Best Scene Reading of IT TAKES BALLS by Charley Scalies

Watch the Best Scene of IT TAKES BALLS:

CAST LIST:

NARRATOR – Sean Ballantyne
CHAPPIE – Jason Martorino
TRESA – Meghan Allen

Get to know writer Charley Scalies:

1. What is your screenplay about?

[Charley Scalies] A honey badger of a housewife leads her husband’s Runyonesque friends in an
unholy scam targeting a political powerhouse threatening her family’s livelihood.

2. Why should this script be made into a movie?

It will appeal to both men and women from their 30’s to 80’s

For the men – Set in the early 1950s it involves a South Philly pool hall that is a front for illegal gambling. Its denizens include a Parish priest who gambles on the “ponies” based on tips he gets from ????, a blind numbers writer, a deaf bookie, a bear of a slow-witted young man who always seems to have the right solution to every problem based on movies he’s seen and poolhall owner who adores his wife but enjoys winding her up.

For the over-40 ladies, it’s about a middle aged couple who are devoted to one another.

For the ladies with a feminist bent, Tressa, the wife, my protagonist, ……..well rather than explain her I’ll tell you what she says to Chappie, her husband

TRESSA
That’s why I love you. You let me protect you.

CHAPPIE
Oh Gesu, here it comes. I’m a man. You’re just a woman. You’re gonna protect me?

TRESSA
You’re not a man. You’re “just a man”. And God gives “just a man” what, at most, two balls? But I’m not “just a woman”. I’m a wife and a mother. You know what that means, huh, “just a man”?

CHAPPIE
I got a feeling I’m gonna find out.

TRESSA
Means God gave me more than enough balls for the whole Goddamned family.

Think Cheers meets The Sting

3. How long have you been writing stories?

2 ½ years

4. What movie have you seen the most in your life?

At my age there are two answers 1. Many 2. I can’t remember them all.

5. What artists would you love to work with?

Joe Mantegna & Vinny Guastaferro (again)*
Chris Bauer (again) *
Danny DeVito
Jim Gandolfini (again – but I’m not terribly anxious to see him any time soon)*
Christopher Walken
Sally Fields
Joe Conklin

* DEMOS AVAILABLE AT HTTP://WWW.IMDB.ME/CHARLEYSCALIES

6. How many stories/screenplays have you written?

This is it. In the planning since 1993. In the writing since 2012.

7. What motivated you to write this screenplay?

a. I was born above that poolhall. Tressa was my mother. Chappie was my father. The denizens are an amalgam of the men who “played and plied” there.

b. I love a good (real) love story as much as I like to laugh

c. The idea for my screenplay, It Takes Balls, has been germinating for over 20 years. I outlined it to screenwriter Joseph Stefano,(Black Orchid, Psycho and Two Bits) while on the set of Two Bits, my first film. He encouraged me – no challenged me – to write it. I regret that he passed before I had the chance to say, “Look Joe, I did it”. I think he knows, anyway.

8. Describe your process; do you have a set routine, method for writing?

No set routine. Write, learn, rewrite, repeat.

9. Apart from writing, what else are you passionate about?

My family

10. What influenced you to enter the WILDsound Festival?

The opportunity to hear parts of it performed by professional actors

11. Any advice or tips you’d like to pass on to other writers?

I’ll pass along Joe Stefano’s advice. When I told him the idea for my story he said, “Go write it.”
“But I’m not a screenwriter”
His response, “You will be when you write it.”