Red-carpet Huntsville premiere to benefit families of bus crash victims

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January 23, 2007

By Kelly Kazek The News Courier Tue Jan 23, 2007, 08:48 PM CST

HUNTSVILLE — On Saturday night, stars will fall on Alabama.

A true Hollywood-style red carpet will lead stars, including Billy Dee Williams, into the Hollywood 18 theater on South Parkway, where the film “Constellation” will have its world premiere.

Filmed entirely in Huntsville in spring 2004 and featuring as many as 800 extras from Huntsville and surrounding areas, “Constellation” is the long-awaited feature film about members of an African-American family coming to terms with the past as they gather for a funeral.

Written and directed by Jordan Walker-Pearlman, nephew of star Gene Wilder, the film stars Williams, Gabrielle Union, Lesley Ann Warren, Rae Dawn Chong, Hill Harper, Zoe Saldana, as well as two Huntsville school children who were chosen for plum roles.

Pearlman, who said he fell in love with Huntsville and considers it a progressive Southern city, made the local charity Angels Among Us the beneficiary of Saturday’s premiere events, which include parties and a silent auction. The charity will earmark a portion of proceeds to provide financial assistance to the families of four students killed and others who were seriously injured in the Nov. 20 Lee High School bus accident.

Daniel Klibanoff, who founded Angels Among Us with his wife Cathleen, said the couple will meet Monday with school administrators to determine which families have the most financial need from the crash, resulting from either medical or funeral expenses.

“We heard last week a family had its utilities turned off because of financial hardship from the medical bills,” he said.

Klibanoff, who said he is also a “small investor” in the film, had the idea for the charity after he and Cathleen became engaged and heard the song “Angels Among Us” by the group Alabama. The couple requested donations in lieu of wedding gifts to form the charity; its mission is to award scholarships to civic-minded students who could not otherwise afford college.

“Somewhere along the line, when it became clear we were going to get the movie a week before the rest of country, Jordan, along with other people involved, decided to make Angels Among Us the recipient of the premiere proceeds,” Klibanoff said. “That was right around the time of the bus accident.”

Tickets to the showing start at $60. Visit www.angelsamongusonline.net for information on the events.

Pearlman has said previously he wants to give back to the Huntsville area, and he hired many local people to work on the film in various capacities, including soundtrack, crew and casting.

A Huntsville student, Tre Rogers, was chosen to play the young Helms Boxer (played as an adult by Williams). Rogers went on to play a role in “Madea’s Family Reunion” in 2006. Kathleen Arthur, now 12 and a seventh grader at Huntsville’s Academy for Academics and Arts, plays the part of a young Rosa Boxer. Zoe Saldana plays the older Rosa.

Part of Pearlman’s attraction to Huntsville was that it did not seem as racially divided as many Southern cities he visited. He said his film does not depict the South in a negative light, as many other filmmakers have.

“I’m avoiding stereotypes of the old South,” he said. “You won’t see any Bubbas, or people with sweaty foreheads sitting on the porch drinking Coca-Colas. You’ll see real people of different races trying to come together. It’s as much about killing white stereotypes as about killing black stereotypes.”

Following the premiere, “Constellation” will open nationwide Feb. 2 in 300 theaters, which Pearlman said is a “wide release,” and then hopefully in as many as 1,000 locations. For a listing, visit www.constellationthefilm.com.

Scenes in the movie were filmed at EarlyWorks Museum, the U.S. Space & Rocket Center, The Ledges, Humphrey’s Bar & Grill, Big Spring International Park and Huntsville International Airport.

For a listing of local extras and a map of filming locations, visit www.constellationhuntsville.com.