Between Day and Night Look Book

A Zachary Kerschberg film

BETWEEN DAY AND NIGHT

Writer/Director Zachary KerschbergProducers Jon Coplon, Dominique Rosales, Zachary KerschbergSetting Berlin, 2014Genre Drama (Narrative/Doc/Experimental)Format Digital/Super 16

A group of immigrant artists living in Berlin strive to be free from society, self-doubt and financial instability.

Between Day & Night

Zachary Kerschberg is an award winning filmmaker based in New York City and Berlin. His short films have screened at prestigious festivals around the world, including Cannes, SXSW, and Rain Dance. He most recently

produced A Ciambra, which won the Sony Discovery prize at the 53rd Semaine de la Critique in Cannes. His documentary films have screened at the United Nations, the World Bank and the Paralympics. He is a recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship, a National Board of Review Student Grant, a Janowsky Award, a Wasserman Award, and an Agosto Foundation Residency.

About the DirectorBetween Day & Night

Jon Coplon’s films have shown at festivals around the world, including Cannes, Venice, NYFF, SXSW and New Directors/New Films. Jon’s projects have been the recipient of numerous awards, and grants from organizations including Cinereach, San Francisco Film Society, Jerome Foundation, Rooftop Filmmakers Fund and the Spike Lee Production Grant. Jon spent several years working with director Jonas Carpignano in southern Italy on films including the short, Young Lions of Gypsy (A Ciambra), which won the Discovery Prize at the 53rd Semaine De La Critique at Cannes; and A Chjána, which won the Controcampo Award for Best Short Film at the Venice Film Festival in 2011. He recently wrapped production on the feature, Mediterranea and is currently prepping Between Day and Night, Zachary Kerschberg’s narrative/doc/experimental portrait of the immigrant art scene in Berlin, shooting winter, 2014.

Before working in film, Jon spent several years writing about music on staff for Blender magazine. He grew up in New York City and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania where he majored in Visual Studies.

Dominique Rosales is the founder and creative director of Dominique Rosales and the Playground Project, a Berlin based performance art collaborative that creates innovative works for museums, galleries, arts spaces, events and festivals. She has worked with Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (USA, Mexico, Canada, NYC) State Theater Mainz (Germany) Francesca Harper Project (NYC) Ildance (Sweden) Lion King (Germany) Middle Eastern Film Festival (Abu Dhabi) Institute Francais (Germany) Arca (Mexico) Cabaret Voltaire (Switzerland) Pharrell Williams (NYC) and Karine Plantadit, Tony nominated Dancer (NYC, France).

About the ProducersBetween Day & Night

Leonardo D’antoni is an Argentine-American filmmaker specializing in the art of cinematography. He received an MFA from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Graduate Film program and currently works as a director of photography in film and television. He is the recipient of the Best Cinematography Award at the 2013 Fusion Film Festival and an Excellence in Cinematography Award at the 2013 First Run Film Festival. In addition he has been nominated for the Golden Tadpole Cinematography Award at Plus Camerimage in 2013, a Student Academy Award in 2012, and the Volker Bahnemann Cinematography Award from Arri. His films have screened at Cannes, SXSW, Palm Springs and Aspen Shortsfest, among others.

About the Cinematographer

Between Day & Night

In the summer of 2013 I was hired to write a script on the women’s experience in World War II. Although I had always had an

aversion to Germany (my grandparents were Polish Jews that escaped Europe in 1939), I moved to Berlin to work with a researcher from Humboldt University.

I landed in Reuterkiez, which is considered the ‘problem kiez’ of Neukölln, the traditionally Turkish and Arab quarter of Berlin. A third of the population is foreign born, another third is unemployed and 90% of school age children speak German as a second language. The area was definitely covered in graffiti, with old furniture scattered on the sidewalks, and you could easily buy drugs in the parks or freely smoke in the bars despite the city’s no-smoking laws, but after living in New York for six years, I found it far from dirty. To me it was a bustling, vibrant, diverse neighborhood. What’s more, it had opened its doors to a new wave of artistic immigrants that were arriving from all corners the world, myself included.

Before long I was mingling with Berlin’s own outcasts; Germans of mixed

race, second generation Turks, African asylum seekers, East Berliners yet to adapt, and West Berliners forced from their homes because of gentrification. Everyone was searching for unbridled freedom and there was a liveliness and spark to the quarter that gave Berlin its pulse – the counter culture that kept the city raw and sexy. What I had been longing for in New York –

the old bohemian spirit, the nostalgic days of 1980’s independent film – was happening in Berlin.

We live a simple life, drinking cheap beer, smoking hand rolled cigarettes and spliffs, biking from basement parties to painting exhibits to video installations; buying clothes at flea markets; browsing the outdoor Turkish stalls for seasonal vegetables, never eating quite enough; borrowing money from one friend only to lend it to another; working illegally to pay our modest rents; wearing sweaters in the house to keep the bills down; dancing until morning on any night and making love with whomever we wish. There is a sense of freedom I haven’t found in America. But with this freedom comes a precarious, nomadic life, devoid of stability or intimacy, punctuated by drunken stupors, sleepless nights and emotional extremes.

After only two months in Berlin, I applied for an artist visa. The next year was one

of the most inspiring of my life, and the basis for my film. I met people from all corners of the globe. We shared stories and collaborated on art projects. I had finally found a culture that embraced and valued me and that encouraged me to dream and take risks. I began to see all the things that had been holding me back and I wanted to make a film about shaking off those demons and really being free. I decided to make a film with whatever money I could find and to do it without any rules at all. The more I looked at my crazy ideas, the more they began to make sense.

Director’s StatementBetween Day & Night

the StoriesBetween Day & Night

Dominique, a Cuban/German from East Berlin, studied at the Berlin Ballet Academy and danced for Alvin Ailey in NY, has returned home, where she is now teaching at a middle school for immigrant children with issues. She is creative and inspirational - a free spirit, but with her own doubts that lead to highs and lows. She dances, drinks, and dates an Israeli heavy metal singer as she struggles to get an interactive performance installation off the ground; one that no one believes in or even understands, until she insists on a rehearsal in Berlin’s historical water plant. She brings in one dancer and one singer, a tiny piece of her jigsaw idea – it is the first time we get a glimpse of her brilliance and we pray she won’t give up.

Matteo, an Italian guitarist and singer, who has released five albums, is a hopeless romantic that leaves his band in Torino and moves to Berlin for love, but after two weeks is kicked out. With only his guitar and his duffel bag, he finds himself homeless, playing on the streets to survive. But this is a handsome, charismatic budding rock star and he makes friends and meets women quite easily. As he gets back on his feet he begins writing poetry and recording new songs, telling his story in smoky bars, until he lands a contract with a German label and records his first solo album. But even as he moves into his own apartment, he’s questioning who he is and his relationship to his own music. Has he sold out?


Gizem, a young Turkish woman, born and raised in West Berlin, struggles, against the wishes of her family and community, to become an actress. She works daytime as a waitress in a café while auditioning for parts that are mostly clichés and stereotypes of German Turks. Having applied for a work visa in America, she dreams of moving back to New York City, where she can be free from her overbearing but soft spoken father. In Berlin she constantly questions her identity, and is affected by the indirect racism that surrounds her. When the American visa is approved she is ecstatic, but her father quietly denies her, saying she cannot leave. Resolute on pursuing her dream, the only concern holding her back is her younger brother, to whom she is quite close, but when he tells her to go, but come back, her decision is made.


Martin, a Tanzanian/German from East Berlin, grew up as a ballet prodigy and by 18 was performing the Lion King at the Hamburg Opera. But after four years he had grown bored with the production and was accused of becoming ‘fat’. Thus, he relocated to Berlin and began to teach himself to sing. He now hosts a morning radio show with Christopher and sings in a church choir and jazz clubs when not performing with Delta Q, the award winning a cappella quartet. He is insanely talented but lives off social welfare as a political belief, and blogs about a resource-based society that offers an alternate worldview. Not yet openly bi-sexual, Martin goes back and forth between men and women, always discontent with his current partner. In reality he is just looking for someone to love him as he is.


Gerti, a once famous East German singer, now in her 80’s, sings in small basement cafes. She is full of life, and can put down a pot of coffee and a bottle of cheap alcohol in one afternoon, often steadying herself with one arm on the wall, but her voice is still like a bird song. She tells stories of the West Germans crossing over to East Berlin illegally to record albums with her, albums, of course, that she never received credit for. She smiles and laughs it off, because life is good. Dominique, who’s like a grand daughter, has approached her to sing and act in her performance installation, and the elegance and experience she offers brings validity to the project. Life couldn’t be better, until she receives an eviction notice demanding she leave the apartment she grew up in.


Christopher, an American experimental composer and contrabassist, is utterly uncompromising in his art, which leaves him financially unstable. Thin as a rail, with a twist mustache, he has performed with all of the great contemporary experimental musicians. When his one regular gig, Certain Sundays (conversations on sound), falls through, his ability to stay registered as a PhD student of notation for improvisers comes into question. Furthermore, his unrelenting dedication to his music and refusal to take jobs outside of his field may lead to his ruin. Without missing a beat and not overly concerned with his own welfare, he begins each morning by hosting a public radio show with his roommate, Martin.


Ahmed, a refugee from Burkina Faso who has traveled by land to Germany after suffering violence and racism in Italy, is applying for asylum. He lives in a makeshift squatter camp, occupied mostly by Roma. Invisible in the city, he walks around unnoticed; collecting beer bottles he recycles at grocery stores. When approached by a performance artist, he agrees to be part of an installation to raise awareness about the refugees in Berlin. There he meets Martin, comes into focus (literally), and starts participating in Berlin’s nightlife. At the same time, he becomes ashamed of scavenging for bottles when a woman he likes sees him. Desperate to earn money some other way, he enters an underground street dance competition, and the audience sees an incredible raw and beautiful performance – Ahmed is a dancer. In the end his asylum is rejected because he can only apply in Italy, where he first landed. We don’t have any idea what will happen to him.the Stories

Between Day & Night

Josh, an American dancer from Los Angeles, spent a few years performing with Alvin Ailey before moving to Germany to focus on dance science. He is already quite accomplished, has enjoyed success in New York and is now searching to push his own limits, which he often does through drug use. He is confident and amiable, but also quiet and reserved when not dancing. He often hangs out by himself, and sometimes DJs underground parties. Both an inspiration and enigma to everyone around him, we wonder if he will push too far.


Georgina, a German/British/Italian/Barbadian dancer, is both the heart and engine of Berlin’s underground voguing scene. After winning a reality dance show, she moved to NY and studied voguing with legend Archie Burnett. Now she’s back in Berlin, has started Germany’s first voguing house, House of Melody, and is determined, against all odds, to launch the first voguing ball in Germany, but it isn’t easy being a woman in a predominantly gay male dance scene. She also teaches at the Nike Training Club, the Tanzhaus NRW in Dusseldorf and internationally in Paris, Helsinki and Istanbul. Although her life appears perfect to outsiders, she spends her nights alone, wondering why she can’t find love.


Nelson, an East German graffiti artist and MMA Fighter, works as a bouncer at Berghain, the most famous club in Berlin. After dropping out of high school in the tenth grade, he began working in construction, doing graffiti and murals in his spare time. Pushed by Dominique to go to university and study fine art, he initially lashes out at her. But on his own he begins to ask questions and thus begins his impossible journey to study what he loves.


Bilel, a French-Algerian hairstylist working in Berlin, realizes his career has peaked, that he doesn’t have the talent to go further. Even though he charges 100 euros a cut and works with celebrities, he decides to quit and search for something else. He’s always dreamed of owning a bar, but his Muslim family looked down on working with alcohol. When his mother passes, he feels free to begin that journey. Lying about his work experience, he lands a job in a local bar, the first step toward that dream.


Thabiso, an accomplished South African photographer, has a residency at the Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, where he lives and works. He has exhibited photos around the world to great acclaim, but his current project is taking snap shots of people in the neighborhood, which neither the residency, nor the South Africans admire or understand.



Corey, an American dancer, left a successful career in New York because he felt it was easier to be a gay black man in Germany, where he has found both freedom and happiness.

Individual stories crisscross, merge and separate in different ways. Their friendships, work, love interests and artistic collaborations bring them together, as do a morning radio program and photographer’s snap shots. They rub shoulders in cafes, clubs, parks and bars, but are also tied together by their daily routines of eating, drinking, making love, showering and sleeping.


Between Day and Night is about freedom. It’s about taking our own paths and overcoming those things that restrain us: society, family, economics, prejudice, self-doubt – for everyone it is something different. Personally, I want to break from any preconceived notions of what film has been or should be. I’m not trying to make something unique – I just want to entertain each idea – give it a chance to live.

This attitude has encouraged me to combine narrative, documentary and experimental approaches, with a large ensemble cast and no script or designated running time. The film will be shot in black and white, except the scenes at sunrise and sunset, which will be in color. The majority will be wide screen, but certain documented scenes in the film will be shot 4x3 at 18 fps to connect to the early German masterpieces Berlin, Symphony of a Great City (1927) and People on Sunday (1930). Furthermore, the film will be in German, English, Turkish, Italian, French and whatever other languages the characters naturally speak. We will shoot on the Canon C100, which allows us to move quickly and performs well in low light, important because we’ll be lighting scenes minimally.

There will be a number of live performances and rehearsals in the film, as well as a handful of scenes enhanced by visual artist Cristina Maldonado, who works by manipulating projected films in real time, giving them surrealist overtones. I will also attempt to have the audience participate in one scene, thus breaking the fifth wall of cinema. In short, the film is an experiment. At the end we will shoot the edited movie on Super 16mm film to enhance the warmth and authenticity that runs throughout the individual stories.

Artistic VisionBetween Day & Night

Zachary KerschbergHobrechtstrasse 24

12047 Berlin, Germany+4915901004492

[email protected]

Jon CoplonWeserstrasse 26

12045 Berlin, [email protected]

Dominique RosalesPrenzlauer Berg 17

10405, Berlin+491795756525

[email protected] Contact

Between Day & Night

Between Day and Night Look Book

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Transcript of Between Day and Night Look Book