"Revengeance" Kickstarter stretch goal success!

A big "Thank You" to everyone who helped support our Kickstarter campaign for "Revengeance".  We started with a goal of $80,000 and we surpassed it, with over $90,000 in donations.

Of course, a lot of the credit goes to the awesome Adam Rackoff, who worked his butt off to spread the word and make it a success. 

Thanks to all you supporters, we can now continue the production of "Revengeance", which is written, designed and voiced by the great Jim Lujan and animated by yours truly. 

We're hoping to finish this film by the winter of 2016, and then we'll send it out to film festivals all over.  So hopefully you'll be able to see it in your local multiplex or art cinema shortly after that.  Even better, if you're a Kickstarter contributor, you'll get to see your name in the credits. 

I love Kickstarter!  It's such an important part of me being able to remain independent and make films the way I want to make them. 

Thanks to everyone who helped spread the word, and thanks again to everyone who kicked in some money. 

--Bill Plympton

"Revengeance" Kickstarter campaign success!

Yeee Haw!  We made our Kickstarter goal of $80,000 for "Revengeance", the new animated feature I'm making with Jim Lujan -

However, it was a close call - now we have one day left in the campaign, so my Kickstarter advisor said that it would be super cool if we could go over our goal, set a new stretch goal and raise money for the post-production of the film.  So we're going to make a bold move and raise the goal to $90,000 - that is, if we get another $10,000, we'll put that money toward editing, sound and promotion.

The crowd-funding landscape sort of changed a bit since we raised money for my last film, CHEATIN' - I don't know if there are just more projects out there to fund or what, but it's not as easy as it used to be.  My thanks to Adam Rackoff for keeping on top of things, and adding more rewards tiers to get more people to back the film.  My staff also helped out by digging through bins of artwork to find some of the best images from my classic films - we raided the archive to help raise money for the next film!

                                                           Get them while they last!

We also benefited from the great news that Matthew Modine will be joining the voice cast of the film.  Matthew's been a great friend and has done voices for me before, in my shorts "Santa, the Fascist Years" and "The Flying House", so it will be great to work with him again.  I'm glad that working with me didn't prevent him from being in films like "Jobs" and "The Dark Knight Rises".

                                      Matthew Modine and his "Revengeance" character, Sid

"Revengeance" is about 1/3 done, and I must say, in all modesty - it looks fantastic!  And I hope you'll be proud to help support such an amazing film.  I'll remind you that for a measly $1,500 I will create a character from your photo and put you in a scene or two in the movie - you'll be immortalized forever (I guess that's redundant) in a Bill Plympton film!

So, keep indie animation alive and tell your friends that they have until 9 pm on Thursday, May 21 to be part of this great film - once again, the link to the campaign is:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/billplympton/bill-plymptons-revengeance-an-animated-feature-fil

Thanks,

Bill Plympton

CHEATIN' Tour, Part 5

The next stop on my CHEATIN' tour was Columbus, Ohio.  I flew there from Portland, and after so many cities in a row, it was tough to leave my hometown of Portland, but also nice to be getting close to returning to New York.  In Columbus the Gateway Film Center had a special Monday night screening of CHEATIN', followed by a meet-and-greet with members of their local film club.

As part of the publicity materials for the theaters, I had signed 10 prints of art from my film, and we told each theater that they could use them however they wanted to promote the film - they could raffle them off, they could give them to the first 10 people in the door, whatever they thought would get the most attention.  In Columbus, they gave away the prints to members of this Film Club - I'm glad that clubs like this exist to appreciate movies, so check out the cinemas in your area to see if you can join one!  You never know what you'll get out of it.

After Columbus, I came back home to NY, to a big pile of e-mail and some interview requests, but just a few days later I was on the train up to Boston, for the opening night screening at the Brattle Theater.  There was a great crowd at the Brattle, especially considering that "Avengers: Age of Ultron" was opening that same day.  Maybe that film got sold out and people came to see CHEATIN' instead, I don't know.  But people waited in a long line after the show to get sketches from me, which I always appreciate.

I remember one trip I took up to Boston back when my film "Mondo Plympton" was playing in theaters, and there was a huge snowstorm that day, plus there was a Bugs Bunny festival playing in another theater across town, so very few people came out to my show.  This trip to Boston was a lot better, so that's progress.

                                      Doing a Q&A session at the Brattle Theater in Boston.

Finally, I took a trip up to Rochester, NY, arranged by Peter Murphey at RIT.  I've been up to RIT before, they have a great animation department.  I did two presentations at the school on Wednesday, one was more about the artistic side of making animation, and the other was more about the business aspects of it, like how to survive as an independent animator. 

My thanks to Maxwell Harvey-Sampson for taking such great photos of my lectures at RIT.

The next night, I appeared at the Little Theatre in Rochester, which is another of these cool little indie cinemas that you should definitely check out if you're in the area.  They screened CHEATIN' and I did the Q&A session afterwards, and once again people lined up to get their sketches.  I definitely felt like a rock-star after making so many appearances around the country! 

                                         The crowd at the Little Theatre after the screening

But that sort of brought me to a break the tour.  Not really the end, because we're already setting up the next leg, with screenings in Philadelphia and Washington DC at the end of July (stay tuned for details).  If I didn't make it to your city this time around, please let me know, or contact your local theater and tell them they can still book CHEATIN' this summer by e-mailing me or my staff.

Right now, I need to get back to animating some new projects, and answering some of my mail.  Plus we have to get ready for San Diego Comic-Con, which is really right around the corner. 

Meanwhile, check out my Kickstarter campaign for "Revengeance", we've only got a few days left to make our goal, and we recently added some new rewards, including a whole bunch of original animation art from some of my most classic films!  Please take a look, here's a link:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/billplympton/bill-plymptons-revengeance-an-animated-feature-fil

CHEATIN' Tour, Part 4

My next stop on my tour was Denver, where I met a lot of old friends to reminisce about my early years.  Also, Ron Henderson, the past director of the Denver Film Festival, was there to introduce me.  Back in the mid-1990's, he was the first person to organize a complete Bill Plympton retrospective.

Finally, I arrived in my home state of Oregon, to do a 4-city tour.  It began in Portland, where I dropped in at LAIKA, the studio behind "The Boxtrolls", "Coraline" and "Paranorman" - I gave a talk to help promote my film and got to hang out with Travis Knight, lead animator on "The Boxtrolls".

Then I had two sold-out shows at Cinema 21, thanks to Tom Ranieri and my local publicity guy, Steve Tenhonen.

The next day, I traveled to Salem Cinema, where my old friend Loretta Miles organized an afternoon premiere of CHEATIN'.  As soon as I finished my Q&A, I jumped into my rental car and hustled up to Portland to do an appearance on the LiveWire broadcast.

                                       Hey, it's a cake with my "Guard Dog" character on it!

It was a packed house of 700 people, even with a monsoon storm going on outside.  LiveWire is a very cool radio show, similar to "Prairie Home Companion" - lots of awesome interviews, comedians and musical guests.  In the green room, I got to chat with Ken Jennings, the celebrated all-time winner of the most games on "Jeopardy!", and Andy Richter from the "Conan" show.  Of course, I was there to promote CHEATIN', now available on Vimeo on Demand.

                                             With Andy Richter at the LiveWire broadcast

                                                  With Jeopardy! champ Ken Jennings

The following day, I drove to Corvallis, home of the Oregon State Beavers, to appear at the cool Darkside Cinema - unfortunately, they weren't aware of my appearance until the day before, so there were only 6 Plympton fans in the audience.

On to Eugene, home of the Oregon Ducks - I showed CHEATIN' at the Bijou Cinema, which used to be a church, then a funeral home, and now it's a very "religious" cinema.

Part 5 coming soon!

--Bill