TBA: The Best Actors are on their way here

By Mary Alice Blackwell

Published: October 9, 2008

It’s all beginning to fall into place.

The final TBAs are getting filled in as the Virginia Film Festival approaches the Oct. 30 start of its 21st annual event.

If you haven’t started to fill in your order form, you might just find yourself on the outside looking in. Especially for the TBAs that were announced Wednesday evening.

While there are some extraordinary filmmakers — including Guillermo Arriaga who wrote the Oscar-nominated “Babel” — fans want to see the stars.

The festival’s artistic director didn’t have to look far to find a Hollywood heroine, but he, and we, were mighty mighty lucky that she was free.

Albemarle County’s own Sissy Spacek, who has had a long involvement with the festival both as a participant and a board member, will be on hand opening night to screen her latest film, “Lake City.”

I say latest, because “Lake City” is scheduled for release nationwide on Nov. 7. But Spacek also has two other new films in the works. “Pull,” with Rickie Lee Jones and Karen Black, is still in production, while “Four Christmases” should hit the screens around Thanksgiving. Talk about star power, “Four Christmases” is loaded to the gills with the likes of Reese Witherspoon, Vince Vaughn, Dwight Yoakam, Mary Steenburgen and another Virginia resident, Robert Duvall.

But more on those later.

“Lake City” will debut at the Culbreth Theater at 7 p.m. Oct. 30, and it has mighty strong ties to the area.

Let me count the ways.

First of all: There’s Sissy who plays Maggie.

Her resume includes six Academy Award nominations for “Carrie,” “Missing,” “The River,” “Crimes of the Heart,” “In the Bedroom” and the award-winning “Coal Miner’s Daughter.” She also came to the fest in 2006 to showcase “Nine Lives.”

Second: There is the director and screenwriter, Perry Moore, a University of Virginia graduate. Moore will be joined by his co-writer and co-director and the co-owner of his production company, Hunter Hill.

Third: There is Weiman Seid, another UVa alum, who served as a “Lake City’s” producer.

Fourth: You can’t say producer without saying Mark Johnson. This UVa graduate knows how to produce quality films, everything ranging from “Rain Man” to “The Chronicles of Narnia.” He’s also a really nice guy and frequent friend of the festival.  He’ll be back too.

Fifth: Now there is no mention that he will be in town for the film, but Dave Matthews, of the Dave Matthews Band, also has a role in the movie … as “Red.”

Sixth, and probably not last in the Virginia connection: “Lake City” was filmed in Richmond and at Four Mile Creek Farm in Varina.

The film, about a mother and son who finally reunite after a falling out over a family tragedy, also stars Rebecca Romijn, Drea de Matteo (of “Sopranos” fame), Keith Carradine and Troy Garity.

Garity will be joining Spacek, Johnson, Moore, Hill and Seid on the Culbreth stage. (Did I mention that Moore was a UVa student when he met Johnson at the Virginia Film Festival?)

Anyhow, Garity also has an impressive resume and pedigree. Many may remember him as Isaac Rosenberg from the “Barbershop” movies. He was also named one of People magazine’s Most Beautiful People in 1998. Garity also played his father in 2000’s “Steel This Movie.” Garity, who uses his grandmother’s maiden name, is the son of Jane Fonda and Tom Hayden. A talented family that includes cousin Bridget, uncle Peter and grandfather, the late-great Henry Fonda.

So, you see, there is plenty to look at, plenty to learn from and plenty of good fun in store.

Head to http://www.vafilm.com to get your tickets before it’s too late.