My Date with Drew

I have not been able to watch The Drew Crew assignment My Date With Drew over weeks. When I first saw the movie trailer on HBO with big words on it <>, I was so confined that I must watch this. Failure for the second time to complete the movie, I gave a final trial for the three hour clips joined to form a morphologically superb dream-come-true project.

Needless to say the movie is a must if you have a soul. You can find details and even buy the DVD at http://www.mydatewithdrew.com/ . I have pasted some words from the site… and I even don’t know whether I should have or not, anyway give it a look.

SYNOPSIS "If you don't take risks, you'll have a wasted soul." – Drew BarrymoreEver since the second grade when he first saw her in E.T. The Extraterrestrial, Brian Herzlinger has had a crush on Drew Barrymore. Now, 20 years later he’s decided to try to fulfill his lifelong dream by asking her for a date. There’s one small problem: She’s Drew Barrymore and he’s, well, Brian Herzlinger, a broke 27-year-old aspiring filmmaker from New Jersey. But that doesn’t stop Brian and his film school pals from doing everything they can think of to convince Barrymore to go out with him – and documenting their quest along the way. Equipped with a video camera they have to return to Circuit City in 30 days and the $1,100 Brian won on a game show (where the winning answer was, prophetically, “Drew Barrymore”), they’ve got one month to accomplish their mission. To succeed, they’ll need to negotiate an army of publicists, agents, producers and assistants who surround the star so Brian can pop the question. My Date with Drew is the award-winning, inspirational story of an ordinary guy who, despite incredibly long odds, puts everything on the line to pursue his lifelong dream. It’s also an astute and often hilarious look at contemporary dating rituals, the culture of celebrity and the power of passion. Winner of the Audience Award for Best Feature Film at the HBO Comedy Arts Festival; the Best Documentary Award at the Vail Film Festival; and the Audience Award for Best Feature Film at the New York Gen Art Film Festival, My Date With Drew also swept the 8th Annual Sonoma Valley Film Festival, bringing home the Audience Award for Best Lounge Feature, the Grand Jury Award for Best Feature Film, and the Geller/Devonport Award for Best First Time Feature.A Drew Crew LLC Production, My Date with Drew is directed, produced and edited by Brian Herzlinger, Jon Gunn and Brett Winn and produced by Kerry David. Original Song is written and performed by Tony DeSare. Original music is composed by Stuart Hart and Steven M. Stern. The music supervisor is Joe Fischer. My Date with Drew is rated PG by the Motion Picture Association of America for mild thematic elements and language. My Date with Drew opens August 5, 2005.

THE SET-UP
After graduating from Ithaca College Film School, Brian Herzlinger, Jon Gunn and Brett Winn came to Los Angeles with one goal in mind: making movies. But like many aspiring filmmakers, they often found themselves working at less glamorous industry jobs to pay their bills while struggling to shepherd film projects through “development hell” at various studios. So when Brian won $1,100 on a game show pilot, he decided that rather than blowing it on something frivolous – like paying his rent – he would use it to finance an independent film.
Winn recalls the moment the idea for My Date with Drew was born. “Brian and I were sitting together at Hamburger Hamlet on Van Nuys Blvd. having dinner. We were thinking, ‘Why aren’t we making feature films?’ The answer was simple: We don’t have millions of dollars. We had seen these ads for Circuit City that said they had a no-hassle, 30-day return policy. I figured if we got a digital video camera from Circuit City that would give us 30 days to shoot before we had to give it back. So we decided to make a movie.”

Winn, who works during the day editing movie trailers, had recently finished working on the campaign for Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle, starring Cameron Diaz, Lucy Liu and Drew Barrymore. “I said to Brian, ‘You’ve had a lifelong crush on Drew, why don’t we see if you could get a date with her?’ The more we talked about it, the more it seemed like a good idea. The best case scenario was Brian would get a date, the worst case was it would be a great chance for us all to work together.”

Winn was sure Brian’s self-effacing humor and good-natured charm would win over Barrymore. “Brian is so likeable,” says Winn. “Whenever Jon and I introduce him to our friends, the one comment we always hear from them the next day is, ‘That guy Brian, he’s so cute, he’s so nice. We love Brian.’ I was very confident if we got him in front of Drew she would feel the same way.”
Herzlinger and Winn called Gunn to see if he would join them in their impromptu adventure. After a little coaxing, he agreed to come onboard. “It seemed like just a fun project to do with your buddies,” recalls Gunn. “We never had any idea it would turn into something so big.”
The three decided to share responsibility for directing, producing and editing the film. Gunn then enlisted the help of Kerry David, his partner in the production company Lucky Crow Films and the Executive Producer of Agent Cody Banks 1 & 2, who agreed to come on as producer.
While a 30-day shoot is short by Hollywood standards, it meant Winn, Gunn, and David would essentially have to put the rest of their lives on hold for a month. “It sounds easy,” laughs Herzlinger, “but try telling your boss you’re going to spend the next 30 days videotaping a guy trying to get a date with Drew Barrymore.”

Nonetheless, three days after they agreed to “greenlight” the movie, the camera had been purchased, production had begun and the clock was ticking.
The filmmakers’ initial plan was to use the “six degrees of separation” approach to reach Barrymore. In other words, they would find someone who knew someone who knew someone who – well, you get the idea – and have that person pitch her on the idea of a date with Brian. Since all four members of the “Drew Crew,” as they came to be known, worked in the entertainment industry in various capacities, they figured it would be relatively easy to at least get a “yes” or “no” answer.

Much of their optimism was based on Barrymore’s reputation as a down-to-earth, fun-loving woman with a great sense of humor. “So many people we met with and interviewed, whether they were industry types or people on the street, said ‘Drew’s totally the kind of person who would go for this; she’s so normal and so sweet,’” says Gunn.

But after their initial attempts to reach Barrymore failed to bear fruit, the enormity of the task began to sink in for the Drew Crew. Gunn recalls: “Going to the Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle premiere and seeing the thousands of people around her and all the security was a reminder of how famous and inaccessible she really is. Even though she may seem really cute and normal on Jay Leno, that doesn’t mean that anybody can call her up and say ‘Hey, let’s go to dinner.’ There’s a fortress around her.”While continuing their efforts to open a line of communication with Barrymore and her Flower Films production company through friends of friends, the filmmakers interviewed Brian’s family, his ex-boss and even complete strangers to get their thoughts and advice on his mission. These on-camera conversations form the heart of My Date with Drew.

For instance, hard-body actor Eric Roberts suggests that the key to Herzlinger impressing the object of his affection is to work out and add muscle mass. Meanwhile, Herzlinger’s mom, who has never met Barrymore but is an avid supermarket tabloid reader, is convinced the actress is not right for her son and suggests he find a “real person” to date instead. And Brian’s ex-girlfriend flies into a jealous rage at the thought of Brian running off with Drew – despite his assurances that his chances of forming a romantic relationship with the star are slim to none.
“Everybody in my life is a character,” Herzlinger acknowledges. “The best part is that every reaction we got was totally real.”
Nonetheless, Herzlinger takes some of the advice he receives to heart, including Roberts’ fitness recommendations. “It was a case of me just being worried about myself; not wanting to look like an idiot or sound like an idiot,” he says. “I figured it couldn’t hurt to do some push-ups, get a facial and get a haircut.”
Gunn believes Herzlinger’s obviously genuine self-doubt is one of the main reasons audiences connect with him and with the film. “We all have insecurities and Brian really wears his on his sleeve,” he says. “We get to live out our own dreams and passions watching him go through this. Even if a date with Drew has nothing to do with your specific passion, everyone can relate to it.”
In fact, it becomes increasingly clear that if Brian has any chance of winning over Barrymore, it will be through his own sweet-natured charm and self-deprecating humor. “There’s no way you’re going to impress Drew Barrymore by taking her to a restaurant she’s never been to before or wearing a shirt that’s cooler than any she’s ever seen,” notes Winn.
In order to give Barrymore and her associates a sense of Brian’s personality as well as to convey the playful spirit of the project the Drew Crew shot and edited a “trailer” for the film which they used as a calling card throughout the process.
“Brian had a dream that we all embraced,” says producer Kerry David. “Our first obstacle to overcome, which was vital, was to reassure the people we were approaching and meeting with that there was absolutely nothing threatening about us or our project.”
Herzlinger concurs: “This whole project was born out of our enthusiasm and a sense of fun. The last thing we wanted to do was suggest anything any else.”
As the “six degrees of separation” strategy yielded one dead end after another, the Drew Crew decided to take a more public route to reaching Barrymore.
After securing an interview for Brian on an LA drive-time radio show, they launched a website featuring the movie trailer.

“The website was definitely the key to getting the movie out there and our attempt to get Drew to see the trailer,” says Herzlinger. “What happened as a side benefit was that we received 150,000 visits from Drew fans in the first two weeks. We also got a bill that we couldn’t believe for hosting the site.”
The internet wasn’t the only 21st century technology that proved critical to the making of My Date with Drew. The advent of low-cost digital video cameras and personal computer-based editing equipment made it possible to produce the film with essentially no budget.
Winn remembers the limitations of working with film on a traditional flat-bed editing bay from his days at Ithaca College in the 1990s. “We were always getting kicked out of the editing room at 10:00 PM when it closed. I remember always saying, ‘If there was only a way we could keep editing in our room.’ Now, 10 years later, with the advent of Final Cut Pro and other digital editing systems you can purchase at home for $1,000, we were able to make a feature film on my laptop computer.”

After a month or so holed up in Winn’s spare bedroom, the Drew Crew had whittled the 85 hours of footage they had shot down to a five-hour assemblage of their favorite scenes. They then painfully let 3.5 hours go, and began holding test screenings for friends and peers at Winn’s house for some outside perspective.
“They’d give us notes and then we’d go back and re-cut,” Winn remembers. By the time we had it cut down and ready to show, it was pretty solid; not too different from the final version.”
One of the pleasant surprises for Herzlinger was the reaction of entertainment industry professionals to the film. “The fun thing is that people who live in L.A. and work in the industry have responded as purely and positively as people from Iowa or New Jersey. I was worried that people out here would be so jaded that they wouldn’t get the ‘lifelong quest’ aspect of the movie. But the response across the board has been that people say they’ve been inspired to follow their own dreams.”

HOOKING UP
If the quest for a date with Drew Barrymore was a long-shot, finding a distribution deal for the film was equally daunting. Hundreds of independent films are produced each year, and most never see the inside of a commercial movie theater. Without a big name cast or director, the film would have to sink or swim on its own merits.
Buzz about My Date With Drew began to build after the extraordinary reception at a number of notable domestic film festivals, including its premiere at the renowned HBO Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen, Colorado, where it won the Audience Award over such indie hits as Supersize Me, Garden State and Napoleon Dynamite.
DEJ President Andy Reimer attended a screening on the recommendation of his director of acquisitions. “I found myself charmed,” recalls Reimer. “As most people who see the film are, I was taken with the journey Brian and his friends go on. Who hasn’t said to themselves ‘If I could only have a few minutes with the girl or guy of my dreams, I know they’d really like me!’”
According to Reimer, after the film won the Audience Award for Best Feature Film at the Gen-Art Festival in New York, DEJ acquired the film.
Along with films such as Supersize Me, My Date with Drew is riding a wave of interest in a new type of highly personal documentary, one that both entertains and offers a unique viewpoint on society at large.“I think what distinguishes My Date with Drew and some of these other films is that they work as movies rather than just as documentaries,” says Reimer, who notes that audience members asked to categorize the film were twice as likely to call it a “comedy” or “romantic comedy” as opposed to a “documentary.”
“Screenwriters struggle to find ways to hit the right beats in a romantic comedy,” notes Reimer. “But those things that are difficult to do intentionally happen organically in this movie. Brian and his partners bring viewers along on a ride that is so ultimately satisfying that in the end, people love it. Without overstating it, there’s a pretty profound reaction. It’s what people go to the movies for.”
“I suspected that young women would be the key demographic for this film,” adds Reimer, “because they would find this guy sweet and romantic, and that he was trying so hard for his date. What was surprising was that young men respond strongly to the film as well. Anyone who has ever sweated and fretted about asking out a girl that they really liked can find themselves entirely identifying with Brian’s plight.

THE MORNING AFTER
Herzlinger cites Steven Spielberg, whom he had the opportunity to meet briefly when he was a senior in high school, as his moviemaking idol. Not surprisingly, he lists E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (which stars a very young Barrymore) as his favorite movie and ranks Schindler’s List as the best movie of all time.So what does My Date with Drew have in common with the über-director’s action-packed thrill rides like Raiders of the Lost Ark and Jurassic Park? “Steven Spielberg takes ordinary people and puts them into extraordinary circumstances,” observes Herzlinger. “Not that I’m comparing My Date with Drew to any Spielberg film, but there were many times during the shooting that I thought ‘I couldn’t be more ordinary and what’s happening here is pretty extraordinary.’”Of course, My Date with Drew didn’t just happen to Herzlinger and Company, they brought it into being through sheer persistence and force of will. “The one thing we’ve learned from this experience is the value of perseverance,” says Winn. “So many times people told us ‘No.’ From trying to get the date to trying to get a distribution deal to trying to get the music cleared, if we had taken no for an answer, none of this ever would have happened.”

For Gunn, what began as a fun summer project, turned into a once-in-a-lifetime experience. “It started out as a detour, a distraction, because Kerry and I have all these other movie projects we’re working on. But in the end it’s been by far the most fun project I’ve ever done. We had total freedom because there was no financing, no development process, no script approvals. And it was a movie we made with our best friends. It’s just been a great surprise every step of the way.”
Herzlinger hopes the film will inspire those who see it to follow their dreams, no matter how out of reach they may seem. “Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t do something. It doesn’t matter if you live in LA or you live in New Jersey, you should always go for your dreams.”

ABOUT THE FILMMAKERS
BRIAN HERZLINGER (Director, Producer, Editor)
"Make it." That’s what Steven Spielberg told high school senior Brian Herzlinger in 1994. Herzlinger never forgot those words: Three years later, he had graduated Summa Cum Laude from Ithaca College with a BS in Cinema & Photography, having written and directed The Film Contest, a short 16mm film which received national recognition.After moving to Los Angeles, Herzlinger interned at DreamWorks and MGM and then worked as a Production Assistant on a number of commercials and music videos. He then worked for two seasons as a Producer’s P.A. on the hit CBS medical drama “Chicago Hope.” During that period, he wrote and filmed his second short, Malicious Intent, an award-winning, 13-minute, 35mm silent narrative. He then became Assistant to Bill D'Elia, one of the Executive Producers of Ally McBeal, for three seasons. While there, Brian directed the award-winning film Krutch, a 24P Hi-Def short that ranked in the Top 50 for HBO’s “Project Greenlight.” Herzlinger later served as the Assistant Director for Promo Shoots for the WB Network, as Assistant to the Executive Producer of the Warner Bros./ABC pilot “Gramercy Park” and as Assistant to the Producer of the ABC series “Grey’s Anatomy.” My Date with Drew is Herzlinger’s first feature film as a director. He is currently working on a reality TV show based on the film, on which he will serve as both host and Executive Producer. Herzlinger is also a founding partner, along with Brett Winn, in Rusty Bear Entertainment, an LA-based production company which has numerous films and television projects in development.
BRETT WINN (Director, Producer, Editor)A graduate of Ithaca College, Winn has been working in the film and television industry for nine years. He has written, produced, directed and edited several short films, written three screenplays and edited three feature films, including Mercy Streets, directed by his longtime friend Jon Gunn. For the past five years, Winn has been focused on movie marketing, producing and editing award-winning theatrical trailers and promos. Winn worked on the campaigns for three Drew Barrymore films: Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle, Duplex and 50 First Dates.Winn recently partnered with Herzlinger to launch the production company Rusty Bear Entertainment, which is in pre-production on a Christmas movie, a superbike documentary and numerous television projects. Still, Winn says My Date With Drew will always hold a special place in his heart because it gave him a chance to work with his best friends, Herzlinger, Gunn and David, and to create a film that is the embodiment of his credo: "Let's just do it... what are we waiting for!"
JON GUNN (Director, Producer, Editor)Since graduating with a degree in Cinema & Photography from Ithaca College, Jon Gunn has worked as a writer, director, producer and editor. Previous to My Date with Drew, Gunn directed Mercy Streets, starring Eric Roberts, David A.R. White and Cynthia Watros. Released in theaters nationwide in October 2000, Mercy Streets received the “Best Feature Film” award at the 2000 WYSIWYG festival as well as the Movie Guide Award for “10 best films of 2000.” In April of 2001, Mercy Streets landed at #19 on the Billboard video sales charts.In addition to film production, Gunn is a successful entrepreneur. He co-founded Studio 27, a post-production company specializing in movie trailers and commercials, whose clients include Columbia/TriStar, DreamWorks, NBC, Fox and Paramount.Most recently, Gunn teamed up with Kerry David to form Lucky Crow Films. The production company is developing 65 Roses with actor William H. Macy. Gunn and David also co-own IndieProducer, a company dedicated to helping emerging filmmakers around the world get connected to Hollywood.
KERRY DAVID (Producer)After starting her career in the business affairs department at Paramount Pictures, Kerry David spent three years working for, and traveling with, Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman on such projects as Portrait of a Lady, Peacemaker, Practical Magic, The Blue Room, Without Limits and Mission: Impossible II. She also spent over a year in England with Cruise and Kidman working on Eyes Wide Shut with director Stanley Kubrick.David then started her own production company, which co-produced the Special Edition DVD of The Usual Suspects with Robert Burnett for MGM. Next, she set up and executive produced the teen superspy action-comedies Agent Cody Banks and Agent Cody Banks: Destination London for MGM. She most recently produced “Perfect Romance,” a romantic comedy written by Allison Burnett for Lifetime TV. David is currently working on 65 Roses with actor William H. Macy and screenwriter Michael Schiffer. She also optioned the books Why Beulah Shot her Pistol in the Baptist Church with Hudson Hickman at MGM, and Blood From Stones by Douglas Farah.
In 2001, David founded IndieProducer.net (IP), an online community that educates and supports new and emerging talent in the film industry. IP provides independent filmmakers with information, resources, entertainment, interviews, education and networking opportunities to further their careers. David spearheaded IP’s growth to include a worldwide screenwriting contest and short film contest, culminating in a red carpet awards gala that also honors a successful member of the entertainment industry for their outstanding contribution to film.
David has been a guest speaker at the Dallas Screenwriter’s Association, the Santa Fe Screenwriting Conference and the UCLA Extension course on producing. She has also served as a panelist and moderator at several film festivals and is a voting member of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA).
http://ekendra.blogspot.com