El Velorio (The Wake)
Follow along in this day-in-the-life-during-the-pandemic story of a Queens man as he prepares to mark the death of a loved one from Covid.
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Julia MaddoxDirectorA Coalfield Christmas, Elba Ruiz: Fat Meat
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Julia MaddoxWriterThe Coward of Hickory County, More Than A Heart Can Hold, Slip Away, Death Comes for Danny
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Julia MaddoxProducer
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Prabhat GurungProducer
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David SeltersKey Cast
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Dawn FalconeKey Cast
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Project Type:Short, Student
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Runtime:3 minutes 37 seconds
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Completion Date:March 1, 2023
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Production Budget:100 USD
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Country of Origin:United States
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Country of Filming:United States
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Language:No Dialogue
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Shooting Format:Digital
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Aspect Ratio:16:9
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Film Color:Color
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First-time Filmmaker:Yes
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Student Project:Yes - City College of New York
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Queens Memory ProjectLong Island City
United States
March 19, 2023
New York -
Reel 13/ WNET Shorts CompetitionNew York
United States
March 25, 2023
TBD
Julia Maddox grew up in both Madisonvile and Murray, Kentucky where she learned the power of a good story by editing her Dad’s column of short stories for the The Madisonville Messenger. She acted and did technical theater in numerous community theater productions at The Playhouse in the Park and college productions at her alma mater, Murray State University, before moving to New York City in 1999. In 2022, she graduated with an MFA in Film from City College of New York where she was a BAFTA U.S. scholar. Her feature script, The Coward of Hickory County was a finalist at the 2021 Atlanta Film Festival Feature Screenplay Competition. Coward was also a finalist for two prestigious Humanitas Prizes in 2022 - The New Voices Fellowship, and the Carol Mendelsohn College Drama Award. Her new feature script, More Than A Heart Can Hold, has made her a current semifinalist for the 2023 Stowe Story Labs/Film Fatales Fellowship. She lives in Queens with her high school teacher wife, Jaime, and retired therapy dog, Sugar.
This film was an assignment from my film directing class to write and direct a narrative film with no dialogue. El Velorio (The Wake) is a story about how one man in Queens chooses to acknowledge the death of a former lover from Covid. In the spring of 2020, Northern Queens was devastated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Located right by Elmhurst Hospital, the Corona/Jackson Heights/Elmhurst community was briefly the epicenter of the epicenter of the outbreak in the United States. Thousands of people died here, leaving many thousands more trying to figure out how to go on in "the wake" of so much personal devastation and loss. It is my intention that this film honor the memories of all those we've lost, and acknowledge the struggles the survivors go through as they work out how to move ahead with their lives. Cinematographer: Prabhat Gurung. Actors: David Selters and Dawn Falcone. This film is dedicated to the memory of David's husband, William Bondar.