When filmmakers Andrew Gallery and Jordan Ehrlich decided to make a documentary about Jeremy Tyler, they thought it would be the typical story of a basketball phenom trying to make it to the NBA.
Never could they have imagined Tyler emerging as trail blazer in his sport or the project taking them to the third-largest city in Israel or Japan's capital city.Tyler, of course, bypassed his senior year at San Diego High School and a scholarship offer from Louisville to play professionally overseas, a highly controversial decision that sparked backlash nationwide. The 6-foot-11 big man and his family believed the lack of competition in high school wasn't properly preparing him for the NBA, so he left to play first for Israeli power Maccabi Haifa and now for the Tokyo Apache of the more remote Japanese professional league.
Gallery was kind enough to join me recently to chat about the project, which he expects to be released in late 2011 after the NBA draft. He was a little reluctant to reveal some of the film's juicier behind-the-scenes moments since it won't be out for so long, but we spoke about how Tyler decided to turn pro, whether the criticism has impacted him and what his experience in Tokyo has been like so far.
JE: How did you decide to do a documentary on Jeremy?
AG: A friend of mine sent me a clip of Jeremy when he was ninth grade, and we were like, 'Wow, this kid's phenomenal.' We said let's go meet him, and literally after that first face-to-face meeting, we decided to start shooting. We didn't know anything that would happen because we started shooting when he was a sophomore before the scandal of his junior year and before him leaving high school. We thought it would be the average story of a kid going to college and trying to be a No. 1 draft pick, but it has been a roller coaster ride to say the least.
My Life the Film website <---------------Click the Link---<-------
No comments:
Post a Comment