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Show Studios Producing Film On Joseph Smith, Gold Plates BYU Continued from page S The main scenes, however, focus on e?fsrts rf mnhctor to sfpal thp nlatps which they have heard are made of gold and therefore will be valuable; on the hiding of the plates in the barrel of beans; on Martin Harnss pleading to borrow the manuscript and on his losing it and subsequent events. All this is being told in a film being made with the professionalism of any Hollywood production and yet with the simplistic honesty that marks a work done with a worthy purpose by those w ho believe in its objective. The production will combine scenes taken in Palmyra and those made lot of the BYU Motion on the Picture Department, according to W. 0. Whitaker, producer-directoWe are spending 18 shooting days on this film, he explained r. And some of these days have lasted more than 10 hours, interjected Brother Whitakers young assistant, Dave Jacobs, whose job it is to keep order on the set and see there is no noise when the cast rehearses or shoots. We havent worked just in the daytime, either. One time we were out on the lot at 3:1b a m. back of the Harmony, Pa., home. Thats when the renegades were surrounding the house. It was eerie, but we wanted it to be real. Brother Jacobs then described the mobsters skulking about in the trees and although it was a hot afternoon when we visited the set, we could feel goose pimples as Dave told about the scene. The 18 shooting days for the film, which will be distributed throughout the church and possibly on television stations, compares to the week or 10 days a similar production might take tor television. Usually an hour show will take a week or two, and the usual shooting r schedule for a series is about five days a segment. Under the watchful eye of Brother half-hou- Whitaker, who spent years at Disney Studios in Hollywood, the cast of profesand amateur sional, performers is recreating tme significant period in church history. Casting was an especially exacting task. Peter Johnson, the energetic castWe tested an ing director, explained: average of 12 persons for each role. The most difficult aspect of the casting was to match nine persons for the family of the Prophet. They had to look like a family. 1 auditioned all over Utah. We have three professional members in the cast. That is people from Hollywood. We looked all over Utah for someone who looked like Joseph Smith. Finally, we chose David Westberg, a young actor who has been in such movies as Tora, Tora, Tora and such television productions as Mod Squad. He has wavy blond hair, and a handsome, seiious face. His nose might not have the angular proportions seen in many of the Prophets pictures, but he has the same piercing eyes and handsome qualities. The role of Martin Harris is being taken by Eric Server who has performed on many southern California stages and been in such television productions as Streets of San Francisco, Mod Squad, Ironside, General Hospital, Mission: Impossible, The Rookies and ABC Movie of the Week. He also will be seen in the coming movie, Westworld and has done such commercials as the one for Ajax. Louise Fitch, a veteran actress from Medical Center, The Partridge Family, Bonanza, Bold Ones, Dragnet, Ben Casey and General Hospital and from such movies as They Shoot Horses, Dont They? is playing Lucy Mack Smith. Judith Olauson, well known for her performances in many Utah stage productions, has the meaty role of Lucy Harris. Others in the cast include Elizabeth Cannon, Charles Parker, Rod Bean, Joseph Walker, Tim Slover, Rebecca Nibley, Cathy Britsch, Brien Smith, Don Balesirero, Don Oborn, Coleman Creel, Rich Stephen Crscroft, Pat Matevia, Lucile Wheeler, Norman Lovendale and 1UU1 I1C. Some have had extensive local acting experience in local productions; others are amateurs. Douglas Stewart, BYU graduate, has researched the written carefully in producis film While the screenplay. tion he has been dividing his time between visits to BYU for checking on any needed revisions and the Oklahoma location of the movie, Where the Red Fern Grows, which he has adapted fiom the prize-winnin- g play. Grant Keate, a member of the church, left his Hollywood studio makeup duties to take over that job on the BYU production. for Bob Stum, cinematographer church films for 17 years, has the job of production manager. He has had an important role in such BYU productions as The Three WitWindows of Heaven, nesses and Mans Search for Happiness." Research for authenticity has involved writers, the art department, construction, makeup and wardrobe as well as cooperation from townspeople, according to Brother Johnson. He pointed to rooms of the Smith house that were measured to size and then constructed on the BYU sound stage. A replica of the Smith home was built in a field a couple of blocks from the sound stage. We think it Iooks more like the Smith home did when the Prophet lived there than the remodeled It had no one, said Brother Johnson. porch. We have no porch And the area behind we were careful there. We have trees, the same kind as behind the home at Harmony. Our photographers were careful not to get in the mountains back of BYU, said Brother Jacobs. Authentic table cloths were provided by a sewing class under Prof. Elizabeth Long shot shows Joseph Smith praying in grove. two-stor- y ... Liechty, and Max Alleman and Wayne Beesley of Provo supplied muzzle-loadin- g rifles. But the main feature of the production is that it will preserve on film a reenactment of an era in the church that was both black the loss of the 167 pages of manuscript and the mobs and inspiring with words of the Prophet near the end: I have learned there is a price to free agency. And when a man obeys the voice of the Lord and the whispering of His spirit, he will always be blessed and upheld. 7 Students, Teacher Pen Tribute to Pres. Continued from page 3 Steve Goldsmith, WTiittier, Calif.; Linda Sue Burr, Houston, Texas, and Jean Bradshaw, Gilmer, Texas. The students met with their instructor in her office that afternoon. We sat and stared at each other, becoming progressively more awed by the job ahead of us, Sister Jenkins related. After a while we talked a little more seriously, and decided that the only way to approach the calling was on our knees. We decided that we would have to be humbled to be inspired, and we knew that a fast was the only way to become that humble. ' We knelt in prayer, and Brent, who was called to be leader of the group, committed us to a fast, Sister Jenlans said. The students and Sister Jenkins fasted for 24 hours. 24 hours of enduring some of the greatest temptations tc break a fast that any of us has ever endured, she said. And with the beginning of that fast that came some of the most inspiring any individual of the group will ever witness. The group reconvened the next day at 4 p m. and until 1 a m. As problems were wrote for nine hours It was mini-miracl- RCH WEEK ENDING NOVEMBER 3, 197? faced, the group knelt in prayer, seeking inspiration for the right words. Doors were opened for us during that first meeting. Prayers were answered, silent testimonies were borne, and the spirit was a powerful influence upon us as we wrote, Sister Jenkins related. They met again the next day at 2 p.m., thinking that all that was before them was to merely review the copy and approve it. But, Sister Jenkins explained, they had lost much of the spirit of inspiration that accompanied them the previous day. We found we couldnt write. The words that we produced had no meaning for the tribute. It was as if our powers of creativity had been completely stripped from us We struggled in vain for six hours, getting nowhere, she explained. We felt the unbased fear of frustration give way to the oppressive spirit of contention. Sister Jenkins said after the group had humbled itself sufficiently, the spirit returned and they were able to finish the tribute at four oclock the next morning. The tribute was given to President Lee at the homecoming devotional assembly by Steve Flint, student body president. It read, in part: Lee As sons and daughters of the living God, we stand united in tribute to the living prophet. Since Eden, God has called His chosen servants men of faith and wisdom who rise above the sins of the world by mastering themselves, their lives perfected in virtue by earthly trial; so are prophets raised up in the necessity of time to join this line of inspired men. not leadPeople of all nations cry for leadership ership of oppression or bondage, but the divine leadership of Christs church, where men are foreordained to lead Gods children from sin into celestial glory. That leadership requires years of preparation and celestial refinement. For possession of those keys of peace in this last dispensation of time, the keys that unlock modern miracles and usher in Christs millennial reign, a man must lie chastened of God. "Called from the simplicity of farms and fields to stand in the upper rooms of the temple, where the veil is thinnest, comes such a man, whose life is a testimony that speaks the praises of God. This is a man who is inmore than a man, a man bearing Israels prophetic heritance, one of Gods choicest sons. "Thanks be to God that we live in a prophets time, when his Inspired leadership draws us closer to standing in those holy places where we prayerfully await Christ's ' second coming " |