Wilbraham & Monson Academy's theater group, also known as "film" for the final trimester, has been working on a new project: interviewing teachers while driving them in a golf cart around campus and filming it.
The new idea is entirely different from what this afternoon activity has done in previous years. CEGS Department member and film teacher Michael Dziura said, "Usually what I do is write a half an hour long script, and then work with the students to shoot a movie from that script. However, I got to the point where I want to give the students more control of what the film is going to be. I thought it would be more interesting to do a documentary with different students interviewing different teachers."
After Mr. Dziura decided to change the regular agenda of film to a documentary shooting, he explored the idea of interviewing WMA members in golf carts. The idea came from Jerry Seinfeld's show "Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee," which is now available on Netflix. In the show, Jerry Seinfeld chose a car, picked up different comedians in each episode, and chatted on the way while getting coffee.
"I thought that would be an excellent thing to do with the WMA community," said Mr. Dziura. "We are obviously not getting a nice car, but one thing that I identified in the WMA community is the golf carts. There are golf carts everywhere."
Mr. Dziura then expanded on the idea to make it more unique to WMA. The interview questions were varied. English Department Member Mr. Dean Guarino found that the questions were interesting. "They asked me all sorts of things. We talked about the gun law, love and singing Rihanna in the shower. I really liked it. It's fun to interview in this way."
Even though the project is getting better and more well organized, the members of film still think there are many things that they can improve upon. Mr. Dziura shared his thought that the film needs more members who are genuinely interested in filmmaking to join, and give them the opportunity to create on their own. He also hopes to start the process earlier in the year, which would get people ready to start working as soon as the spring comes around.
Georgii Chichua '18 said, "I think we should focus more on editing films because that is a big part of the film process."
With this passion, the film class wants the project to be perfect. Mr. Dziura and the members of film class approached their work with an energetic attitude. A version of the documentary was released at school meeting May 17.
- By Yinqi "Sherry" Yang '20