The buzz is already building for GIRLTRASH: All Night Long and the movie just wrapped on Feb. 15.
A visit to the set in Los Angeles revealed that Angela Robinson has rounded up yet another band of capable babes, following in the footsteps of her first hit feature D.E.B.S., a refreshingly original film about crime-fighting femmes.
The heroines of GIRLTRASH, however, are far from debutante material. Throughout the night they encounter rival bands, a lovesick babe, a club-swinging badass ( The L Word's Rose Rollins), sleazy con artists and coke-snorting sorority sisters.
Thanks to her L Word ties, it wasn't hard for Robinson to lure Rollins, Kate French, Clementine Ford and Malaya Rivera Drew onto the GIRLTRASH heap.
Rose Rollins and Friends
Expectations are high for the film, because it's the second feature from POWER UP Studios, whose Itty Bitty Titty Committee set box office records, including the highest grossing LGBT film to open in 2007.
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It's day 20-something of 28 grueling all-night shoots and the cast and crew are by now battered but bonded. The crew is mostly women, including Robinson (writer-producer), her partner Alex Kondracke (director), Lisa Thrasher (producer) and Stacy Codikow (executive producer), as well as the director of photography, stylist and makeup artists, more than a dozen production assistants and even the Best Boy.
Alex directs Michelle and Mandy
The cast hop around to keep warm between takes; crew members wrap them in parkas whenever Kondracke yells "cut."
"No one believes that LA gets cold but it's been like in the 40s every night," says Kate French, in good spirits despite the biting night air. "And we're wearing summer clothes because it's supposed to look like June."
Angela Robinson and Cast
If Pink and Cyndi Lauper had a love child, she might be Lisa Reiffel (pronounced rah-fell). A vocal powerhouse with natural comedic timing, Reiffel plays the hapless Daisy, lead singer of Alotta Flame.
Daisy drives her band mate Tyler (Michelle Lombardo of Quarterlife ), sister Colby (Gabrielle Christian) and two opportunistic followers (Mandy Musgrave, Kate French) on a rocking and rollicking ride to win back her girlfriend (Clementine Ford) and win the Band Slam contest.
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Reiffel and her husband Johnny wrote the music for the film; their band, Killola, makes up much of ALotta Flame.
"It's so unique, it's so different," Christian says of the film. "It has a lot of serious undertones, such as coming out and going through the stages of adolescence to adulthood, but you have this like rock musical parody element. It's fun."
Kate, Lisa, Gaby, Mandy and Michelle
On teaming up again with Musgrave, who played her girlfriend on South of Nowhere, Christian says their previous experience helped. "Mandy knows I'm really uncomfortable when we have to do these semi-nude, making out scenes and she just makes jokes out of it. It sets us both at ease."
What appears to be the only temperamental personality on set belongs to a classic Chevrolet Impala. Every other take it stalls just when the actors attempt a getaway.
Rehearsing in a parking lot on Hollywood Boulevard, Lombardo at first looks tentative behind the wheel. But in no time her expression is one of fierce determination. She hits the gas, pulls out with tires screaming and circles the lot with a stunt-driver's precision. Crew members discreetly step backward.
It may be impossible for fans of The L Word to look at Lombardo as lady killer Tyler and not think of Shane. Not that they look alike...it's in the heat and attitude.
"I watched some James Dean clips to kind of get his whole piercing eyes mentality down," says Lombardo, a former swimsuit model who four months ago didn't resemble Tyler either.
"She creates this whole adventure throughout the night to try to get Colby laid. The entire evening is based upon a lie," she says, explaining Tyler's eye toward adventure and the similarities to herself. "I don't do that necessarily in real life, but I love finding out new things."
The film now goes into post-production; Codikow says it will be ready for release in 2011.
"It's been literally the time of my life," despite the exhausting schedule, says Reiffel, also a producer on the film. "There was a night when I was literally backstage at the Knitting Factory at about 3 a.m. crying and praying, how am I going to remember lines and look alive and all I want to do is close my eyes and fall asleep?
"By the end of the day you're fulfilling your dreams," she says sincerely, "so it's not hard."
www.girltrashallnightlong.com
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