play confirmed, David Stone finds himself the next most likely victim.
Bio:
Alan MacInroy studied film and theatre at Simon Fraser University's School for the Contemporary Arts while pursuing a degree in Communications. He is the author of six plays including The Mourning Heir which was presented in a staged reading at the Vancouver New Play Festival. It is upon this play that Doubleblind is based.
ALAN MACINROY, Writer
(604) 779-2947
(604) 331-1877 Fax
sparta800@live.com
Drumheller
Genre: Mystery
Logline: A 1920’s coalminer discovers a dinosaur skeleton in his mineshaft that stirs up a whole lot of trouble in the badlands.
Synopsis: The badlands - even the name conjures up images of a tormented landscape shaped by the elements.
1924. John Gallagher’s coal mine at Carbon on the edge of the Drumheller badlands is going bust. He also owes his lawyer a lot of money going back to his murder trial three years ago. His girlfriend, Hannah Bruce, a parttime bootlegger and owner of a local bed-and-breakfast, is begging him to flee the valley with her because the pals of anti-union boss he allegedly killed are out for revenge. Their relationship is, in turns, as solid as bedrock and as fragile as the crust.
When Gallagher finds a dinosaur skeleton in his mineshaft things start looking better for a few moments; maybe he can sell it somewhere. He makes contact with a paleontologist from the university in Edmonton named Bloomfield who he quickly learns is nearly as desperate for money as he is. The paleontologist, though, won’t go away. He wants Gallagher’s dinosaur bone, and he might have his eyes on Gallagher’s girlfriend, too. He’s charming and smart and ambitious.
It’s a harsh world where a wrong step could mean an untimely demise.
Meanwhile, Gallagher’s troubles mount. His old head wound from the war is acting up again causing him those terrible spells which he swears give him glimpses into the future. He glimpses himself in prison. Bad times in badlands for Gallagher.
Some are predators and some are doomed to become prey.
Now a mysterious young couple, a Mr and Mrs Snow, break down in their car in the valley nearby. They say they are bound for Alaska on their honeymoon and take a room in Hannah’s bed-and-breakfast while Gallagher works on their car. Gallagher, eventually, discovers they’re outlaws with a suitcase full of stolen money and a trail of blood behind them. The man is crazy and his wife is beguiling and they’re both very dangerous. But Gallagher is dangerous, too, and he’s determined to get their booty. Too bad somebody has to die in the process.
The bones of that somebody are found in Gallagher’s burned out mineshaft seventy-five years later by Peter Reid, a paleontologist from the Tyrrell Museum, who, quite accidentally, has come upon Bloomfield’s old journal. The prospects of retracing the man’s footsteps arouse him and he tracks down a strange Old Woman who he believes to be Hannah Bruce. Is she though? She's nearly a hundred years old and she's reluctant to talk. Eventually Reid learns that John Gallagher escaped from prison while serving ten years for arson and vanished off the face of the earth. What happened to his dinosaur bone? What happened to all that money? What befell the Snows? The skull of the person found in Gallagher’s old mine has a bullet hole in it.
Like the landscape, these characters have much to reveal and much to hide. Excavating their stories becomes a discovery of hidden truths and ambitions. Living within this environment has enabled them to become creatures well suited to their own sense of survival, but also deadly if stirred.
It’s a tale of menace, madness and passion. Themes of investigation and excavation function throughout, along with a spectacular landscape and a compelling historical backdrop.
Bio: Gordon Pengilly is a ten-time winner of national and international writing competitions. His stage plays have been produced across Canada, New York, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, the Netherlands and Japan. His radio dramas have been broadcast by the CBC, on BBC World Service, on Satellite XM (U.S.) and in Australia. Drumheller Or Dangerous Times won the WGC's Jim Burt Prize for Screenwriting in 2003 and was workshopped at Praxis in 2004. Seeing In The Dark won the 2008 Canadian Short Screenplay Competition and was produced in Regina by Year Of The Skunk Productions. Harm’s Way was a runner-up in the Hollywood Scriptapalooza Competition was workshopped by Praxis in 2005.
Contact:
gpengilly@nucleus.com
Or Contact Praxis