WILMINGTON — The pearl is the traditional gift for a 30-year anniversary and at the center of Wilmington’s annual independent film festival celebration, kicking off this week.
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Well, at least the pearl is represented by way of the oyster — the theme of the Cucalorus Film Festival, taking place Nov. 20-24. It will feature 100 films, dozens of events and live performances, as well as plenty of opportunities to hobknob with filmmakers.
Like the bivalves’ strong ties to the coastal southeastern North Carolina community, an oyster’s metaphorical representation to Cucalorus is deep and multifaceted. It can inspire both love and aphrodisia — which many of its films will evoke this week — and is indicative of reincarnation. Cucalorus has that in bushels and pecks.
“This year we approached Cucalorus with the intention of having the feel of a family reunion,” Dan Brawley, chief instigating officer, said.
Brawley has been steering the Cucalorus ship for 25 years now, after the festival was founded at the now-defunct Water Street Restaurant back in the mid-’90s. A film collective known as Twinkle Doon — consisting of area filmmakers and movie buffs — started the initiative by screening a few short films there.
Ever since, it has grown throughout the years from being a one-day watchfest into a five-day event. Multiple venues are hosting the events this year — from Thalian Hall to Jengo’s Playhouse to Bourgie Nights and even the Railroad Museum — bringing in filmmakers worldwide to Wilmington.
Here’s a look at what to expect:
Shorts blocks
Shorts are a large part of Cucalorus’ originality and this year there are 10 blocks, each 80 to 100 minutes, showcasing around 78 films.
“The way people watch movies has totally changed,” Brawley said. “Everyone has a cinema in their home now.”
But they likely won’t find Cucalorus’ shorts available on Netflix or Amazon Prime.
All blocks take on fun names annually to elevate the festival’s theme; this year they’re monikered after oysters. For instance, “Winged Pearl Shorts” centers on dance and will screen Friday night and Sunday morning, while “Coffin Bay” comedy blocks are on Thursday and Saturday nights. There is also Masonboro Pearl,” featuring documentaries, to show Friday morning and Sunday evening.
In between the shorts are bumpers — essentially clips showcasing people and moments from Cucalorus’ past.
One short, “Fidelity” was co-produced by Twinkle Doon founder Bo Webb. Webb is a cameraman and director in the film industry, having worked on shows such as HBO’s “Veep” and currently Jonas and Joshua Pate’s “Outer Banks” (the Pates also entered films in Cucalorus in the early days of the festival).
Webb and his son, Mack — a Harvard student — shot “Fidelity,” in Wrightsville Beach for two days over the summer. Mack wrote it and Bo directed it.
“I finished shooting ‘Outer Banks’ season four in the late spring and was eager to do something creative like a short film,” Webb said.
Webb had a desire to also enter a piece for the 30-year anniversary of the festival; he was one of the early founders of the Twinkle Doon group that started Cucalorus, named after a lighting effect. Webb entered work in the very first Cucalorus and helped make festival commercials and shorts years thereafter.
However, this year he also wanted to pair up with his son on a project. “Fidelity” had all the makings of a promising short, Webb said; his son had penned it as a short play of the same name first.
“It was funny and well-written and the scale was manageable — it mostly takes place in one room, which would make filming relatively fast and inexpensive,” Webb said.
He was able to hone his directing skills and focused the piece more on the writing and acting instead of camera work and visuals. It stars four people who take on the story of the protagonist, Will — who attempts for a whole 20 minutes not to cheat on his girlfriend.
“It was a great learning experience,” Webb said.
While the outcome is one of praise, the experience of filming a short project in two days wasn’t like that of a larger production shoot. Webb said he felt the stress more because of being in charge of everything himself.
“We shot 10-plus pages a day,” he said, “a blistering pace.”
“Fidelity” appears in the “Carolina Dreams” dramas block, showcased on Thursday night at 7 p.m. at Thalian Hall’s Ruth and Bucky Stein Theater and Saturday morning at 10 a.m. at Jengo’s Playhouse. Webb will give a question-and-answer after the shorts block; tickets can be accessed here.
Features
Around 60% of filmmakers accepted into Cucalorus are women — something that Brawley said is now “baked into the festival model.” Their directorial hands are apparent in multiple comedy, dramas, and romances screening this week.
Brawley suggests “Lady Parts” by Nancy Boyd, “Messy” by Alexi Wasser and “Lone Wolves” by Ryan Cunningham, for starters.
“Lady Parts” is based on a true story of a woman having a rare condition affecting her private parts — vaginismus — which has her moving back in with her parents to undergo surgery and stalling her sex life in the process.
“It’s bad enough to have to move back home with your parents,” Brawley said, “much less have to talk about sex. And it’s such a taboo to talk about vaginas — but it shouldn’t be. We all came from one. I mean, it’s 100% of the human population. So this comedy is very refreshing.”
“Messy” follows a young woman, Stella, in New York who begins dating after enduring a bad breakup. She’s a bit of a love addict; Brawley called the flick “provocative” and “sexy,” and it’s been touted as the modern-day “Annie Hall.”
He also suggested “Lone Wolves,” following a single 40-something as she endures finding a sperm donor and lands on an old high school prom date. Yet, she learns he is autistic and dealing with mental health issues.
“It showcases a woman wanting to be in control of her reproductive choices,” Brawley said, a hot topic circulating the political arena as of late.
Also taking on women’s rights is the feature film “Lilly” starring Patricia Clarkson (“Six Feet Under,” “Sharp Objects”); it also features local actor Paul Teal, who passed away last week at the age of 35. It’s the story behind the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, which Congress passed in 2009. When Ledbetter found out she was making half the pay of her male counterparts at Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, she sued the company and won.
“It’s just an incredible story of somebody who fought and fought and fought for something that was just so obviously an injustice and ultimately was able to affect change on a big scale,” Brawley said.
The filmmaker, Rachel Feldman, will be at a panel discussion after its 1 p.m. screening on Saturday at Thalian Hall’s main stage.
Starpower will take up a panel Friday night on Thalian Hall’s main stage as Simon Rex, a former MTV VJ and well-known actor (“Red Rocket,” “Scary Movie”), talks about “Operation Taco Gary’s.” Starring alongside Rex is Dustin Milligan, Jason Biggs and Brenda Song. The film follows two brothers who go on a cross-country road trip but end up trying to escape a global crime network.
“The safe zone is Taco Gary’s restaurant,” Brawley described. “For some reason, the crime numbers have agreed that that’s the place where you can’t shoot somebody.”
Their hijinks makes for a “zany comedy,” that was filmed in Waxhaw and Charlotte, North Carolina, in June 2023. The film also includes Charlotte musician Benji Hughes as Camper Gary.
Hughes is a vocalist and songwriter, known for hits heard on “Eastbound and Down,” “How I Met Your Mother” and “Walk Hard: The Dewey Cox Story.” He’s also released multiple albums, appeared on Jeff Bridges’s 2011 country album and recently performed in Wilmington the last two months (read PCD’s recent interview about the musician here). Hughes isn’t a stranger to Cucalorus, having performed at the festival before; he will take the stage again inside Jengo’s Playhouse on Friday around 1 a.m.
To kick off the feature film on Friday, there also will be a taco party hosted at the Railroad Museum in downtown Wilmington at 5 p.m., open to passholders only. PCD will have more coverage on “Operation Taco Gary’s” this week.
Performances, interactive events
Cucalorus also makes it standard practice to be inclusive of minority filmmakers or people of color in its annual event. These creative minds now comprise roughly 50% of films entered into the festival, but transitioning a work from the ground-up isn’t always an easy process.
The festival has a Works-in-Progress Lab to help provide support to Black storytelling and social justice documentaries. Coordinated with the local nonprofit Working Films, it is hosting numerous labs in the filmmakers lounge throughout the festival. Hosted in the Thalian Hall ballroom, hour blocks will feature topics like fundraising and distribution or accountable storytelling and audience engagement.
A documentary created out of the works-in-progress lab is scheduled to debut Thursday at Jengo’s Playhouse at 7:15 p.m. “The People’s Way” is directed by William Taft and Ashley Tyner. It follows three community organizers in the wake of George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis and how differently everyone processes the conflict left behind in the community.
“One of the things that that film really shows you, I think, for a white audience, and that’s obviously where I can speak from, is that the Black community is not monolithic — all Black people don’t agree on everything,” Brawley said, “and even with something like George Floyd, the response is varied within the Black community in terms of: ‘What do we do now?’ It’s very nuanced.”
Along with works-in-progress events, Cucalorus hosts residency programs annually to help artists get their ideas into the world. It includes the festival covering expenses for artists to stay at the Jengo’s Playhouse compound to hash out the creations.
“It tends to be a greenhouse where you start your seeds,” Brawley said. “Then the festival is like the showroom. The artists have conceived, developed, and nurtured those works right here in Wilmington.”
Peruvian artist Roxanna Barba — a former Cucalorus residency participant, from Miami — will host a live performance in the filmmakers lounge on Friday at 8 p.m. The lounge is being hosted for the second year at the Thalian Hall ballroom, a place where people gather and cultivate a sense of belonging.
Barba’s piece, titled “In my center, a cyborg seed,” questions the genesis of technology being defined in relation to mortality and transcendence. Barba has been part of the festival for years, showcasing her short film “A Chair as a Chair,” made during her residency less than a decade ago. She also has been part of the dance residency.
“One of the nice things that has happened organically over the years, we were able to build a really strong connection to all these artists in Miami, who are mostly Latinx women artists, and so that’s definitely contributed to the cultural flavor of the dance program,” Brawley said.
A perennial favorite of Cucalorus comes Thursday with Dance-a-lorus on the main stage of Thalian Hall. It pairs up choreographers and dancers in modern, tap, jazz, ballet and more with filmmakers and musicians. The multimedia event blends the artistic genres, with this year showcasing 10 performances.
One is “Seabreeze” by Kevin Lee-y Green, the founder of Wilmington’s Techmoja Dance Company.
This new piece is inspired by the former local resort for African Americans; it was open in the mid-20th Century during the Jim Crow era, located between Monkey Junction and Carolina Beach. Resorts were built on both Seabreeze and Freeman Beach on 100-plus acres of land, purchased in the mid-1800s by a free Black and Indigenous couple, Alexander and Charity Freeman.
There were hotels, restaurants, an amusement park and multiple juke joints, bringing in national jazz and R&B acts. Hurricane Hazel and beach erosion contributed to the decline of the resorts and by the 1970s, all hotels were gone and only a handful of bars remained.
Seabreeze was given an historical marker earlier this year and Green said he grew up listening to his mother, Donna Joyner Green who has since passed away, speak about her time visiting the area.
“Her memories, filled with joy and wonder, painted a picture of a magical time that I am eager to bring to life through this work,” he said.
The dance will feature nine performers — including Green — whose intent is to capture the beach vibe, community strength and resilience, and nightlife of the resort. The music will feature sounds from Duke Ellington and The Drifters, often heard on the resort grounds. There also will be Southern blues from the 1800s included.
“While much of Black history has been framed through the lens of trauma, I believe it’s essential to celebrate and explore Black joy,” Green said. “This project seeks to honor that joy and preserve a vital piece of cultural history.”
He added the dance is important as it looks back at history, how the events shaped the local people and landscape, and helped open pathways to the future. The piece is in development and comprises two sections, with the Cucalorus performance coming in at roughly 8 minutes.
“This piece serves as a reminder of the rich heritage worth celebrating and underscores the significance of generational wealth,” Green said. “Once completed, the full work will also explore the pressing themes of gentrification and the rapid impact of climate change.”
Green has participated in nine Cucaloruses to date and is among plenty more familiar faces making appearances this year as well; Brawley calls 2024 a “greatest hits” of sorts. Shirley Gnome, Thea Fitz-James and Alexander Tatarsky have been a part of the festival before and are returning in 2024.
Gnome’s live performance, “Titular Character.” tackles sex, religion, rage, human anatomy and more, as she performs her cabaret music, with a voice like an angel, silly and evocative humor and a fresh take on the absurd.
Fitz-James debuted “Naked Ladies” in 2015 and “Drunk Girl” in 2016 at Cucalorus and worked as a stage coordinator in 2018 for the festival. This year she is making her U.S. debut with “Crazy Bitch Boss Bitch,” a one-woman live show. She takes on the character piece as a female entering a male-dominated field and challenging ideas on burnout, sexism, and mania.
Fitz-James said she created the show in the summer 2024 with collaborators Kelsey Jacobson, Mo Horner and Deanna Cervi. It was inspired by a few years she worked in a corporate setting, and how she and her fellow female coworkers survived.
“So many of the women I know — these high achieving, work-obsessed, intelligent women — were getting increasingly burnt out by either their work or their community,” she said. “I was interested in workaholism and women, and my own (unhealthy) relationship to my work.”
She calls “Crazy Bitch Boss Bitch” a “love letter to my boss bitch self,” but also a “healing potion” for women she worked with before.
“Crazy Bitch Boss Bitch” evolves from the point of view of a working woman, who loves her job but is also a bitch and owns it, Fitz-James said. The audience sees her in conversations with male coworkers, her biting humor often riddled with profanity, and watches her transform after her day-to-day changes one day.
“The whole thing is performed to a metronome: a metaphor for the 9-5 but also a poetic exploration of human’s relationship to the capitalist 9-5. And there’s dancing at one point,” Fitz-James said.
It was workshopped over the summer and has been received well, Fitz-James said, describing it as one of her most sophisticated shows to date. The artist said she felt seen by one reviewer’s quote, explaining the performance showcases “what it means to lean so far in that you’re practically toppling over.”
Parties and more
Cucalorus celebrations kick off proper on Wednesday, Nov. 20. The opening soiree is at Hi-Wire Brewing, a short block away from Jengo’s Playhouse, Cucalorus’ headquarters where many of this year’s films will be screened and the late-night parties also are hosted. There will be four oyster farmers on hand serving fresh bivalves, plus comingling and camaraderie, at Hi-Wire.
The opening night party is open to the community at large for free — no tickets or passes are required.
To intersperse movie-watching and live shows, there also are opportunities to catch tunes, such as at Bourgie Night this Friday, 9:30 p.m. Pure Disco with Rizzy Beats, a local DJ, who has a penchant for the Bee Gees. On Saturday at 10 p.m. Greg Wynne will be fielding vinyl selections, also open to the community at Bourgie Nights.
There is also a Women’s Storytellers Brunch on Sunday at Palate at 11 a.m. and the Commiseration Congregation taking place in the Filmmakers Lounge on Sunday at 2 p.m.
Annually, Cucalorus also commemorates one of the greatest films shot in Wilmington and a most-favorite cult classic created by David Lynch — “Blue Velvet.” The Bus to Lumberton has been an art installation, interactive 5K fun run, and speakeasy lounge in the past. This year it’s continuing forward off the beaten path as Cucalorus presents Ambassador Nikita Chrusov and his crew of three from the Soviet Unterzoegersdorf.
“It’s just weird enough to be perfect for Cucalorus,” Brawley said, adding the group reached out to the Cuc team after they discovered a newfound love for “Blue Velvet.”
Brawley said he was unsure what to expect of their presentation: “They sent us all these photographs that look like 1980s Soviet propaganda. So I don’t really know. I’m a little nervous about it, to be really honest with you, which is good.”
“Are you being trolled?” PCD asked.
“Maybe — that would be priceless,” he answered.
Chrusov will do an official presentation in the filmmakers lounge Thursday at 3 p.m. and will be at events throughout the festival making “ambassadorial appearances.”
He’s from Soviet Unterzoegersdorf, known as the last republic of the USSR situated in Austria — which happens to be a fictional country created by the art collective Monochrom.
Monochrom has created short films, public theater performances, and computer games, and since 2008 has been doing what they call “interventions.” This comes when Chrusov is sent to various happenings throughout the U.S.; a decade ago he made it into a Disney afterparty to speak with executives about cultural imperialism and was ejected from the event.
Tickets to Cucalorus events and screenings range from $10 to $15, with individual tickets available at Thalian Hall’s website, here. Passes are $150 to $750; see the full lineup from the festival here.
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