A few years ago, Andy Pratt ’04 had finished his first full-length screenplay, something he’d wanted to do since his days at Minnesota Law. He had finally carved out the time for his passion, which led him to this moment: a “table read” with three other 2004 Minnesota Law classmates, including David Asp, Anthony Sanders, and Chris Martin, along with their spouses.
“My original goal was to write a full-length screenplay, get my friends to read it, and we’d enjoy it,” Pratt says. “Then I’ll move on, and that’ll be out of my system.”
The reception to “Too Perfect,” the moniker Asp gave to the screenplay, was extremely positive, with the laughs landing where Pratt hoped they would.
Then Asp, who had encouraged Pratt to finish the screenplay, asked, “Why don’t we just make it?”
Nearly three years later, after the full-length screenplay was turned into a short script, the 12-and-a-half-minute dark comedy is a reality. When they started the project, neither Pratt, a lawyer at the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency, nor Asp, a litigator at Lockridge Grindal Nauen, had any filmmaking experience. What they did have was a 25-year friendship, an entertaining screenplay, and a network of collaborators, including Minnesota Law alumni, dedicated to making a movie.
The Premise
Pratt and Asp met as congressional interns in Washington, D.C., applied to law school, and later became roommates in Minneapolis. Their production company, Seward Square Productions, is named after the address of the D.C. apartment where their friendship began.
Pratt had carried screenplay ideas around in his head for years, but law school, family, and his career took priority.
“I never thought I had the time to engage in this hobby,” says Pratt. “I had a few ideas, but I just let them sort of languish for many years, as other things were front and center.”
When he finally sat down to write, “Too Perfect” was born. A fan of the Coen brothers, whose “The Big Lebowski” he cites as a personal favorite, Pratt crafted a dark comedy about an average guy with a beautiful, devoted girlfriend. The problem is that he doesn’t want to commit to the relationship, so he enlists the help of a reformed pastor with a shady past. Of course, things don’t quite go as planned.
“My favorite movies are comedic in nature,” Pratt says. “For me, a comedy has to have something deeper. The darkness brings out the laughter for me.”
Asp adds, “I like the quirkiness of this one. The way the absurdity pieces together throughout the film is so funny, and it allows you to step back and think about it, too.”
On Set
Pratt took on the role of writer and director, while Asp signed on as executive producer. Early in the process, the two turned to Jud Nichols ’13, a Twin Cities criminal defense attorney and independent filmmaker, for advice. He urged them to consider making it a short instead of a feature film. Pratt was initially opposed.
“If you’re training for a marathon, why run a half-marathon?” Pratt recalls thinking.
Eventually, Pratt and Asp agreed that a short could be made well on a modest budget, but a feature couldn’t, at least not without cutting corners that would be noticeable. Asp pushed from the start to make the film look and sound professional.
“It can’t look like a home video,” Pratt remembers him saying. That standard would shape every choice they made.
Asp’s sister, Sarah, who has a theater background, signed on as a producer and ran casting. Hundreds of actors submitted for the three leads. For the classroom scene, she recruited young actors from the Mankato theater community. Pratt and Asp’s own children appear as extras.
Asp handled all the contracts for the cast and crew and negotiated a license with Guns N’ Roses’ attorneys to use one of the band’s songs in the closing scene. To keep costs down, the production hired local musicians to record a cover instead of licensing the original and tweaked a few lyrics.
Pratt built the three-day shooting schedule that included filming at an apartment in the North Loop of Minneapolis, Luce Line Brewing in Plymouth, and a Rosemount fire station, which was used as both a classroom and a hospital room.
Along the way, Asp and Pratt discovered a supportive film community willing to help bring the short to life.
“People signed on to help us just because they wanted to see it happen,” says Asp. “We were two outsiders, so it was cool to have that experience. We started calling people randomly and meeting with them. Then we’d ask them who else we should meet with. And that’s how we got all these people on board.”
Final Cut
In late February, Pratt and Asp hosted a private screening at Luce Line, where more than 110 friends, family, and supporters showed up. Since then, they’ve submitted “Too Perfect” to more than 20 festivals. It was recently screened at the inaugural Long Island Cinema Festival, where it picked up four nominations, including one for Best Screenplay.
Pratt describes the experience as “surreal.”
“One of the things early on we talked about was if this was even feasible,” says Asp. “It’s shown me it’s possible to do this while I have a career, and it’s not always clear that you can do that.”
“Too Perfect” isn’t a one-off. Pratt has written a second full-length screenplay that he’s currently shopping around.
“Our production company is Seward Square Productions,” he says. “That’s plural, so we’re going to have to do another one.”