Eva Gordon HMS '00 (Producer, PLAY THE GAME)

By Sean O'Rourke MAT '68

Filmmakers come from diverse backgrounds: acting, cinematography, writing, film school. Eva Gordon HMS '00 has a different background. She earned a PhD in chemistry at the University of Wisconsin, spent two years as a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard Medical School, and married an MBA. With a background like that, who would have thought that the first movie she executive produced, PLAY THE GAME, starring Andy Griffith and Doris Roberts, would be in selected theaters on August 28th?

It all began in business school where Eva’s future husband, Marc Fienberg, had trouble developing enthusiasm for straight line amortization schedules and depreciation rules. After graduation, he bought a round-the-world plane ticket, hoping to come back from his trip with a script for a movie. On one night of the trip he woke up with an idea for a romantic comedy and wrote an outline of what would become PLAY THE GAME.

Inspired by his grandfather, who lost his wife and resumed dating at the age of eighty-nine, the film is about an octogenarian widower who receives instructions on the dating game from his grandson. Then when the grandson meets the girl of his dreams and strikes out, grandpa does the instructing.

In the meantime, Eva and Marc rekindled their college romance, got engaged and prepared to settle down in their hometown of Chicago. But Boston pulled Eva back to a job at a pharmaceutical company started by one of her former colleagues at the Medical School. They moved to Boston right after getting married.

While Eva focused on discovering new drugs, Marc worked in strategy consulting. He also honed his writing skills with Harvard Square Scriptwriters, a group that met in the Square before the rent went up. Soon the screenplay was a family project.

It became clear that if the film were to be made, it would be faster to raise the money in Hollywood. So Eva and her husband quit their jobs and moved to Los Angeles, arriving with two suitcases and a six-month-old baby girl. Family and friends called the move “risky” and “irresponsible.” They were probably right.

While her husband raised money, Eva worked on casting and scouting locations. Andy Griffith was the first choice for the male lead. At first he declined, but when he could not stop thinking about the script, he called back to accept. Eva then helped recruit Doris Roberts from Everybody Loves Raymond and Liz Sheridan who played Jerry Seinfeld’s mother in the eponymous sit com. Paul Campbell of Battlestar Galactica plays the grandson and Marla Sokoloff of The Practice is his one true love.

The shoot took twenty-five days at locations in and around Los Angeles. Despite being nine months pregnant, Eva was on the set every day. Four days before the end of photography she started having contractions on set, and like any committed executive producer, she told her husband that since this was their third child but their first film, she could get to the hospital on her own and he could just come after filming was finished for the day. Luckily the contractions turned out to be a false alarm. The baby arrived safely ten days later.

After post-production and festivals, Eva and her husband test marketed the film in Florida. Because of their non-existent advertising budget, many in the industry expected the film to play for a week. But because of a huge grassroots marketing effort, which included Eva speaking to theater audiences for weeks to introduce the trailer, the film surprised everyone. It played for three months for over 60,000 people, earned $370,000 in box office and became one of the top five independently distributed films of 2009.

With four small children at home, Eva stays busy. While continuing to promote the film, she also writes scientific papers and is working on a text book. In addition she and her husband have almost finished raising money for a new family comedy and are also beginning to produce and direct television commercials because of their strong business background.

On August 28th PLAY THE GAME opened at selected theaters coast to coast. For more information visit www.playthegamemovie.com.