New film production - A Dance For Grace

A new film titled "A Dance For Grace" by director/producer Orville Matherson is currently in production, filming in USA and Jamaica.
"A Dance For Grace, previously titled Saving Grace, began shooting several months ago(summer 2008) in various North American locations including New York, Connecticut and Atlanta. Shooting is expected to be completed by May 2009, following the filming of several sequences in Jamaica.

A Dance For Grace follows in the tradition of other such coming of age dance films as Footloose, Saturday Night Fever and Save The Last Dance.
It tells the story of a group of mostly caucasian high school students living in a small rural town, who decide to enter a dance competition, hoping to use the prize money to fund a life saving operation required by one of their town's most revered citizens- a middle aged woman named Grace.

Their quest leads them to recruit their Jamaican born dance tutor, Ricky Myers - a former drug dealer currently on probation. He decides to introduce them to his Jamaican culture by teaching them a dancehall routine for the competition.

But as the contest draws closer and the race is on to save Grace's life , other forces around Ricky and his dancers are in a race against their own personal demons. There is Mason , a crooked cop who knows no boundaries, Gerri, the probation officer reluctantly falling in love with a man on the wrong side of the law, and Opal, the gifted choreographer who is tormented by her unfulfilled dreams as a dancer. And it soon becomes apparent that for them all, the Dance For Grace is now a dance to save their very souls.

Set to the pulsating beats of Jamaican dancehall, A Dance For Grace is an exciting, uplifting, fast moving tale of courage, redemption and the will to succeed against all odds.

"It was always our dream to involve Jamaica in the project some way," Matherson says. "And during one of my visits earlier this year, I met briefly with the Film Office at Jamaica Trade and Invest as well as other local interests and saw that bringing part of the film here would really not be so difficult after all."

Powell continues: "I actually re-wrote the script a bit to accommodate a Jamaican shoot and we are hoping that it will lend authenticity and vitality to the project, and of course, show Jamaica off in a very positive light."

"A Dance For Grace will showcase Jamaica's dancehall culture in a tremendously positive way, in a film that really celebrates the coming together of different races and cultures for a common good," Matherson continues.

"Initially, we were going to shoot it all in the USA but we are hoping that through this and subsequent visits, we can put all the pieces together to ensure that Jamaica itself plays a prominent role in the final product."

Quotes taken from the Jamaican Observer