Film & TV Writer-director Leah Cameron is Helping Unveil 'Where Cool Came From' in Pop Culture Web Series

    LOS ANGELES, CA, December 14, 2015 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Canadian writer-director extraordinaire Leah Cameron has returned for Season 2 of "Where Cool Came From," a stylized docu-web series that traces the origins of pop culture proclivities both hip and trendy, along with those timeless and true.

Examining an eclectic selection of pop culture trends - from awe-inspiring cars to mid-century modern architecture, vinyl records, tattoos, graffiti and more - host Dave LeBlanc traverses North American locales to answer the question: Is there such a thing as timeless cool?

"Cool is something that emerges out of the need for self-expression, it has an authenticity to it. True cool can't be marketed or sold," said Cameron, who previously directed the award-winning short drama, "Subway Harmonies" and wrote the hit film festival shorts "Ninulla" and "The Lion Shadows." "Jazz will always be cool. Vinyl records will always be cool. Our show isn't interested in promoting the latest trend, we draw the line when marketers sell something back to people as cool. For us, cool is about individuality and self-expression."

From Stornoway Productions and director-producer Robert Fantinatto ("I Dream of Wires"), "Where Cool Came From" will broadcast new webisodes three times weekly on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays through to January 22 on its official website - www.wherecoolcamefrom.com. The series releases three webisodes per topic and recently sold to Discovery Channel Latin America.

Headquartered in Toronto, the international production has traveled to cover topics and sources in Chicago, Detroit, New York, Los Angeles, Palm Springs and San Francisco.

"As the show's creator, my main goal was to provide the audience with an entertaining, but smart pop culture show focused on exploring the origins of many of our cultural signposts, from our obsession with coffee to the recent revival of vinyl records," said Fantinatto. "Behind all of these popular interests, which sometimes seem ephemeral and kitschy, there is always a deeper story that gives the trend some authenticity. The criteria we used to determine if a topic was "cool" was that sense of authenticity that made it more than just a passing trend."

The Season 2 premiere is a webisode titled "Retro Sports Rising," which looks at the sudden interest in cool leisure sports such as roller skating, roller derby, bowling and axe throwing, that each have deep cultural roots.

Last week's webisode - "A Gentleman Most Finely" - dropped. It examines trends in male dress, from the urban woodsman or "lumbersexual" look that popularized in 2015, to the stylings of the modern dandy.

Episodes on cool cities (with a focus on Detroit), shoes (with a focus on Doc Martens and sneaker culture), graffiti and other forms of street art, geek culture and the history of gaming will be released in the coming weeks, with a final half-hour episode on the "Language of Cool," which will trace how cool language and the word "cool" arose from African-American and jazz culture in the 1940s evolving to where it is today.

For Season 2, Cameron wrote and story edited six webisodes and served as associate producer and segment director. The Toronto native is critically involved in scripting, story editing, voiceover writing, research and writing creative daydream sequences. She wrote 18 webisodes for Season 1, including the pilot, a three-part series on coffeehouse culture.

"The show benefited greatly from Leah's many skills," Fantinatto said. "She was not only the primary story editor and writer on the series, shaping and writing our pilot episode and five other episodes in season one and shaping all storylines prior to and after shooting in season two, but she also worked in the capacity of associate producer, researching topics and arranging interviews."

Cameron, an alum of the world-renowned American Film Institute in Los Angeles and recipient of AFI's Joseph Stefano Award of Excellence in Screenwriting, gained prior documentary writing experience for the Henry Less TV series, "I Prophesy." She engages her special expertise of screenwriting that artistically brings "Where Cool Came From" stories to life.

"While Where Cool Came From is technically a documentary series, I do bring my experience as a narrative TV writer to bear when I am writing and story editing the show," she said. "I have made Dave, our host, into a character who has certain personality traits that are more exaggerated than the person he is in real life. So I've helped craft him as a character and Rob and I make sure to give him a journey or a character arc in each episode. Dave's curiosity will lead him to actually grow a beard for our episode on the modern gentleman before deciding he completely hates it, for example. Or he'll decide to actually get a tattoo for our show tattoos. I'm giving him a goal and obstacles he must overcome to learn more about a certain topic. I really try to craft things as a narrative storyteller."

For the second season of "Where Cool Came From," Cameron directed four webisode segments that evidence her outstanding talents further. "There were numerous occasions where Ms. Cameron took over the directing duties to shoot some dramatic recreations, an area where her experience far exceeds my own," said Fantinatto.

Cameron says "Where Cool Came From" is aimed for an audience of men and women aged 25-45. "We've sort of seen it connect with different groups of people. The web allows people with niche interests to connect," she said. "People who dress retro, people living like it's the 1940s...you can connect with them through online message boards. You can connect to all these niche groups who are into these cool things to build an audience."

Cameron was the recipient of the National Screen Institute's National Drama Prize. Through the program, Cameron directed the 2010 short drama, "Subway Harmonies," which became an official selection at renowned film festivals such as the Palm Springs International Film Festival, the Miami International Film Festival and the Montreal World Film Festival. Following the story of a former Chinese opera star turned piano teacher, "Subway Harmonies" placed among the audience favorites at Palm Springs. It also screened at the Canadian Consulate in Ghana and the Short Film Corner at the Cannes Film Festival. "Subway Harmonies" was sold to the Sundance Channel, BRAVO and Air Canada. It was Cameron's first film, and one that announced her presence as an extraordinary talent.

A year later, Cameron wrote the short drama film, "The Lion Shadows," which was nominated for a Golden Tadpole Award at the 2011 Camerimage International Film Festival. The film screened at an AFI Showcase at the Director's Guild of America, and at the East End Festival in London.

She also wrote in 2011 the script for "Ninulla," which screened at the Dokufest 2.0 in Kosovo and received a special jury mention. The story is set during the 1999 Kosovo War and follows a teenage girl who seeks refuge from a village massacre in a mountain cave, and who shares a surreal reunion with her older sister.

In 2012, Cameron wrote the original story for "Reverb," a short family drama starring Sara Arrington ("Safe House"), Justin Tinucci ("Standing Up") and Jonathan Kells Phillips ("Winner"). She later went on to direct, write and produce the short comedy, "City of Neighbourhoods" starring the award-winning actress Hannah Spear ("Versus Valerie") and the documentary "Icarus Fell."

Cameron used her special story and screenwriting knowledge for stints in creative development where she vetted scripts, gave notes and story advice at some of Hollywood's most distinguished production companies including producer Robert O. Kaplan's ("40 Lashes Less One by Elmore Leonard") Rustic Canyon Entertainment, River Road Entertainment ("12 Years a Slave", "Love and Mercy", "The Tree of Life") and Gore Verbinski's ("RANGO", "Pirates of the Caribbean" franchise) Blind Wink Productions.

"Good stories are founded in a compelling character who we can relate to who has a strong desire or need to attain something," said Cameron. "I usually like to have a character who has dominant characteristics about them that get in the way of what they want or really need. There's both drama and comedy in that for me."

Before her foray into film and TV, Cameron served as an editor and writer for many leading Canadian publications such as Azure, Fashion Magazine, Toronto Life, Creative Screenwriting and more.

Next up Cameron's been hired as a researcher in the writing room for an upcoming hour-long CBC drama series. Cameron is also set to write, direct and produce "Canadaville," a forthcoming comedic web series that's currently in pre-production.

For more information, visit http://tinyurl.com/LeahIMDb.

Watch "Where Cool Came From" at: www.wherecoolcamefrom.com.

Leah Cameron is a film and TV writer-director from Toronto.

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