Counting for Thunder - The Story  Counting for Thunder is inspired by the three years when Phillip Irwin Cooper, unlucky in work, money and love, went home to the Gulf Coast of Alabama to help out when his relationship with Caroline, a UCLA college professor, hit the skids and his mother was given a dire medical diagnosis. Working through his past with his complicated family, some old high school chums, and the desperate and hilarious southern characters who grace his hometown, Phillip ultimately finds his own voice as his mother is regaining hers for possibly the last time. Counting for Thunder covers many of the same universal themes of love, life, sex and death as Fried Green Tomatoes. Producer Marsha Oglesby, a former southerner, likes to compare the heart of Counting For Thunder to a couple of other authentic films that found their way to the screen from one-man-shows, Slingblade and My Big Fat Greek Wedding. She feels the piece thematically most resembles Terms of Endearment as played with a mother and son.

 

Counting for Thunder - The Adaptation  Phillip wrote and performed a one-man-show based on his experiences where he portrayed 23 wildly disparate characters. As it played solely on word of mouth in LA for seven months, producer Oglesby saw it and urged him to adapt it into a screenplay she could produce. She feels that since Hollywood has been lax in capitalizing on the string of enormous box office successes built around small town southern eccentrics from Steel Magnolias to Forrest Gump and now The Help, the time is ripe to give the movie-going public a quality alternative to the run-of-the-mill action movie.

 

Why We Need Your Help - Keeping the film independent will allow Phillip the creative control to translate to screen what worked so well on the stage. The film will certainly resonate with those whose lives didn�t turn out the way they�d hoped by a certain age, while their aging parents always, it seemed, had a much clearer path.

 

What We Need & What You Get - Those involved so far have been donating time & talent in all areas of pre-production.

 

Emmy-winning casting director Donna Ekholdt is assembling an amazing cast, including Dale Dickey, last year�s Independent Spirit Award winner for her role in Winter�s Bone, who is set to play Phillip�s sister.

 

Tony Nako, chief lighting technician on Drive, Burlesque, The Sorcerer�s Apprentice, and Hairspray is on board as cinematographer.

 

Marsha Oglesby produced Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow with Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow and Angelina Jolie, Righteous Kill with Robert De Niro and Al Pacino, and the Debra Messing mini-series The Starter Wife.

Amity Janow, an actress and teacher who has helped guide the project since its inception as a one man show, will also produce Counting for Thunder with Paul Hardister, who has created content for Link TV, here! and the Universal Studios web channel, Reelshort.com.

 

We have the ability to assemble a top notch production team all the way through post. Phillip will direct and has agreed to play himself as the character of Benjamin Stalworth.

 

Given the location shoot in Alabama, much of the funds collected on IndieGoGo will cover essential expenditures: airfare, lodging & food for the cast & crew.

 

In return for your help, take advantage of all the unique & interesting gifts! Please feel free to give anonymously if you wish. You may also give any amount not listed.

 

Other Ways You Can Help -  We would appreciate your assistance even if it only means you spread the word by sharing the link to this site with friends, family, and co-workers via Facebook, Twitter, even old fashioned email. Pre-production (finishing casting, securing locations, etc.) has already begun with the goal to shoot the film in the early summer.