An unknown actor practically has to beg a celebrity acting coach to help him audition for a TV role in the short film, Master Maggie.

Most people think of acting classes as being a necessary requirement on the way to their Emmy, Oscar, or Tony.  The direction that director/co-writer Matthew Bonifacio takes us on is not quite as we expected.  One could see this as an acting coach’s worst nightmare.  In addition to filmmaking, Matthew Bonifacio is also an acting coach.  He uses the acting coach here to serve as a stand-in for his own life but with heightened stakes at hand.

Whether its real life or the fictional world on camera, the end goal remains the same: to get your students to be truthful and confident in order to book the part.  This is exactly what acting student Graham Chase (Neil Jain) does from a certain point of view.  Is acting coach Maggie (Lorraine Bracco) proud of him?  Well, I’ll just let you determine this for yourself.  I would say more about this film but the husband-and-wife writing team have written the film in a way that prevents me from doing so.  You just need to see it for yourself!

In addition to executive producing, Saturday Night Live veteran Kenan Thompson also has a minor role.  Thompson’s work shows that he’ll definitely have a career after he decides to leave SNL.  I’m curious to see if he’ll tackle dramatic roles in his future.  What we see from Thompson here is somewhere between comedy and drama.

DIRECTOR:  Matthew Bonifacio
SCREENWRITERS:  Julianna Gelinas Bonifacio & Matthew Bonifacio
CAST:  Lorraine Bracco, Neil Jain, Kenan Thompson, Brian Dennehy, Chris Henry Coffey

Master Maggie held its world premiere during the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival in the Shorts program.