SYNOPSIS

Nate, a small-time pot dealer, wants out of Texas. Out of his family home-- broken and haunted by the tragic death of his mother. Out from sharing a roof with his father-- a legendary drug dealer, who is stewed in whiskey and grief. Out from the demands of constantly looking out for his lost little brother, Sitter. Out of sight-- and heading west—with, Nikki, the girl he has loved since they were children. In a misguided attempt to secure Sitter’s future and escape, Nate takes on one last big score— one that will shatter his world forever.

DIRECTOR'S STATEMENT

When I read the script of Dance With The One, I was excited to explore the fierce emotions in the story. The writers, Smith Henderson and Jon Marc Smith, understood the deep wounds and ricocheting anger that have torn the Hitchens’ family apart after the tragic overdose of Nate and Sitter’s mother, Josephine. Because their dad, Owen, has stopped functioning as a father, all of the characters are in an emotional survival mode that turns into a fight for physical survival as the story accelerates.

I was inspired that the genre element of the plot provided a velocity and structure that revealed more about each character and their past as the tension rises and they become more defined by their actions. Nate has to face the brutal reality of abandoning his brother. Sitter’s terrible sadness explodes, and Owen does what he alone is capable of in an attempt to save his sons.

I’ve always admired films that could deliver truthful emotional stories on the spine of a genre plot. Films like One False Move and At Close Range. I’m also a huge fan of the Billy Jack movies, and in some ways, I saw Nate and Sitter as Billy Jack’s kids. This no doubt has to do with my own background. My father was a member of the Hog Farm commune and I grew up around many outlaw hippies. Often the experience was more Altamont than Woodstock. That said, there was an abundance of humanity and love within the community, and it certainly conditioned me not to judge the Hitchens’ family. This empathic perspective was critical in telling this story because it is a story about individuals on the fringes of society.

I’m proud of the film on several levels: the beautiful performances; the fact it looks like a film made for ten times its budget; the pitch-perfect music and score; the dynamic energy that was on the set everyday as 98 percent of the cast and crew worked well past their experience level; and the way the trust grew within the company as we overcame challenges at every step of the process. But in the end, our job was to tell the story of Hitchens’ family as richly and truthfully as we were capable—and that’s what I’m most proud of, because I know we’ve achieved that.

Oh and did I mention, I had a blast making this film.

- Mike Dolan

SCREENWRITERS' STATEMENT

Our collaboration on "Dance with the One" actually began in Tom Grimes's graduate fiction workshop at Texas State University in 2002. The source material, Jon Marc's novel Every Lost Girl, was workshopped in that class, and when the two of us began our screenwriting partnership, one of our first ideas was to use the characters and situations from that novel.

When Smith was accepted into the Michener Center for Writers, the screenplay that would become "Dance with the One" began to take shape. In Stephen Harrigan's Film Studies class, we developed the first outline for the movie, and in the summer of 2007 we banged out the script for possible admission into the University of Texas Film Institute's fall workshop.

As a couple of fiction writers, we had no idea how much we'd overwritten the first draft. There were pages and pages of description, the act structure was a mess, and no one really understood or liked Nate or his family. But UTFI Creative Director Alex Smith and the other UTFI readers saw the germ of a good film buried deep within the reams of prose and we soldiered on. We were truly lucky they were such close readers because no one else would have (or should have) given this drafty, overwrought screenplay a chance.

A key motivation for us was the very real prospect of having the script filmed, and we strove to tailor the movie to the budget and schedule of the summer 2008 shoot UTFI was planning. We also had the unique opportunity to test scenes with real actors, directors, and production teams in the UTFI spring production workshop, which allowed us to see how the words and scenes played outside our heads.

When the script was chosen in April of 2008 we celebrated for about a day before we realized the daunting task before us: collate everyone's notes, rewrite the second act, devise a third act climax that would fit the budget, and have a shooting script ready for Mike Dolan in six weeks. This was no small hill to climb--literally hundreds of writing hours stood between us and the locked script. And if we didn't deliver, the movie would have no chance.

We weren't without considerable resources--Alex and Tom Schatz had decades of experience in movies, and Mike was already an accomplished actor, director, and writer himself--but we felt the heat, no doubt. Thankfully, Stephen Harrigan was our writing mentor and sage, and with Mike and Steve we were able to get the script where it needed to be. After six weeks of long workdays, we were thrilled and relieved to turn in the final version. In fact, it was a bit surreal to have our part done and know that the effort of scores of people working in the 100-degree heat was only about to begin.

As writers, we were astonished to see how well Mike and the crew translated our words and dreams onto the screen. We were also amazed at all the performances, but especially those of Gabe, Mike, and Xochitl. What knockouts these three incredibly talented young actors are. They're flat-out great in the movie--we're so pleased and proud of their work. The film looks fantastic: what a great job Marcel Rodriguez did. You'd think he had millions of dollars to work with. And the score--it captures the Austin we hear in our heads. And the set design, and the costumes, and the editing and sound, and we could go on and on . . .

All that matters, really, is that this turned out to be a fine, fine picture. We feel very lucky to have been a part of it. Gracias, y'all.

- Smith Henderson and Jon Marc Smith

ABOUT UTFI

UTFI is a non-profit educational film institute established at the University of Texas at Austin in 2005. Our mission is to teach students “hand’s on” feature filmmaking by helping them make feature films via the constant guidance and mentorship of professionals in the film industry.

PRODUCER'S NOTES

“Dance with the One” is the first feature film in America to be made completely by a non-profit educational entity: UTFI—the University of Texas Film Institute. “Dance with the One” was developed via the UTFI Feature Film Lab, a non-profit educational program designed to train UT students in all phases of professional feature filmmaking.

“Dance with the One” began as one of eight scripts selected for the Fall 2007 UTFI Screenwriting Lab, a revision workshop taught by Alex Smith. The Lab culminated in fully cast public readings. “Dance with the One” was one of four scripts selected to then move on to a spring UTFI Production Lab, where student directors, producers, actors, cinematographers and production designers—guided by Alex Smith and five other professional mentors—rehearse, shoot and edit key scenes from the selected scripts. Out of a pool of thirty UTFI developed-scripts, “Dance with the One” was selected by a panel of professionals to be UTFI’s initial feature film.

“Dance with the One”, shot in summer 2008, was made by over 120 UT/UTFI students, in all facets of pre-production, production and post-productin, including writer Smith Henderson (MFA ‘08 Michener Center for Writers); director Mike Dolan (MFA ’07 MCW); cinematographer Marcel Rodriguez (MFA ‘10 RTF); production designer Yvonne Boudreaux (MFA ’07 Theater and Dance); and three recent undergraduate RTF students—editor David Fabelo, art director Sam Avila and casting director Molly Green.

RTF faculty members Alex Smith (MFA ’96 MCW), creative director of UTFI; and Tom Schatz, (Jones Centennial Chair in Communication, PHD) and UTFI executive director, produced the film along with Bryan Sebok (Ph.D. ’07) and Dolan. RTF Information Technology Manager, Keefe Boerner, formerly of Robert Rodriguez’s Troublemaker Studios, was the post-production supervisor.

While graduate and undergraduate students from RTF, the Michener Center, the College of Fine Arts, and the schools of Architecture, Business and Law filled 90% of all production/post-production roles, over twenty professionals from the local/national filmmaking community mentored students in every production department. These professionals include producer Elizabeth Avellan (“Sin City,” “El Mariachi,” “Spy Kids”), screenwriter Stephen Harrigan, casting director Beth Sepko (“Office Space,” “Infamous.”), and Production Designer Cary White (“Friday Night Lights”, “The Faculty”, “Mean Girls”).

“Dance with the One” depicts thirty harrowing hours of one young man’s life as he tries desperately to save his family from a lethal drug-dealer. It features a nearly 100% Austin cast, including Gabriel Luna, Dana Wheeler-Nicholson ("Tombstone," "Fletch," "Friday Night Lights") and Barry Tubb (“Top Gun”, “Return to Lonesome Dove”). It also features a score composed by Christopher Schmitz (Phd, School of Music) and a vibrant soundtrack that features a wild variety of different generations of Austin musical talent.

Any profits made from the sale and distribution of “Dance with the One”, or from any UTFI feature film, will funnel back into the UTFI Feature Film Lab. UTFI’s mandate is to give students an experience they can't get at any other university: creating their own professionally made feature film with industry guidance and mentorship.

UTFI is currently deciding which of its thirty-plus developed student scripts it will make as its next UTFI Feature Film. A second UTFI-developed film, “Five Time Champion” was shot in the summer of 2009, but not by UTFI. UTFI is also actively seeking co-producers for its film slate.

- Alex Smith