The Path to “The Realm”

By Allyson Diana

The Realm is one of the biggest undertakings Butterfleye Films has ever done. The difficulty in creating a web-series takes the form of the unseen things, such as pre-production considerations, creating a fantasy world out of nothing, and coordinating all of the efforts of the cast and crew to make a polished idea come forth onto film.

When the Realm was conceptualized it was merely an idea in the head of an awesome creator. This creator is my husband, Tony. He came to me on a starry night and began talking about a fantasy world with witches and wizards, but more importantly intense emotional relationships that would far outlast the magic he dreamed of.

Then the real world set in amidst commitments and events (unable to be missed according to family members), we developed a world which we proudly call “The Realm”. A year ago it was only talk among our closest friends. However that talk never ceased and ideas emerged. Quickly I started on scripts, taking the points that my husband gave me and creating these fresh, new characters. The first script is aptly named “The Girl” as even now, we are too excited to give away her name. Her counterpart was to be romantic (but normal), imagine that, yet creating James was a challenge to any writer. There were subtleties and nuances that could not have been imagined in my husband’s mind when he originally conceptualized it. Slowly but surely the characters of the fantasy world (The Realm) came to life. As any writer knows, it takes development on one side to understand the other. I started developing characters in the fantasy world that I could have never thought of without developing the main characters of “The Girl” (still not going to tell you her name) and James. What came out was something I didn’t even expect. While my husband and I collaborated on many projects in the past, “The Realm” may prove to be our best.

Entering “The Realm”

By Tony Diana

About a year ago I had this idea for a web series, it would fulfill one of my lifelong goals, to spin a mystery while telling a love story. I really like complicated involved tales that take a while to tell and all the while you get to spread little clues 

This is “The Realm”!  I am close to having it forged into reality. I got the story mapped out and characters created now it has to be written. Enter my brilliant wife Allyson. I told her about the story and it seemed to ignite her imagination, so much so that she created some new characters into my story and added layers that now make it equally hers as much as mine.

As of this writing we have sent our audition notices and received a healthy amount of actors interested in the project. This is where we work hard to find the right people to cast for the leads, James (The man who feels a little cut off from life) and the mysterious girl who shows up on his doorstep. Equally important are the supporting characters Dustin (James's best friend) and Cassie (Dustin's Girlfriend). We are ready to enter “The Realm”.

The Realm is a story about two worlds, our everyday world we live in and a fantastical land of magic and monsters and what happens when people from each of those worlds come together and the danger they must fight in order to be together.