2007 Virginia Screenwriting Competition Winners

• Jim Dawson

  Cinderella Eight

  Cinderella Eight is the true story of eight high school misfits from Virginia who turn a winless racing crew into the #1 team in the nation, with a shot at the world championship in Henley, England.  The boys are all social misfits who, rejected from the traditional sports of football and basketball, find mutual comfort rowing on the river as the school’s unofficial and unrecognized crew team.  After early victories that stun the British racing establishment, the boys must find a way to take it up one more level as they challenge the defending world champions in the final race for the crown.

• Alan Williamson

  The Way Things Turn

  The Way Things Turn is a quirky, offbeat character-driven comedy about CB and Bridget, a pair of small time con artists who team up, pretending to be a married couple about to have a baby in order to scam the government for food stamps, welfare and free housing.  Their plan works until Bridget falls in love with CB and they sleep together…and Bridget gets pregnant for real.  Fearing CB will disappear if he discovers he’s about to become a father, Bridget suddenly finds herself a pregnant woman pretending to be pregnant.

• CB Wilson

  Agony House

  In 1946 Virginia, an ex-detective is coerced by a wealthy widow into protecting her attractive daughters and herself from his former employer, the local crime boss.  The detective’s desire to protect the family pulls him deeper into the past he is trying to escape.

Finalists

• Jeff Bridgeman

  The Party Wedding

  Tom and Leslie, an unmarried commitment phobic couple, plan to throw a big party to reconnect with friends and family, but a mix-up causes wedding invitations to be sent out to everyone.  When the response to their wedding comes back overwhelmingly positive and meaningful, the couple is forced to figure out if they’re truly meant for each other before it’s “death do they part”.

• David Hopkins

  Realmkeeper

  In an uncertain future, Paxton Gamble has been fighting hard for the restoration of religious freedom in America.  What he doesn’t realize is that his battle pales in comparison to the one he will be forced to undertake.  Paxton discovers that he is the only one who can save humanity from forces far more dangerous than any government on Earth, but first he must find the strength to overcome a painful past and a vengeful enemy.

• Anne McLaughlin

  Out Of Focus

  A public defender witnesses a murder, then escapes a bullet from his girlfriend’s kidnapper.  Tying the two events together, he fights to save her and his own life.  But can a man who sees only the good in people really understand the evil that comes so easily to others?

• Arturo Munoz & David Phillips

  Avenging Angel

  If the implacable Major Gilmore catches Rebecca spying for the Yanks, he will hang her.  Although she openly espouses anti-slavery and pacifist views, this idealistic young woman serves as a volunteer nurse for wounded rebels in Civil War Winchester.  A rebel soldier sweeps her off her feet and, in defiance of her Quaker elders, Rebecca falls in love.  Hoping to exploit the trust she enjoys among the confederates, General Sheridan sends an old black slave to convince her to spy for the Union, and serve as her secret courier.  As Sheridan prepares to attack Winchester, Rebecca must choose sides, the fate of the battle hanging on her decision.

• Tim O’Shea

  The Monitor

  A brilliant and talented 10-year old slave girl is secretly freed by her sympathetic Virginia owner in order for her to receive an education in the north.  Ten years later, as she chases her dream of becoming a famous actress, she returns to Virginia at the start of the Civil War at the urging of her former owner.  She sacrifices her dreams in order to play a lead role as a spy embedded in the Confederate White House.  Only by letting go of her dreams does she become an actress on the most important American stage of her time, as she helps turn the tide of the war and in doing so discovers her own bitter destiny.

• Virginia Shepherd

  Holy Relics

  Life turns upside down for two proper Englishmen past their prime on a camping holiday in the Scottish Highlands.  With a comic nod to Franz Kafka, one of the men contracts a strange disease he is convinced is changing him into a butterfly.  As he undergoes his transformation, the local middle-aged women begin to treat him as the reincarnation of an ancient vegetative deity, showering him with flowers and their bodies

• Jill Stevens

  Now You See It, Now You Don’t

  When swimming superstar Billy Darcy meets clever Lizzie Bennett, it is anything but love at first sight.  Having to deal with a dysfuntional family of her own, Lizzie is impatient with Billy’s arrogance.  It is only when they are forced together on a regular basis that Billy falls in love with Lizzie and she discovers that sometimes people are anything but what they seem.  When Lizzie’s mentally ill sister goes missing, Billy must make the ultimate sacrifice in order to help the girl he loves.

• Lawrence Watford

  Archangel

  Archangel is the story of Marse Cook, a troubled inner city youth with amazing talent on the basketball court.  After being arrested, yet again, for driving around in a stolen vehicle, a school counselor convinces the court that transferring him to a new environment would be a viable alternative to juvenile detention.  He enrolls in the 99 percent white and wealthy Madison Lakes Christian Academy and clashes with Jack Shepherd, the hardened basketball coach.  The two must confront the prejudice within them and, in the process, they become each other’s hope.

• Jeremy Wickman & Ravi Dinesh

  Stalemate

  Lionel Willaims is stuck in a job he despises: interviewing donors at the CryoStore Sperm Bank and then writing up exagerated profiles to sell their samples.  He is stuck in a tedious routine with a fiancee, Nina Hart, who is a beautiful, sociable woman who systematicly plans out the course of their lives. He is also stuck listening to the obnoxious whining of his manic coworker, Harold Peterson.  Harold’s a pathetic eager-to-please guy on a desperate seach for a woman to give his life some kind of meaning.  An opportunity for escape comes in the form of Karen Anderson, a young widow with problems of her own.  As his romantic relationship with Karen develops, Lionel must deal with issues of alienation and responsibility and learn to cope with the consequences of his choices.

• Luther Windsor

  Rebel Yell In German

  While looking into the strange disappearance of his grandfather, an in-house patent attorney for a defense contractor stumbles upon the fact that his company is exploiting alien technology from crashed UFOs.  When he resigns for a seemingly unrelated reason, he is unaware of how his newfound knowledge is relevant to his family “mission.”  Life then becomes increasingly more dangerous as he investigates the situation.