Sequel to '93 cult chick flick filmed in north country bridges gap in storyline

Apr. 1—HENDERSON — The 1993 film "Chantilly Lace," which has gained a cult following over the years, now has a sequel filmed in the north country.

"Chantilly Bridge," filmed in 2019 in Henderson and other parts of Jefferson County, premiered in mid-March, with one reviewer calling it "a genuine love letter to female friendship."

"Chantilly Lace" had no script, with the actresses largely improvising their lines and conversations. It was filmed at Sundance, Utah, including at the Sundance Institute and became a hit at the Sundance Film Festival. The two-hour film later aired on Showtime. It received wide acclaim for its intimate exploration of the "secret lives" of women.

Emmy winner Linda Yellen, who directed the film, brought together an all-star ensemble cast for "Chantilly Lace." That cast largely returned for the sequel, "Chantilly Bridge."

The plot of "Chantilly Lace," according to the Internet Movie Database, IMDb: "Seven women friends, including a nun in crisis, an angry divorcee, and an unfiltered, sexually-charged artist gather in the Colorado Rockies at the upscale vacation home of Val, to celebrate the surprise 40th birthday of popular film critic Natalie. When Val's offbeat younger sister arrives with a newcomer, tensions rise as secrets of love, loss, and betrayal are revealed. Years of friendship are tested in a pivotal year as the women re-assemble for the engagement of another, and once more to mourn the shocking death of a third."

"Chantilly Bridge," the sequel to "Lace," will be released to video-on-demand sites on April 14.

The principal photography for "Chantilly Bridge" was shot in December 2019, ending right before the winter holidays.

"Everyone was so fabulous in Henderson," Ms. Yellen said in a phone interview from New York City. "I'd go up there again in an instant and encourage people to do so."

She said that the winter season provided a captivating contrast to the first film.

"The first movie, done 30 years ago, was shot in the summer," she said. "Since 'Chantilly Bridge' in a way reflects the winter of our lives if you will, I thought it would be a great contrast. It was always my dream to be able to include bits and pieces of the first film — kind of like a memory piece, going back. I wanted that to be bright and shiny with shades of summer. The autumn, snow and winter seemed perfect for this stage of life."

"Chantilly Bridge" premiered March 15 at the New York Film Academy's Burbank, California, campus.

"When we premiered it in California, it had a wonderful response from the audience," said Massena native and Henderson resident Dana Keefer, who along with Ms. Yellen, produced "Chantilly Bridge." "We did a question-and-answer afterwards. A couple of the actresses were there. The questions went on for over an hour."

The new "Bridge" film, Ms. Keefer said, will be screened today in New York City by the Directors Guild of America.

Variety magazine in 1993 called "Chantilly Lace" "a knowing, bittersweet look at the complex lives of modern American women." It has a 94% audience approval score on the review-aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes. The film, Ms. Keefer believes, is not exclusively for a female audience, which adds to its uniqueness.

"It turns out that the fellas are extremely interested in how it is that women actually speak to each other when there are no men in the room," Ms. Keefer said. "And it covers a lot of issues."

"I think men like it too because they felt like a fly on the wall," Ms. Yellen said. "They don't get to see groups of women as they are just with each other."

As for the reasons for the cult status of "Chantilly Lace," Ms. Yellen said, "It was so honest showing the world of women. A lot of women's films are just stupid and don't have much depth and they kind of stereotype characters. Every so often, one comes along that's very touching and insightful. It was also special because it dealt with subjects that back then were quite revolutionary to talk about — sex lives and homosexuality as it was then as opposed to LBGTQ today."

She added, "Also, even though we were in our 30s when we did it, and some of us in our 40s, we felt like life was already passing us by, career-wise. How funny that we should then be able to reunite all those years later and see that wasn't true."

For the sequel, six of the seven actresses in "Chantilly Lace" returned, including one who returns as a ghost. Patricia Richardson, best known for playing Jill Taylor in "Home Improvement," was not in the first film, but has a significant role in the new one. Another actress, Naaji Sky Adzimah, makes her big-screen debut in "Chantilly Bridge." She plays the 25-year-old daughter of the character played by Helen Slater, best known for the "Supergirl" movie and TV series. Martha Plimpton, who was in the first movie, did not return for the sequel. The movie's songs are performed by the legendary Judy Collins.

The cast also includes Lindsay Crouse ("Places in the Heart"); Jill Eikenberry ("Something Borrowed"); Ally Sheedy ("The Breakfast Club"), Talia Shire ("The Godfather") and JoBeth Williams ("Kramer vs. Kramer.")

Six of the actresses stayed at a Henderson residence while the film was shot. At the time it was owned by Lucinda and Bud Drescher, Ms. Keefer said.

"There's a very big mansion on Harbor Road with bedrooms with bathrooms, enough to hold the six principal actresses," she said. "They loved being together during the shoot, where they talked about their characters and what their characters were interested in. They bonded. The owners of the place allowed them to do this for no money. I just had to pay to get the place cleaned professionally afterwards."

Ms. Keefer said that when producers went to look for an editor for the film, the COVID-19 lockdown hit, and all the editing studios closed.

"We finally found an editor who had equipment at home, but we weren't able to sit with him to cut the film, so it had to be done on Zoom, which was an onerous and lengthy process," she said. "During 2020 and 2021, Ken Carmon, a local businessman and a gifted amateur drone cinematographer, shot scenes featuring young girls portraying our characters as they were growing up together in a small town, as well as many beautiful shots around the area. The editing was finished in the early fall of 2021, and the movie then went to sound and color labs to complete post production."

Principal photography for the film was done over seven days, with drone cinematography recorded over the next year and a half.

'UNBREAKABLE BOND'

In the sequel, it's 25 years later. The film occasionally travels back in time as characters recall the past, including scenes from the 1993 film. They confront old resentments and celebrate new milestones as they rediscover an "unbreakable bond."

"It's a rare gift for a director and actors to revisit characters we created 25 years ago," Ms. Yellen said. "By marrying moments from the two films, I'm able to share with our audience the unique experience of seeing our characters age as in real life while witnessing the pivotal events that shaped their friendships."

"You get on screen, these actresses in their 40s and 50s, and now in their 60s and 70s, without makeup, without special effects," Ms. Keefer said. "That's also quite an outstanding feature and very unusual. I think that's one of the things that will make this quite outstanding."

"Chantilly Bridge," Ms. Keefer said, consists of three acts when the characters are reunited.

"In the first one, they get together because one of their character's mother has died and they come back to pack up the old family house," she said.

The house in the film where those scenes were shot is at 161 Paddock St., Watertown.

In their second meeting, the characters reunite for a retirement celebration. In the third act, the characters gather for the distribution of the cremains of the mother from the first act.

"That was shot at my house here in Henderson and on the bridge to Association Island in Henderson Harbor," Ms. Keefer said.

Ms. Keefer is a 1964 graduate of Massena High School. She has a bachelor's degree from William Smith College in Geneva; a master's degree in English from the University of Virginia; a master's in theater from City University of New York and a doctorate in theater also from CUNY. She and Ms. Yellen met in 1978 when Ms. Keefer was getting out of graduate school. At the time, her husband ran the 92nd Street Y, a cultural and community center on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

"A member there happened to be Linda Yellen's agent," Ms. Keefer said. "She was looking for somebody to be an assistant."

From 1978 to 1980, Ms. Keefer worked with Ms. Yellen and did three films with her, as assistant to the producer. The third one, "Playing for Time" written by the late Arthur Miller and released in 1980 as a CBS Television film starring Vanessa Redgrave, is based on a true story by Fania Fenelon and concerns female prisoners in a Nazi concentration camp who are spared from death in return for performing music for their captors. It won eight major awards: six Emmys, a Golden Globe and a Peabody.

Over the years, Ms. Keefer and Ms. Yellen remained friends by keeping in touch. Ms. Keefer became a corporate executive and is president of her own one-woman company, Keefer Consulting. She still does some work in the area of hospital revenue cycles after retiring from Health Management Systems, where she worked from 1980 to 2016 — vice president from 1987 to 2016.

"The movie business was my 'road not taken,' which is why producing 'Chantilly Bridge' has been such a special journey for me," she said.

Ms. Yellen has visited Ms. Keefer in Henderson.

"When she got the rights back to 'Chantilly Lace' and she wanted to do this update, she said, 'We want to shoot it here,'" Ms. Keefer said.

In "Chantilly Lace," the characters meet at a vacation house. For the "Chantilly Bridge" sequel, they gather at the fictional town where they grew up. Henderson, other towns and places like the zoo at Thompson Park aren't mentioned by name in the film but credits are given at the end.

"The principal shooting was done in Henderson, Sackets Harbor, Watertown and all around the countryside," Mr. Keefer said. "It's an indie movie, pretty low budget, so it was important to shoot it in a place that would be affordable. We had an entire community of people who volunteered and served in roles in the film. I probably had 100 people from around the area who participated in the making of this film."

She added there was a sense of community between the actresses and the local citizens. "They had a wonderful time and the actresses were very approachable and very open and struck up a few friendships in the community."

In addition to the north country being an "affordable" place to shoot, the area brought other benefits, even in winter.

"The landscape here is like another character in the movie," Ms. Keefer said. "It's quite beautiful."

Among her duties as producer, Ms. Keefer raised funds for the film. She said there are six local investors. She also signed contracts and solved problems as they arose.

"Linda, the director, is the creative aspect," Ms. Keefer said. "She has always brought me into that process as well. Her directing style is very different. It's very collaborative, very soft."

"Chantilly Bridge" is much more scripted than the first film. Ms. Yellen directed from a script by Michael Leeds and herself.

"It made the focus of it and editing a little easier, but these are such brilliant actresses that they were able to move easily between scripted and nonscripted and to add their own voices, which no matter how good of a writer you are — and something I find as a director — the actors have some insight once they get into it and that's very helpful," Ms. Yellen said.

A TRILOGY POSSIBLE

Ms. Yellen and Ms. Keefer haven't ruled out a third installment of the "Chantilly" story.

"The actresses are all for it," Ms. Keefer said.

Ms. Yellen said such an idea for a trilogy was discussed a few weeks ago while she was in Los Angeles.

"We actually began talking about an idea we think is quite special and doesn't require us waiting 10 or 20 years to do," she said. "I think the world, particularly the world of women, is interested in such counter-programming. For me, after dealing with big studio films that take years just to develop, it's kind of a joy to be able to make a small movie — not small in ideas but just in kind of cause and scope — and get it done."

The details

WHAT: "Chantilly Bridge," filmed in Henderson, Sackets Harbor, Watertown and other local areas. It's a sequel to the 1993 film, "Chantilly Lace."

WHERE: In selected theaters and beginning April 14 on video-on-demand.

PLOT: "Chantilly Bridge reunites a group of lifelong, steadfast friends who are still — in their later years — chasing their dreams, fighting injustices, and sticking up for their convictions. The women lay bare their lives and deal with important issues that impact all women with humor, humility, humanity and love. No topic escapes the razor-like wit and insight."

TRAILER: wdt.me/chantillybridgetrail

RUN TIME: 86 minutes

INDUSTRY RATING: It has no official industry rating from the Motion Picture Association of America.

A REVIEWER'S TAKE: "The movie may not cover any new ground or provide any real insight but it is a genuine love letter to female friendship. And, at a time when society tries to pit women against each other, that's something worth celebrating." — Lois Alter Mark, writing on the Alliance of Women Film Journalists website.