Willow Productions Presents:

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SLOGAN

“Not your typical ingredients for a fairy tale.

LOGLINE

In the story-book town of New Braunfels, Texas, two best friends, Craig and Angel, together open their very own bakery. What starts out as a storybook tale of friendship slowly turns when a fiery new employee named Lacy is hired into the business. When Lacy and Angel form a relationship, dark secrets are revealed and the story spirals downward to an ending you will never expect.

SHORT SYNOPSIS

In the quaint town of New Braunfels, Texas, something strange lurks within the aroma of the sweet smelling Naegelin’s Bakery. When best friends Craig and Angel opened it’s doors one fall no one would have guessed the dark secrets that were hidden just behind the delectable pastry counter. The small business seemed to be a fairytale story of success, and would have been until a sassy new employee named Lacy stumbles into the store one afternoon. When the Red heel wearing bombshell attracts the attention of his best friend Angel, Craig is overwhelmed with a horrible jealousy that sprirals out of control as the story leads viewers to an ending they will never expect.

‘A Bakery Story’ is a tasteful tale of dreams, drama, passion, lust, obsession, obscurity, insanity, confused sexuality, and it all takes place in a bakery. Not your typical ingredients for a fairy tale.

LONG SYNOPSIS

Craig and Angel were the best of friends since the first day they met in college, and together they represented the official baking team of the Kappa Delta fraternity. After graduating college their sweet tooth and appetite for entrepreneurship leads them to buy their very own bakery in the small German town of New Braunfels, Texas. Life is good, and it looks like the young bakers will have a happy ending to their fairy tale – or so it seems.
Along with smiles on their two eager faces, business becomes better and better with each passing day- perhaps a bit too good! With business booming and the two friends looking for the next step on their ladder to success, fate brings a new face to town. Lacy, a young woman looking for a new start and a few friendly faces stumbles into the bakery one quiet afternoon just in time to find Craig and Angel discussing the next steps in adjusting to their rising sales. Immediately intrigued by Lacy’s overwhelming charm and even more so by her long legs and red hot heels, Angel blindly invites her into the business. After all the two friends can barely manage the enormous orders of bear claws they have to bake each day.
Almost overnight Craig’s perfect world becomes a lost dream as his recently discovered love begins to slip from his flour covered fingers. As the growing attraction between the sexy, short skirted, lipstick wearing lacy and Angel becomes unavoidably obvious, Craig’s jealousy and frustration grows out of control. What used to be a secret passion quickly becomes a painful obsession. When a late night errand to the bakery causes Craig to stumble upon a lustful night between Angel and Lacy, all sanity slowly fades to vengeful jealousy. As this book’s pages slowly lead further and further from a fairy tale, Craig’s passion also grows further and further from innocence. One long sleepless night bleeds into an early morning encounter between Craig and Lacy, leaving the door wide open for anything to happen.
“A Bakery Story” is a recipe for lost love — the ingredients mix up a visual and musical journey of passion, confusion, romance, lust, jealousy, and secrets that are as sweet as the sugar in the bakery’s delicacies. The only smiles at the end of this story are those of the vibrant, crimson-colored cookies Craig pulls from the oven each morning.

DIRECTOR STATEMENT
“A Bakery Story” was my first attempt to really see what it took to bring an idea to life as a film and my choice of subject matter even surprised me. I wrote the script for the film after a summer of working in the very bakery we shot in. It was a summer of odd mornings and even odder characters that helped bring the idea of this film to the page. We shot over 8 crazy nights in Naegelin’s bakery which is the oldest running bakery in Texas. The crew, made up of mostly friends and family were one of the craziest ensembles of people I have ever been blessed to work with and together we made this long shot of an idea happen. I am sure if you ask anyone who was a part of this what the experience was like you would get an answer that sounded something like this; “I will never be able to eat a doughnut in the same way”. The bakery was a character in itself and everything from the flour covering everything that entered the room to the suspicion of ghosts haunting the set made it a memorable experience to say the least. I think our 1st AC, “D”, must have went through 100 cans of compressed air keeping our camera clean and we still ended up with scratches on the film. Our demanding schedule and low budget forced us to work in the nights when the bakery was closed and be out, floors swept and equipment packed into the truck, by 2 in the morning every day. I want to thank the support of the entire community of New Braunfels for both supporting as well as funding this project as well as my crew who stuck through the entire ride. I hope everyone that sees our film will be able to share in the experience of visiting the enchanting world of Naegelin’s Bakery.

THE SCRIPT

The original concept for “A Bakery Story” was based on experiences from a summer working in Naegelin’s Bakery. The original concept slowly became more abstracted by my fun during the writing process as well as my desire to protect my inspirations. I think the result tells a classical tale in a way that is fresh and fun to audiences of all different backgrounds.

CASTING

The casting process for “A Bakery Story” was vigorous. I am a huge fan of actors and I love every moment of auditions. We Auditioned over 75 different and talented individuals from Austin to New York and Los Angeles. I had a strong desire to cast both individuals with adaptability and truth as well as a sort of harmony in their collaboration with each other. I could not have asked for better results in our casting and what it cost us in travel expenses it paid for in exceptional talent coming together.

“2″
REHERSALS

One thing that is always important to me in movies is the ability to capture the truth, or essence of real life. After having the personal experiences of working in a bakery myself I could not settle for the actors playing “Pretend” baker. We flew in Ric, Luis, and Shasta a whole week early and thanks to the kind staff of Naegelin’s we set them up on a routine of working in the bakery every morning. In real bakery style they arrived at work every day before dawn and we would get back together in the afternoons to rehearse the scenes in the same bakery with real props. I think this experience not only gave the actors real experience to draw from, it gave them a comfort in their surroundings and with each other. I think by the time the camera rolled any of them would tell you that it felt natural.

CINEMATOGRAPHY

Starting from the beginning I decided to shoot on film. Most of my experience in the past with film as a cinematographer makes visuals very important to me and I still cannot let go of the beauty and adaptability of real film. Another thing that I value in working with film is the focus it brings to the entire cast and crew when the camera begins to roll.

The artistic style of the film was motivated by the subject matter. We chose to shoot it in a lower contrast to give a storybook feel and to diffuse and soften our images in post to match this vision. As the story slowly twists and turns we let the visuals drift into a darker and more hand held style to show tension.

A lot of the camera work was close and intimate. I really love seeing actor’s faces and to me the use of a closeup really brings us into an intimacy with the characters and their realities.

Due to the fast pace of shooting, low budget, and our tiny camera crew many shots on our shot list were scrapped day one and replaced to make our days. Like many extremely low budget productions the camera was a refurbished Eclair NPR with no video tap or monitor and our gear was less than industry standard. In one of our more ambitious shots I was literally being pushed through the bakery while standing on both an apple box and wheelchair held together by ratchet straps. Who needs cranes when you have a few friends you trust and a surfer’s balance?