Filmmaker Michael Gilkison says filming his new movie, “Sandy Wedge,” at The Woodford Club and Wilson’s Pool Room in Versailles was an opportunity for him to highlight his hometown.
Those locations were also important to the plot of the film because the main character in the film, Sandy, played by Gilkison, was a really good pool player. “That’s where I put my own life into it,” he says.
It was after he started playing golf when the 2005 Woodford County High School graduate says he came up with the story idea about a golfer who putts like a pool player.
“The best writing comes from experience,” he says, adding, “There’s always a little bit of the writer in the writing.” And in this film, he acknowledges Sandy is “a lot like me,” only goofier.
His co-star in “Sandy Wedge” is Mason Pryor, the son of comedian Richard Pryor, whom Gilkison says he met while doing stand-up comedy. Both have given performances at Country Boy Brewing in Georgetown, he says.
“Sandy Wedge” will have a screening at Thoroughbred Theatre in Midway this coming Saturday at 6:30 p.m. Advance tickets are available for $25 plus tax by visiting eventbrite.com and searching for “Sandy Wedge,” or $25 at the door, if a limited number of tickets (100) are not sold out.
A portion of the ticket sales will be donated to the Wilson family, whose pool room (where Gilkison’s middle school football team ate hamburgers) was destroyed by a fire this year. He says ticket sales will also support his continued promotion of the film so it gets additional screenings. Screenings are coming up in New Orleans and Los Angeles, he says.
Growing up in Versailles, Gilkison says he loved telling stories. It was only after earning a degree in English at Georgetown College and an unsuccessful pursuit of a journalism career that he returned to his love of telling stories.
He began pursuing a filmmaking career after moving to California in 2013. “I started writing scripts and doing short films,” he remembers. He started doing stand-up comedy too.
More than anything, he wanted to get the stories he told on a page onto a screen. “So,” he says, “I started directing and producing my own stuff because then I knew it wouldn’t sit in a box” at some movie studio.
Gilkison, who has another feature film (The Finish Line) to his credit, says he moved from Kentucky because people kept telling him that he had to move to Los Angeles or New York if he wanted to pursue a career in filmmaking.
After acquiring many of the skills needed to make movies while living in California, he came home because technology allows him to make movies here while working with people – no matter where they live.
Gilkison says he embraces every opportunity to be a part of storytelling, like being a background performer – formerly called an extra – in the series “This is Us.”
Currently, he’s working on a documentary and credits having a supportive wife, Heidi, for supporting him on this journey as a filmmaker and comedian.
Gilkison, whose 9-year-old son Ambrose plays young Sandy in “Sandy Wedge,” describes stand-up comedy as “the most underrated art form.”