Flash Before the Bang | |
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Directed by | Jevon Whetter |
Screenplay by | Jevon Whetter |
Story by | Jevon Whetter |
Produced by |
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Starring | |
Production companies |
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Country | United States |
Language | English |
Flash Before the Bang is an upcoming American sports drama film written and directed by Jevon Whetter about a deaf track and field team from Oregon in the 1980s. The film stars Russell Harvard, Daniel Durant, Grace Byers and Alaqua Cox.
Inspired by a true story of an all-deaf high school track and field team in Oregon, preparing for the 1986 Oregon State Track and Field Championship. [1]
The film from writer/director Jevon Whetter is a telling of his true experience from the 1986 Oregon State Championship, and was revealed in 2021 with Troy Kotsur, Nyle DiMarco and Deanne Bray initially attached to star, with production from Pearl Street Films and Exodus Film Group and Matt Damon and Ben Affleck as executive producers. [2] [3]
In May 2023, the film moved forward with John D. Eraklis from Exodus Film Group, Mary Aloe of Aloe Entertainment, and Tiffany FitzHenry of FitzHenry Films as producers alongside Delbert Whetter. Executive producers include Fanshen Cox in association with Trujulo Productions. [4] Jessica Alba is also an executive producer through Lady Spitfire. [5]
The cast includes Russell Harvard, Daniel Durant, Alaqua Cox and Grace Byers with eight deaf actors playing the roles of athletes on the track and field team, who are all first-time actors. [6]
Principal photography was scheduled for Oregon and Washington, with an appeal made for deaf and hard of hearing people available to work as extras. [7] [8] Filming locations include Cascade High School in Turner and Kennedy High School in Mt. Angel, in Salem, Oregon in July 2024. [9]
Marlee Matlin is an American actress. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award, in addition to nominations for a BAFTA Award, and four Primetime Emmy Awards.
Tusken Raiders are a fictional alien race in the Star Wars franchise. They first appeared in Star Wars (1977).
Sue Thomas: F.B.Eye is a television series that premiered in 2002 on the PAX Network. The show ended in May 2005 due to PAX's decision to halt the production of original programming. It was one of the two highest rated shows on the network, along with Doc.
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The National Theatre of the Deaf (NTD) is a Connecticut-based theatre company founded in 1967. It is the oldest theatre company in the United States with a continuous history of domestic and international touring, as well as producing original works. NTD productions combine American Sign Language with spoken language to fulfill the theatre's mission statement of linking Deaf and hearing communities, providing more exposure to sign language, and educating the public about Deaf art. The NTD is affiliated with a drama school, also founded in 1967, and with the Little Theatre of the Deaf (LTD), established in 1968 to produce shows for a younger audience.
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Russell Wayne Harvard is an American actor. He made his feature film debut in Paul Thomas Anderson's There Will Be Blood (2007), playing opposite Daniel Day-Lewis as his adopted son, H.W. Plainview. In the 2010 biopic The Hammer, he portrayed deaf NCAA championship wrestler and UFC mixed martial arts fighter Matt Hamill. Harvard also won acclaim Off Broadway in 2012 as Billy, the deaf son in an intellectual, though dysfunctional, hearing British family, in Tribes by Nina Raine. For his interpretation, he won a 2012 Theatre World Award for Outstanding Debut Performance and nominations for Drama League, Outer Critics Circle and Lucille Lortel Awards for Outstanding Lead Actor. He played Mr. Wrench in the first and third seasons of the television series Fargo.
The Les Schwab Invitational (LSI) is Oregon's premier pre-season high school invitational basketball tournament.[1] Prior to its founding in 1996, Oregon's high school teams had to travel out of state for quality pre-season play, denying fans connection to local teams prior to the regular season. In 1994, South Salem High School coach Barry Adams and Beaverton High School coach Nick Robertson, along with the Oregon Athletic Coaches Association, proposed a pre-season tournament to showcase the upcoming season's top teams. After two years of phone calls, lobbying, and meetings, the Oregon State Activities Association approved the proposition and the Oregon Holiday Invitational was born. Since its creation, the tournament has hosted nationally ranked teams from many states including Virginia, New York, Nevada, Louisiana, Texas, Maryland, Georgia, Florida, Pennsylvania, and numerous top teams from California. The LSI is a 4-day, 32-game, boy's high school basketball tournament. It features 16 teams chosen from Oregon's top schools and elite national teams through a partnership with Nike. Prime Time Sports is the owner and promoter of the tournament which was founded by co-tournament creator John McCallum.
Emilia Annis I. Jones is a British actress. She is best known for her lead role as a child of deaf adults in the drama film CODA (2021), for which she received a British Academy Film Award nomination for Best Actress. She is also known for starring in the Netflix adventure series Locke & Key (2020–2022).
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Grace Byers is a Caymanian-American actress. She starred as Anika Calhoun in the Fox music-industry drama series, Empire from 2015 to 2018. In 2021, she began starring as Quinn Joseph in the Amazon Prime Video comedy series, Harlem. In 2022, Byers played a leading role in the comedy horror film, The Blackening.
Daniel N. Durant is a deaf American stage and screen actor. His breakthrough starring role was as Moritz Stiefel in the 2015 Broadway revival of Spring Awakening. Durant had a major supporting role in the Academy Award-winning film CODA (2021). He and the cast won the Special Jury Award for Ensemble Cast in the U.S. Dramatic Competition at its world premiere at the 2021 Sundance Film Festival, along with the award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture at the 28th Screen Actors Guild Awards. On television, he is known for his recurring role in the ABC Family series Switched at Birth (2013–2017).
CODA is a 2021 coming-of-age comedy-drama film written and directed by Sian Heder. An English-language remake of the 2014 French-Belgian film La Famille Bélier, it stars Emilia Jones as Ruby Rossi, the child of deaf adults (CODA) and only hearing member of her family, who attempts to help her family's struggling fishing business while pursuing her aspirations to become a singer.
Alaqua Cox is a Native American (Menominee) actress. She landed her breakthrough role – her first ever acting experience – as Maya Lopez / Echo within the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the Disney+ series Hawkeye (2021), continuing as the protagonist in the spin-off series Echo (2024).
Echo is an American television miniseries created for the streaming service Disney+, based on Marvel Comics featuring the character of the same name. A spin-off from the series Hawkeye (2021), it is the 10th television series in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) produced by Marvel Studios, sharing continuity with the films of the franchise. It sees Maya Lopez return to her hometown where she must come to terms with her past, reconnect with her Native American roots, and embrace her family and community. Marion Dayre and Amy Rardin serve as head writers and Sydney Freeland leads the directing team.
The 94th Academy Awards ceremony, presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), took place on March 27, 2022, at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood, Los Angeles. The awards were scheduled after their usual late February date to avoid conflicting with both the 2022 Winter Olympics and Super Bowl LVI, with the latter being held in nearby Inglewood, California. During the gala, the AMPAS presented Academy Awards in 23 categories honoring films released from March 1 to December 31, 2021. The ceremony, televised in the United States by ABC, was produced by Will Packer and Shayla Cowan and was directed by Glenn Weiss. Actresses Regina Hall, Amy Schumer, and Wanda Sykes hosted the show for the first time. Two days earlier, in an event held at the Ray Dolby Ballroom of the Ovation Hollywood complex in Hollywood, the Academy held its 12th annual Governors Awards ceremony.
Troy Michael Kotsur is an American actor. Born deaf, Kotsur made his acting debut in the late 1980s working with the National Theatre of the Deaf. His television debut was in a 2001 episode of Strong Medicine and his film debut was in the 2007 thriller The Number 23.