A comedic 'coming of age' tale, this feature film directing debut from NYU Graduate Matthew Huffman, captures the frustrations and triumphs of Generation X. Set in San Francisco, "Playing Mona Lisa" follows Claire Goldstein, a brilliant 23-year old pianist, as she graduates from the San Francisco Academy of Music. Disappointed over her rejection by the prestigious Tchaikovsky piano competition, she and her boyfriend Jeremy (ZACHARY KRANZLER) celebrate their failure by opening a bottle of champagne and he asks her to marry him. Excited, she confides the news to her friends, Sabrina (BROOKE LANGTON) and Arthur (JOHNNY GALECKI). Pinning paper hearts to herself that proclaim her answer to his proposal, a resounding and exuberant "YES!," she runs to Jeremy's apartment where he sheepishly acknowledges that he thinks that it would be best if they broke off their relationship.

Despondent, Claire retreats to her apartment but a few nights later that too is taken away from her when an earthquake rumbles through San Francisco and her building is condemned. With nowhere to turn, she is forced to take shelter in her childhood home where her neurotic family, in the midst of the chaotic preparations for her older sister's wedding, threatens her already shaky sanity.

Her sister, the tightly wound Jenine (MOLLY HAGAN) is obsessing over the color scheme for her wedding and the impending arrival, from Boston, of her fiance and his family. Her mother Sheila (MARLO THOMAS) has decided to host the engagement party at the house and is struggling to prepare authentic kosher dishes for her new in-laws. Her father, Bernie (ELLIOTT GOULD), has recently quit his job and burned down his office.

Her best friend and cousin, Sabrina, convinces her that the best remedy for a broken heart is a great party and a new attitude. Sabrina's convinced that Claire needs to learn how to play the game with men. But Claire is having a hard time getting over Jeremy despite the best efforts of her close friends Sabrina and Arthur. One night, she accidentally bumps into handsome and romantic Eddie (IVAN SERGEI). Could he be the one to woo her out of her depression and back into life?

Claire's teacher and mentor, Bennett (HARVEY FIERSTEIN) is also sympathetic to her broken heart, having had his own heart shattered by his lover not long ago. Encouraging Claire's unique talents, he tries to convince her to pursue her dreams, knowing that her passion for the piano will heal her.

As the story builds to its comic crescendo at Jenine's engagement party, Claire learns that everyone around her - Sabrina, Arthur, Alice, Jenine, Bennett, Sheila, Bernie and especially Eddie - have all been hiding behind their Mona Lisa smiles and that no one's life is as great as it seems. Claire learns that failing down is just part of the process of learning to walk.

"Playing Mona Lisa" is directed by Matthew Huffman, from a screenplay by Marni Freedman & Carlos de los Rios, based on the play "Two Goldsteins on Acid" by Marni Freedman. The film is produced by Sid, Jon and Bill Sheinberg. Executive producer is Larry Schapiro. Co-executive producers are Gerard Bocaccio and Tom Prince. Co-producer is Carlos de los Rios. The film is distributed by Buena Vista Pictures Distribution.

Origin of the Project

Writers Marni Freedman and Carlos de los Rios met and dated on and off throughout college (the USC Filmic Writing Program) but ended their relationship at the conclusion of their academic careers. Carlos remembers that a year after graduation he went to see a play called "Two Goldsteins On Acid," that Marni had written. "Watching the play I realized that the inspiration for the material was our real-life break-up," he says. "Every word had the audience laughing and every word rang of truth. I couldn't see that the play was critical of my real-life actions, all I could see was how marvelously the comedy had hit real nerves with every single attendee that night. I walked out knowing that I had to make that story into a film."

"At the time I wrote the play I was a scared girl wondering if I should keep writing, taking a chance on my dream or give up," Marni Freedman says. "The process of doing the play was totally intimidating but also powerful and life-changing. Even today I still see it as a very specific turning point in my life. I wrote about risking and then I did it, and I knew no matter what the outcome, the most important lesson I learned was to try."

Reuniting as friends, Marni and Carlos decided to adapt the play into a screenplay. "We started to meet on a regular basis to discuss the material and what could be done to make a great play also live well on screen where the requirements to keep an audience interested are different than they are onstage," Carlos says.

"We both confirmed that what we most wanted to do was tell the story of a person who loses all faith in their own personal power because of a traumatic romantic event," Carlos continues. "Furthermore we wanted to tell a story about the climb back up that hill of self-belief.

"In the play," Carlos says, "after being dumped, the lead character proceeds to stay in bed for the entire play. Characters float in and out of her room and flashback sequences allow a rich story to unfold onstage but the girl stays in bed, heartbroken until at the end she has the courage to get up and face the world. While hilarious and original onstage, we had to adapt the idea of a girl in bed to a girl who is 'in bed' in her mind as she interacts with the world. We had to start by asking, 'What are the filmic equivalents to a girl being depressed, stuck in bed with the sheets pulled over her head?' We put the fears that were spoken of by the lead in the play in to newly invented characters. This way, on film our lead would have to interact and conflict with people who represented the ideas she rolled over in her mind during the play."

"It was hard!" Marni says. "There was nothing easy about it. We took a very static play and worked it and worked it until it had movement, the way a film needs movement. Carlos was so instrumental in the process. He figured out how to take a feeling expressed only in dialogue and translate it into visual terms."

As the writers began fashioning a screenplay, many themes that were in the original play: romantic disaster, family craziness, fears about self, generational comparisons, belief in artistic ability, finding a new strength and many others became important elements for the film.

The play had accomplished two important things. First, it set the tone for the screenplay. That, the screenwriters acknowledge, is the hardest thing to find on any new project; the specific tone that will balance comedy -with tragedy. Secondly, the play innately had imbedded deep in its core a dual theme: On the surface there is a semi-feminist statement about women not needing men to define themselves. A statement that says, "Love will come ladies, but know and respect yourself first if you want to have any chance of making that relationship work when it does come along."

Simultaneously, the play was totally universal and had nothing to do with women at all on its deepest core level. It could be viewed as specific to one group's needs and desires but it was also totally universal and above any simple classification. The play and the film, ultimately are about any person, regardless of gender, who has ever gone on an emotional rollercoaster ride through hell and had to claw their own way back to a healthy belief in themselves.

"New themes, which were not originally in the play, also began to emerge as we wrote the screenplay," Carlos says. "For instance, the characters of Sabrina and Bennett were not in the play; two very important characters that the film's structure relies on both thematically and plotwise. Sabrina allowed us to look at different versions of women's responses to the importance of men in terms of defining themselves. Other characters let us add more layers to the story than were originally there but we always kept the play's main themes in mind and let them guide us, even in to new territory."

It should also be mentioned that Marni Freedman and Carlos de los Rios got back together romantically somewhere around the time they were tossing around the idea of adapting the play to film. "By the time we were working on the material we were a couple, again," Carlos says. "It was pure absurdity, writing every day about our break-up while moving in together and getting more deeply involved romantically. On paper we looked like hell but in real life we looked rosy! It made more than a few of our friends and family members laugh to think of us together writing about all the nasty, spiteful places you go mentally after a break-up only to end the night snuggling up together."

That aspect hasn't changed. The couple is getting married in April.

Sid Sheinberg created The Bubble Factory in 1995 after leaving MCA/Universal as president and chief operating officer. He formed the company with his sons, Jon and Bill, to make the type of films they themselves enjoyed watching. The decision to produce and finance "Playing Mona Lisa" was made because, as Sid succinctly says, "It deals with many generations moving on with their lives. It's truly a film with universal appeal."

Freedman originally saw the story as being specifically aimed at "twentysomethings," about the "awakening that occurs for all young people some time in their life." She and de los Rios were both surprised to find that the story had resonance with many different ages. Sheinberg noted that, "Angst is a passage of life that's true of all generations."

"I will always be thankful to Sid," says playwright/screenwriter Marni Freedman. "He gave us our first break. He is very honest and on the level. And he cared very deeply about this project."

Carlos de los Rios echoes his partner's sentiments. "It was a dream to be discovered by the man who discovered Spielberg. What else can I say? From top to bottom it was a dream come true. I had to remind myself that this was all real many times! Sid is a very intelligent producer. He's really sharp with story notes and was very respectful to us. We changed very little from script to screen. That's due to both Matthew [Huffman] and Sid."

Director Matthew Huffman came to the attention of the Sheinbergs through his short film "Secret Santa," which had won him a student Academy AwardÒ while he was at New York University. Although he'd originally been developing another project with The Bubble Factory, he was riveted when "Playing Mona Lisa" was passed to him. He immediately called Sheinberg and told him that he wanted to make the film. He and Sheinberg both agreed that this coming of age story had universal appeal and is not strictly the provenance of Generation X. The production, too, encompassed this diversity.

"It's good to have wise men like Sid Sheinberg and young geniuses like director Matthew Huffman on a project," notes Marlo Thomas (who stars as Claire's mother Sheila Goldstein).

Elliott Gould, who portrays Claire's father, Bernie, summed it up when he called "Playing Mona Lisa" "a labor of love for all."

This universal theme, along with the strong writing, was instrumental in attracting a wide range of actors to the project. Alicia Witt immediately related to the character of Claire. "It's amazing how the script is about my own life, my moments of crisis and hesitation about not knowing what to do with my life and feeling like if I spent too much time in limbo life might pass me by," says Witt.

Harvey Fierstein echoes her sentiments, finding in his character Bennett, the music teacher who offers Claire advice about playing both instruments, the piano and the heart, the "complexity of emotion that made him soar above the onedimensional."

"Alicia is phenomenal," says Marni Freedman. "Her performance was so dead-on perfect. It's amazing when you write a scene and then an actor nails it. I had the experience of wanting to hug her after many takes and just tell her, 'you did it!"

"We'd seen her on 'Cybill' and thought she was the character we'd written," adds Carlos. "We knew she could do this part and when she got to the set she went beyond what was on the page. She's also a sweet person and an amazing pianist."

The multi-talented Alicia Witt played every piece of piano music in the film. In between takes she would often entertain the crew by playing songs and compositions on the piano. The head of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, the school where several scenes were filmed, had his students watch the shoot while Alicia played piano as a way to show how a top-notch piano talent approaches the keyboard.

The most complex character was Eddie, played by Ivan Sergei. As Sergei puts it, "Eddie is four guys, has three names, two women and one bad hair day." It's a potent metaphor for the different masks all the characters wear and a veritable challenge that excited all the actors who signed on.

The city of San Francisco offers a perfect setting for this film about leaping from one part of life to another. As well as its beautiful landscapes: picturesque Fort Mason, where the Goldstein family home is located, the Palace of Fine Arts and the Arboretum in Golden Gate Park, theatrically romantic settings for Eddie's carefully staged courtship of Claire, for example, it is also a city of contrasts and change. Boasting a modern downtown, in sharp juxtaposition to its older historical areas, industrial pockets softened by the breathtaking Golden Gate Bridge and the tranquility of the Bay, it is, as Alicia Witt calls it, "A cross between New York and Los Angeles, but not as uptight as the two."

The city is a major entry and departure point for people traveling all over the country; it is, as director Huffman puts it, "a gateway city. A big city with a small town feel, not easily categorized and not easily known, a West Coast city easily loved by Easterners to whom it feels familiar, constantly changing and reinventing itself. It is the perfect setting for a story about moving on with one's life and coming to terms with the conflicts inherent within each of us."