HOWELINGS
In search of financing for ‘Inevitable Harm’
Jenna Stauffer, host and producer of KEYTV’s “Good Morning Key West with Jenna Stauffer,” us about the origins of the documentary film, “Inevitable Harm,” that she’s producing with Paul Hardt:
“I was volunteering with a life skills and writing class at the Monroe County Detention Center,” she recalls, “when I met Tamara for the first time. She was one of the inmates in the class and, to me, she didn’t look like she belonged.
“Knowing so little about her, I became drawn to Tamara each week as she’d share her writing and her poetry, filled with pain and loss. I knew she had a story. And after her release from jail, I found out she had a backstory a mile wide and just as deep.”
“Inevitable Harm” tells the true tale of how a law-abiding woman, one sunny afternoon in 2008, without prior knowledge of wrongdoing, was handcuffed by police and arrested in front of her children at a local hotel. Also arrested was her fiancé, Richard. Subsequently, 20 charges were filed against the couple.
For decades, an independent and idealistic Tamara had longed for The American dream: A family, being a soccer mom, owning a home with white picket fence and a minivan in the garage. But after completing graduate school and earning her third degree came a divorce. As a single mother with three young children, her life just hadn’t worked out as she’d planned. Enter Richard, a charmer seeking stimulation and a woman he could capture. Richard absorbed Tamara’s identity and her values and he toyed with her hopes.
“Inevitable Harm,” scripted by screenwriter Sandra L. Brown, unveils the dangers that come to someone caught in relationship with a disordered spouse, all the sorrows and the emotional trauma that come from the crossfire of antisocial behaviors and an incessant need for control and drama.
Within six years they’d been arrested six times, in 2013 it for false identification.
The film shows the daily chaos and controlling behaviors of their life on the road and Tamara’s horror in losing her children. But it is also a story of self-discovery, of Tamara’s amazing inner-resilience and ultimately her desire to excel.
One third of the film is already shot and Paul and Jenna are seeking financial support through Kickstarter to bring it to completion. “Our story is a universal tale of the human condition and we can all relate to on some level,” says Jenna.
To view a stunningly professional promotional trailer featuring the remarkable Tamara herself, visit www.kickstarter.com and search for Inevitable Harm. You’ll be amazed.
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This year’s New York Botanical Garden’s Orchid Show —its 12th annual and now the largest of its kind in the nation — was held at the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory in the Bronx and called “Key West Contemporary.”
Billed as a “mosaic of classic and exotic orchids in a design inspiration taking its cues from a modernist Key West estate garden,” the weekend show featured events and activities meant to “capture the artistic and cultural appeal of the Keys” along with a curated poetry walk.
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Chip Phillips has died. He was 67. Officially called George Phillips. Jr., he was fondly and widely known in Key West simply as Chip, a regular contributor to our town’s alternative press and a fixture as a bartender and at work in the downtown Fusto’s and at BO’s Fishwagon at the Bight. He could also be found at Key West Island Books, Heron Books and the Haitian Art Company.
Born in Pittsfield, Mass., Chip worked at the Fall River Herald newspaper and was co-publisher and editor of Brattleboro’s bi-weekly First Issue paper as well as the owner of a deli.
He left behind many friends from his years in Key West and we will miss him.
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Joke from up north:
Snowmen fall from Heaven unassembled.
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Quote for the Week:
“It is not because things are difficult that we do not dare.
“It is because we do not dare that they are difficult.”
— Seneca
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