Wheel
Los Angeles, California | Film Short
Comedy
An awkward, obligatory friendship and a poorly-timed meltdown make taping a Wheel of Fortune audition harder than solving the puzzle. WHEEL is for comedy lovers who relish in uncomfortable situations, seek out stories with flawed characters, and who are champions of female-driven productions.
Wheel
Los Angeles, California | Film Short
Comedy
Green Light
This campaign raised $7,680 for production. Follow the filmmaker to receive future updates on this project.
113 supporters | followers
Enter the amount you would like to pledge
An awkward, obligatory friendship and a poorly-timed meltdown make taping a Wheel of Fortune audition harder than solving the puzzle. WHEEL is for comedy lovers who relish in uncomfortable situations, seek out stories with flawed characters, and who are champions of female-driven productions.
About The Project
- The Story
- Wishlist
- Updates
- The Team
- Community
Mission Statement
The Story
Is there ever a good time to get bad news?
WHEEL is a character-driven comedy about a Wheel of Fortune audition…in a less than ideal audition environment.
A commercial session runner, Soph, gets hit with some career-shattering news while helping her eccentric neighbor, Luise, tape her Wheel of Fortune audition.
Tensions are high, nerves are shot, confidence is shaken, and it’s awkward as hell.
When these two untamable personalities can’t focus on the task at hand, the audition takes a turn for the worse.
THE WRITERS
We (Nancy Friedrich and Thea Lux) met in Chicago, a rich hub of improvisational comedy and storefront theater. We each performed in stage shows, both comedy and theatrical, and eventually fled the cold winters and settled in Los Angeles. Every now and then our paths would cross creatively, but it wasn’t until years later, the pandemic in full swing, that Thea reached out to Nancy to collaborate in an effort to reignite creativity and momentum.
With every new wave, every new variant, we held each other accountable, cheered each other on, and completed a 26-page script which… was daunting to shoot. Thankfully, within those 26 pages we were able to hone in on what mattered most to us: the relationship between the two characters.
We lifted a scene from our longer script and WHEEL came into focus. Our collaborative process lends itself to conversational, grounded performances that we specifically wrote to highlight our individual skills as comedic actors.
CLICK TO SEE THE FILMMAKING TEAM
WHY THIS FILM NOW?
Even in difficult times, laughter is important.
Moments of levity are what help us survive, get through it, and stay afloat as best we can. We hope that Wheel can serve as a cleansing breath, a distraction, or provide some respite from doom-scrolling.
We are also inspired by the influx of female-driven storylines and comedic writing partnerships that showcase women onscreen and behind the camera. With the pandemic affecting every aspect of film production, it became clear that self-producing was the most direct way to perform the roles we wanted to play.
So not only do we hope our comedy makes our audience feel good, the creative process of writing characters that made us laugh made us feel good.
CROWDFUNDING
We specifically wrote the script to be very self-contained and shootable. Two characters, one location, and only one shoot day. But there are still a lot of moving parts even with a paired down script.
We are self-funding a portion of the budget to ensure the initial up-front costs are covered. Your contribution will help us manage those costs better, cover post-production, and pay our crew more. Here is the majority of what your contribution will support:
- CREW: The majority of our budget is being spent paying our crew for their time and talent. We want to offer a fair rate of pay even at the indie scale in which we’re operating. Any funds over our goal will go towards paying our crew more.
- CAMERA and LIGHTING and SOUND: In order to make a one-room scene look and sound visually compelling, it is important we invest in the right equipment to make the images tell the story we want to tell. That includes a camera with cinema-grade image quality and professional, high-quality lenses, and investing in a professional sound mixer.
- FESTIVALS: Not only do we want you to see this film once it’s done, we want larger audiences to see it! Festival submission costs range from $25–$100, and we’d love to enter our favorites that would best forward this short’s momentum.
- COVID COSTS: While restrictions have eased, we are still committed to keeping everyone safe on set. We will be testing our cast and crew and providing our them with PPE.
STRETCH GOALS BREAKDOWN:
- GOOD if we raise $4,000: We are “green lit” by Seed&Spark and any funds raised will be collected.
- BETTER if we raise $6,000: This covers our basic production costs, paying the crew that has not waived their fee, equipment rental (camera + camera insurance, lights, lenses), our location, and day-of needs like food, Covid PPE, and insurance.
- BEST if we raise $9,000: Our post-production costs will be covered if we hit this stretch goal. Editing, color correction, sound mixing, and being able to submit to at least five festivals.
- BEST OF THE BEST if we raise: $10,000: We will compensate crew that waived their fee, we can submit to even more festivals, and we can break even.
HOW CAN YOU HELP EVEN MORE?
Spread the word! Our personal network is only so big and with your help we can reach a larger audience. We appreciate any email, social post, or grocery store conversation you have that shares the information about this campaign!
Here is an example of what you can share on social media:
- Do you like female-driven comedies and supporting indie films? Help @thealux and team by supporting their short film, WHEEL, an awkward, character-driven comedy about a Wheel of Fortune audition gone wrong. Learn more: https://www.seedandspark.com/fund/wheel
Tagging us allows us to re-share what you’ve posted and double our messaging.
Pledging your financial support at any level is appreciated. You can contribute any amount that fits your budget and we will be truly grateful.
We hope you follow our campaign to stay up-to-date with our project as we go into production. We’ll keep followers posted with behind the scenes photos, news on post-production, and any screening opportunities or festival information when it becomes available.
Your support means so much to us and we can’t wait to bring Wheel to the screen!
THANK YOU!
Wishlist
Use the WishList to Pledge cash and Loan items - or - Make a pledge by selecting an Incentive directly.
Location
Costs $200
We found a location that fits our story and has built-in production design.
Share this update!
About This Team
HONORA TALBOTT | Director
Honora Talbott is an award-winning writer and director who loves writing comedy about complicated female relationships and women who break out from social norms and create their own rules. She started out doing sketch comedy and her feminist and socio-political sketches were featured five times in Huffington Post, twice in Bustle, along with US Magazine, the A.V. Club, The Nerdist, LA Weekly, Entertainment Weekly, Pop Sugar, Cosmopolitan, and more. Her original pilots and specs have made her an Austin Film Festival Finalist, Cinestory Finalist, and Disney ABC Writing Program Semifinalist. As a filmmaker, her comedy thriller short We Know Where You Live (NBCUniversal Short Film Festival Finalist) played at 5 Oscar Qualifying Film festivals and streamed on HULU. Her documentary short Vote Neil (TRIBECA, AFI FEST) was licensed by NBC News and Revry. Most recently she developed television shows with Lena Dunham's Good Thing Going, New Form Entertainment and Minnie Driver's Huge Fan Productions. Her newest satirical sci fi short film FEMPIRE (AUSTIN FILM FESTIVAL, DANCES WITH FILMS) was licensed by GUNPOWDER's sci fi label DUST.
NANCY FRIEDRICH | Actor/Writer
Nancy Friedrich is an LA-based actress. Some of her credits include Homecoming, PEN15, Another Period, Dr. Ken and Unplugging. In Chicago she won a Jeff Award for supporting actress playing Mary Warren in the Crucible (2010) with Infamous Commonwealth Theatre and was nominated for Lead Actress in a play for Playing Jennifer in The Dastardly Ficus with Strange Tree Group. In the short film world, she co-starred and co-directed the short Nadine.
THEA LUX | Actor/Writer & Producer
Thea Lux (Tay-uh Lucks) is an actor/writer living in Los Angeles. Raised by Chicago's theater and comedy community, she's a founding member of the collaborative theater company, The New Coordinates, and helped create the cult-hit, 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche, which ran Off Broadway and is published by Samuel French. She's voiced several characters in narrative podcasts ranging from independent to Audible series, an animated series, Moonlight Storytime, by Bix Pix Entertainment, as well as her own stop motion short. Additionally she was in Craig Benzine's (Wheezy Waiter) go90 series, AlgoRhythm, and the Coen Brothers’ Netflix film, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs.
LILI SOTO | Cinematographer
Lili Soto’s cinematography has been featured on Hulu, Dazed & Confused, and Vice. She has had the opportunity to work for a range of productions like Goldenvoice music docs, HuluLATINX Campaign, and award winning short films. Most recently “My First Native American Boyfriend” with writer/director Joey Clift received several awards during its festival run. Her work centers around uplifting marginalized voices and giving lesser seen communities a platform. Lili attended UCLA Film School and received a Bachelor of Fine Arts. She is currently based in Los Angeles and is a first-generation American of Mexican descent.
Current Team
Incentives
- The Story
- Wishlist
- Updates
- The Team
- Community
Mission Statement
The Story
Is there ever a good time to get bad news?
WHEEL is a character-driven comedy about a Wheel of Fortune audition…in a less than ideal audition environment.
A commercial session runner, Soph, gets hit with some career-shattering news while helping her eccentric neighbor, Luise, tape her Wheel of Fortune audition.
Tensions are high, nerves are shot, confidence is shaken, and it’s awkward as hell.
When these two untamable personalities can’t focus on the task at hand, the audition takes a turn for the worse.
THE WRITERS
We (Nancy Friedrich and Thea Lux) met in Chicago, a rich hub of improvisational comedy and storefront theater. We each performed in stage shows, both comedy and theatrical, and eventually fled the cold winters and settled in Los Angeles. Every now and then our paths would cross creatively, but it wasn’t until years later, the pandemic in full swing, that Thea reached out to Nancy to collaborate in an effort to reignite creativity and momentum.
With every new wave, every new variant, we held each other accountable, cheered each other on, and completed a 26-page script which… was daunting to shoot. Thankfully, within those 26 pages we were able to hone in on what mattered most to us: the relationship between the two characters.
We lifted a scene from our longer script and WHEEL came into focus. Our collaborative process lends itself to conversational, grounded performances that we specifically wrote to highlight our individual skills as comedic actors.
CLICK TO SEE THE FILMMAKING TEAM
WHY THIS FILM NOW?
Even in difficult times, laughter is important.
Moments of levity are what help us survive, get through it, and stay afloat as best we can. We hope that Wheel can serve as a cleansing breath, a distraction, or provide some respite from doom-scrolling.
We are also inspired by the influx of female-driven storylines and comedic writing partnerships that showcase women onscreen and behind the camera. With the pandemic affecting every aspect of film production, it became clear that self-producing was the most direct way to perform the roles we wanted to play.
So not only do we hope our comedy makes our audience feel good, the creative process of writing characters that made us laugh made us feel good.
CROWDFUNDING
We specifically wrote the script to be very self-contained and shootable. Two characters, one location, and only one shoot day. But there are still a lot of moving parts even with a paired down script.
We are self-funding a portion of the budget to ensure the initial up-front costs are covered. Your contribution will help us manage those costs better, cover post-production, and pay our crew more. Here is the majority of what your contribution will support:
- CREW: The majority of our budget is being spent paying our crew for their time and talent. We want to offer a fair rate of pay even at the indie scale in which we’re operating. Any funds over our goal will go towards paying our crew more.
- CAMERA and LIGHTING and SOUND: In order to make a one-room scene look and sound visually compelling, it is important we invest in the right equipment to make the images tell the story we want to tell. That includes a camera with cinema-grade image quality and professional, high-quality lenses, and investing in a professional sound mixer.
- FESTIVALS: Not only do we want you to see this film once it’s done, we want larger audiences to see it! Festival submission costs range from $25–$100, and we’d love to enter our favorites that would best forward this short’s momentum.
- COVID COSTS: While restrictions have eased, we are still committed to keeping everyone safe on set. We will be testing our cast and crew and providing our them with PPE.
STRETCH GOALS BREAKDOWN:
- GOOD if we raise $4,000: We are “green lit” by Seed&Spark and any funds raised will be collected.
- BETTER if we raise $6,000: This covers our basic production costs, paying the crew that has not waived their fee, equipment rental (camera + camera insurance, lights, lenses), our location, and day-of needs like food, Covid PPE, and insurance.
- BEST if we raise $9,000: Our post-production costs will be covered if we hit this stretch goal. Editing, color correction, sound mixing, and being able to submit to at least five festivals.
- BEST OF THE BEST if we raise: $10,000: We will compensate crew that waived their fee, we can submit to even more festivals, and we can break even.
HOW CAN YOU HELP EVEN MORE?
Spread the word! Our personal network is only so big and with your help we can reach a larger audience. We appreciate any email, social post, or grocery store conversation you have that shares the information about this campaign!
Here is an example of what you can share on social media:
- Do you like female-driven comedies and supporting indie films? Help @thealux and team by supporting their short film, WHEEL, an awkward, character-driven comedy about a Wheel of Fortune audition gone wrong. Learn more: https://www.seedandspark.com/fund/wheel
Tagging us allows us to re-share what you’ve posted and double our messaging.
Pledging your financial support at any level is appreciated. You can contribute any amount that fits your budget and we will be truly grateful.
We hope you follow our campaign to stay up-to-date with our project as we go into production. We’ll keep followers posted with behind the scenes photos, news on post-production, and any screening opportunities or festival information when it becomes available.
Your support means so much to us and we can’t wait to bring Wheel to the screen!
THANK YOU!
Wishlist
Use the WishList to Pledge cash and Loan items - or - Make a pledge by selecting an Incentive directly.
Location
Costs $200
We found a location that fits our story and has built-in production design.
Share this update!
About This Team
HONORA TALBOTT | Director
Honora Talbott is an award-winning writer and director who loves writing comedy about complicated female relationships and women who break out from social norms and create their own rules. She started out doing sketch comedy and her feminist and socio-political sketches were featured five times in Huffington Post, twice in Bustle, along with US Magazine, the A.V. Club, The Nerdist, LA Weekly, Entertainment Weekly, Pop Sugar, Cosmopolitan, and more. Her original pilots and specs have made her an Austin Film Festival Finalist, Cinestory Finalist, and Disney ABC Writing Program Semifinalist. As a filmmaker, her comedy thriller short We Know Where You Live (NBCUniversal Short Film Festival Finalist) played at 5 Oscar Qualifying Film festivals and streamed on HULU. Her documentary short Vote Neil (TRIBECA, AFI FEST) was licensed by NBC News and Revry. Most recently she developed television shows with Lena Dunham's Good Thing Going, New Form Entertainment and Minnie Driver's Huge Fan Productions. Her newest satirical sci fi short film FEMPIRE (AUSTIN FILM FESTIVAL, DANCES WITH FILMS) was licensed by GUNPOWDER's sci fi label DUST.
NANCY FRIEDRICH | Actor/Writer
Nancy Friedrich is an LA-based actress. Some of her credits include Homecoming, PEN15, Another Period, Dr. Ken and Unplugging. In Chicago she won a Jeff Award for supporting actress playing Mary Warren in the Crucible (2010) with Infamous Commonwealth Theatre and was nominated for Lead Actress in a play for Playing Jennifer in The Dastardly Ficus with Strange Tree Group. In the short film world, she co-starred and co-directed the short Nadine.
THEA LUX | Actor/Writer & Producer
Thea Lux (Tay-uh Lucks) is an actor/writer living in Los Angeles. Raised by Chicago's theater and comedy community, she's a founding member of the collaborative theater company, The New Coordinates, and helped create the cult-hit, 5 Lesbians Eating a Quiche, which ran Off Broadway and is published by Samuel French. She's voiced several characters in narrative podcasts ranging from independent to Audible series, an animated series, Moonlight Storytime, by Bix Pix Entertainment, as well as her own stop motion short. Additionally she was in Craig Benzine's (Wheezy Waiter) go90 series, AlgoRhythm, and the Coen Brothers’ Netflix film, The Ballad of Buster Scruggs.
LILI SOTO | Cinematographer
Lili Soto’s cinematography has been featured on Hulu, Dazed & Confused, and Vice. She has had the opportunity to work for a range of productions like Goldenvoice music docs, HuluLATINX Campaign, and award winning short films. Most recently “My First Native American Boyfriend” with writer/director Joey Clift received several awards during its festival run. Her work centers around uplifting marginalized voices and giving lesser seen communities a platform. Lili attended UCLA Film School and received a Bachelor of Fine Arts. She is currently based in Los Angeles and is a first-generation American of Mexican descent.