In 2008, after a year of heavy research, a lot of pooling resources, and numerous re-writes on my screenplay – then titled White Night: Survivors of Jonestown – I set out to shoot a film trailer based on my low-budget script in hopes of gaining enough interest to shoot it on a micro-budget of 200-K.
It was dropped online the week of the 30-year anniversary of the Jonestown Massacre which garnered the typical nationwide coverage on major news outlets. Unlike previous projects that merely recount the details of this atrocity, mine focused more on a pair of survivors, then children – now adults – who were abandoned by their father they thought had died prior to the mass suicide. Learning of his existence 25 years later, they seek him out for answers. Their father, who was played by the late Jamaican actor Calvin Green – noted for performances in Bill Duke’s Deacons of Defense and the 1994 Cannes-winning Exotica – has left his past and identity behind him living a successful existence as a politician with a beautiful wife and daughter. Suspecting his involvement in their late mother’s death, the two survivors seek answers and retribution and in Cape Fear-sque fashion, torture him and his family to get it.
As was true to Peoples Temple values, the family and characters are diverse. Early feedback was promising with an option, a placing in film festival, and some interest from production companies. But the economic decline hit most boutique production companies that specialize in edgy and/or arty content hard, and the little interest died. This was to be expected and after three years of rejection, I put it on the shelf and focused on other projects, having more success in the surging TV market as streamers took off.
In 2022, with a handful of new connections, and a looming WGA strike which forced companies to stockpile content, I began submitting the original trailer again, and the phone began to ring. Whether it was it the success of films like Get Out or Tinseltown’s new fascination with diverse content, I’m not sure. Regardless of the reason, I decided I must rewrite and make the story more current. I also focused more on the female lead and made her African-American. I also set the story in Oakland rather than Los Angeles.
After banging out several drafts, I began submitting and once again the phone rang. “Who else has seen this?” “What else have you written?” “Are you looking to direct this?” These are all cryptic and mean one thing for a struggling screenwriter who has been around the block a few times: “there is interest.” The production companies that have been largely interested are the heavy-hitting African-American stars companies.
Now titled The Dissenter, the newer, updated version seems to have struck a chord with some people who can get it made. I know there are other Jonestown projects in the works – Octavia Spencer’s option on Tim Reiterman’s Raven, Leonardo DiCaprio based on The Road to Jonestown, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s White Night with FilmNation – but what I understand from those production company readers in the know with a backlog of scripts to read, the uniqueness of this and its focus on survivors stands out. Good news indeed, but it will still need a top director or star get the greenlight.
I haven’t published in the jonestown report since 2013, but I want to thank those of you who have reached out over the years. It was the KTVU local coverage of the 10-year anniversary in 1988 as a freshman in high school that first got me intrigued. Naturally at 15, my perception of time was different, and how something 10 years old sparked such a reaction from any adult I asked about it struck me as odd. I have several other projects that are looking good as well and I’m more optimistic than ever.
If you would like to view the original trailer from 2008 feel free to drop me a line Skycycle.Productions@gmail.com, or check out White Night: Survivors of Jonestown at IMBD.