MovieBytes Interview:
Screenwriter Christopher Canole

An interview with screenwriter Christopher Canole regarding the Bare Bones Writing Competition.

A: "Felix the Flyer" Latino Chariots of Fire...as a Cuban mailman runs in the 1904 Olympic Marathon he recounts his 1200 mile super-run up the Mississippi River to battle the world's greatest marathoners chasing him in the most bizarre race in history, filled with racism, cheating, and drugs to become an inspiration for all future underdogs.

A: Bare Bones is a challenging film festival contest that requires you to present a low budget project proposal. Since Felix the Flyer is a historical feature film script, budget is often used to reject even award winning scripts. In my case, Balboa Park in San Diego is an exact replica of the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair, and the marathon back then was more like today's high school cross-country race. Winning in the Bare Bones Film Festival is a great marketing tool for unproduced writers.

As an added benefit, since I was born in Oklahoma and am part Charokee , this festival helped me reconnect to my roots. Felix is the first of three Olympian stories I planned on writing years ago. I just finished Her Swastika Sword, the story of Helene Mayer in the Nazi Olympics. I hope to someday write a new version about the great American Indian and Olympic champion Jim Thorpe. The other contest I've won include the AAA Creative Screenwriting Grand Prize, Script Magazine Grand Prize, Queens International Film Festival, Kids First Film Festival, Screenplay Shootout, and I have placed in the top three or honorable mention of the New York Hip Hop, Indie Producers, Gaffers, Twin Rivers, Indie Gathering, Screenplay Festival, San Diego Film Festival, Acclaim Film, and WriteMovies.com

A: ShIronbutterfly Ray kept in constant touch with me both through email and on the web site. She even arranged a newspaper interview before the awards were announced.

A: Feedback was not part of this contest.

A: As I said before a Bare Bones win is a great marketing tool which I will add to a postcard I send to interested producers. And I am sure future affiliation with the Bare Bones Film Festival will continue to nourish my career. In fact the producer of Godfather and Apocalypse Now, Gray Frederickson , has requested Felix through the Bare Bones contest.

A: I am a Cal Arts masters degree graduate, union set photographer and actor who decided it was time to create my own stories. In the past three years I have written eleven screenplays: Bloodgroove (60?s college story), Drawn Together (political thriller), DVD Day (science fiction doomsday), Spring Snow (Mishima novel adaptation for my PhD in literature), Runaway Horses (Another Mishima), Z.I.A. (Family Zoo story), Counter-Clockwise (Science fiction romance), Felix the Flyer (sports biography), Pen Dragon (comic book fable), The Last Limo (post 9/11 American Odyssey) and Her Swastika Sword (sports biography).

A: I live in La Jolla which isn't bad when I see the number of actors, directors and producers who visit my little village. I lived in Culver City with my Aunt Dallas as a kid on the back lot fence of MGM Studios. Like the Bare Bones return to my Oklahoma roots, perhaps I will return someday to the foothills of Los Angeles.

A: I am now blocking my first romantic comedy, Sunset Suites, which takes place in a nursing home and deals with the whacky insights I've gained in the past six months taking care of my 92 year old Aunt Dallas. She looked exactly like Bette Davis which created many funny moments in her life. And as the main "Nail Girl" for Howard Hughes' Spruce Goose, she saw things few could imagine.

Posted Thursday, May 8, 2008