When his HSU faculty colleagues in the Theatre, Film & Dance department said they wanted to include a film screening in the year’s production schedule, David Scheerer saw it as a way to take care of some unfinished business, as well as to provide some unique opportunities for HSU students.

The unfinished business was a feature film, shot in 2005 when Scheerer taught film at Montana State University. Using professional actors, some of whom he’d met during his years working on what became the Sundance Film Festival, he directed the script of a former screenwriting student, Michael Van Wagenen. But test screenings revealed some problems, and the project was shelved.

Scheerer and Van Wagenen discussed a solution—a different way to frame the story of a mentally ill young man and his relationship with a young woman who was interning as a social worker. But the new version required a new character, and new scenes amounting to about a third of the complete film.

So Scheerer asked his HSU colleagues “if they would be willing to support me in shooting these new scenes. Much to my joy, the season selection committee agreed.”