A Word from Devon J. Read
Director of "PRELUDE TO HOPE"

November, 1998. Ryan Jordan and I went to see some movie (I have no clue what movie it was; usually I remember these things, but more important parts of this particular memory crowd the movie out of my mind) here in San Diego, CA. Outside the theater we got our first glimpse of The Phantom Menace. The teaser poster had just been released and the theater folks were setting it up as we walked by. We just had to stop and admire it. Once we got inside we had Star Wars on the brain and couldn't care less about the movie we were watching.

On our way out, Ryan told me about this movie he had on his computer called Troops. He said it was just the coolest thing and that I just had to see it if I considered myself any kind of movie-freak and/or Star Wars geek. He took me back to his computer and showed it to me and I just went crazy. That very night we decided it would become our goal in life to make something like Troops, to honor its creator, Kevin Rubio and of course, the creator of the universe, George Lucas.

We came up with a pretty basic storyline, assuming we'd be the only players in this little film and that we'd have no budget to work with. Alas, had we gone with this storyline we'd have finished eons ago... oh well, it's all for the better. Now we have a smorgasbord of Jedi, Royal Guards, Stormtroopers, Lightsaber fights and powerful action. This has complicated things, to be sure, but I'd have it no other way. I'm very happy with the way things are coming along and I'm sure that, as Clear Concrete Productions' premiere film, this will be getting things going with a bang.

Ryan and I had planned on doing all the work for our movie on our own but we quickly discovered that was impossible and I'd like to take this chance to thank all the folks that have helped us out. Most of our equipment we've borrowed from Correia Jr High; I'd like to thank principal Bernie Calderon and the tech center staff, Scott Irwin and Rand Stoller for their support and help, as well as all the encouragement from the rest of Correia's staff. Local City Councilman Byron Wear managed to get us access to shoot at the San Diego Convention Center for free and we'd really like to thank him for helping us out in that respect. All the staff at the convention center has been great to us, so I'd like to thank them all.

For help with the development of the script I'd like to thank all the folks at DTP (you know who you are), especially Nathan Butler, Misti Pitts and Dana Chrisman, as well as some of our players, Kristoffer Newsom and Chandler Morris. While he was a late arrival, Shawn Sagady of Illusive Productions (you may remember him as the creator of the now possibly-on-permanent-hiatus fanfilm Fall of the Sith) has been an incredible addition to our crew. On the set Ricky "The Force" LeBlanc, Marshal "MoePaul" Wilke and Cody "The Farce" Aldridge have all been indispensible. And of course, all of our families, while sometimes brought to near insanity by all we have asked of them, have been incredible in their support and encouragement.

Devon J. Read

Director, Prelude to Hope
Clear Concrete Productions
clearconcrete@home.com