NORTHAMPTON \u2014 When people break up with their partners, many write about it in journals or start texting friends.<\/p>\n
But when a bad romance rocked Western Massachusetts native Rio Contrada, he responded by writing and directing a feature film about it in Hollywood.<\/p>\n
\u201cI dated a school psychologist who cheated on me and gaslighted me,\u201d he told The Republican. \u201cWhen that happened, I started to write this piece. There was this juvenile take of, \u2018How could she do this me,\u2019\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Contrada, 34, was raised in Florence and went to Northampton High School. After graduating from Emerson College in Boston, he moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career in television and film. <\/p>\n
He has just completed his first movie, \u201cSplinter,\u201d and after premiering it at film festivals in California, he will be screening it before a Pioneer Valley audience on Dec. 22 at the Academy of Music in Northampton.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m thrilled. It\u2019s always good to have a home crowd. I\u2019m excited to see how an audience of people who share my background and values will take the movie,\u201d he stated.<\/p>\n
\u201cSplinter\u201d tells the parallel stories of an adult woman and a little girl, tied together by trauma.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s about a motorcycle riding, pill-popping school psychologist who has to confront her own history of trauma in order to help the second grader she\u2019s working with,\u201d explained Contrada.<\/p>\n
The writer-director says the second grader reminds the psychologist of herself. When the child starts biting classmates and refusing to speak, the counselor concludes the little girl is also a victim of trauma.<\/p>\n In the movie, the character of the therapist chooses a \u201cfast life\u201d instead of dealing with her demons.<\/p>\n \u201cShe been riding a motorcycle, doing drugs, having all of the sex. That kind of living fast is a way to avoid meditating on problems we have,\u201d said Contrada.<\/p>\n By the time the closing credits roll on this hour-and-a-half film, Contrada hopes his audience understands mental health care workers are neither superhuman nor immune from their own psychological challenges.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of people have this sense that people in mental health fields have their (stuff) together, that they\u2019re androids who exist outside of the human condition. In reality, psychologists, therapists, social workers are people that have their own problems,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n When Contrada screens the film in Northampton, he said it will be a tribute to mental health care professionals. He said he plans to donate all proceeds from the showing to the Center for Human Development in Springfield.<\/p>\n Emmy Award-winning actress Debbie Allen plays a prominent role in \u201cSplinter.\u201d Contrada first met her on the set of \u201cGrey\u2019s Anatomy,\u201d where she stars as Dr. Catherine Fox. <\/p>\n Allen is the show\u2019s executive producing director and Contrada was her assistant. He also worked for her production company as director of development.<\/p>\n The full cast of \u201cSplinter\u201d includes 18 actors and performers. Contrada manages them along with a staff and production crew of more than 70 people. <\/p>\n While he doesn\u2019t don the formal title, the Western Massachusetts native is also the movie\u2019s producer. Since he has no corporate or private financing, he is funding the film with $8,000 he raised through crowdsourcing, along with his salary and savings.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a great way to make movies because you\u2019re not beholden to a rich financer. But it\u2019s also very difficult. It\u2019s hard to get that money from a large portion of people and having your own money in the movie is not fun,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n \u201cSplinter\u201d was filmed in and around Los Angeles and the Mojave Desert in Lancaster, California. <\/p>\n Contrada said he was able to cut production costs because of support he received from his friends at \u201cGrey\u2019s Anatomy,\u201d who lent him cameras, motorcycles, props and a couple of actors.<\/p>\n \u201cA lot of crew members offered me gear or advice. The movie wouldn\u2019t have been possible if it weren\u2019t for \u2018Grey\u2019s Anatomy.\u2019 I got a lot of favors and stuff for free, which helped us save an inordinate amount of money,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Contrada said beyond his own involvement in the film, the production has strong ties to the four western counties. He said the entire soundtrack comprises original songs written and performed by local musicians.<\/p>\n \u201cI wanted to maintain a connection between my work and my hometown. There\u2019s a million brilliant musicians in Western Mass, just a really flourishing music scene. I went to high school with a lot of them,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Contrada said he didn\u2019t set out to make a blockbuster\u2014he just wants the film to carry a message of support for mental health care workers. He also advocates action, addressing and removing problems before they fester \u2014like removing a splinter.<\/p>\n Contrada\u2019s father, Fred, was a veteran journalist for The Republican, who died in 2018. The filmmaker said he\u2019s already begun working on his next project \u2014 a movie about what divides and connects the generations. It will be based on his relationship with his father. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.masslive.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" NORTHAMPTON \u2014 When people break up with their partners, many write about it in journals or start texting friends. But when a bad romance rocked Western Massachusetts native Rio Contrada, he responded by writing and directing a feature film about it in Hollywood. \u201cI dated a school psychologist who cheated on me and gaslighted me,\u201d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2181614","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2181614","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2181614"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2181614\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2181615,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2181614\/revisions\/2181615"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2181614"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2181614"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2181614"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"'Splinter'\"](\"https:\/\/www.masslive.com\/resizer\/v2\/SQR74XEAHRBRJOU3ALELNK2SHI.jpeg?auth=d468bd494fbfdc4253de8744eaba14942d49edbdaa94b0ee492ca97b71874949&width=1280&smart=true&quality=90\")
Fast bikes and sex<\/b><\/h2>\n
Managing a \u2018Splinter\u2019<\/b><\/h2>\n