Coon Rapids area teacher touts screenplay at Sundance Film Festival
Like a happy wanderer, Jesse Hendrickson travels along life’s winding road, watching stories unfold and meeting fascinating characters along the way.
Sometimes those stories are his own, the lead character he himself. Other times, Hendrickson is simply a bystander, witnessing the joy and celebration, tragedy and pain of another.
Those stories accompany Hendrickson like faithful companions as he travels life’s highways and now, one of those stories has taken on a life of its own.
You see, Hendrickson co-wrote a screenplay several months ago, entered it into the Smashcut! Screenplay Contest and was named 2011 Smashcut! Overall Winner out of some 600 entrants.
The prize: a trip to last month’s Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, with an opportunity to hobnob with writers and producers, directors and film makers.
“There are so many stories… I knew I wanted to write something. First I wanted to write a children’s book, then I thought about writing a screenplay and that’s when I called my mom,” said Hendrickson, an Adams Elementary School, Coon Rapids, special education teacher whose mother is the author of a few screenplays herself. See more in Sue Austreng’s ABC Newspapers feature.
