Bring Down The Moon: Public Access Daytime Drama

One of my more ambitious projects involved my work on a soap for Public Access Television. Bring Down The Moon was a six episode series that followed four college kids whose friendships and lives were all fractured by cheating, lies, and broken promises. It aired Mondays at 6:30PM with the repeats Mondays at 10:30PM and Wednesday at 1:00AM. It premiered October 2nd, 2007.

It was a project I created originally for the SOAPnet contest, SOAP-U. It sought out aspiring soap writers, producers, and actors to create a ten minute pilot video. I rented a camera from campus, got a group of friends together and we shot multiple items over the course of three separate tape dates. I'm more the writer than the film guy, so it was fun to do this project and submit it. No budget, no boom mic, just four players, a script, and me directing them. It was a fun project and a learning experience from someone who just wanted to tell some interesting, soapy stories.

When we weren't picked for the semifinals, I knew I had to continue this project somehow. I went to everyone I knew(our campus TV station, etc.) to try and rent a camera with no such luck. And someone told me about Community Access Television in Fayetteville, Arkansas and their classes on camerawork and production. After completing the field camera courses, I spent my entire Spring Break holiday working on the scripts, creating a shooting schedule, etc. We recast a few roles and in late March 2007, we began taping at my friend, Dave's apartment. Shooting concluded early May 2007, although we taped an additional scene during the summer, and did a reshoot during the fall.

What I feel differentiates this from most independent soap projects is that the basic elements of genre are there. This wasn't supposed to be an art film and I feel that most student "soap operas" pass their failed projects off with that title. True soap isn't supposed to be a shitty art film. The joy of soap is in elements of human emotion that we see with these characters in situations of heightened reality. It can be serious, funny, endearing. And I feel that soap operas essentially play by their own rules.

I feel that my work as a writer has much improved since this initial project, but I'll always think back to how this project came to me at the right place and the right time. And it was a way for me to prove that, yes, I could complete something. This project will always have my heart.

Here are the links to the pilot and the first act of episode 101. Again, I have to tell you the project was pretty low budget. But then again, after seeing Guiding Light's last few years on the air, I'd say I did a pretty decent job with a handheld field camera and no boom microphone.