Announcing Kara Killmer as Charlotte Holloway

We are excited to announce that Kara Killmer is playing the role of Charlotte Holloway, the heroine in Beyond the Mask.  Kara shares about her connection with the Charlotte: “Ever since I read the script, the character Charlotte has caught my imagination.  Throughout the film she shows herself to have a beautiful blend of wisdom and femininity replicating Matthew 6 perfectly, as ‘wise as a serpent, but as gentle as a dove.’   It’s brilliant to tell the Redemption story with the familiar backdrop of colonial America.  I have always wanted to be in a period piece and I am so excited to be going on this grand adventure!”  It is such a privilege to be working with Kara.

Announcing Andrew Cheney as William Reynolds

The Beyond the Mask team is thrilled to announce that Andrew Cheney is playing the role of our story’s hero William Reynolds.  We are so excited to have the privilege of working with him on this film.  Andrew had stiff competition when he tried out for the part of William Reynolds with over 1200 other actors submitting for the role.  He was the perfect choice and we connected with him right away.

Andrew comes to us with veteran film experience, as the recent star in the SAICFF audience choice award winner “Seasons of Gray.” Athletic and likeable, he enjoys playing soccer and working out.  We have built him a personal training room for his use during the weeks of filming.  Fun to work with, Andrew looks the part and his acting has been blowing us all away.

The Costume Department

Costumes

The soft hum of sewing machines accompanied by the clicking of computer keys greets those entering Beyond the Mask Costume Headquarters. Costume-making is in full swing and we are spending more than ten hours a day surrounded by thread, cloth, and scissors. Daily we receive more packages filled with notions and material. We have spent well over a hundred hours shopping for deals and have been very thankful for the willingness of the Joann cutting ladies to spend hours cutting material for this project. We’ve had many adventures perusing wholesale and international websites in search of trim, accessories, and shoes.

We are very excited to have built several costume mock ups and, thanks to the gracious assistance of several very lovely seamstresses, we continue to build more by the day. Recently we were blessed by four custom-made clothes racks. We are now filling them quickly and looking to get more. The storeroom, previously a garage, has been painted, creating a clean space for the extras’ costumes, which began arriving yesterday.

Anxiously, we await the measurements of the cast, which should be finalized shortly. Upon receiving the measurements, we will have until September 3, when filming starts, to have most of the costumes finished. After that, we will have the first two to three weeks of September to complete costumes that will be needed later on in the shoot.

We have been so thankful for the ladies who have come to help on this project. Through their skilled hands, we have been able to complete many important pieces like shirts and shifts that will be necessary for most of our costumes. Continually, we are looking for people who would like to build costumes. Housing is available through filming. If you are interested in helping, please contact us at Btm.productionteam@gmail.com.

If you are unable to join us, but still want to offer your support, we’d appreciate your prayers as we seek to please our Heavenly Father in every aspect of this project.

~From the costume team

Moving Forward

Dear Supporters,

Thanks for all you help and prayers over the past year. We could not be happier to announce that through your help, the Lord has opened a door for us to walk through.

Last fall, our team determined that June 15th, 2012 was the last possible deadline for securing the production budget to film Beyond the Mask. By that time, we needed to see 26 units of financing committed to the project. By late May (after six months of great effort), we had raised just 15 units…and now had only three weeks to go. Over the course of the next two weeks, we saw five more units come in. However, it was Tuesday morning, and we were still 6 units short for Friday’s deadline. We knew that it was beyond our own power to make this happen. We needed a miracle. …And a miracle is what we got. As we were preparing contingency plans for shutting down the project, the 6 units came in – with the last one arriving at 9:30pm on the evening of June 15th! To our team this was a clear signal – the Lord is in this work and He has called us to move forward. We expect many challenges in the days to come, but we believe firmly that He has called us to this task and that He will be glorified through it.

Thanks to your prayer and encouragement, and the Lord’s clear leading, the financing for the tools to make this film are now in place. Now, as we move forward, we are looking to stretch every dollar so that the finished film can have the maximum possible impact.

We would like you to please carefully consider three categories where you could be involved. First, we are looking for volunteers; check out a number of categories here. Second, we are seeking odds and ends that you might have in your garage or might find at a yard sale. We’d love to have your help finding these items. Third, in a couple of days, we’ll have sponsorship opportunities for folks to help us obtain sets, costume, props, and specialty equipment that will help push the film to the next level.

Thanks for standing with us as we move forward with the creation of  an action/adventure film with a Christ centered message.

In Him,

Aaron, Chad, and the Beyond the Mask Team

June 15th – Major Fundraising Milestone Reached

Praising the Lord for His leading and provision! Stay tuned for exciting announcements coming next week!

Trip to Albany

This past Tuesday and Wednesday we shared some great fellowship with Stephen and Alex Kendrick (the Producer & Director of Fireproof and Courageous) down in Albany, Georgia.

Stephen and his wife Jill welcomed us into their home; in addition to sharing their film-making experience, they poured love and grace into us personally, encouraging us in our marriages and our walk with the Lord.

The meeting revolved around the script, which we spent most of our time reading and brainstorming. Stephen and Alex love the Lord, love to have fun, and love to work hard. At one point, Alex jumped up and said, “Ok, here’s how I’d direct this scene…” and then proceeded to lay on the floor, illustrating how the hero would wake up after being knocked out in a bomb-blast.

We were encouraged and humbled that the Kendricks would take so much time and energy to help us as we enter the last stages of writing Beyond the Mask. As we complete this round of final polishes on the script, please pray that the message of finding hope and identity in Christ will shine through loud and clear.

Windmill Island: History & Mystery

“We wanted our final set piece to be both historical and fantastically imaginative at the same time, and we found this contradiction in Windmill Island,” Nick, the Production Designer, told us.

In the early summer of 1776, Windmill Island (also known as Smith’s Island) sat off the shore of colonial Philadelphia in the Delaware River. Located just south of the Drawbridge Wharf, the island stretched a half-mile west from Arch Street and was approximately one block wide.  Several decades before the time of our story, two immigrant brothers had constructed an octagonal windmill on the northern end of the island, giving it its name. They also built three docks on the western side, facing away from the city, and dug a channel into the interior of the small land mass.  Because there is no evidence that the windmill was ever in operation, it is unclear what the brothers actually built it for. By the 1770s, Windmill Island was abandoned…and there it sat unused until in the 1830s it was deemed a “shipping hazard” by the US government, and dredged under.  Hmm…a shipping hazard? Or perhaps, was Windmill Island destroyed to bury once and for all the role it played in a rogue British East India Company plot against the American colonists? This island offered us the perfect mixture of historical fact and mysterious background; Windmill Island will be the Bad Guys’ Hideout in Beyond the Mask.

In early October of 2011, our volunteer team began construction on the windmill set. Sadly, no, it’s not actually on an island in the Delaware. Built on the edge of a pond on our Michigan backlot, our windmill currently stands about twenty feet high, although the final product in the film will stretch almost ninety feet into the sky.  Alongside the mill, we have recreated two of the three docks that originally reached into the Delaware, and several of the warehouses and barns.  To give this set the weathered, neglected look that it needed,we primarily used recycled lumber.  Some of the wood came from ripped-out decks, and some was scrap from Amish sawmills.  One construction volunteer brought a U-Hall truck full of pallet planks, which being used for the shingle siding on the windmill.

The Art Department has done a fantastic job, pulling together an incredible location from the varied materials they used.  Stepping onto this set pulls you back to the historical 1700’s and yet leaves you with a feeling of its mystery…

The weather is finally warming up here in MI, and we look forward to more progress on the sets as the production moves towards filming later this year.

~Sara & Shannon Burns

Beyond the Mask & Veggie Tales

Director Chad Burns and his wife, Angela, met with Phil Vischer (Creator of Veggie Tales) last week in Chicago for lunch.

Phil has many years of experience creating Christian media content for families and it was a real privilege to sit down and hear from him. Phil had a lot of advice and a few connections to offer us.

Phil’s faith journey is similar to the journey traced by the hero in Beyond the Mask. Phil spent years thinking that his good works and fine efforts for the Lord would please God and earn favor. After a lot of hard lessons, Phil came to see that the Lord is more concerned with the orientation of our heart toward Him than the work of our hands. You can read a more about Phil’s journey and the Savior he loves in his auto-biography, Me, Myself, and Bob.

Phil’s timeless advice was simple: If you are worried or losing sleep about what you are doing for God… then maybe you aren’t doing it for God. Maybe you are doing it for you. The answer is not, “don’t worry so much.” It goes deeper. The answer is to lay aside our quest for personal fulfillment in our work and look to Christ for what only He can offer; the true satisfaction of our souls.

Please pray that we at Burns Family Studios will work hard as unto the Lord, and not for ourselves or other men.

Fellowship of Christian Filmmakers

Last Saturday, Beyond the Mask’s Producer and Director (Aaron and Chad Burns) had the privilege to speak at a “Fellowship of Christian Filmmakers” meeting in Alexandria, VA. During the Q&A portion, led by producer Ron Newcomb, Chad and Aaron presented their vision for Christian action-adventures films, and answered questions about what it takes to develop, produce, and distribute this kind of project. The excitement and enthusiasm of this group was encouraging and infectious. We know their prayers will be with our team as we press on with fundraising and development for Beyond the Mask.