Lakes Region's own film company wrapping up its first production

Why should a writer, director and actor with decades of success on both stage and film choose to invest his talents in a company based in the Lakes Region? Because, as one of his predecessors once wrote, there's no place like home.

Ernest Thompson is best known as the Oscar-winning writer of "On Golden Pond", which started as off-Broadway play and evolved into the 1981 film starring Katharine Hepburn, Henry Fonda, Jane Fonda and Squam Lake. Since then, his career has included work in theatre, cinema and television, finding him in the various roles of actor, writer and director, often filling more than one of those roles at any given time.

Last year, Thompson was joined by producers Lori and Morgan Murphy in founding Whitebridge Farm Productions, LLC, a film production and education company located in New Hampton.

"Time and Charge$", one of the company's current projects, is a full-length feature film written and directed by Thompson and in which he also plays the lead role. Producer Morgan Murphy explained the plot follows a New York finance executive who returns to New Hampshire to land a multi-million dollar investor. While in his native land, he encounters old acquaintances who challenge him to remember the person he once was and to re-evaluate his personal measure of worth.

Acting along side Thompson and under his direction is a mixture of people, some trained and experienced actors who have traveled from the industry's strong holds, some students partway through a training program, and others, local people whose acting experience might be limited to the time spent in one of Whitebridge Farm's classes.

Because all people working on the film are volunteering their time, the shooting is done exclusively on weekends and on Lakes Region locations. On Sunday morning, Thompson, Murphy and crew were shooting a scene in an alley on Main Street in Plymouth, one of the last several scenes to be shot before the film moves into post-production. Murphy said the company hopes to enter the film into the festival circuit beginning this fall and will later begin a distribution of the film and local screenings.

Although his career has seen him working with actors such as Robert Downing, Jr., Shirley MacLain, Kathy Bates and Keifer Sutherland, Thompson has no anxiety with working with untrained talent. The scene shot on Sunday clearly illustrated this point. While setting up a scene, Thompson approached passers by.

"Hi, I'm shooting a movie. Want to be in it?" he asked.

This proposition was accepted by Jeff Capeci and his son Bradley, up from Newtown, Conn. and visiting relatives in Plymouth. They were walking by on their way to breakfast but found themselves suddenly extras in a movie. Another surprise extra was John Solomon of Plymouth.

"This definitely made my day, this is sweet," Solomon said in between takes.

Thompson doesn't have any reservations about working with actors whom others might label amateur. "I don't really look at them as amateurs, I look at them as people further back on the learning curve," he said. Their lack of experience is made up for with hunger and enthusiasm, he said. Since the project has been progressing for many months now, he said he's seen many local volunteers become "quite proficient."

"I love their energy, their sense of professionalism. I think everyone working on this movie has a sense of ownership."

Jeff Tolstad, a recently-retired physician from Manchester, is one of the local volunteers. He's serving as Thompson's assistant on this project. Tolstad, who grew up in Los Angeles, said he was always curious about what it was like to work on a set, and appreciates the opportunity to work with Thompson, who he said maintains an "approachable, down-to-earth" demeanor and a family-like atmosphere on the set.

Also appreciative of the opportunity was Patte Sarausky, a Laconia resident and a second-grade teacher at Belmont Elementary School. She had been taking acting classes with Whitebridge and decided to volunteer to help produce "Time and Charge$".

"This is where I wanted to be. This is where you learn. This is the best class there is, being on the set," said Sarausky. "The thing I find so fascinating is the Whitebridge family, how welcoming and open they are."

Welcoming and open, but professional. The scene in the Plymouth alleyway, shot and re-shot over a couple of hours, would result in less than a minute of the final cut. Though the talent involved doesn't command the pay scales of Hollywood's elite, Thompson believes the end product can be just as good.

"I've worked with the stars, I'm getting excellent performances out of local talent," said Thompson, who sees the work that Whitebridge does as the future of film making, a future where a professional-quality movie can be shot with a digital video camera and edited on a desktop computer.

Murphy added that there's plenty more projects in store for Whitebridge and many more roles to be filled, encouraging interested people to contact the company. "If you've got a good heart and an open mind and you care about what you do, we've got a place for you," he said. More information can be found at whitebridgefarmproductions.com.

"This is paradise for me, to be here, do this work and develop this company," said Thompson, who grew up in the Lakes Region and makes his home in New Hampton.

"We're not beholden to Hollywood. We can be in the most beautiful place in the world and make movies," he said.