'Win Win' is Embraced by Local NJ Crowd

For the past two weeks, New Jersey residents had to cross the Hudson River and pay a visit to New York City if they wanted to see on the big screen.

But after much anticipation, the New Providence-based film finally came close to home, and residents hailing from New Providence, Chatham, Madison, Berkeley Heights and beyond came out to support and be a part of local cinematic history this weekend.

Win Win opened at Chatham Cinema on Friday afternoon and will continue to be shown through Thursday, April 7.

The new film has fueled the pride of New Providence Borough residents and local high school athletes since its limited release on March 18. This excitement is partly due to the fact that its Director and Writer Tom McCarthy and Co-Writer Joe Tiboni are natives of New Providence and graduates of its high school.

But if that weren’t enough to inspire locals to flock to theaters to see Win Win, the film also takes place in a small town in New Jersey called New Providence.

“[Win Win] has been appealing to everyone,” said Roberts Chatham Cinema owner Gary Heckel, who noted that the movie has drawn crowds of all ages from teenagers to young adults to senior citizens.

Theater employee and Chatham resident Kyle Grow said he’s noticed a lot of younger people in the crowd compared to other movies that have shown at the venue.

Heckel, who has yet to see the film himself, said he found out that he would be showing Win Win at his theater in Chatham about a month ago. The owner immediately recognized the director, Tom McCarthy, from McCarthy’s previous films The Station Agent and The Visitor, which were both shown at the Chatham theater. It wasn’t until Heckel began to read up about Win Win that he realized it would have additional local significance.

The main plotline in Win Win centers around Elder Law attorney Mike Flaherty (Paul Giamatti), who runs into tough times at his New Providence law practice and is looking for an extra source of income to support his family.

As we watch Flaherty interact with his wife and kids, struggle at work, coach the New Providence High School wrestling team, and make life-changing decisions concerning one of his elderly clients, viewers are met with the thrill of scenes that contain endless references to the real life New Providence, New Jersey.

That first glimmer of home is experienced early on in Win Win when an overhead shot of South Street’s intersection with Springfield Avenue suddenly fills the enormous movie theater screen. It’s enough to make an NP resident’s heart flutter.

While the interior scenes, including the film’s New Providence High School gymnasium, are actually re-creations of those we know and love in our hometown, the accuracy of the sets will provoke more than a few memories of high school gym classes and sports practices for NPHS graduates. Viewers will also be delighted to watch their town name and high school mascot, the Pioneer, show up on characters’ apparel, in the coaches’ high school office, and throughout the school gymnasium scenes.

The results are in, the locals are thrilled, and dare I say the film is a winner?

“The movie was a win-win all the way!” said Beverly Rivkees, who works alongside Joe Tiboni on the New Providence Community Activities Advisory Board (CAAB). “An excellent cast and an excellent story. It was the best!”

Fellow CAAB member, Gloria Badgley, also had rave reviews: “This movie was just excellent! It’s always a treat to go to one of McCarthy’s productions and certainly, Joe Tiboni did an outstanding job. Everyone was raving and clapping. They actually clapped at the end of the movie!”

“The actors nailed it from the Jersey attitude to the NP way of life,” said Laura D’Onofrio, a 2004 NPHS graduate, who ran high school track and cross country. “As an athlete at New Providence High School, you really were Pioneers. You had to lead the young ones and had to believe in your sport and your teammates.”

Athletes Jeff Sanfilippo and Joe Randazzo were easy to spot exiting the theater wearing sweatshirts from New Providence High School, where they are both currently in their senior years.

“I’d say, two thumbs up!” said Sanfilippo, a wrestler at NPHS. “This year was an off year for the wrestling program, so [the movie] definitely depicted [NPHS wrestling] pretty well. I liked how the gym [in the movie] had all the championship banners from our gym. That kind of gave it the realistic feel.”

“I definitely liked it,” Randazzo added, who wrestled during his sophomore and junior years in high school, and currently plays football and baseball. “It was really cool to see everything and the story was definitely a good story."

High School teens weren’t the only ones sporting their NP High paraphernalia. Bruce Martin, a New Providence resident of 26 years, borrowed his son’s wrestling jacket to wear to the movie.

“The acting was terrific,” Martin said. He attended the showing with his wife, Kathy, and said he still goes to school wrestling matches despite the fact that their son has graduated and is now away at college.

“The wrestling was great. We’re big wrestling fans," said Kathy Martin. “[Win Win] was fabulous! Great storyline; I was just waiting for the next scene to happen. Just seeing the New Providence scenes and the streets on the big screen was thrilling!”

“I’m going to buy the DVD with all the extras too when it comes out!” said Bruce Martin enthusiastically.

Cinema owner Heckel reported that New Providence High School wrestling coach Gary Bremer had attended an earlier movie showing that day. However, those in the audience of the 9 p.m. showing may not have known that former NPHS wrestling coach Victor Bucossi was both a fellow spectator and an important contributor the production of Win Win.

Bucossi, whose name you might recognize from Win Win’s credits, worked as a stunt consultant for the film’s wrestling scenes.

“It was great fun working with Tom [McCarthy] and Joe [Tiboni], and they’re good men,” he said of his on-set experience with the writers and director.

But it wasn’t the first time Bucossi had worked with the New Providence natives. Bucossi also served as McCarthy’s and Tiboni’s high school wrestling coach during his approximately 15 years of coaching at NP High.

The former coach said that he had been invited to the Win Win cast and crew party in New York City but was unable to attend, so Friday’s showing of the movie was the first time he had seen it in completion.

“I thought it was terrific,” said Bucossi who also said he found it to be a very realistic portrayal of New Providence and high school wrestling. “I only worked on the wrestling scenes so I hadn’t seen the final product. I was excited about it, and it met my expectations."

Gary Callahan was also in the audience of the late showing of Win Win in Chatham on Friday night. And even though he traveled all the way from Flemington, NJ, to watch it, he too had a personal connection to the show.

“I might have a biased interest. The young man, Alex Shaffer [who plays wrestler Kyle Timmons in Win Win], is my son’s best friend,” revealed Callahan, referring to the adolescent actor who is a real-life wrestling champion at Hunterdon Central Regional High School in Flemington.

When asked what the actor is like in real life, Callahan replied, “Exactly what you saw on the screen.”

He went on to explain that at first, Shaffer refused the acting role when it was offered to him.

“[Shaffer] wanted to be a high school championship wrestler so when he was cast for the movie, he turned them down initially… so they actually postponed production so that he could accomplish the Atlantic City visit and win the state championship. The day after, they started filming in Long Island,” Callahan said.

The Flemington resident said he found the film compelling and overall, a good movie.

Sean Cusack, a recent graduate from the College of William and Mary in Virginia, found the film meaningful both as a New Providence resident for 10 years and as a film student.

“It was awesome! I loved it!” raved Cusack. “It was just great. McCarthy really captured the feel of New Providence. It’s just a beautiful film. It follows a certain formula but at the same time, it holds enough unique qualities to it. It just captures the spirit of the town beautifully while at the same time, sharing a really great story.”

Abraham Gertler, a Madison High School freshman and wrestler, said of Win Win’s fictional wrestling team, “Their practices didn’t seem too tough, but the main character seemed to make it tough for himself, which is like some of the JV wrestlers on our team. They kind of make it harder than it already is.”

Gertler, who was accompanied by his mother Jojo Gertler, said he recognized many of the extras in the wrestling scenes as fellow wrestlers at Madison High School who had been cast in the movie.

“Watching the film, it wasn’t so much about wrestling," said Jojo Gertler. "It was about life and relationships and what you have to do to survive… and trying to trust each other. And sometimes you just don’t understand what the other person is going through. I found the Paul Giamatti family very forgiving in the scheme of things.”

The Madison mom shared that she had studied Acting in Los Angeles and was privileged to have had actor Jeffrey Tambor (who plays Flaherty’s Assistant Coach Stephen Vigman in Win Win) as a guest teacher. In person, she said Tambor was “charming, gracious, humble and just, self-effacing. He was really, really wonderful.”

As for how well the film portrayed this area of small-town Jersey, Jojo Gertler said, “I think New Providence, probably, and definitely Madison where we’re from, is a little more charming than they portrayed in the film. Life is sweet here. It’s ideal. I’ve lived in a lot of glamorous places in LA and in other places in the country, but this is the best, most well-rounded place I’ve ever lived in.”

Win Win is rated R and and runs 105 minutes. For information about times and ticket prices at the Roberts Chatham Cinema, visit its web site here.