Contact: Joseph Meissner, Director http://www.facebook.com/floodstreets.movie Cell: 504-382-3557 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1627892/ Email: [email protected] “Upbeat, amusing film... Well-done and involving.” - Louis Parks, The Houston Chronicle, three out of four stars Logline: A diverse group of creative malcontents struggle to find love, money and marijuana in the surreal streets of post-flood New Orleans. A nuanced view of the city and its people, Flood Streets shows the changing landscape of New Orleans as it has never been seen before, dispelling stereotypes to reveal the tragic, defiant, joyful city many call “the Soul of America.” Short Synopsis: Flood Streets explores life in New Orleans a year after Hurricane Katrina wiped out most of the city, interweaving characters as diverse and eccentric as the city itself. Madeline is a pot-addled real estate agent who stumbles upon a crisis of conscience in an abandoned home. Matt is a reformed bohemian trying to go straight - but he can't stop fantasizing about his dentist. Nine-year-old Abby wants to buy her family a boat by selling home insurance to her friends, and single mom Georgia cooks up a scheme that could put her daughter in danger. Together these creative malcontents struggle to find love, money, and marijuana on the surreal streets of post-flood New Orleans. Contact: Joseph Meissner FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Cell Phone: 504-382-3557 Email: [email protected] NEW ORLEANS FILMMAKERS TAKE UNIQUE PATH TO MAKE THEIR FIRST FILM Flood Streets Spins an Unexpected Story of New Orleans’ Recovery Helen Krieger and Joseph Meissner owned a home and two businesses in New Orleans when Katrina hit. During the six-week mandatory evacuation that followed, while the National Guard kept their Ninth Ward neighborhood under quarantine, the husband/wife team had time to contemplate how they might rebuild their lives from scratch if there was nothing left to come home to. Despite the fear and uncertainty, here was an opportunity to start from scratch and realize dreams both had deferred. For Krieger it was writing and for Joseph Meissner, it was acting and directing, so they decided to join forces to tell the story unfolding around them of New Orleans’ strange recovery. They sold their house after making the necessary repairs, moved into the back of Meissner’s martial arts school and used the proceeds to fund Flood Streets. Based on a collection of short stories Krieger wrote, Flood Streets follows a group of creative malcontents as they struggle to find love, money, and marijuana in the surreal streets of post-storm New Orleans. Inspired by ensemble movies like Altman’s Short Cuts, this was a complicated first film to pull off, with five story lines, 42 characters, 48 locations, 147 extras, and a parade… all on a budget that wouldn't pay for lunch on a Hollywood film. Friends from the neighborhood came to their aid, offering shooting locations, artwork and labor. They wanted to be part of a project that captured the complexity of the city’s culture, a truly unexpected film filled with fresh performances and energetic music. Actor and comedian Harry Shearer (The Simpsons, This Is Spinal Tap), and songwriter Becky Stark (The Decemberists, The Living Sisters) signed onto the project because they fell in love with the script. Shearer said it was a project that “finally got it right about New Orleans.” It took roughly three years to write the script, 25 days to shoot it, and 15 months to edit and post- produce, guided in part by the film’s co-producers – Louisiana filmmakers Glen Pitre and Michelle Benoit (Belizaire the Cajun, The Scoundrel’s Wife). Flood Streets is playing at independent film festivals across the country, and the book of short stories, In the Land of What Now, that inspired the screenplay is available through Amazon. Production Notes: New Soundtrack to New Orleans New Orleans has always been a hotbed of musical inspiration, so much so that we've become a victim of our own success. It's easy for people to think of New Orleans as a kind of museum to jazz or funk, but in fact, the music scene in New Orleans is constantly evolving with each young musician who makes the existing musical forms his own. It happened when young musicians, too inexperienced to gain entry to the mainline brass bands, formed their own groups and injected their love of hip-hop into the music, keeping the tradition alive and relevant for new generations of second-liners. It happened when indie rocker Clint Maedgen joined the Preservation Hall Jazz Band as the lead vocalist, bringing, quite literally, a new voice to the most traditional band in New Orleans. While shows like HBO’s Treme do a great job of sharing with the world those stalwarts of traditional, well-defined New Orleans musical forms, Flood Streets aims to shed light on the contradictions and collaborations at the edge of the ever-evolving culture of New Orleans, especially its youth culture. In addition to Clint Maedgen and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Flood Streets features many other bands, some just breaking into the national spotlight, that are leading this musical cross-pollination in New Orleans, bands like the Zydepunks, Panorama Jazz Band, Loren Murrell, Debauche, and others. The cast is also filled with musicians including lead actress Becky Stark (Living Sisters, The Decemberists, and Rolling Stone Magazine’s #3 artist to watch), Rachel Dupard, a 15-year-old singer from Dallas who overcame years of speech therapy to become a stunning vocalist, Marygoround, a fire dancer and accordion and piano player, and Jacques Duffourc of the band the Bally Who. Husband/Wife Team Tell a Tale of Infidelity When husband and wife team Joseph Meissner and Helen Krieger collaborated on their first feature, they created a film with a deeply conflicted couple at its core, but the filmmakers promise this isn't a portrait of their own marriage. Flood Streets follows a group of creative malcontents, none of whom have much luck in love, but the central, strained relationship is between reformed bohemian Matt (played by Meissner) and his rock 'n roll girlfriend, Liz (played by Melissa Hall). As the couple drifts apart, Matt battles with his desire to stray. Meissner's performance captures the nuance of this character's struggle perfectly. “He really did an amazing job of bringing this guy to life,” Krieger says, “and on one hand that might be a little scary, but then again, I'm the one who created the character in the first place, so I guess I shouldn't talk.” Meissner and his co-star Hall also do a great job of making the relationship itself believable, of capturing both the intimacy and the distance that can happen after living together for awhile. With Krieger always on set as the producer, filming those intimate moments was sometimes awkward. “It was pretty funny, I have to admit,” Krieger says. “It's hard enough to play a love scene with someone you barely know, but when you have to do it with the guy's wife sitting behind the monitor giving you notes, it takes it to a whole new level of awkwardness. I got a lot of ideas for future stories.” Barring the occasional awkwardness, the two are an effective team. Krieger brings the storytelling skills and Meissner his years of experience as an actor. Working together on their first feature, their relationship was also an asset. “There's a short hand you get when you're together that's really useful,” Meissner says. “We already knew each others' tastes and communication styles, so we could just get straight to work.” And making their first feature on a micro budget, there was a lot of work. “I can't imagine doing this alone,” Krieger says. “It's grueling and it's challenging and it's really fulfilling, so it's great to have someone to share that with.” Low Budget in Hollywood South Thanks to Louisiana film industry tax incentives, New Orleans has become a major movie-making hub, and locals are thrilled whenever a new production comes to town. But while these films bring great economic benefits to local crew and service industries, they have yet to trickle down to local filmmakers. With very few exceptions, most movies taking advantage of tax incentives are written, produced, funded and often primarily cast outside Louisiana, leaving local directors, writers and producers out of the action. So when New Orleans director Joseph Meissner and his wife, writer Helen Krieger, started pre- production on Flood Streets, they were determined to use as many other New Orelanians as possible. All the crew lived here, and all but two of the 42 actors were local. Having a writer, producers, director, crew and talent from New Orleans gave them the experience base they needed to tell the story right. It also energized the production as people signed on to help because they wanted to support a completely local project. In one case, an elderly neighbor invited one of their bands to play on his front porch, let the crew mic his screen door, then danced in his living room while they filmed. DIY Counterculture New Orleans has always been a creative cauldron, attracting people at all stages of their life who are interested in art and culture. After the storm, even more people moved down, interacting with our culture to create an amazing artistic incubator. As was the case in New York City after 9/11 many of these post-Katrina transplants are young.