Local boy makes good in feature film shooting in the Springs
On the big screen, Los Angeles fills in for locales around the world -- and even the universe. In the upcoming feature film “A Tale of Two Sillies,” Colorado Springs will be standing in for Los Angeles.
Shooting on this feature film, which stars Cheyenne Mountain High School graduate Daniel Sobieray, begins in December and will run about six weeks. Locations include South Tejon Street and the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs campus.
"For me, it's a two-parter," he says. "I get to be home with my family and spend eight weeks here. And I get to bring back something to the community that helped me so much."
The movie, a “Breakfast Club”-like comedy, was originally going to be filmed in Los Angeles, but the cost of filming in the entertainment capital was prohibitive. Denver was the next locale considered, but when Sobieray became attached to the project about six weeks ago, he suggested Colorado Springs.
Shooting in While Colorado Springs has been home to many of reality show television shots and commercial filming, feature films are less frequent, says to Amy Long, vice president of marketing and membership for the Convention and Visitors Bureau and a film liaison for the Colorado Springs Film Commission. Depending on the length of the shoot, Long says the economic impact can be great -- as much as $12,000 a day injected into the local economy.
Sobieray, who graduated in 2002, wasn’t a drama club kid when he attended high school. He was on the hockey team, which won the state championship his senior year. After graduation, Sobieray attended Michigan Technological University, where he continued his hockey career.
“I was all jock and sports,” he says. “If you had told me I would be putting on makeup and doing theater and acting, I would have laughed at you.”
But that changed when he was asked to do some fitness modeling in 2005.
“At first I was terrified that my hockey player friends would tear me apart,” Sobieray recalls. “But it was the opposite. They used my modeling to get girls.”
After finishing his degree in finance, the fitness modeling turned to runway and editorial modeling with such clients as Ray Ban, Calvin Klein and Hugo Boss. He spent time living in Madrid and Tokyo. In 2010, he was offered a role on the now-defunct soap opera “All My Children.”
Sobieray, who is one of six siblings, now lives in Los Angeles, and is happy to be home in the Springs to shoot “A Tale of Two Sillies.”
The film is set in 1994 and focuses on a group of upper-class college students (UCCS will be transported to the beach and the coffee shop on Tejon Street will be across the street from campus, thanks to the magic of post production). And yes, there are more than a few nods to Charles Dickens’ “A Tale of Two Cities.” Even the spelling of Sobieray’s character's name, Yendis Notrac, is a jumble of the Dickens’ character Sydney Carton.
For Sobieray, shooting in Colorado Springs is about more than just being able to spend time with his family. It’s giving back to the community that helped him succeed.
“When you go up, you want to send that elevator back down,” he says. “It’s an obligation to others.”
