Watch Now: The Baby Cries

The Baby Cries (Film Festival Cut) from Mario Jose Novoa on Vimeo.
The Baby Cries (Film Festival Cut) Directed by Mario Jose Novoa
Produced by Kristen Wair and Mario J. Novoa
Starring: Miriam Peniche, Martin Morales, Matt Pascua, MJ Silva
Cinematography by Dan Cotreau
Music by Morgan Coffman

May 5, 2013 : The Baby Cries in Dublin, Ireland!

www.gaytheatre.ie

May 5, 2013 : The Baby Cries in Dublin, Ireland!

I’m sure there are many babies crying in Ireland, but not like mine. This story is about two gay dads raising their newborn daughter while trying to reconnect with their own parents. This story is about love, faith and hope for LGBT people who are trying to mend ties with their family. This story is based in part of my own experience as a father while trying to reconcile with my parents, after coming "out" many years prior. This week my little baby will be shown to an international audience with a cast and crew from Los Angeles. They’ve arrived in Ireland and are prepping for an all week performance.

I am So grateful that my play The Baby Cries is part of the International Dublin Gay Theater Festival in Dublin, Ireland this week! 

Congrats to the cast MJ Silva, Martin Morales, Andres Solorzano and Carla Vega who are in Ireland already. Break a leg guys!

PRE-PRODUCTION | Table Reading for The Baby Cries

A talented cast and crew embarked on a table reading for The Baby Cries. The Baby Cries is a short film comedy based on a stage play I wrote for CASA 0101's The Brown and Out Theater Festival this year. It is a story of a gay couple raising their newborn daughter and the chaos that ensues when the traditional Catholic Salvadoran grandparents show up. The talented Cast includes: Martin Morales, Miriam Peniche, Matt Pascua and MJ Silva.

As the writer/producer/director of the film, it is a proud moment to see the "baby" come alive. The play version generated a lot interest and praise from the audience, and it was great to hear how well people connected to the story. Time and time again people would tell me how they identified with each character - people from all walks of life: gay, straight, male and female. When writing the piece, there was a part of me that wanted the characters to be identifiable with anyone and people did indeed connect to the story of family, tradition and the insecurities of raising a family.

At the table read we discussed story, character motivation, speech and dialogue. The cast is invested in portraying their character with a finite sense of honesty, and as a director I could't be happier. Martin, Miriam, Matt and MJ came into the reading wanting to know more and how best to emote for camera. When you have a cast engaged in the process you realize how deep their own motivations are as actors. How could a director not love working with actors?

In the next few weeks we'll undertake on make up and camera tests that will lead us to our day of production. For now, the actors will have to prepare for their roles for the camera, awaiting the day "action" is called.

The Baby Cries - Production Design and Performance

I took these photos of the location during our preproduction of the film The Baby Cries, to help get a sense of coverage. This is the hardest part for a director sometimes, because you have intuitively know where to get your best shots. Sometimes your intuition can work against you, and you end up with bad shots. This is always frustrating. I've learned to experiment in pre-production and production, and find the best shots that conveys story, color, design and most importantly, allows the actors to do their best.

When I took this random photo in pre-production, I rewrote a scene between the grandparents in which they talked about their relationship with their son. I loved that we could see across the Silver Lake Reservoir in L.A. I didn't know if we could pull it off, especially with the lenses that we were working with. Although during production we had a limited amount of time, I went back and reshot the scene again with actors Martin Morales and Miriam Peniche. This time we achieved the shot I wanted and was pleased with the outcome.

One of the things I try to be conscious of as a filmmaker, is that we are taking full advantage of the location we are shooting in. I've worked on numerous projects where the director forgets to use the location as character, and ends up cutting out the beauty of the location. The use of close up shots seems to dominate the logic in post, although I argue that with cinema, location is everything...and performance.

Silhouette of Martin and Miriam.

The Baby Cries: In Pre-Production Mode

Taking The Baby Cries from stage to screen has some fantastic challenges. Last night I had a great session with Production Design and Actor Martin Morales regarding the look of The Baby Cries. For two weeks I've been discussing lenses and cameras with Director of Photography Dan Cotreau and trying to find a look for the film. This is the first time as Director that I've approached a film from a production design perspective and Martin had some great ideas. I listened intently and pictured what the ideas would mean in the scope of a film frame.

I heard about the environment of the room, the color in the scope of emotion and using light to convey a passage of time. Between production design and cinematography, there are elements, ideas and design that overlap. As a director I try to listen to what people are bringing to the table so that I can let them create within the vision I have. My main approach is always about the performance in front of the camera, so I hope that all the elements we are creating now are well defined before we get into production. As more collaborators jump on board, I look forward to orchestrating a heartfelt story about family and love.