Lenihan Makes Directorial Debut with ‘Red Dot’ Film

Morgan, sorority girl and inadvertent registered sex offender, finds that having to report her status to her neighbors really puts a kink in her dating plans.

Such is the premise of Chloe Lenihan’s film Red Dot, a film inspired by the plight of Lenihan’s friend who was arrested in college for public urination – an illegal act in all 50 states and classified as a sex crime if it occurs in public view in some states.
“The charge was ultimately dropped and she has a good sense of humor about the whole thing,” Lenihan said. “Her experience led us to wonder about how people would react if a beautiful girl knocked on your door and said the last thing you would ever expect.  The setup seemed ripe for comedy.”
Lenihan, a graduate of Corpus Christi Elementary School and former member of the Palisades-Malibu YMCA swim team, screened her directorial debut at the Malibu Film Festival on Dec. 6. The film made its local premiere after screening at the Palm Springs International ShortsFest and other festivals where Lenihan said it has been very successful. Red Dot’s lead actress, Elizabeth Masucci, will be starring in the new TNT 1960s cop drama, Public Morals, playing wife to Ed Burns.
Lenihan also comes from an acting background, then moved into production when she went to work for Palisadians Colin Cotter at Entertainment Group and later Graham King at GK Films.
Working with a shoestring budget on her own film, Lenihan said it was a challenge to create the desired aesthetic with limited resources and man-power. But by bringing together a strong team of collaborators who were resourceful and had a positive attitude, the film came in at budget.
“I was really lucky to have such a great team because we accomplished so much with very little,” she said.
Lenihan credits her fellowship at Columbia University, where she is pursuing an MFA in Creative Producing, as the catalyst for the film’s direction and success.
“My professors have created an environment that challenges me to take creative risks and develop my confidence as much as my practical skills,” she said. “I’m naturally a very visual person, but it was in the program that I realized how much I enjoy directing.”
The recipient of the New York Women in Film & Television scholarship, Lenihan has written the screenplay for a feature version of the film with the intent to direct it.
She has been accepted to the Maine Media Writers Retreat where she will workshop the screenplay into a finished product ready to take to market. The feature derives its comedy as a Kafkaesque coming-of-age story about an all-American girl, and inadvertent sex offender, searching for a sense of identity despite her social stigma.
View a trailer of the film at http://vimeo.com/95659609.