We've Got Balls Rolls into Distribution Deal

We've Got Balls, a wacky bowling comedy that comes from the mind and director's chair of Orange County Crazies founder Cherie Kerr, has won a distribution deal.

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See We've Got Balls in Director Cherie Kerr's Own Intimate Santa Ana Theater

Indie Rights plans to debut We've Got Balls May 26 on iTunes, Vudu, Playstation and Xbox and make it available on other digital platforms soon thereafter, according to Linda Nelson, the Los Angeles-based independent film distribution company's CEO.

“We're so excited to be releasing this very funny comedy,” says Nelson in a release from Kerr's own Santa Ana-based KerrPR company. “It's hilarious to see a small business go 'balls out' to save their lanes.”

“We are thrilled to be working with Linda Nelson and her team to get Balls into the marketplace,” says Kerr, whose film company is called Ree-invent Films. “They are a dynamic team who are bound to help make Ree-invent's first movie project a success.”

“We finally have a way to reach a very specialized niche to get behind our indie films so that they can then find a broader audience,” says Nelson, who promises an aggressive social media campaign for We've Got Balls. “We can't wait to use social media to reach all our bowling fans who will undoubtedly spread the word to all their friends and fellow bowlers.”

Shot mostly at Fountain Bowl in Fountain Valley, the 92-minute screwball comedy is about bowlers, employees and assorted wackos trying to save a small-town alley from a greedy developer's wrecking ball.

We've Got Balls premiered at the 2013 Newport Beach Film Festival and won an award there as well as at the Movieville International Film Festival, the Action on Film International Film Festival, the All Sports International Film Festival, the World-Fest Houston International Film Festival and Indie-Fest International.

The film's male lead is Andrew Dickler, who edited Spooner and was also the lead in Douchebag, which were both directed and co-written by Kerr's son Drake Doremus of Like Crazy and Breathe In fame. Also starring is Gary Austin, co-founder and creator of the Groundlings, which counted Kerr among the founding members of the legendary LA improv troupe. Another of Kerr's Groundlings' pals, Lynne Marie Stewart, who was Pee-wee Herman's Miss Yvonne, is also in the film.

So many of Kerr's friends, business associates and Santa Ana improv students show up on the screen that the We've Got Balls cast is massive. But she also gave the small part of a butler to an unknown named Jay Abdo.

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When he was Jihad Abdo, the actor was a huge film and television star in his native Syria. But some negative comments about the Assad regime and subsequent persecution caused Abdo to flee to the United States in October 2011, when he joined his wife studying in Minnesota. The couple later moved to Los Angeles so Abdo could pursue acting, and after changing his first name and struggling as a pizza deliveryman he got his first movie part in America in We've Got Balls.

From a Wall Street Journal profile last year:

For all Ms. Kerr knew, Mr. Abdo was a recent immigrant with a polished style and double takes that reminded her of the late comic legend Sid Caesar. When Mr. Abdo told her he was famous in the Middle East, she recalls responding, “Wow, Jay, I'm so honored you were in my small little indie film.”

Abdo went on to star along with Nicole Kidman, James Franco and Damian Lewis in Werner Herzog's Queen of the Desert, which debuts today at the Berlin International Film Festival. Coming at the end of this year is Tom Tykwer's A Hologram for the King, which is based on the Dave Eggers novel and also stars Tom Hanks, Tom Skerritt and Sarita Choudhury.

The balls definitely aligned for Abdo.

Email: mc****@oc******.com. Twitter: @MatthewTCoker. Follow OC Weekly on Twitter @ocweekly or on Facebook!

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