> > RELATED Aimee Mann, Will Forte, Mayim Bialik on Dayton natives' album
Two days before it is released on digital movie sites, "Boy Band" will be shown to its first paying audience at 1 p.m. Saturday, March 2 at the Little Art Theatre, 247 Xenia Ave. in Yellow Springs.
>> RELATED (April 10, 2018) This Dayton-made movie is making its world premiere this weekend
The event includes a Q & A session with Levinson, a Dayton native who began making the film in 2016 with his brother, writer Stephen Levinson.
The Levinson brothers, sons of Dayton Daily News writer Meredith Moss and retired attorney James Levinson, have been making art for decades.
>> Behind the scenes on the set of locally-filmed movie 'Boy Band'
The film will be released for sale on iTunes, Amazon and other services on March 5.
Joel Moss Levinson, a Yellow Springs resident, said the movie has been a labor of love.
“I am really grateful for the people who made it happen because no nobody got paid what they deserve,” he said. “If we put it to our hourly rate, we probably got three cents an hour.”
The film follows the fictional group the Heartthrob Boyz as they head back to the studio to record a second album.
It stars Steve Agee, Seth Herzog, Jordan Carlos, Dave Hill, Esther Ku, Julie Goldman, Dave Gruber Allen, Jerry O'Connell and Questlove.
>> Monsters, dragons and unicorns take over COSI
Pre-production work for the movie was done at ReFraze Recording Studio in Kettering.
Scenes for the film were shot at the Dayton Art Institute, the Dayton Masonic Temple and numerous other places in Dayton, Yellow Springs and Kettering.
About 25 local people served as actors and crew members in the movie.
The 84-minute film was screened at the 2018 Cleveland International Film Festival and for supporters at the Neon in downtown Dayton.
“These Kickstarter people have been waiting a long time for their movie,” Levinson said.
Nearly $20,000 was raised by a Kickstarter campaign.
Levinson said it is gratifying to see a movie through to its release.
“It takes a long time to make a movie when you don’t have any money to throw at it,” he said. “It took everybody banging together and willpower to make it happen.”
WANT TO GO?
What: "Boy Band" screening and Q&A with Joel Moss Levinson
When: 1 p.m. Saturday, March 2
Where: Little Art Theatre, 247 Xenia Ave. in Yellow Springs
Cost: $10 and tickets available here
About the Author