"Then There Was Joe" kicks off Arkansas Cinema Society's Homegrown Film Series

LITTLE ROCK, AR – Then There Was Joe, a full-length, comedy feature film written, produced, directed, co-edited and starring Little Rock native Justin Warren and based on Warren’s own family, will be the first film showcased by the Arkansas Cinema Society’s new Homegrown Film Series. The series was created to give Arkansas filmmakers a venue, and a voice, in their home communities.

A screening of Then There Was Joe will take place at 6:30 p.m. Feb. 3 at the Central Arkansas Library System’s Ron Robinson Theater, 100 River Market Ave. in Little Rock. Admission was $12, but the screening is currently SOLD OUT !!! To get on a waiting list, please email info@arkansascinemasociety.org. After the screening and discussion, an afterparty will be held at the nearby Stickyz Rock ‘N’ Roll Chicken Shack, 107 River Market Ave.

A question-and-answer panel following the film will include Warren and the film’s co-star, Ray Grady. Grady, a Chicago comedian and actor, is a veteran of various comedy shows including The Next Level, Season One; Martin Lawrence Presents: First Amendment Stand-Up and Comic View. He was also in the 2015 movie Goddess of Love.

Also starring in the film is James “Butch” Warren (White Lightning, CNN Presents Black in America: The Black Man) and T. Dion Burns (Drumline, Jeremy Brooks) as well as veteran actress Natalie Canerday (Biloxi Blues, One False Move, Sling Blade, October Sky, Walk the Line). James M. “Butch” Warren and William L. "Billy" Rutledge, M.D., are executive producers of the film.

Then There Was Joe is a tale of brotherly love and forgiveness with a twist: An upstanding young man needs to study for the bar exam, but must babysit his criminal, legally homebound older brother instead. Will he be able to keep his sanity and keep his brother out of trouble?

Warren portrays harried law student Ben Hazelstein, who is shopping for an engagement ring for his girlfriend when he’s rudely interrupted by a breaking TV-news story: brother Joe (Grady) has been arrested for robbing a bowling alley full of birthday-partying third-graders! When Joe goes from jail to house arrest, the young men’s father, the widowed Judge Roy Hazelstein (Warren’s real-life father, James “Butch” Warren) orders Ben to keep an eye on his brother as he awaits his court date. The brothers’ tangled relationship plays out hilariously.

A graduate of the University of Southern California (USC) School of Cinematic Arts, Justin Warren wrote Then There Was Joe a year out of film school. Two producers for a major Atlanta film mogul wanted to option the script, but wanted to make too many changes. Warren ultimately decided to do the film himself with the goal of making a high-quality product with a low budget, a goal that, viewers will see, was fully realized.

After the screening, the movie will be available for pre-order at www.ThenThereWasJoe.com.

                                                               

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