Katherine Heigl and the producers of the her latest film project, Jenny’s Wedding, are turning to the crowd-funding site Indiegogo to help cover costs necessary to properly finish the film. It’s terrain that filmmakers like Zach Braff, Spike Lee and the talent behind the upcoming Veronica Mars feature have already navigated, but still a fairly new (and somewhat controversial) phenomenon in the film industry, one in which the ripples are still unsure.
Jenny’s Wedding tells the story of a woman (Heigl) who surprises her old-fashioned parents by announcing she’s getting married to a woman. The film was written and directed by Mary Agnes Donoghue (the screenwriter of Beaches, White Oleander and Veronica Guerin) and co-stars Tom Wilkinson (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, In the Bedroom), Linda Emond (Stop-Loss, Julie & Julia), Grace Gummer (Meryl Streep’s daughter and co-star of Frances Ha) and Alexis Bledel (TV’s Gilmore Girls, Sin City.) The film wrapped principal photography last month but is taking to online crowd-funding and asking for $150,000 for music, sound, titles and coloring of the feature. The filmmakers also want to use some of the financing to enter the movie, which currently doesn’t have a domestic distributor, into various film festival in an effort to secure a theatrical release. “Many wonderful indie movies disappear because the quality of work in post-production fails them,” the filmmakers assert in their plea for funding. “Don’t fail us.” They are providing promotional coffee mugs, beanies, signed copies of the screenplay, advanced screenings with cast and crew members as perks to generous contributors – the most expensive of all being the wedding dress worn in the film by Heigl, valued at $15,000; the more curious being retweets directly from Heigl (or her handlers.)
Heigl says of the project, “The movie is really just about her journey and her journey with her family and revealing this part of herself that she’s kept hidden for so long.” It’s been a rough couple of years for the Emmy winning former Grey’s Anatomy actress, who has appeared in box office disappointments like The Big Wedding, One For the Money, New Year‘s Eve, and Killers in recent years, none of which were particularly well received, and all a far cry from her biggest successes, Knocked Up and 27 Dresses.
As of right now the project has earned $5,156. The funding drive will run until March 28th.
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