Double first for Green Bay Media's film ‘Say It With Flowers’

Cardiff’s Green Bay Media has just completed its first film drama for the cinema, ‘Say it with Flowers’, which is also the first cinema presentation for Welsh filmmaker Wyn Mason.
The film is the story of Leila, a young woman who receives a huge bouquet of flowers on her doorstep. Reawakening her romantic longing and lust for life, she sets out to find her secret admirer.
Up-and-coming Welsh actress Eve Myles, a favourite from the long-running BBC Wales series 'Belonging', plays the film's central role. She has strong support from the cast - Bradley Freegard, Steffan Rhodri and John Pierce Jones.
Chelsey King-Simpson, a student at Swansea University where Wyn Mason lectures in screen writing, wrote the film's script. He saw the talent of this new writer and was determined to get her script to the screen. Together with experienced producer Richard Staniforth of Green Bay, he worked with Chelsey to revise the story and prepare it for Arts Council film lottery support, which it won last year.
The film was shot in stormy weather on location in Chepstow and Llantwit Major in October 2004. When the skies did open, the crew were working inside – on designer Tom Pearce’s wonderful set dressed with a large and impressive collection of flowers from commercial florists based in Bessemer Road Market in Cardiff.
Producer Richard Staniforth said: “Wyn Mason was insistent on using a certain palette of colours in the film. That meant that we needed certain special varieties of flowers - and lots of them. And to show the passage of time in the story, they had to be in every imaginable state from tight new buds to drooping decay. The design team had quite a job on their hands but, with the help of the florists, they came up smelling of roses.”
Executive Producer John Geraint said: “Green Bay’s first cinema piece is a real gem. Film production takes time as well as talent, but ‘Say It With Flowers’ launches Green Bay into a period where a number of really strong cinema scripts we’ve developed with writers based here in Wales are ready for the camera to roll.”
The short film is to be screened to an invited audience in Cardiff’s Chapter Arts Centre to celebrate St Valentine’s Day.
Directed by Wyn Mason, filmed by Ray Orton and produced by Richard Staniforth, 'Say It With Flowers' was supported by the National Lottery Fund of the Arts Council of Wales, through Sgrin Cymru Wales, as part of their short film initiative to develop new writers and directors.
The Wales Screen Commission supported the filming and Barcud Derwen, BBC Wales and Green Bay assisted with the financing of the film which will be broadcast on BBC next year.
(SP)