John Wilkes Booth

Our lead villain and main target of Abraham Lincoln has been cast! JOHN WILKES BOOTH will be portrayed by DAVID LOBACH. Though he's warned us that he can't grow an actual mustache, we're sure that the cost of a fake one will be made up by David's sinister approach to the role and his commitment to the intensive sword training and fighting he'll be required to do. With only a few actors left to cast, pre-production on KILL BOOTH is slowly coming to a close. Principal photography, here we come!

Mary Todd Lincoln

MARY TODD LINCOLN has officially been cast! MICHELE FORTIER will be filling the smaller, but important, part of Abraham Lincoln's wife. After her kidnapping at the hands of Booth, Abe's resolve grows stronger and his quest for vengeance is taken to a whole new level.

Mary Surratt

Our lead female villain and femme fatale, MARY SURRATT, has been cast! MEGAN CROSEN will be taking on the task of portraying the badass villainess and second-in-command to John Wilkes Booth. Her struggle against Abe is one of the most violent in the entire movie, so finding an actress who can handle both the drama and the intense action is a great asset to the production. Expect the majority of the rest of the cast to be revealed as the week goes on.

Blades of the Civil War

Having carefully looked into which weapons we'd like to use for the film, we finally decided upon our purchase. George Atzerodt's sword, which eventually becomes Abe's, is a straight-edge 1840 Non-Commissioned Sword. For John Wilkes Booth, we've purchased a Confederate Cavalry Saber as his primary weapon of attack and an Old Fashioned Horn Folder knife as his backup. All of the weapons purchased fit the period of the piece (1865) perfectly and we can't wait to get our hands on them and begin choreographing some awesome fight scenes.

A Few Items of Interest

After going through another script revision, some of the script's props have finally been purchased. The two smaller items are a feather pen and a Confederate flag, both of which have always been part of the script. The new (and much more interesting) item is a replica of the gun that John Wilkes Booth used to shoot Lincoln. The Philadelphia Derringer has been written into the script for use by Booth, both during flashbacks and elsewhere. So, enjoy the pretty pictures while we continue to toil away on pre-production!

1890 -- Here We Come!

Good news, everyone! As of this morning, KILL BOOTH has been approved to use The 1890 House as a shooting location! Not much else to say about the matter, so enjoy this exterior shot of what will eventually serve as "Lewis Powell's Estate" and other various locations!

Location Scouting - Gallery 1

Mike, Peter, and I spent our day today location scouting for multiple scenes of the movie. The scenes in particular are the kitchen fight with David Herold, the manor fight with Lewis Powell, the shack fight with Mary Surratt, and the shack dialogue scene between Mary Surratt and George Atzerodt. The following is a gallery of photos taken during the scouting process.

Locations Visited: Pinkerton Shack/Barn (Marathon, NY) and 1890 House (Cortland, NY)

Fruit Chunks

EXCERPT FROM "KILL BOOTH"

INT. KITCHEN - DAWN

The warm light of dawn reflects off a cluttered counter top full of utensils and KITCHENWARE. Near it sits the disheveled, morning-weary figure of DAVID, who quietly munches BREAKFAST from a CEREAL BOWL.

Originally, there was going to be a box of "Lucky Charms" on top of the table as well, but in order to avoid copyright infringement and a potential lawsuit, Mr. AJ Pinkerton was kind enough to whip up a *new* cereal for us. Enjoy!

David Herold

Ladies and gentlemen, I present our first conspirator: DAVID HEROLD. A smooth and suave villain, Herold is the first target on Abraham Lincoln's hit list. It's his bare-knuckle brawl with Lincoln that opens the movie, so it's my pleasure to announce that he's officially been cast! JOHN METZGER will be tackling the role and, having seen some of the previous student films he's been in, I feel quite confident that he'll do an excellent job. Now all that's needed is the rest of the cast. And locations. And costumes. But that's a story for another time, I suppose. *sigh*

I Can Has Licensed Music?

Yes, I can! After contacting a guy named Jimmy Oliveira about using his rendition of "The Star Spangled Banner" in KILL BOOTH, he most happily replied with, "Of course you can, man!" I won't reveal when or where the song will appear, but rest assured that his awesome performance will definitely make the film that much more badass. Anyway, if you want to hear the song, check out the YouTube video below.

Casting Call Poster

Three's a Crowd (of Producers!)

As pre-production on KILL BOOTH rolls along, it's become increasingly more apparent that we aren't finding one main producer for the film. For this reason, we've decided that it's in the best interest of the movie to go with three. Co-Producers, to be exact! Stepping up to the plate are Mike Sutter (who's already working as the DP), Peter Srinivasan (our very own Abe Lincoln!), and myself. At this point in the pre-production stage, the three of us are already diving headfirst into the producer roles, so we figured why not make it official and handle the production duties as a team. Multi-tasking, here we come!

Writer/Director/Editor: Nathan Morse
Director of Photography: Mike Sutter

Co-Producers: Nathan Morse, Mike Sutter, Peter Srinivasan
Executive Producers: AJ Pinkerton, Peter Johanns
Title Theme: AJ Pinkerton, Peter Srinivasan, Lora Rivera

Hats Off (To the First Budgetary Purchase)

The first budgeted purchase towards KILL BOOTH has officially been made! After talking with a few people related to the project, it was decided that Abraham Lincoln needed a better hat than the one shown in the teaser poster. Though it served its purpose for a quick promotional picture, the general consensus was that the teaser hat was too short and, well, too amish. So, after skulking around the Internet looking for a suitable (and affordable) stove pipe style hat, I finally found one that should work perfectly for us. Here's hoping that it looks just as good on our Abe Lincoln's head as it does in the picture!

The Hunt for a Composer

So at this point, I'm trying to find someone to provide the musical presence of the film. The strength of the "Kill Booth Theme" is something that I want to keep throughout the movie, so finding someone who can provide an excellent score to match it is going to be difficult. I contacted a guy named Rob Grimaldi, who I had previously met during my Audio Workshop class. He responded back by saying that film scoring is exactly what he was looking to do for his future career and that "Kill Booth" sounded like an awesome project. Unfortunately, he's in LA this semester and therefore won't be able to work on the movie. Not easily, anyway. There's still the prospect that I could send him files over the Internet to work on, but I doubt that's the route I'll end up going. It's a bummer though, because I know he's someone who could probably pull off the proper epic/western style music I'll be looking for. Anyway, the search continues!

Crew Information - A Small Update

Not much of an update here, but since I haven't done one in awhile, I guess anything is good. With "KILL BOOTH" in full pre-production and actual production not too far around the corner, I figured I'd list out some of the crew members that I know *for a fact* will be contributing to the project. They are:

Writer/Director/Editor: Nathan Morse

Director of Photography: Mike Sutter

Executive Producers: AJ Pinkerton, Peter Johanns

Title Theme: AJ Pinkerton, Peter Srinivasan, Lora Rivera

I think that's about it for now. A few positions I'm currently looking into filling are Music (the film's soundtrack composer), Sound Mixing/Editing (both on set and in post-prod), and Producer. To a certain extent I'll be producing the film myself, but I've yet to decide if we need a full-time Producer whose only job is to do just that. More updates to come as time passes.