BRATTLEBORO — Vermont film director Jay Craven will host a casting call on Thursday, March 3, for his new film, Wetware, which will be partially shot in Brattleboro.
The picture will be produced during March, April, and early May in Vermont and other locations. The casting call will take place from 6:30 to 8 p.m., at the Marlboro College Graduate School, 28 Vernon St., in Room 2E.
Craven is searching for actors, ages 19-60 for various roles. Actors should bring headshots and resumes, if available. Scenes from the script will be provided upon arrival. Contact wetware.casting@gmail.com for further details or to schedule an alternate audition time.
Wetware will be produced through the Movies from Marlboro film intensive program, organized by Marlboro College and nonprofit film and performing arts producer Kingdom County Productions. Twenty professionals will collaborate with 30 students from a dozen colleges to make an ambitious film for national release.
Based on the 2002 novel by author Craig Nova, Wetware is a noir thriller set in a near future where cutting edge genetic engineering firm, Galapagos Wetware, makes alterations on applicants who are down on their luck to help them forget their past and handle a range of tasks like mopping up crime scenes.
With business booming, genetic programmer Hal Briggs is charged with developing more sophisticated prototypes, Jack and Kay. High-end clients anxiously await these deluxe models, to carry out missions like manned space travel, deep cover espionage, and counter-terrorism. Briggs begins to alter some genetic codes, adding qualities to Jack and, especially, Kay, to whom he develops a dangerous attachment.
Briggs' boss, Leslie Carr, has problems of her own. She navigates a thorny relationship with Wendell Blaine, Galapagos' lead investor and chief prognosticator on all matters of money. But tensions mount when Carr and Blaine tangle over field tests, deadlines, and specs.
Then, word gets out that Jack and Kay have escaped, before Briggs has completed his work. Briggs scrambles to track his fugitive prototypes and, as he reexamines Jack and Kay's codes, he makes a provocative discovery that will change everything.
Wetware's characters are flawed, multidimensional, and a little absurd. The film will dig into fertile themes of love, work, freedom, genetic engineering, the social costs of living in a wired age, the power of music, and what it is to be human in trying times.