SYNOPSIS

THE WEDDING WEEKEND is a warm spirited comedy about a group 30-something college friends who haven't quite grown up. Fifteen years later they reunite at a friend's wedding. During a long weekend , the men reflect on how their lives have progressed -- and in some cases, regressed --since their college heyday.

The movie opens in flashback with the group in peak form, singing at their senior concert in 1991. With the naiveté of their “ivory tower” view, they all fully expect to become masters of their chosen fields. In present day New York City, however, life has not gone entirely as planned. David is far from the software entrepreneur he envisioned and instead is taking calls from computer illiterates as a technical support supervisor. Richard – while a successful trademark attorney – is fresh off a divorce from a woman who, it turns out, no one ever liked in the first place. Will makes ends meet as a recording studio lackey while he struggles to make it as an actor. And Ted, an uptight businessman whose wife frequently reminds him that making money is his only talent, is about to lose his job.

When fellow singer Greg announces he’s getting married on Long Island and wants the group to sing at the wedding, a plan is set in motion to rehearse for a long weekend at the family beach house of Spooner, the iconoclastic, Zen-like member of the group. Steven – the one member considered “successful” by the others – is recruited from LA where he produces TV, including his latest venture: a reality show about “Wheel of Fortune” hostess Vanna White.

At the weekend house, we meet the significant others: Ted’s very-outspoken wife Trish, whose raging lust isn’t helping with Ted’s stress; David’s grounded wife Dana, who longs for her husband to grow out of his extended adolescence and agree to have children; Will’s new girlfriend, Julep, a smart and funny woman whom everyone assumes is a beard for Will’s latent homosexuality; and Steven’s Hollywood wife Michelle who turns out to be not quite as Type A as she seems. And then there’s Elsa, Steven and Michelle’s twenty-three year old Swedish nanny, who brings out the worst of the men’s post-adolescent behavior and pre-mid-life angst. The group has always been obsessed with a fear of aging and of running out of time to achieve their lofty goals, and Elsa’s voluptuous presence is like a neon sign that points to their ebbing hairlines.

One bar room brawl, nostalgic skinny dip, near death experience, surprising sex fantasy, and miraculously salvaged wedding later, these lifelong friends have readjusted their perspective. In the end, they raise their voices in song to what’s good and true in their lives.

THE WEDDING WEEKEND

The independent film is written, directed, and produced by Bruce Leddy. Eliza Steel is the Co-Producer. Cinematography is by Clyde Smith. Bill DeRonde is the Editor.

Renowned Casting Director Avy Kaufman -- whose credits include such recent films as Brokeback Mountain, Syriana, and Capote -- worked with director Leddy to assemble a cast capable of delivering the comedy and handling the unique demands of a cappella singing. The cast features some of New York’s finest actors including: David Harbour, a 2005 Tony Nominee for “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf;” Molly Shannon of “Saturday Night Live” and the upcoming Sofia Coppola film Marie Antoinette; Mark Feuerstein of In Her Shoes, What Women Want, and “The West Wing;” Reg Rogers of Analyze That, Runaway Bride, and I Shot Andy Warhol…; David Alan Basche, from Universal Pictures’ acclaimed United 93 and Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds; and Elizabeth Reaser, who starred in Sweetland, Puccini for Beginners, and The Family Stone.

Leddy was inspired to make the film by his experiences singing with the Williams (College) Octet and an alumni group in New York City called The Lemmings. The bonds formed over months of rehearsals, road trips, and performances proved to be some of the most enduring in his life. “When you’re singing in a group that’s blending together, finding your place in the chord, it’s almost an out of body experience,” explains Leddy. “I wanted the audience to feel what that’s like both by hearing the incredible music these guys can produce and by seeing how strong their friendships are. The music connects them.”

The group in the film has discovered that life doesn’t play out quite as smoothly as they thought it would when they left their collegiate ivory tower. “I decided that the Denis Leary ditty ‘Life’s Gonna Suck When You Grow Up,’ was this crowd’s anthem,” says Leddy, “because we’re finding them at the particular moment that comes to all of us when you discover you actually have to make some hard choices to become a real grown up. Many of these characters are at a bend in the road, and the movie is about how they navigate it, with the help of the women in their lives as well as each other.

It was filmed in New York City and in the Hamptons on Long Island. The film premiered at the HBO U.S. Comedy Arts Festival in Aspen where it won the Audience Award/Best Feature. It also won the Audience Award/Best Feature at the Rhode Island International Film Festival, and the Breckenridge Film Festival, and the Best Indie Comedy at the Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival.