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The How To Be filmmakers have announced their U.S. Screening tour! 

Last month we mentioned that the cast and crew of How To Be would be taking the film on the road in the U.S. this spring, and now we’re thrilled to announce the schedule!

The tour will kick-off on the west coast with Oliver Irving (writer/director) and Joe Hastings (composer) at the Las Vegas International Film Festival on 10 April. Mike Pearce (Nikki) and Johnny White (Ronny) will meet up with them in Florida on 17 April, and together the four will work their way up and around the east coast, bringing the film to festivals and special cinema screenings in cities from Florida to Massachusetts. Festival tickets will be available soon through each festival website, and tickets for special tour screenings can be purchased directly through each theatre beginning this Wednesday 18 March.

The complete tour schedule, including special appearance listings, is below:

Our partners at Spunk-Ransom are doing a monthly giveaway contest for a promotional How To Be poster.

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The contest is open internationally, and you must enter by March 31st.  You can enter via email. Full instructions and additional information on the contest are available here.

This year's Singapore International Film Festival will include an appearance by Justin Kelly, How To Be's producer.  Mr. Kelly will be attending the screening of the film at Lido 1 on Saturday, 25th April at 11:30 am. 

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General ticket sales for the screening have now begun.    Standard tickets are S$9.50 and are available for purchase online here. 

How To Be has just received the Honorable Mention prize in the Professional Full-Length Narrative Golden Lion Award category at the 2009 George Lindsey UNA Film Festival!

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Congratualtions to everyone involved and thanks to everyone who attended the screening and helped make it a success!

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Day Pass tickets for Saturday, March 28th at the Burbank International Film Festival have sold out.  How to Be will screen that day at 6:45 pm at Woodbury University.  Director Oliver Irving is scheduled to make an appearance at this Los Angeles premiere of the film. 

Cinequest's CQ Central interviewed How To Be producer Justin Kelly and actor Michael Pearce, who plays Nikki in the film.  They talk about getting the film to screen, distribution, and why people should line up to see it.

Tell us a little about the origins of How To Be, from writing to financing.

Justin Kelly: How To Be was written by Oliver Irving together with the composer Joe Hastings and actors Johnny White (RONNY) and Michael Pearce (NIKKI). It came together through anecdotes and observations about those around them.

Michael Pearce: Started out as a short film, I remember a script being written, about 20 pages but as the project developed Oliver realised it had enough to become a feature.

JK: The financing took about two years, mainly with writing a business plan for the production company and pitching it to private investors. The investment is structured as a UK Enterprise Investment Scheme together with cast and crew accepting some deferred fees.

It appears that the film has been screened at numerous other festivals; how has it been received? Do audiences respond differently at some festivals than they do at others?

JK: Since its premier at Slamdance 2008 where it won the Grand Jury’s Honourable Mention, the film has been well received in particular by young people and fans of Robert Pattinson. 

MP: I’ve only been to one festival but the film was very well received, especially by girls, I think that’s because I’m in the film.

Christina Muller with Inside Cinequest interviewed Writer/Director Oliver Irving at the festival about the music, working with Robert Pattinson, the casting process and more.

The Milpitas Post did a short review of How to Be in their guide to last week's Cinequest Festival.

Art (Robert Pattinson of "Twilight" and the "Harry Potter" films) is a desperately unhappy struggling musician in London. His girlfriend dumps him, his friends don't understand him, and his relationship with his parents is thoroughly dysfunctional. Desperate for a change, he turns to self-help books and finds It's Not Your Fault, a step-by-step guide to fixing your life. When he learns that the book's author is available for in-person, at-length work, he shells out to bring the man to England. The elderly author moves in with Art and his parents, and acts as a catalyst for change but not in the way anyone was expecting.

This is a charming and thoroughly odd comedy about growing up and spreading one's wings. It's thoroughly enjoyable to see Pattinson as a lovable loser after his turn last year as the impossibly perfect vampire hero of "Twilight." This young man has some serious talent, and films like this may help keep him from becoming too typecast to show it.

How To Be played to huge crowds at Cinequest on February 28th and again on Monday, March 2nd.