On Wednesday 2nd October at The Marine Theatre in Lyme Regis, we hosted the first public screening of #TreesAreTheKey.
We’d sold almost 100 tickets leading up to the event. Sophia Moseley, the theatre manager, reliably reassured us there would likely be, ‘a good few walk in’s on the night’ – indeed there were.
Our amazing trustees and volunteers were out in force: Helen, Izzy, Rikey, Chris, Phil, Emily, Sue, Yvonne, Dave, Jake, Martin and co-founders, Simon and Tracey. We were also joined by talented filmmaker, Tim Tyson Short and Anne-Louise Shiner, Head of one of our UK-Kenya twinned schools, featured in the film.
It Was Alright on the Night
In the auditorium, a table was proudly laid out with our fundraising merchandise. At another station, volunteers encouraged theatre goers to become volunteer too, boosting their numbers to help on a variety of projects. We also had a double table filled with mouthwatering vegan savouries and cakes donated by Helen Roberts of The Flour Pot Vegan Bakery in Chard. Half of the ingredients were also very kindly donated by our local Co-Op and countless hours were given by Helen and her team, making, baking and selling them on the night for donations.
Our CEO comments: “I stood at the back with Simon and the theatre volunteers, as the room fell silent and the lights went down. There were no seats left and I don’t think I could have sat still anyway. When the first frames of the film began rolling and the sound of the creatures and insects of Kenya started coming through the speakers, I took a deep breath, hoping the sound levels would be OK. Then Kate Winslet’s narration began and I blinked hard in the realisation that this was the moment we’d been working towards for many months. My gratitude to so many great people, poured out of me.”
‘Cut!’
Despite there being a few irksome punctuation points along the way, the process of getting the film to its polished finish for our team, was relatively painless. Tim worked swiftly and tirelessly on it however, lacing all the stories together, penning a brilliant script and working with the post-production crew to present the film in its best light. He did an outstanding job in the field and long after the last frame was shot. He knows Kenya well, having worked there many times before and he won the trust of the Boré community and the Mothers of the Forest, quickly.
Before we knew it, 40 minutes had passed, the credits rolled and the audience expressed their appreciation of #TreesAreTheKey, noisily! Our feel good film was a success. The Q&A afterwards saw a wonderfully diverse selection of questions posed to the Word Forest team who were over there, and Tim and Anne-Louise too. Together, we had a unique opportunity to back-fill with details of what life is like on the front-line of climate change. We were also able to show how incredibly engaged and enthusiastic the tree planting community we’re lucky enough to work with in Kenya, really are.
The Numbers
It has taken a few days to tally up all the funds raised around the event, including a wonderful £500 donation from Anne-Louise, whose students did a terrific bit of fundraising.
We’re incredibly grateful for all of the contributions and we’re delighted to announce receipt of a little over £2,000. This will be turned into 800 trees. In tiny handful of years, they will have absorbed around 200 tonnes of CO2 and other pollutants. Additionally, the money will stretch to funding the construction of 1/5 of a new large, solid stone classroom in Kenya too; they cost £10,000 in total.
New Screenings
Our Team spoke to several people who are keen to host fundraising screenings of #TreesAreTheKey in their own communities. We guided them to TreesAreTheKey.com/screenings to register their interest.
We asked Tim if all his documentaries pan out in this way for the first showing and he said, “No, this event is unique”. He was uplifted and enthused by the supporters who had come together from Lyme Regis and neighbouring counties, to share in the viewing experience; he concurred the positivity in the theatre, was palpable.
Our Chair of Trustees, Simon concludes: “We’re living through a rather scary time, where scientists and the general public know we have to make radical changes to avoid the worst environmental disasters, despite our politicians still not quite getting it. Our film clearly shows one way we can help to mitigate some of the worst effects of climate change.”
If you’d like to donate so we can plant more trees, click here and if you’d like to host a fundraising screening of #TreesAreTheKey, click here.
Thank you!
Your support, quite literally, means the world to us all.
The Team
