Sundance Filmmaker Blog: Coley Sohn, Boutonniere

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I don’t think I’ll ever forget when I found out my short Boutonniere got in. It was the night before Thanksgiving, 6:00 p.m., and my girlfriend and I had a delivery menu out, ready to order some Thai food. The phone rang and when I checked the caller ID, it said Sundance Institute. My heart stopped. I looked up at my special lady friend and told her it was Sundance. I’m not sure how well swearing goes over on this thing, but she proceeded to recite a long string of “No f***ing ways!”

I picked up and Shorts Programmer Kim Yutani introduced herself, although I totally missed that part cause my mind was already going in a thousand different directions. I asked her if she called to wish me a happy Thanksgiving and she said yes, that they call all 5,600 shorts applicants just to extend their hopes of each and every one of us having a nice holiday. We riffed on that for a minute or two but I really don’t remember the rest of the ten that we spoke. All I know is that I put my hand in an armpit after hanging up and discovered I was dripping in sweat. The rest of the night, I was so scared to go to sleep because I didn’t want to wake up and have the whole thing be this amazing dream that I’d recount to my girlfriend.

This is my first time at Sundance. I’m actually a first time director. I’ve got a pretty nice sized posse joining me including my girlfriend who wrote and sang the song in our closing credits, my producer, executive producers, composer, casting director, lead actress and a few extremely supportive friends to boot. Okay, the sun’s going down and my impatient dog is wagging his tail in my face, reminding me about his evening hike. Tomorrow’s gonna be all about figuring out if my snowboard will fit in the cab to the airport and how much the airlines is gonna charge to check three big boxes of swag.

These are good problems to have!

Sohn’s Boutonniere premieres tonight at 11:30 p.m. at the Prospector Square Theatre; click here for additional screening times.