And So It Begins...

ZEMIRA – Independent Feature Film - Non-Union Females
Zemira Film, Inc. is casting the non union females for feature film
Zemira.

Curtis John (Director). Curtis John and Mecca Woods (Writers).
Shooting starts early spring TBA.


PRODUCERS: Curtis John and Mecca Woods
SYNOPSIS: ZEMIRA is a coming-of-age story loosely based on real life events. It centers around the title character, Zemira Black, a booksmart but awkward African-American girl struggling to find her place and her voice in the world. As if dealing with the stress of being a teenager isn’t hard enough, Zemira struggles with the adversity of her drug addicted parents and an upbringing in a violent South Bronx neighborhood, both of which are starting to destroy her unless she can figure out how best to fight for her life. For more information check out http://www.zemirathefilm.com


COMPENSATION: Reel copy, credit, transportation/meals, possible low pay (To be determined). Submit headshot/resume electronically to: zemirathefilmcasting@gmail.com--please include role for which you are submitting in the subject line.

(Young talent must be 18 years or older and not in high school)

Auditions will begin in mid-September; non-union talent is encouraged. We will contact you with dates and locations upon selection. All actors MUST bring a monologue of their own choosing. We will provide sides of the film script to selected actors.

SEEKING:
ZEMIRA –AFRICAN AMERICAN
[TO PLAY 14-16]
Our protagonist. Zemira is the oldest of two children. She hates when people mispronounce her name. It’s, sound it out, ZA-MEER-UH. Despite growing up in the South Bronx, Zemira has aspirations of being a famous poet and writer one day. Very intelligent, although highly emotional, and very much a smart-ass, she’s grown very tired of her mother and father’s contradictory nature: constant drug use and violence against each other while always telling their kids to do the right thing. So Zee (her nickname) has begun to rebel against them by being out at all hours with her best friend or her boyfriends. Neighbors always saw her with her journal, but she barely even writes anymore, the one thing she was always passionate about.

Zemira’s best and only friend Robyn, helped her come out of her shell,as has mother nature, who allowed her to shed her baby fat and begin to blossom into a curvy young woman. She’s still insecure though, most especially because of her second-hand clothes and deep dark skin. Although seeming to become a different person, when no one else is around Zemira will still have her face buried in one book or another. Zemira’s seeking what she thinks she needs, love and acceptance, but her empty search for these things is catching up to her.

JEANETTE-AFRICAN AMERICAN
[EARLY-MID 30s]
Zemira’s mother. Jeanette comes from a long line of abused women. She thought she changed her destiny when she met her now husband Darryl, but eventually even he is abusive to her as well, more emotionally than physically, as she got caught up in his drug use. Now trying to stay clean and make a stable life for herself and her
two children, Jeanette has finally let go of being so damn independent and mistrusting, and has learned to seek out help from other people. If this doesn’t work out for her though, she has no idea what she’ll do.

A small woman, Jeanette’s very un-girly. She tends to wear men’s clothes and keeps her hair in a short boy cut. She’s got a great sense of humor, but can easily explode on you when angered. Don’t get on her bad side! A film fanatic, she utters lines from the classics with ease, especially anything that Brando or Bogey have done.

ROBYN-AFRICAN AMERICAN
[TO PLAY 14-16]
Zemira’s best and only friend, Robyn is a wild and crazy girl that Zemira befriends their first week of high school. An only child, Robyn is spoiled rotten by her mother who works two jobs just to support them. Extremely proud of her expensive name brand clothes and gold jewelry, she’s a very thin girl who upon first look one would think she spends all her food money on fly gear. But even with her loud, crass and often obnoxious ways, Robyn’s a sweetheart who tends to have people’s best interest in heart, although mostly when it’s lockstep with hers, and usually has Zemira’s back.

Ironically, around adults Robyn is well-mannered and respectful. Highly sexually active – she lost her virginity at age 12 – Robyn always has a boyfriend and stays flirting with any cute boy in her immediate vicinity. She never talks about her dad, or about her brother who died when she was seven years old.