Hollywood will come to Arnold this fall during the filming of a movie that's set in the mountain town.
“Nominated,” written by part-time Arnold resident Dan Pavlik and co-written by David Baptist and starring Bay Area actor Brian Degan Scott, will be filmed in Arnold and surrounding areas this September.
This will be Pavlik's first full-length feature film.
“Making a movie is like planning a wedding,” Pavlik said at an interview held at the Black Bart Playhouse in Murphys. “There is a ton of details and organization.”
Pavlik, whose main home is in Fremont, got his start in the movie-making biz as a corporate video producer, which he did for more than a decade.
“Twelve years and lots of corporate videos later, I realized I wasn't doing what I wanted to do,” Pavlik said.
He attended a two-day movie class in San Francisco, which he described as “film boot camp.”
“Five minutes into it, I was in love.”
“Nominated” is centered on a has-been child actor, Mickey Monroe, who is nominated for an Academy Award after starring in a highly acclaimed independent movie.
At the suggestion of his agent, Blake Dunbar, Monroe, a rough-and-tumble sort of character, takes a weeklong retreat to a cabin in Arnold to stay out of trouble.
Dunbar's plan to “cash in on the Oscar buzz” backfires, and Monroe instead “insults the locals, offends vacationers and gets attacked by a pastor,” the movie's Web site says.
Pavlik said that when it came to the starring role, he needed a character who fit the description: “Slimy but lovable at the same time.”
Scott, who has been friends with Pavlik since about 1996, agreed to take the role.
“I can act slimy,” he joked.
Scott has appeared in television shows, including “Nash Bridges,” and also had a public access comedy sketch show in the San Francisco area.
Pavlik said the inspiration for the movie came after watching the Academy Awards.
He had thought about writing a screenplay, and said the idea came to him in a very detailed dream that night.
In the weeks following his dream, he began to craft Monroe's character – one he describes as “a down-and-out Hollywood star.”
About three-quarters into the script writing, Baptist hopped on board. The writing duo had worked together before in 1992, on the book “The Everyday Guide to Everyday Stuff.”
When the script was done in 2008, Pavlik entered it into the Nicholl Fellowship in Screenwriting, a contest for amateur screenwriters. That year, he said, 5,200 scripts were entered and “Nominated” made it to the top 5 percent cut.
That was a good sense of validation, Pavlik said.
Soon after, they recruited Carl Lumbly, who has appeared in numerous television shows and movies, and who worked with Scott on the TV show “Alias.”
“Carl read it and said, 'I'm in,'” Pavlik said, another event that he considered another great validation.
He then came to Arnold and started meeting with various people and businesses to get the ball rolling.
He said that about half the movie will be filmed in Arnold, while the other half will be split between the Bay Area and Los Angeles.
“The almost immediate response (from locals) was 'How can I help?'” Pavlik said.
He has and will continue to illicit sponsorship from local businesses, and has already received sponsorship from places like Don Fry Realty of Arnold.
Pavlik said he will work with local businesses and even put some “product placement” in the movie, such as Don Fry Realty signs in the background of some shots.
“We want to work the local angle with (things like) product placement,” he said.
“The best part about it is – it's real,” he added.
Pavlik is also looking for an executive producer – the person who pays for the movie to be made.
The catch is that the executive producer in this movie will only need to donate $25 and write an essay of no more than 50 words saying why they should be the executive producer. The imaginitive essay must include the words “vindictive,” “superficial,” “validation,” “sleazeball” and “gravy.”
The winner of the essay contest will win the onscreen title of executive producer.
Pavlik added that he is also looking for local movie extras and would like to make the local aspect of the film as authentic as possible.
“If you truly believe in it and stick with it, you're going to overcome the obstacles,” said Pavlik.
“I'm obsessed ... it's my favorite topic.”
For more information on “Nominated,” visit
nominatedthemovie.com. To enter the executive producer essay contest, visit
nominatedthemovie.com/exec_prod.htm.
