About Us

SOLE PRODUCTIONS - GENESIS
In 2002, Davida Rappaport's task was to contact former high school students for a 30-year class reunion, and one of her calls was to Robert Alaniz.

After discussing the reunion, Davida mentioned her recollection of Robert's passion in high school for writing plays and scripts. She then asked if he had written anything lately, and Robert admitted he had not.

Based in Los Angeles at the time, and conveniently working for a talent law firm, Davida put forth this offer to Alaniz: "If you ever decide to write again, get a script to me and I'll shop it around."

Robert, further encouraged by his wife, Carol, purchased a screenwriting program and within a year began working on a script.

Then in 2001, Robert ran into Joyce Antonacci while shopping. She previously appeared in Saturday Night Disaster, one of Robert's first nine films - a Super 8 Sound comedy made in 1978. Though happy to see Robert, Joyce was saddened by the loss of one of her best friends Diane Geolz, who recently died from breast cancer. The two young women met during the making of Saturday Night Disaster and became lifelong friends.

They tried to contact Robert only a few months earlier to arrange a viewing of the film one last time before Diane died. Sadly, this never happened. That film meant a lot to these two women and it struck a cord with Robert - how this amateur film, made over 20 years earlier, brought these two women together. It made him wonder how many others have been affected by his films, especially those with whom he once worked.

Another realization came when he met the young daughter of one of the leading ladies from one of his early films - born of parents who met during the film production process. Alaniz thought, "If it weren't for that film, this little girl wouldn't be standing here in front of me." While those primitive films won no awards and brought him neither fame nor fortune, they clearly changed lives.

Unearthing his nine older films, Robert bought a digital editing program and began the painstaking process of remastering them, first on VHS tapes then later on DVDs. He then searched for and found many of the people from those films for a series of reunions.

E.J. Dal Bello, a friend who frequents the same Starbucks as Robert, attended one of those reunions. He and his wife Nella, both impressed with what they saw, encouraged Robert to make a film of Timeserver, the story of a middle-aged man who believed he could travel through time, and alter the past to make his present life more convenient, a script they knew he was working on at the time.

As a child, young Robert dreamed of being a filmmaker. But, like many youngsters with big dreams about their future, one reality check after another along the way nearly extinguished his dreams. But an ember still burned, and Robert Alaniz knew it was time to again pursue his passion for making films.

Thus, after having not written in over 20 years, Timeserver officially became Robert's comeback project.

When word got out about a film being made in Frankfort, a small Chicago suburb, the local response was overwhelming.

Timeserver premiered in October 2004 at the Rialto Square Theater in Joliet, Illinois to an impressive audience of over 1,000, fulfilling another of Alaniz's lifelong dreams.

After the local success of Timeserver, it was obvious another movie was necessary. Barrymore's Dream, a psychological suspense thriller about a man who has astral projection, became that next film.

Originally made in the '70s as one of those Super 8 movies, the Barrymore's Dream script was one Robert always wanted to rework and remake. It was while producing this film Robert began to see the potential behind his newly formed SOLE Productions, and the effect its output could have on others.

For his third film, Bitterblue, Alaniz had the opportunity to work with teenagers. He discovered that SOLE Productions offered local youths an educational experience in film and media production, which could prove valuable should they pursue films as a career.

In April 2006, a feature story about Bitterblue ran on FOX NEWS in a prime time broadcast after American Idol. Reaction to Bitterblue has been awe-inspiring, and the film struck an emotional chord with audiences of all ages.

Then in September of 2007, Barrymore's Dream won the BEST FEATURE FILM award at the Route 66 Film Festival in Springfield, Illinois.

In 2008, SOLE productions completed their fourth film, Robert Alaniz's The Vision. Combining elements of the paranormal with suspense, thrills and humor, this film was Robert's most ambitious and rewarding. The film included music scored by Doug Adams, who has worked with film composer Howard Shore (Lord Of The Rings) and also features the single "Dirty Little Word," by Kallie Flynn Childress, star of the hit movie Sleepover.

SOLE Productions is presently in pre-production on Robert Alaniz's fifth film, DINKs. This is also Alaniz's second foray into the comedy genre, the first being his 1978 satire, Saturday Night Disaster.

It has been an exciting journey for SOLE Productions over the past six years, the last chapter of which is yet to be written. Along the way, Robert Alaniz has not only fulfilled his dream of making films again, but his productions continue to change lives, helping countless others fulfill their dreams.

Jerry Osborne
January 2010

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