THE FILM
THE STORY
Joey Miller is the undisputed king of Detroit party MC’s. He’s also a single father and deeply in debt. To make matters worse, during his latest, one-of-a-kind wedding performances, all his prized sound equipment gets destroyed in a freak accident. To add insult to injury, his daughter Julie’s Bat-Mitzvah is only weeks away and she’s counting on him to MC her party. After exhausting all of his options, he turns to his shady Uncle Morty, who agrees to give him the needed money to get back into business. But only under one condition. Joey must go and steal his grandmother Rose’s most prized possession: her famous top secret dill pickle recipe. And it’s a recipe which she has vowed to take to her grave.
DIRECTOR’S STATEMENT
The Pickle Recipe is a heartwarming family comedy. But the recipe is really a metaphor for life. One of our characters talks about how the people in our lives are the ingredients that make us who we are. When something like a recipe is passed down from one generation to the next, it helps us remember people and places, those special moments that are dear to our hearts… and our stomachs!
I’m Italian-American. More specifically, my father’s side of the family is Sicilian. Sunday dinners at my grandparents were a staple of my youth. And my “Nannie” made the most incredible sauce and meatballs. You’ll hear this from most Italian-Americans. Their grandmas made the best meals they ever had and they can never find a better sauce for the rest of their lives. (And it’s true.)
Those family dinners helped shape my life. The taste of my grandmother’s food and the smells from her kitchen will stay with me forever. If you’re lucky enough to have a loving family, as dysfunctional as it may be, and a grandmother who brought everyone to the table to share a wonderful meal, then you can relate to this story.
Ethnicity doesn’t matter. Pickles, meatballs, burritos, dumplings, whatever part of the world the dish and the family comes from, recipes and foods passed down from one generation to the next feed our senses and our souls and connect us. That’s what I want audiences to get out of this film.
