‘Ceres’ a High-Octane Probe Into Chicago’s Slippery Investment Banker Slope

HollywoodChicago.com — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 00:35:08 -0700

CHICAGO – Tucked surreptitiously at the way-way-way-off-Loop location of the Prop Thtr – Chicago’s oldest-surviving non-equity theater in the area – the signature that is “Ceres” is its high-octane energy. The cast act in harmony much in the same way as the “X-Men” character Juggernaut: once their momentum is synthesized, it can’t be stopped.

The theme is carried consistently from the instant “Ceres” lights up all the way through its curtain call. All throughout the middle, The Factory Theater troupe allows theatergoers to feel like privileged voyeurs in the lions’ den of high-volatility investment brokers who crook all their rules, loyalties and ethics in order to make the coveted sale.

Gretchen Carter as Ivy in the Chicago production of “Ceres”.
Photo credit: The Factory Theater

The 1992 film “Glengarry Glen Ross” – perhaps the quintessential exploration of sales in cinema – is shrewdly referenced in “Ceres” to imply partial inspiration. Beyond the Al Pacino machination examination, Chicago writer Heather Tyler acknowledges having drawn a direct muse from “sitting in a room stuffed with attorneys and answering some questions one Thanksgiving”.

Set against the milieu of the Windy City’s financial district and honed specifically on the suspect actions of a furtive assemblage called Unit 57, the ensuing outpouring explores the explosiveness, backbiting camaraderie and infidelity often triggered by the towering profit demands of corporate governance.

Chicago director Angelina Martinez – who took on this play with full realization that right and wrong often aren’t blatantly black or white – sets in motion the dangerous “grey area” with a Chicago cast of nine stage actors and a dozen more film actors. A film is presented in tandem with what’s live on stage and is creatively projected onto the stage’s far wall.

While the film crew had a decidedly more grave air about them, the stage crew sometimes fell victim to zealously delivering their lines while neglecting to feel them and understand their intentions.

While film sound was sometimes a screechy issue on preview night, the production will likely iron out that kink. The title “Ceres” has questionable relevance about a planet that never was and perhaps would have been better served as a variation of “Money Talks,” “Get Outta My Way, Sucka” or “Swindling is the Life For Me – Or is It?”.

While auxiliary topical research would have been a credibility improvement and supplementary lasting lessons from the story as a whole would have left us more fulfilled, Gretchen Carter’s Ivy character importantly and ultimately probes the double-edged ethics sword inherent in this profession – amid a probe, in fact, into her unit’s overall profiteering practices – and leaves us with the message to question the beast even if it’s lavishly feeding the cow.

“Ceres” runs through April 26 at the Prop Thtr at 3502 N. Elston in Chicago. 8 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays; 7 p.m. on Sundays. Tickets cost $20.

By ADAM FENDELMAN
Editor-in-Chief
HollywoodChicago.com
adam@hollywoodchicago.com

Debut Film ‘Killer Bean Forever’ Coming From ‘The Matrix Reloaded’ Animator Jeff Lew

HollywoodChicago.com — Sun, 11 Nov 2007 00:25:34 -0700

Jeff Lew, the lead animator for “The Matrix Reloaded” and an animator for “X-Men,” is taking special effects into his own hands in his feature-length directorial debut of “Killer Bean Forever”.

Lew says on his Web site: “For the past four years, I’ve been working at my computer 14 hours a day, seven days a week. I’ve spent my entire life savings and maxed out credit cards.” Here’s the trailer.

His list of software used includes Maya, Final Render, Vegas, Photoshop, Syntheyes, Acid Pro, Audition, Particle Illusion, Vue, Renderpal and Seamless Texture Generator. Here’s some trivia:

The current length of the movie is 85 minutes.

The screenplay was written over a 1.5-year period.

Pre-visualization took nine months.

Modeling and texturing took about six months.

Animation took about 2.5 years.

Final renders are in high definition.

Rendering final shots started well over a year ago and still continues.

There are more than 1,000 shots.

The longest shot is a continuous 76 seconds.

The shortest shot is eight frames long.

The renderfarm started with three dual-core computers. They have now been replaced with four quad-core computers.

Each rendering computer is equipped with two gigabytes of memory.

The maximum amount of polygons rendered for a single shot is 1.9 million.

Every shot is rendered using a simulated physical camera using true depth of field.

Lew hasn’t yet announced when the film will release. He says the following on the difficulties posed in its creation:

The hardest part about making a feature-length movie is getting through the massive number of shots.

I set up a pipeline/method that allowed me to animate easily. Pretty much all the lighting in the movie uses similar setups (just different colors and intensities).

The difficult part was when it came time to render the shot. Some shots just had too many polygons to render and I was limited by using 32-bit software.

Some of those shots took about one to four hours of work just to get it to render. Multiply that by 1,000 shots and that’s a lot of time and headache.

Other than that, the action scenes have been really tough mostly because the amount of shots per minute becomes a lot higher than normal scenes.

There were times where I would work all day and only come out with four seconds.