An Industry Case Study
Narrative | Dramatic Features
Film Name: Sproutland
Genre: Drama (Dramedy)
Length of film: 25 Minutes
Date: Premiered April 2021
Director: Cynthia Wade
Producer: Matthew Syrett
Executive Producer: NA
Writer: Nannina Gilder
Cinematographer: Boaz Freund
Editor: Fiona Otway
Composer: Max Avery Lichtenstein
Production Company: Cynthia Wade Productions in association with Honor Society Films
Budget: NA
Financing: Self Financing
Shooting Format: 23.98 fps
Screening Format: 2:1 (2K scope)
World Premiere: Audience Award, Berkshire Film Festival; “Best Director” nomination, Elba Film Festival
Website: sproutlandfilm.com
The Official Trailer for Sproutland
Watch The Trailer for Sproutland directed by Cynthia Wade
A Short Biography of Cynthia Wade
Cynthia Wade is a DGA film director based in Los Angeles. Her documentaries include The Flag Makers, Grit, Generation Startup, Living The Legacy, Growing Hope Against Hunger, Mondays at Racine, Freeheld, Born Sweet, Shelter Dogs, and Grist For The Mill.
She directs commercials with real people from Kellogg’s Mini Wheats to Dove Real Beauty and is represented by Honor Society. Sproutland is her first fiction film. Cynthia has a BA from Smith College and an MA in Documentary Film from Stanford University. She’s won 60+ awards.
The Cynthia Wade Interview
indieactivity: What is your film about?
Cynthia Wade (CW): When health food guru Sproutman dies suddenly, his widow must confront not only her loss but an entire way of life. Surrounded by groomed lawns, organic shops and youthful bodies, she navigates yoga mudras, jade eggs, and online dating while her teenage son grows increasingly alienated.
If bean sprouts can’t bring them together, what will? Filmed on location in the scenic Berkshires, this quirky, funny, and heartwarming short is the fiction debut of Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker Cynthia Wade.
Tell us about the festival run, marketing and sales?
Cynthia Wade (CW): Florida Film Festival; Annapolis Film Festival; Rhode Island International Film Festival; Peekskill Film Festival; Berkshire International Film Festival Audience Award Winner; Elba Film Festival Nominated Best Director; HollyShorts Film Festival; Santa Fe Independent Film Festival; Mystic Film Festival; Centre Film Festival; Yo-Fi Fest; Crested Butte Film Festival; Joyce Forum Jewish Short Film Festival; Rocky Mountain Women’s Film Festival.
Give the full Official Synopsis for your film?
Cynthia Wade (CW): What happens when the health guru of your town – the one guy who got everyone to love sprouts – is killed in a sudden accident? For his grieving widow Beth, navigating life without Sproutman isn’t easy, especially because her fitness freak neighbors can’t stop imitating him.
Inspired by true events, Sproutland follows Beth as she navigates the constant reminders of her deceased husband —in the local juice bar, in the yoga studio, and at home with her son. As Beth forges a path she neither expected nor wanted, she learns that life can hold despair and joy at the same time.
Development & Financing?
Cynthia Wade (CW): This is a scripted film based on true events. For nine years, I lived full-time in Great Barrington, Massachusetts in the heart of the Berkshires, a muddy, earnest community known for family farms, yogis, hikers and meditators, fiddlers, and felters.
When local health food guru Sproutman Steve Meyerowitz was killed in a car accident in 2015, a hole was ripped into the community. More than a thousand people showed up at Sproutman’s funeral. His wife Beth navigated an unfamiliar world where many around her clung to a reality that no longer existed.
The idea of a vibrant town clinging to a dead reality was intriguing to me, so this became the focal point of the story. I am most interested in the intersection of fact and fiction. Over the years, I have increasingly directed my documentaries to look more like scripted films, where the shooting is deliberate, proactive (as opposed to reactive).
This film blends traditional documentary elements (handheld camerawork, real-world texture) and magical hyperbole. The blurring of fact and fiction excites me.
In Sproutland, Beth plays herself. The rest of the cast is comprised of actors, both professional and novice. We used Zeiss high-speed prime lenses to give the film a polished but naturalistic look. My longtime documentary and commercial film collaborator Boaz Freund shot this on his Alexa. Oscar-nominated editor Fiona Otway, based nearby in the Hudson Valley, is the editor.
How do we sprout after trauma? As a documentary director who has spent much of her career filming non-actors, this is a natural world in which to explore fiction film work. The continued success and reinvention of Sproutman’s business and the book Beth wrote, A Grief Sublime, are both testament to the possibility of rebirth and reinvention after death and trauma. This film, coming out of a reimagining of loss, allows for another form of rebirth.
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