'JT Leroy' Clip - Kristen, Laura Dern and Jim Sturgess

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Video: Korita05

First trailer for 'JT Leroy'

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BTS photo of Kristen and Jim Sturgess on the set of 'JT Leroy'

Click on pic for full view.

Kristen appears to be the one that Jim is looking at.

Source: Jim Sturgess Photographer: Lindsey Byrnes

First look of Kristen as Savannah Knoop/JT Leroy + interview with Justin Kelly and Savannah Knoop with W Magazine

Stills

  

BTS

Click on photos and stills for full view.

When Savannah Knoop offered the director Justin Kelly the rights to her 2008 memoir Girl Boy Girl: How I Became JT Leroy, it began a nearly decade-long development process to bring the story to the screen. The film chronicles Knoop's experience as she became swept up playing the mysterious alter ego JT Leroy, who was created by her sister-in-law, the San Francisco-based writer Laura Albert. In public, Knoop embodied the elusive gender-fluid teenage author who became a national phenomenon in the early aughts. Eventually, Kristen Stewart signed on to play Knoop, and Laura Dern took the buzzed-about role of Albert.

The story of JT Leroy is a saga worthy of the screen, and is one that still lives in infamy. Also the subject of last year’s documentary Author: The JT Leroy Story, the adventure began with an unknown writer called Terminator, whose acclaim in underground lit circles caused him to spiral into a fever dream of cult celebrity status. Revealed to be Jeremiah “Terminator” LeRoy (JT for short), the writer published a series of acclaimed magic-realist books chronicling his experiences as a queer, gender-fluid teenager, raised in rural West Virginia by his prostitute mother. Celebrities and the media devoured the novels, Sarah (1999), The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things (1999), and Harold’s End (2005). Fashion and Hollywood became obsessed with the elusive author, who often appeared at photoshoots and events in a blonde wig, sunglasses, and black hat, hobnobbing with everybody from Winona Ryder to Asia Argento, Courtney Love, and Bono. But it was all a lie. Albert was behind the persona of JT, authoring the books and posing as him on phone calls and emails; Knoop became the public face, putting a person to the name for cameras and public audiences, while Albert tagged along as a brash, British woman named “Speedie.” When an explosive New York Magazine piece outed the two of them, Albert’s literary world came crashing down, and Knoop was left to pick up the pieces.

Now, with the film freshly wrapped, Kelly and Knoop (who co-wrote the film) are offering W an exclusive first look at Kristen Stewart in character as both Savannah and JT, and Laura Dern as Laura Albert. They also hopped on the phone to discuss working with the two A-list actresses, perfecting characterization through wardrobe and hair, and privacy and identity in a post-JT Leroy world.

You’ve been working on this project for a very long time. How does it feel to be on your last day of production?

Justin Kelly: It feels amazing. Savannah and I started working together in late 2009. We’ve been writing, rewriting, developing and getting it off the ground for so many years that it feels amazing. It’s wild.
Savannah Knoop: And it feels like it took as long as it needed to take. We just kept writing and working and thinking about it until it was time to go.

I know the casting process was a big element in getting the film made. Laura Albert, for those who know her, is kind of a larger-than-life character. And with Savannah, you’re casting yourself, which is also daunting. How did you end up with Laura Dern and Kristen Stewart in these lead roles?

Knoop: We’ve always had Laura Dern in our earliest preconceptions of the character. Images of her were actually even in our first lookbook.
Kelly: She’s obviously a genius, and it was very surreal that we were lucky enough to get to work with her. She got the layers of the part in a way we didn’t expect, and it became very exciting. I think people are going to be enamored at the complexity of her performance as this eccentric genius.
Knoop: And she plays it with so much heart. Laura [Albert] is so dynamic and complicated as a character. It was always about merging her interior sense of self and her public sense of self. It felt like this total gift, because she could flip so fast into these different parts of the character. She’s a master of improv, which felt essential to capturing the essence of Laura Albert. One of the things that’s key to the character is how funny she is, and Laura Dern is hysterically funny. And when it came to Kristen, I didn’t have any preconceptions about who was going to play me. I didn’t have any idea. It’s a queer coming-of-age story, which is different from an ingenue coming-of-age. The character is a mix of being in control of her destiny, and letting life take her where it may. It felt exciting to think of Kristen playing the role because it felt like she could identify emotionally with that.
Kelly: I first met with Kristen about two years ago, and she really truly understood the material. She asked a lot of questions I hadn’t even thought about. The nuances that she brings to this character are really incredible—it’s almost hard to talk about. She’s such a precise, detail-oriented actor, and she never stopped getting to know the character, just like you never stop getting to know a person.

In a way, both Laura and Savannah are shapeshifters. So you have actors playing characters but then the characters are also playing characters.

Kelly: Right, you constantly have Laura Albert switching between playing a 20-year-old West Virginian gender-fluid person on the phone and this loud British woman, “Speedie”, in person. Laura Dern had to navigate those three roles.
Knoop: And, for both “JT” and “Savannah”, Kristen really embodied her research into the dual characters. She’s a master at copying gesture—she would do this mouth thing, and I was like, “That’s me!”
Kelly: We got to do a bunch of test shoots, and Kristen worked on this very particular kind of smile that Savannah does herself, but which becomes more exaggerated when Savannah is dressed up as JT. I remember sending a photo of that moment to Gus Van Sant, because he had met Savannah as JT, and he couldn’t believe that it was Kristen. He was like, “That is Savannah, you’re playing a joke on me.” So I was like, “Oh my god, we’re doing something right!”
Knoop: One thing I didn’t think about until we were watching it was that it played almost like a fairy tale. To see JT and Speedie traveling through airports, these freaky people—their looks are so maximal. You enter this world where these people are their superhero personas; their secret selves, but in public.
Kelly: Totally! And for me, it was the first film I’ve done where we had the time to develop their looks with hair, makeup, and wardrobe ahead of time. They both have these very iconic personas that involve lots of wigs and disguises. It was pretty exciting to build these characters with them.
Knoop: And the looks are key because they change the way the characters were behaving and moving. What you put on makes you feel differently, act differently, and relate to the world differently.

In these behind-the-scenes images, you can see Kristen Stewart going through so many hair phases as Savannah. Was it weird to relive your own haircut history?

Knoop: She was a hair-hopper! That was one of the initial grounding points for her character.
Kelly: Kristen has about five hair looks in the movie, because Savannah was in her twenties, a young queer finding themselves. And Laura Dern has six wigs for Speedie. If you Google Image search any of it from that time, it really was that extreme. The crew members would go, “How did anyone believe this?”

Last year, the documentary Author: The JT Leroy Story came out. Watching it and looking back on Speedie and JT, they look like such criminals. If you encountered them, you would probably know right away they were up to something.

Knoop: That was always a huge part of the original JT mystique. It was an Emperor’s New Clothing sort of a thing. The more excessive of a disguise, the better.
Kelly: We did think about doing a softer version of the looks to make it more believable, but decided to go for it. And a lot of them are completely emulating the original ones. This is a project where wardrobe, hair, and makeup really got to use all of their talents and creativity.
Savannah, as a writer and producer on the movie, it must have been really uncanny to watch actors re-enact things that actually happened to you. Did you ever feel like you were experiencing déjà vu?
Knoop: Yeah, I did! It’s intense. In a way, the project was an exercise in taking something you remember and layering it over, and over, and over. The only thing I can think to compare it to is where you look at a photograph and the photograph becomes the access point to your memory. In making this movie it’s like a snowstorm of transposing memories over each other. And a movie is a more compressed version, so you’re trying to find the emotional arc through all of the noise.

Now that shooting is almost over, how do you feel this movie takes that time in your life and relates to our current moment, in regard to identity?

Knoop: I think we are in a different moment culturally now than when it all happened. Language is shifting and the conversation is becoming wider and more complex. It is a queer story. It is multilayered.
Kelly: Agreed. In the eight years that we have been working on this, ideas of gender and queerness have shifted in a way that we weren’t even totally aware of. For example, Laura or Kristen would be talking about JT and say, “He’s not confused about his gender, he just likes to play with gender.” When your two lead actors understand that, and you realize your audience will understand that as well, it totally changes how the story could be heard and felt.
Knoop: We’re trying to be honest to what the story is about, which is the messiness of intimacy. It’s about how you can get so close to somebody and it becomes so complicated, you know? It’s about queering relationships and it’s not necessarily about tagging an identity. It’s about identity being fluid and how that works within all human relationships.

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Jim Sturgess joins the cast of 'JT Leroy' with Kristen

UK actor Jim Sturgess has joined Kristen Stewart, Diane Kruger and Laura Dern in Justin Kelly’s upcoming JT Leroy biopic, which is shooting preliminary footage here in Cannes. Fortitude International is handling sales on the project and has struck a multi-territory deal with a studio, which can’t be announced yet, as well as a deal with Pony Canyon for Japan.

Cassian Elwes is financing and producing the film with Julie Yorn, Patrick Walmsley, Mark Amin, and Thor Bradwell. Executive producers are Fortitude’s Nadine de Barros, with Cami Winikoff, Tyler Boehm, as well as Wayne Godfrey and Robert Jones of the Fyzz Facility, which is fully financing the feature.

It’s based on the true story of two women who created a fake child author persona, tricking the literary community and the Hollywood elite before the hoax was exposed. Kelly adapted the script from a book by Savannah Knoop, who was the public face of the fictional character. Production will get underway in July.

The film climaxes at the Cannes Film Festival, and director Kelly is here with producer Elwes and DP T.J. Williams filming footage which will be adapted in post-production to be used for the final sequence. If you find yourself looking down the lens of ARRI camera while queuing up for a Cannes screening this year, you may well end up in JT Leroy.

“We’re keeping it small so we can move quick. It’s a hectic place, but there are so many cameras around so it’s easy to shoot,” commented director Kelly to Screen.

Read all the updates on 'JT Leroy' at our previous post here.

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"The Big Shoe" in Pre-Production + more details on the project

New screening poster from Bankside Films: 7 July 2014

Click on pic for larger view.

(Via itsoktobeyou.org)

Update from a casting agency in South Africa: 5 June 2014

Steven Shainberg (Secretary, Fur) paid us [Cast Serve] a flying visit to "chat" to a selection of South African actors, then gave the go-ahead to cast about two dozen delightfully quirky character parts for The Big Shoe. 

While "aarghrrr-arrghing" their way through two years of pirate auditions has been fun, many Cape Town and Johannesburg actors leaped at the chance to strut their stuff with characters from the hidden world of shoe-fetishists. Believe it or not, after our initial round of auditions, a healthy clutch of dead pirates have caught the eye of Mr. Shainberg! 

Cast Serve also have "The Big Shoe" listed on their site as a being one of their 'Current Projects'.

(Via @flippysgardenia/ @Mel452)

Production Weekly Update: 17 May 2014

Status: 18 October 2014
Location: South Africa
Producer: Andrew Lazar - Richard Middleton - Christina Weiss Lurie
Producer/Director: Steven Shainberg
Writer: Mickey Birnbaum - Steven Shainberg
Cast: Jim Sturgess - Kristen Stewart - Elizabeth Banks
Mad Chance/ Tango Pictures
VOX3 Films

Production Weekly Update: 12 April 2014

Status: September 2014

Location: South Africa

Producer: Andrew Lazar - Richard Middleton - Christina Weiss Lurie 

Producer/Director: Steven Shainberg 

Writer: Mickey Birnbaum - Steven Shainberg 

Cast: Jim Sturgess - Kristen Stewart - Elizabeth Banks

Mad Chance/ Tango Pictures

VOX3 Films 

Hanway Films 

( Via @Mel452)

Bankside Films has been confirmed as the new sales company for "The Big Shoe," now listed on their website in Pre-Production. 

London-based sales outfit Bankside Films is the new sales company on board Steven Shainberg’s comedy-drama The Big Shoe.

Jim Sturgess, Kristen Stewart, Elizabeth Banks and Klaus Maria Brandauer are set to star in the story of a gifted shoe designer (Sturgess) forced to break free from a family who want to cheapen his art for their own commercial gain. Stewart will play the designer’s muse.

Written by Shainberg and Mickey Birnbaum, new backing for the film comes from Bankside and South Africa’s Azari Media. The shoot is planned for April 2014.

Andrew Lazar (I Love You Philip Morris) of Mad Chance Productions produces, while executive producers are Christina Weiss Lurie, Phil Hunt, Compton Ross and Anton Ernst.

CAA is packaging and reps North American rights.

Bankside’s head of sales and marketing Stephen Kelliher, said: “We are huge fans of Secretary so when the opportunity to be involved in Steven Shainberg’s next feature arose, we knew that we had to do it. It is a highly original story from an extraordinary director who has attracted a sensational cast to the project. We know that international distributors are going to be as excited about this film as we are and we look forward to presenting the film to them here at the AFM.”

More details via Bankside Films:

THE BIG SHOE is a daring and comedic romance about an unusual, creatively stifled shoe designer, Nate and his newfound muse, Delphi, who inspires him to resume his brilliant designs. Denied the chance by his family to design high-end women's shoes, Nate Arbinger, 34, refuses to have anything to do with the family’s industrial footwear business while his father is still alive. Following his death, Nate returns home for the funeral, knowing that his mother, Irene, and older sister, Ellen, 30s, desperately want him to revive and revamp the company but he has little interest in fulfilling their wishes.

His lack of engagement prompts Irene to hire MK, 50s, a therapist who specializes in treating foot fetishists, in order to woo Nate back to work. MK, in turn, hires Delphi, 20s, a foot model and sex worker to act as Nate’s muse. Inspired by the beautiful Delphi with whom he is clearly falling in love, Nate begins to create his most beautiful work. But when the family seizes control of his new line of shoes and separates him from his muse, he suffers a breakdown until MK intervenes to restore an unexpected and surprising harmony to his life and helps him to find Delphi again.

(Via @KstewAngel)

Synopsis via Production Weekly:

A gifted shoe designer, Nate, is forced to break free from a family who want to cheapen his art for their own commercial gain. “The Big Shoe” is a touching an sexy love story and a classic boy-to-man coming-of-age tale, with the colorful backdrop of the fashion/shoe industry. When a muse is strategically ‘planted’ along Nate’s path by his mother, he begins to embrace the mad “logic” of the creative drive, allowing his own deep impulses and wishes to finally be expressed and experienced. He’s revealing to her and to the world his secret. And, while it may make no real practical“sense” to do his art (shoemaking), Nate must.

(Via @Mel452)

Screen Daily / Scan & info thanks to @Gossipgyal 

Video: Jim Sturgess mentions Kristen and 'The Big Shoe'

Jim mentions Kristen at 4.56mins

Later this year Jim Sturgess is expected to start shooting The Big Shoe in which he will star opposite Kristen Stewart. The actor describes it as a film about foot fetishes and shoemaking. He hasn’t yet done exhaustive research on the work of his co-star. He admits he hasn’t seen any of the Twilight series films the brought Stewart to international fame.

When asked if might watch them now he says “probably not.” But he did view some of her independent films and he says: “I thought she was really great."

Source via jimsturgessonline via @rainbowclimber_ via kstewartfans thank you.

Jim Sturgess talks about Kristen and 'The Big Shoe'

Get More: Movie Trailers, Movies Blog

"It's basically about shoe designs," he explained. "I play a young shoemaker who has a foot fetish, so the whole idea is about foot fetishes and shoemaking, basically. So another Hollywood blockbuster."

Jim has yet to meet co-star Kristen but he is obviously well-aware of her work.

"No, I've never met her, so it'll be exciting," he enthused. "I know who she is. I've seen her in some great movies. She did a film called 'Adventureland' that I really liked."

And how exactly will his character, Elizabeth's and Kristen's all fit together?

"Elizabeth Banks plays a therapist who is trying to coax me—who's been hired by my family to coax me into making shoes again. I'm sort of a retired shoe artist. I now work in, like, a Payless shoe store. I've given up on shoes all together. So they bring in Kristen Stewart's character as a muse, and I fall in love with her feet basically. I don't even look at her from the knee down until [gestures at feet]. I saw some audition tapes, her feet look pretty amazing."

When we told Jim of Kristen's recent foot injury (on display at this year's Oscars ceremony), he was quick to (jokingly) explain the situation:

"She was doing foot training," he said. "Working those muscles."

Source MTV

Kristen to star in Steven Shainberg’s 'The Big Shoe' with Elizabeth Banks & Jim Sturgess

Deadline

Kristen Stewart and Elizabeth Banks are joining Jim Sturgess in Steven Shainberg’s The Big Shoe. HanWay Films is handling international here at the EFM with CAA repping domestic. Secretary director Shainberg is helming from a script he wrote with Mickey Birnbaum. 

Sturgess plays a gifted shoe designer forced to break free from a family who wants to turn his designs into mass-produced knock-offs. The family hires psychotherapist Mary Kay (Banks) and muse Delphi (Stewart) to lure him back to work. 

Shainberg says the film will combine eroticism and humor in a similar way to dark comedy Secretary. Andrew Lazar’s Mad Chance produces and Richard Middleton and Christina Lurie are executive producing.

Variety

Kristen Stewart is set to join the cast of Steven Shainberg's comedy drama "The Big Shoe." Elizabeth Banks is also confirmed for the cast alongside Jim Sturgess.

Marking helmer Shainberg's first feature outing since 2006's "Fur," "The Big Shoe" follows a show designer (Sturgess) whose family want to use his designs to make mass-produced knock-offs for fast profit. The family hires a muse (Stewart) and a psychotherapist (Banks) to lure him back to work when he breaks free from the family.

The film is described by Shainberg as combining eroticism and humor in the same vein as his 2002 film "Secretary."

Andrew Lazar's Mad Chance Productions will produce the film, which is scripted by Shainberg and Mickey Birnbaum. Lensing is set to begin June 17.

HanWay Films handles international sales. CAA are handling domestic rights.

THR

BERLIN -- Kristen Stewart and Elizabeth Banks have joined the cast of Steven Shainberg's The Big Shoe, which European outfit HanWay films is shopping to foreign buyers at the European Film Market in Berlin.

They join Jim Sturgess, who plays a gifted shoe designer forced to break free from a family who want to turn his beautiful designs into mass-produced knock-offs for a quick buck. The family hires psychotherapist Mary Kay (Banks) and "muse" Delphi (Stewart) to lure Nate back to work.

Andrew Lazar’s Mad Chance Productions will produce, with Shainberg (Secretary) directing from a script he co-wrote with and Mickey Birnbaum. Richard Middleton and Christina Lurie are executive producing.

"The Big Shoe gives me the opportunity to explore a playful, romantic, sexy, intimate connection just as Secretary did. Not since that film have I had a script that combines eroticism and humor in such a fun way," Shainberg said. "This is a script dear to my heart, and I intend to make a truly unique film from it."

Added HanWay's Thorsten Schumacher: "The director of Secretary making a film about shoes, fashion and fetishism was a must-have item for our team and to have such a stellar cast on board will make it a great fit for distributors. Georgina Goodman’s incredible designs threaten to steal every scene they're in so we’ll see plenty of great marketing possibilities for the film."

Cannes 2012 article: THR (via @ADarkParadise)

The Big Shoe -- featuring footwear designed for the film by England's Georgina Goodman -- will be financed by a new $150 million equity film fund announced this week by AngelWorld Entertainment.

Shainberg (Secretary, Fur: An Imaginary Portrait of Diane Arbus) is set to start shooting this fall from a script he co-wrote with Mickey Birnbaum. The project reteams Sarandon and Sturgess, who will be seen in Focus Features' Cloud Atlas, from Tom Tykwer, Andy and Lana Wachowski.

Andrew Lazar's Mad Chance Productions will produce alongside AngelWorld's Darby Angel, Tykwer and the Wachowskis. HanWay Films will handle international sales, while CAA negotiated the deal and is representing North American rights (CAA also reps WorldView).

The Big Shoe follows Nate (Sturgess), a gifted shoe designer forced to break free from a family who wants to cheapen his art for their own commercial gain. His overbearing mother Irene (Sarandon) hires a psychotherapist and a muse to lure Nate back to work.

"The Big Shoe provides the opportunity to explore a playful romantic, sexy, intimate connection just as Secretary did. The script combines eroticism and humor in such a unique way -- where shoes are better than sex," Shainberg said.

Goodman recently designed a pair of wedding shoes commissioned by the Royal Mint to celebrate the Royal Wedding. Only 11 pairs of the shoes were produced, the first going to Kate Middleton.

"The project has all the elements we were looking for to satisfy our financing model. The script is strong, as is the cast and the creative team, and it's great to work with an experienced and reputable producer like Lazar. The Big Shoe ticks all the boxes, especially as our investment criteria are non-negotiable," said Angel.

AngelWorld's new $150 million equity fund -- putting investors in the first position -- will finance six projects. The Big Shoe is the first to be announced.

Production Company, Angelworld Entertainment official synopsis: 

A gifted shoe designer, Nate, is forced to break free from a family who want to cheapen his art for their own commercial gain. “The Big Shoe” is a touching an sexy love story and a classic boy-to-man coming-of-age tale, with the colourful backdrop of the fashion/shoe industry. When a muse is strategically ‘planted’ along Nate’s path by his mother, he begins to embrace the mad “logic” of the creative drive, allowing his own deep impulses and wishes to finally be expressed and experienced. He’s revealing to her and to the world his secret. And, while it may make no real practical “sense” to do his art (shoemaking), Nate must….

IMDB The Big Shoe

Via kstewartnews and kstewartfans thank you.