[press release from PAC Scriptlab]
There are so few opportunities for the public to get a taste of the early film making process, but for those who love to settle down to a good story, fine acting and a glass of wine, PAC (Perth Actors Collective) Script Lab provides just the thing.
Sleeping Dogs Lie is a new script by Perth writer Andy Harmsen, (writer of Dirty Pretty Nails). The team who hope to raise finance to film it are producer Warwick Doddrell and director Keir Wilkins. It’s a gritty tale of greed and loss that will be read by professional actors at the Subiaco Arts Centre on Wednesday, April 1st.
Producer of the script Warwick Doddrell believes the story and characters capture the spirit and essence of WA’s mining boom where people have for so long been drawn to the promise of economic prosperity.
“With the looming shadow of the Australian Free Trade Agreement hanging low in the political sky, Sleeping Dogs Lie addresses the social fallout of a resources boom in an ever ‘Americanizing’ cultural climate,” says Doddrell.
“This is all happening in a place that has been ignored by our news camera’s lens for being too lucrative and having too much sunshine,” he adds.
Sleeping Dogs Lie is a powerful and evocative story that follows the lives of Jack and Emmy:
Jack owes Emmy money. Emmy needs somewhere to stay. Jack woke up in Emmy’s working bed. Now he‘s got a debt no honest man can pay. Seduced by images of cowboys on TV and delirious with the heat, Jack puts two and two together; Jack has got to be somebody; a cowboy. He’s going to hook into this ‘boom thing’ and get some money for himself. On a frontier filled with red dust, where the streets smell of ore and where someone’s worth is measured in dollars.
Emmy is just trying to survive.
In the state’s far-north where resources are rich and everybody celebrates shared wealth, smaller stories do occur. Small stories disappear into the dry cracks that scar the Earth that show us the true cost of economic prosperity. They show us who we really are and what it is we lost to get there.
To further explore these themes and play a role in the screenwriting creative process, (the public are invited to anonymously comment on the script), PAC Script Lab offer anyone interested a free night of entertainment with a difference.