EDITORIALS

Is The Crazies the First Film to Post Live Twitter Updates?

by Alex Billington
March 27, 2009

It seem as if the whole world is caught up in a Twitter craze right now, with celebrities, directors, movie studios, and everyone else you can think of joining the ranks. It's a popular service, no doubt, and quite fun and sometimes informative. While we've seen directors (like Jon Favreau) and studios (like Lionsgate and Miramax) use Twitter successfully, the first actual film I've seen that has been trying to take advantage of the hype is The Crazies, an upcoming remake of George Romero's 1973 thriller. Not only have they been posting photos from the set (which is very rare), but they even gave away a set visit and walk-on role.

The Twitter - twitter.com/TheCraziesFilm - started on March 4th, and has been updating live from the set in Georgia ever since. It looks like the deadline for the "set visit and walk-on role" contest was very early on, although the winner was only identified quite recently. We're not sure who is running this (my guess is it's someone working in marketing for Overture Films), but they've posted updates like: "Wrapping up today's shoot at the second location... A really creepy old farm house! This is gonna be good!!!" And then there's also the occasional: "closed set. top secret scene. will have more info for you tomorrow night."

A few small photos from the set have been posted on the Twitter as well. This is quite interesting to see, because usually photos from any set, closed or open, are never revealed to the public until the studio wants them to be seen. And even then, we only ever get to see a very small, selective batch of photos. As far as I know, this is the first time a major production has been this open about what's happening on set (and written about it on Twitter). I'm curious to see how much Jon Favreau will continue to write about Iron Man 2 (or how much Paramount will let him), as he's only posted rehearsal updates (like this one) so far.

While it may be too late to when a trip to the set, I'd suggest you follow the Twitter anyway, just in case there are any other cool updates. And I can bet if this goes over well (or, more importantly, if it doesn't hurt the film in the end), we'll see other studios doing similar things with Twitter. The Crazies is being directed by Breck Eisner (Sahara) and stars Timothy Olyphant, Radha Mitchell, Danielle Panabaker, and Joe Anderson. Overture currently has it set for release on September 25th later this year. And if you missed it, we ran the official teaser poster back in February. And hell, while you're at it, follow us on Twitter, too!

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