Throughout this year, I have been in post-production on a new feature film shot predominantly in San Francisco (with other locations in Brooklyn), entitled Ezer Kenegdo, and a trailer is now available to view for the first time. This very personal film was co-directed and co-written with my friend Deniz Demirer, and explores the frictions that develop when a Chassidic Jew from Crown Heights (played by yours truly, in front of the camera for the first time in six years) travels to San Francisco to visit a Polish-born friend (played by my co-director) with the intent of uncovering why a Bay Area art-world iconoclast (played by independent filmmaking icon Rob Nilsson) seeks to destroy a lifetime's worth of his own work. The film also stars filmmaker Josh Safdie (Daddy Longlegs, The Pleasure of Being Robbed) as my character's Chassidic buddy. The film is about historical baggage, its weight on the relationships we forge, the complexities of male friendship (especially when it crosses fraught cultural divides), and how art and destruction plays into all of these things. It's the best time I have had shooting a movie in what feels like a really long time. The cast, recruited mostly among the players in Rob Nilsson's current acting troupe, proved a total and utter joy of collaborative energy. It was that most mirthful of film births. We're still looking to maybe fit in a couple interesting cameo appearances into the film, so stay tuned!
We're looking for a late 2013 premiere of Ezer Kenegdo for cast, crew, friends and family -- possibly December. Then we'd look to pump it out to film festivals...with this one, we'll finally be trying for the best of them. I'm also still working on completing my full feature-length cut of my previous 2012 film A Simple Game of Catch.
