For The Madera Tribune
Ghettobusters actors and actresses. From left are Anthony Campos, Kayleigh Link, Alondra Martinez, Ryan Ochoa, Hector Gomez, Ricky Montez, Concrete, Alyisa Ingrim Araceli Huerta and Jaime Nungaray.
Finally, Falcon Pictures President Danny Sauceda is ready to see his Ghettobusters TV series on the big screen — figuratively.
The cast and crew were treated to a showing of the limited TV series last month on the big screen at Madera Theaters.
“We had a wrap party in Madera,” Sauceda said. “It’s what you do at the end of a long season of filming. You have a party of everyone like the cast and crew. We watched all the episodes. Then, we had a nice dinner at the Madera Municipal Golf Course. We set up a red carpet there, too. We had dinner, drinks, dancing — the whole nine yards.”
After trying to film during the pandemic at places around Madera County, Sauceda is finally hoping to see his film.
“We are officially with Tubi. We are just waiting for them to tell us it’s coming out,” he said. “We’re considered a limited series release so we completed about half of season 1. We released these five episodes to see how they do. If it does well, then it gets picked up for the rest.”
Sauceda wanted to make sure to thank the City of Madera, Madera Cinemas, Jalisco Limo, Madera Municipal Golf Course and The Madera Tribune for their continued support.
Now that Ghettobusters is getting its time on the screen, Sauceda has already reaped rewards from the comedic series.
“Our very first premier we had at the Chinese Mann Theater,” he said. “It was a film festival. We had a party across the street at the Roosevelt Hotel. That was our first big premiere for it. We won an award at that film festival.”
Sauceda earned bigger marks at the East L.A. Film Festival.
“We won the Homey Award and the Audience Award,” he said. “The Homey Award is for winning the block. Some of the film festival has blocks that have three or four movies. Ours was comedy. Our film was the best on the block. The audience award was the one with the most votes.”
Then, he and his crew were invited to the official Latino Fim Festival in New York City that was sponsored by HBO, Yahoo and the National Hispanic Movie Correlation.
“We won Best New Media for best new TV series,” he said. “We’ve gotten really good response from these film festivals. They all know we’re going to Tubi. We should be released shortly. The whole short series will be released. Tubi is already asking for more episodes to become a Tubi Original.”
With the first five episodes filmed and ready to go, it’s back to the drawing board to finish out the first season.
“Our next step is to finish write episodes, find locations, cast and crew,” he said. “We’re getting ready for part two of Season 1.”
The wrap party was intended for the cast and crew and Sauceda said they were blown away by the finished product
“They loved it,” he said. “Our two main stars are blown away at how well it turned out. This was the first time they saw it. They said we have a hit show. You never know what’s going to happen. You go on set, you film it and put it together in the editing room. Ninety-five percent of the people don’t get to see it until it’s complete finished.”
Now that Sauceda has made more contacts, he has move avenues for his new projects.
“Part of the benefits of going to these film festivals is you meet so many people there,” he said. “We went to New York City for the Latino Film Festival. We got to meet the people that run HBO Latino. We met so many people that wanted to know what else we have. When people get stuff done, other people see the value in you and want to know what’s. next. We’re looking at three projects to film until February.”
One of his projects — Totally Awexome Machines — recently finished.
“We have a meeting with the editor and producer to get that finished,” Sauceda said. “We have someone that is going to help us pitch it to Discovery. They already saw some of the trailer and are ready to push it for us.”
They also recently finished filming a short film, “Mr. Bonita,” at George’s Auto Parts in Madera.
“One of our investor wanted to play this role for a long time,” Sauceda said. “It was a spoof on mafia. That one will be hitting the film circuit, too.”
