
Keith Boynton, left, with Aitor Mendilibar, right, the cinematographer who shot “The Haunted Forest” as well as “The Scottish Play” and “The Winter House.” In the background of is Vinny Castellini, first assistant director.
Submitted
Keith Boynton, left, with Aitor Mendilibar, right, the cinematographer who shot “The Haunted Forest” as well as “The Scottish Play” and “The Winter House.” In the background of is Vinny Castellini, first assistant director.
Keith Boynton is a filmmaker who grew up in Salisbury, Connecticut. He attended Salisbury Central School, Town Hill School, and Hotchkiss. He has made numerous feature films including Seven Lovers, The Scottish Play, The Winter House, and is just wrapping up a new film, The Haunted Forest, which is a horror/slasher movie. Boynton has made numerous music videos for the band Darlingside, and for Alison Krauss. He is a poet, a playwright, and comic book art collector.
JA: This series of stories The Creators focuses on artists, their inspiration, and their creative process. Keith, what was the seed that got you started?
KB: I think the earliest stage of everything is just daydreaming. I’ve been a daydreamer my whole life, probably most kids are. Those daydreams are just daydreams - they don’t come to anything - but occasionally something happens in your imagination that you can’t let go of. Something you want to make real, whether that’s a goal in your life, or a project that you want to pursue, or something you want to create, it just sticks in your mind, and can change your whole life.
JA: Was there a favorite book that you loved growing up?
KB: My favorite book in childhood was The Wreck of the Zephyr by Chris van Allsburg. Some books just fired me up a like Maniac Magee, by Jerry Spinelli, an amazing book that was probably the most exciting thing I’d ever read up to that point. I remember finishing it and just sprinting up and down the driveway. I loved all the William Steig books, especially Dominic. Some art forms lend themselves to the imagination. One of the things I love about cartooning (I’m a huge comic book fan, and I collect comic book artwork) I love the way it can be anything. It is the unfettered exercise of the imagination, whereas making a live action film is a very fettered exercise of the imagination. You are bound by the technology and the reality of what you’re shooting, and the limitations of what you have available, so it’s still a creative act, but it’s not the kind of thing you can just daydream on the paper. You must contend with a lot of reality on the way to making that dream something real.
JA: Why do you love language?
KB: I mean, words are magic. They can create whole worlds. I‘ve always been fascinated by them. There’s nothing more human than the urge to communicate, but words do more than communicate; they conjure. It’s a hell of a thing.
JA: You cannot escape the business side of filmmaking. How do you handle all that, financing, promotion, deal making, streaming, film festivals?
KB: It is a job in itself. The mindset of promoting a film is the opposite of making one. It’s rare to find one person who’s good at both. I want the film to be successful, yet don’t see myself as a marketer. When I am forced into that role it’s an awkward fit. I love the response of an audience. I love watching a movie with an audience, or even better being in front of an audience, that immediate kind of connection. The relationship that you have with anyone in the business of curation of a Film Festival, or a studio executive, lacks immediacy. Yet you must not become an artist who thinks they’re entitled to an audience, or entitled to a platform, or entitled to be regarded as special. Audience members who grant you their time are giving you a gift, which is often unearned.
JA: Do you control the editing process?
KB: I edit my own films, I direct them, and I write them. I’m steering the ship to a certain degree at every stage which is gratifying.
JA: How do you cast your films?
KB: For some films I have used a casting director. For The Haunted Forest, the slasher film that we shot in the fall in Maryland, that is just wrapping up, I was the casting director myself. My first time working without a casting director in probably a decade. It was far more work than I realized. There were 38 speaking roles and I had to piece them together for my people to submit it on the Internet, to attract people who lived in the area. Some were actors, some were not, some from New York, some local. It was an incredible hodgepodge of people some of whom had never acted before, and some phenomenally accomplished actors.
JA: Tell us about The Haunted Forest:
KB: Cousins on my dad’s side, the Markoffs, live in Montgomery County, Maryland. They’ve been operating this haunted forest for about 30 years on their property, creating scary tours in October where you walk through, and people jump out and frighten you. It is like a homemade, horror film Disneyland. I was blown away by the scope of it, the scale of it plus the attention to detail and just the passion that they put into this place. My brother Devin McEwan [slalom canoeist, gold medalist 2015 Pan American Games, medalist 2016 Olympics] had the idea to set a film there. He conceived of the story idea. We developed the screenplay together. Great shout out to my brother without whom this movie would never have been dreamed of, much less brought into being. It’s a story about a young man passionate about horror and Halloween. He gets a job at the Haunted Forest, loves his job, meets a girl, then people at the Forest start dying for real and no one knows why. It is a murder mystery, slasher thriller which is not my wheelhouse as a filmmaker, or even necessarily as an audience member, but I had so much fun making this. The film still has a certain romanticism, maybe more than previous films. The genre is larger than life. There’s darkness and terror, but also the opportunity for heroism and overcoming. I think some of the most cinematic stuff that I’ve ever captured is in this movie. We are close to locking the picture edit, and then after that we sign color, music, visual effects and it’ll be ready to premiere at the actual Haunted Forest this fall. Anyone in the DC area, come watch this movie on site and get scared out of your minds.
JA: Were the special effects challenging for you and for the actors?
KB: I had a steep learning curve. We brought in a special effects expert. Some actors were covered in blood, and it was cold at night, yet the vibe on set was amazingly good, people had so much fun. While most of my films are realistic there’s a certain attraction to melodrama. I want to be fantastical, operatic, yet feel grounded and human and real. If you can pull that off, that’s magic.
JA: How can people watch your films?
KB: Three of my movies, Seven Lovers, The Scottish Play, and The Winter House – are available on Amazon and Apple TV. The best way to keep up with me is facebook.com/TheKeithBoynton, and crazylakepictures.com
JA: Your favorite films and directors?
KB: It’s a Wonderful Life, The Sting, Back to the Future, Point Break. Frank Capra, Christopher Nolan, Martin Campbell, Steven Soderbergh.
JA: Relationships feature in your films, and music videos. Does that come from your own well of experience?
KB: I did grow up in an incredibly warm family, incredibly welcoming, supportive, creative, funny, eccentric. I had a pretty idyllic childhood. [Keith’s father Jamie McEwan was an author and medal-winning Olympic slalom canoeist. Keith’s mother Sandra Boynton is an illustrator known for her iconic, delightful creatures and designs] That does stay with you forever. Optimism is one of the gifts the arts can give us when we need something to hang on.
JA: Tell us about your friendship with the band Darlingside.
KB: I’ve known Don Mitchell since he was little. We grew up together. We used to play the Legend of Zelda in his mom’s basement. Later, after hearing their brilliant music, I offered to make some music videos. I have used their music in my films. They are the loveliest people, so sweet, so committed to what they’re doing. They are really four of my favorite human beings in the world.
JA: Your film The Scottish Play, was just shown on Channel 13 as their Valentine’s Day romantic offering. How did you write so many lines of iambic pentameter?
KB: I have always been interested in Shakespeare’s time. I did some Shakespearean acting as a child. The language is extraordinary, alien yet familiar. It does create a different world, a heightened world, a romantic world, something you can indulge in, escape into, so for a long time I wanted to find some way to play in that sandbox of Shakespearean language. I conceived of the idea of having Shakespeare appear as a ghost because then it can be a contemporary story and Shakespeare can be anything that I imagine. He doesn’t have to be tied to his own biography or anyone else’s version of Shakespeare. I can just write him any way I choose. That movie came out of my desire to synthesize the real and the fantastical.
JA: Do you prefer making independent films?
KB: One of the reasons I toil away in the indie world is because I relish the control. My work can be ignored but it can’t be stopped, or changed, influenced by anyone, which is why I direct my own scripts instead of trying to sell the scripts. Screenwriters have no control over what happens to their screenplay. I was a writer first and foremost. [Boynton has an MFA in playwrighting from Columbia]. I had to learn to direct movies because that’s the only way to protect and make sure the story gets out in a way that you feel comfortable with.
JA: You are a romantic at heart, true?
KB: Romance is a recurring theme in my work, although not so much in my life, and maybe those two things are related. It has been a preoccupation of mine since childhood. My very romantic view is a great engine for stories. I do have a small pipeline with my own poetry on Facebook where I can reach a small number of people very quickly. I wish I could scale up a film pipeline, and I knew just how to reach that audience with that same level of immediacy. It would be an extraordinary feeling, so liberating creatively. Sometimes it is so hard to get up the energy and enthusiasm to begin a new project, when so many things that I’m proud of have been orphaned, forgotten, or fallen on deaf ears.
JA: How do you gauge the success of a film?
KB: There are three categories of response: people that I know which can be gratifying, I sometimes hear from professional critics, and then sometimes a random stranger stumbles upon the movie and loves it. Sadly, the scale of money, time, and energy that goes into a film does not always correspond to the to the scale of the impact.
JA: Do you love filmmaking enough to be satisfied despite a lack of response?
KB: I love being on the set. It is only two weeks out of every two to three years, but I love that feeling of working together.
JA: What’s next?
KB: I’m gearing up to another movie in September and that’ll be shot here in Salisbury, maybe at Mt. Riga. It will be about 10 months between shooting one feature film and another. The film is broadly in the category of horror or psychological thriller. More about mood and character and fabulous actors. I’m going to reuse some of my favorites from people who maybe had a smaller part in my other films.
JA: You describe your work on your website: “it’s humor and a touch of optimism. also, we like coffee.”
KB: I think coffee is one of the core principles of life. It’s certainly a major theme in my work. I think every play or movie contains at least one reference to coffee and usually a very loving reference. It’s a touchstone, but also maybe it represents warmth and comfort.
JA: What do you love about filmmaking?
KB: The camaraderie, the moments of magic, the sense of capturing something special and unrepeatable, the sublime irrelevance and absurdity of the whole endeavor, the excuse to drink endless cups of coffee, those occasional moments when you whisper to yourself (or to someone else): We’re making a movie. (And you are.)
Jazz and classical ensembles from Salisbury School and Indian Mountain School, and solo pianists and a cellist, will perform for the 43rd annual student recital at the United Congregational Church in Salisbury on Sunday, Feb. 23.
The annual student recital is returning for its 43rd year at Salisbury Congregational Church at 30 Main St.
This year’s performance is set for Sunday, Feb. 23, at 3 p.m.
Jazz and classical ensembles from Sailsbury school and Indian Mountain School as well as solo pianists and a cellist will grace the stage at the United Congregational Church.
Admission is free and donations to the church’s special music fund are encouraged.
After the performance, viewers are invited to stick around for a reception with sandwiches, chili and dessert.
Indoor track BL champs
Housatonic Valley Regional High School senior Kyle McCarron’s 1600-meter time of 4:30.31 earned him second place in this year’s indoor state meet. He was within two seconds of first-place finisher Matthew Kraszewski from Nathan Hale-Ray High School.
McCarron was one of eight runners to represent HVRHS in the 2025 Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference Class S indoor track meet at Floyd Little Athletic Center in New Haven Feb. 15. In addition to his 1600-meter silver medal, McCarron placed sixth in the 3200-meter run.
For the HVRHS girls, Mia Dodge placed fifth in the 55-meter hurdles. Dodge also placed fifth in the sprint medley relay with teammates Gabi Titone, Harper Howe and Kenzie Lotz. Howe placed eighth in the 600-meter race. Titone placed 10th in the 1600-meter race.
Patrick Money placed 10th in the boys 55-meter hurdles and 25th in the long jump. Money, Kyle McCarron, Silas Tripp and Peter Austin placed 12th as a team in the sprint medley relay.
Joy Brown installing work for her show at the Tremaine Art Gallery at Hotchkiss.
This year, The Hotchkiss School is marking 50 years of co-education with a series of special events, including an exhibition by renowned sculptor Joy Brown. “The Art of Joy Brown,” opening Saturday, Feb. 22, in the Tremaine Art Gallery, offers a rare retrospective of Brown’s work, spanning five decades from her early pottery to her large-scale bronze sculptures.
“It’s an honor to show my work in celebration of fifty years of women at Hotchkiss,” Brown shared. “This exhibition traces my journey—from my roots in pottery to the figures and murals that have evolved over time.”
Co-curated by Christine Owen, Hotchkiss ceramics instructor, and Joan Baldwin, curator of special collections, the scale and scope of the exhibition was inspired by a recent Ed Ruscha retrospective in Los Angeles. “I thought it would be incredible to showcase all these different aspects of Joy’s work,” said Owen, who has known Brown for over 30 years.
Brown’s father, a Presbyterian missionary and medical doctor, opened a hospital in Japan where Brown grew up and cultivated her love of clay. Her first apprenticeship was in Tomba, a region in Hyogo Prefecture known for its ancient pottery kilns and Tambayaki pottery. “There are thousands of years of continuous history of clay there and I was working with a 13th generation potter.” Brown recalled that as part of her early training, her teacher handed her a sake cup and said, “make these.” With no extra instruction given, Brown proceeded to make thousands of copies of the cup. Never fired, she realized that the pieces were an exercise. She explained, “You’re not really making something, you’re participating in a process that these things emerge from.” From there, she embarked on an apprenticeship with master potter Shigeyoshi Morioka. As part of the process she learned from Morioka, Brown has built a 30-foot-long wood-firing tunnel kiln on her property in Kent, Connecticut, where she fires her work once a year in an intensive month-long process. The fire’s natural interaction with the clay creates unique earth tones and ash patterns, highlighting the raw beauty of the material.
Natalia Zukerman
“I learned not just pottery but a whole way of life,” she recalled. “The work is a continuous process—like practicing a signature until it evolves into something uniquely yours.” Her figures, initially emerging as playful puppets, have since evolved into large-scale sculptures now found in public spaces from Shanghai to Broadway to Hotchkiss’s own campus.
Brown’s seven-foot “Sitter with Head in Hands” was installed near Ford Food Court in October, followed by “Recliner with Head in Hands” near Hotchkiss’s Main Building in November. She welcomes interaction with her sculptures, encouraging visitors to touch them and even dress them with scarves or hats. “These figures transcend gender, age, and culture,” Brown noted. “They’re kind of like when you’re 4 years old and you didn’t know or care what you were, you know? All of us meet in that field and I think people resonate with that.”
In conjunction with the exhibition, Hotchkiss will host a screening of “The Art of Joy Brown,” a documentary by Eduardo Montes-Bradley, followed by a panel discussion with the artist and filmmaker on March 6 in Walker Auditorium. Brown will also serve as an artist-in-residence, collaborating with students on special projects.
On being part of the celebration of women at Hotchkiss Brown said, “Fifty years ago, I was deep in the mountains of Japan, immersed in clay.” With a soft spoken and almost childlike quality, Brown spoke about and interacted with her pieces with curiosity, reverence and wonder.
“The practice of working with clay for all these years is grounding and centering for me. It challenges me,” she said. “The work forces me to put myself out there. It’s not just the making of the pieces that make me more whole, the pieces themselves become more present.”
Brown reflected on the retrospective nature of the show and shared that putting it together has been like looking at a family album. “It’s kind of like I’m seeing my whole life in front of me,” she said. “It’s humbling and makes me think about why I do what I do. It comes back to the idea of those thousands of sake cups, you know? We’re just here, being as present as we can be. We’re not making things, we’re participating in a process of being more present, and all that spirit is reflected in the work.”
“The Art of Joy Brown” opens Saturday, Feb. 22, and runs through April 6. For more information, visit www.hotchkiss.org.
This story has been updated to reflect a change in the scheduled opening date due to forecast extreme weather conditions.
Breece Meadow
Chances are you know or have heard of Jeb Breece.He is one of a handful of the Northwest Corner’s “new guard”—young, talented and interesting people with can-do spirit — whose creative output makes life here even nicer than it already is.
Breece’s outward low-key nature belies his achievements which would appear ambitious even for a person without a full-time job and a family.The third season of his “Bad Grass” speaker series is designed with the dual purpose of reviving us from winter doldrums and illuminating us on a topic of contemporary gardening — by which I mean gardening that does not sacrifice the environment for the sake of beauty nor vice versa. There are two upcoming talks taking place at the White Hart:Feb. 20 featuring Richard Hayden from New York City’s High Line and March 6 where Christopher Koppel will riff on nativars. You won’t want to miss either.
An investment manager by trade, Breece and his wife Sabina rented a weekend house in Kent in 2011 just after they had their first child.Soon after he began to volunteer at a nearby farm and then started to cultivate a small cutting flower bed.Breece’s insight — that it is a rare farmer who is great at both growing and selling — led him in 2020 to aggregate demand and supply for cutting flowers by creating a monthly flower market at Kent Barns in collaboration with RT Facts. Coinciding with Covid, the outdoor market became, in many ways, a respite during a challenging time.
Covid provoked Breece and Sabina to move full time to Salisbury.Soon after, he met Page Dickey who had just published her book “Uprooted.” Had it not been for this book and his friendship with Dickey, Breece admits that his front yard would have been landscaped with a version of boxwood and liatris and the existing grass lawn would have been maintained at great expense.Dickey introduced him to organic landscaper Mike Nadeau and a meadow was born.
Meadows.I have written quite a bit about them in this column, in part because a meadow can be a wholesale solution to the lawn issue.It is by no means the only solution but, for a large expanse, it can be extraordinary to behold.The creation of a biodiverse native habitat where there was only a version of grass and weed is a sensation-filled wonder, but it does take a while to achieve this graceful state unless you have the wisdom of Nadeau — and his machinery — behind you.Now going into its fourth year, the Breece meadow has evolved as new native perennials and grasses show up.“It is beautiful to look at from the house but is best experienced from its interior where you can see, hear and feel the life around you.”
While his world view on gardening has changed, Breece doesn’t think of himself as an advocate of native habitats.But he is.The proceeds from Bad Grass this year will go to its 2025 partner project, Steep Rock Preserve’s “Holiday House” project to transform the space into a “ruin garden,” preserving its historical significance while enhancing its natural beauty and restoring native vegetation.
The spongy moth infestation of 2021 and 2022 feels both a long time ago and like yesterday.Walking in the woods, as I did this morning, the effects of spongy moth are more visible than they were last year; the winter winds have blown off the dead limbs from trees that succumbed to the voracious moths’ leaf-eating appetites.On our property we were able to save many trees using BtK and trunk wraps.But most of the truly glorious giant oaks – some well over 70 feet tall and almost as wide - succumbed.Now, several years later, these limbs are taking down smaller trees as they fall to the ground.There is not much to do about it right now unless you can safely relocate a fallen branch that has landed on and distorted an otherwise living tree. Events like this are a reminder of how many young tree recruits we need to ensure the viability of a woodland. This spring there will be quite a bit more light reaching the woodland floor as a result of the dead trees. The open canopy means an opportunity for growth.It is up to us to decide what will grow in these spaces as, without our intervention, they will be overgrown with invasives, prohibiting native trees from growing and destroying a previously viable habitat.Look for these spaces and pull out the invasives as they grow in.For more on the topic go to www.theungardener.com/articles/the-over-under-a-bet-on-the-future-of-the-woods
Dee Salomon ‘ungardens’ in Litchfield County.