By Ray Pride Pride@moviecitynews.com

Michael Tully’s PING PONG SUMMER Heads Into Production

Posted Thursday, September 13th, 2012 - 3 Comments »
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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Indie comedy starring Susan Sarandon, Lea Thompson, John Hannah, and Amy Sedaris shooting on location in Ocean City, Maryland beginning September 17

PING PONG SUMMER, a 1980s-set family beach comedy, begins principal photography on September 17 in Ocean City, Maryland.   Academy Award Winner Susan Sarandon stars alongside BAFTA-nominated John Hannah (THE MUMMY, FOUR WEDDINGS AND A FUNERAL), screen veteran Lea Thompson (BACK TO THE FUTURE 1, 2 & 3, Caroline In The City), actress and author Amy Sedaris (STRANGERS WITH CANDY) and Robert Longstreet (TAKE SHELTER, PINEAPPLE EXPRESS, AIN’T THEM BODIES SAINTS). Filming is scheduled to wrap the final week of October.  Sarandon is repped by ICM, Hannah by Untitled Entertainment (US) and ARG (UK), Thompson by Innovative Artists, Sedaris by Paradigm, and Longstreet by ABA.

The 1980s-set film follows a hip-hop and ping pong obsessed 13-year old from the Maryland suburbs on his long-awaited family beach vacation to Ocean City, where he encounters both a new best friend and a new worst enemy.  PING PONG SUMMER is the third narrative feature film helmed by writer/director Michael Tully, who previously wrote and directed the Sundance Film Festival selection SEPTIEN (IFC/Sundance Selects), directed documentary and SxSW pick SILVER JEW (Drag City), and directed the narrative feature COCAINE ANGEL (IndiePix), which was also a selection of the Rotterdam and SxSW Film Festivals.

Additionally, the cast will be rounded out by six teenagers discovered during open casting calls that took place throughout the state of Maryland during the spring and summer of 2012.  Baltimore’s Pat Moran, CSA lead casting efforts alongside Producer Michael Gottwald.  Notably, Gottwald took the lead on the casting for BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD, which resulted in the discovery of 6-year old phenom Quvenzhané Wallis.

Up-and-comer Wyatt Garfield will serve as Director of Photography. Garfield has just wrapped Tom Gilroy’s IN COLD LANDS, starring Lili Taylor, on which he served as DP.  Stephani Lewis (BLUE VALENTINE, BEASTS OF THE SOUTHERN WILD) will serve as the film’s costume designer.

The project’s financing was secured by the producers through private equity, as well as the generous support from the City of Ocean City, Worcestor County and the state of Maryland.  The film is being produced with Nomadic Independence and in association with Epic Match Media and Compass Entertainment.

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Posted in Movie City News, Press Releases | 3 Comments »

3 Responses to “Michael Tully’s PING PONG SUMMER Heads Into Production”

  1. Dennis Kroger says:
    October 1, 2012 at 8:12 am

    I have a beautiful pair of light brown leather bell bottoms, size 32 along with paisley shirt, etc. that could be used in this film. contact my email if interested.

  2. Jennifer Furbay says:
    October 3, 2012 at 10:52 am

    if you are hiring im ready, television 27 years

  3. John Velasquez says:
    March 13, 2013 at 1:38 pm

    To see photos of the extras and some cast members of ‘Ping Pong Summer’, go here.

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It shows how out of it I was in trying to be in it, acknowledging that I was out of it to myself, and then thinking, “Okay, how do I stop being out of it? Well, I get some legitimate illogical narrative ideas” — some novel, you know?

So I decided on three writers that I might be able to option their material and get some producer, or myself as producer, and then get some writer to do a screenplay on it, and maybe make a movie.

And so the three projects were “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep,” “Naked Lunch” and a collection of Bukowski. Which, in 1975, forget it — I mean, that was nuts. Hollywood would not touch any of that, but I was looking for something commercial, and I thought that all of these things were coming.

There would be no Blade Runner if there was no Ray Bradbury. I couldn’t find Philip K. Dick. His agent didn’t even know where he was. And so I gave up.

I was walking down the street and I ran into Bradbury — he directed a play that I was going to do as an actor, so we know each other, but he yelled “hi” — and I’d forgot who he was.

So at my girlfriend Barbara Hershey’s urging — I was with her at that moment — she said, “Talk to him! That guy really wants to talk to you,” and I said “No, fuck him,” and keep walking.

But then I did, and then I realized who it was, and I thought, “Wait, he’s in that realm, maybe he knows Philip K. Dick.” I said, “You know a guy named—” “Yeah, sure — you want his phone number?”

My friend paid my rent for a year while I wrote, because it turned out we couldn’t get a writer. My friends kept on me about, well, if you can’t get a writer, then you write.”
~ Hampton Fancher

“That was the most disappointing thing to me in how this thing was played. Is that I’m on the phone with you now, after all that’s been said, and the fundamental distinction between what James is dealing with in these other cases is not actually brought to the fore. The fundamental difference is that James Franco didn’t seek to use his position to have sex with anyone. There’s not a case of that. He wasn’t using his position or status to try to solicit a sexual favor from anyone. If he had — if that were what the accusation involved — the show would not have gone on. We would have folded up shop and we would have not completed the show. Because then it would have been the same as Harvey Weinstein, or Les Moonves, or any of these cases that are fundamental to this new paradigm. Did you not notice that? Why did you not notice that? Is that not something notable to say, journalistically? Because nobody could find the voice to say it. I’m not just being rhetorical. Why is it that you and the other critics, none of you could find the voice to say, “You know, it’s not this, it’s that”? Because — let me go on and speak further to this. If you go back to the L.A. Times piece, that’s what it lacked. That’s what they were not able to deliver. The one example in the five that involved an issue of a sexual act was between James and a woman he was dating, who he was not working with. There was no professional dynamic in any capacity.

~ David Simon