This page hosted by
Get your own Free Home Page"Dark Currents" inspired by such past shows as "Dark Shadows" and "Twin Peaks," will air at 10 p.m. on the public access channel (Channel 12) for Mattawamkeag Cablevision. The half-hour show will air weekly for at least a month.
The drama is the brainchild of Lucas Knight and Frank Welch. Both write and act in the series, and Knight directs while Welch produces.
It's hard to tell much about the series from its atmospheric first episode, as the characters are just introduced. There's the thug Mark Jones, played by Jason Gagnon, and his girlfriend, Kristen Lawson, played by Lorna Pelkey. There's Seth Kane(played by Welch), who has been committed to a mental institution by his father. The other main character is Jared Prescott (played by Troy McLeod), a young, adventurous teen who starts off on a journey to track down a secret about his father.
Knight didn't use a rigorous casting process.
"I just got my friends, and anybody who wanted to be in it and would show up," he said."You've got to love it to do it for nothing."
"Dark Currents" sprang from an idea Knight had for a book.
"At first, we wanted to do a low-budget film," he said. "But once we started shooting it, we decided it would be good practice to do a continuing series."
Knight admitted that some elements from his show might seem familiar to viewers of past chillers on TV.
"We do anything we can think of, even if it is a ripoff," he said. "This is practice, for fun. We do try to keep a few fresh ideas."
Knight, Welch, their cast and crew have been shooting on evenings and weekends, at private homes, a school, the town office and even the historic Hobbs House.
"We've gotten some positive feedback, because we're actually doing it," Knight said."That's despite the fact that the worst place to show it is in your hometown."
Two episodes are ready, and Knight is editing the third episode now. After the series run, he plans to edit the episodes together to create a video for video stores.
Already Knight is accomplishing his main goal of learning about filmmaking.
"I've learned to shoot as much as possible, and do as many takes as possible," he said. "Also, I've learned a lot about storytelling and characterization."
He's had other surprises as well.
"It's taken a lot more time than I thought it would take, and I'm into it a lot more than I thought I would be," Knight said."I'm putting a lot of care into it."
Get your own Free Home Page