Early Pitch

Edited - Stagefright is a working title. Its a film about an actor who wants to give a sincere performance but is unsure how to achieve it and is hesitant to even try. He struggles with the choice between acting his practised routine and receiving the automatic applause he always gets or attempting to genuinely connect with the audience and receive an applause that he has actually earned.

The film is set in an ambiguous time somewhere between the 1930's and 60's and plays out entirely within the theatre which the actor performs. The theatre will be visually designed as how I imagine Broadway Theatre in its golden era rather than an accurate portrayal. The colour scheme will be mostly reds, purples and blues. The music will play a major roll in the story telling as will the animation style which will be highly stylised and flexible and will abruptly change as the audience reacts to the actor, throwing him off balance and vice versa.

The narrative will be carried by the protagonist's acting and his reaction to the audience. But it will also be told visually. Some of the story will be told through visual metaphors and film language. So the reality of the world will be a little bit loose.

The aesthetic isn't definite yet. I'm still working out what it is about the story that I'm drawn to so the story will be revised quite a bit over the next few days.