Eric Norwine wants to put his hometown in the limelight. After several years in Tinsel Town, learning the art of film-making as a production assistant and producer among the likes of Will Ferrell and his own personal hero, Billy Crystal, the University of Southern California (USC) graduate has come home, hoping to bring moviemakers to St. Charles County and Missouri.
Eric started out at the University of Missouri-Columbia, a journalism and economics major, initially planning to go to law school. But he says his dream was making movies. "I always had a passion for film and theatre and plays,” Eric adds.
He says in 2008, however, MIZZOU only offered two film-making classes: “Food and Film,” and “Early Chinese Film.” He took the classes but applied to acting schools on both the East and West Coasts. Ultimately, he was accepted to USC, one of the toughest film schools in which to get in.
At USC, Eric says he took on an average of 22 credit hours per semester, all while carrying a 4.0 GPA and interning at Will Ferrell and Adam McKay’s website and video production company, Funny or Die. While doing every typical internship gofer job he was given, Eric also learned production and “covering scripts.” That’s when interns read scripts and write up summaries of them for the stars to consider. “In the meantime, I got coffee. I took out the trash. I didn’t ask for anything.”
But then Emmy and Tony Award-winner, Billy Crystal came to town to work on a parody trailer for a sequel to When Harry Met Sally…
“All I asked, my ‘big ask,’ was to just be involved,’” he says. He met him soon after.
Eric had asked a man getting on an elevator, in the senior living facility where the parody was being filmed, to hold the door. The nine-time Oscars host turned around and said: “You know, the nice thing about these old folks’ homes is that the elevator doors close slower.”
“I’ll probably tell that story for the rest of my life,” Eric says.
After graduation from USC, Eric worked as a post-production assistant on Fun Size, a teen comedy being shot on the Paramount Studio Lot. He wrote scripts on the side.
But things changed on a trip home in 2012. He learned his father, Mark Norwine, had attempted suicide twice the previous year. He was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, just like his son. Eric had been diagnosed at 16 years old.
What began as a tragedy took the father and son all over the country with a movie they made with Joshua Salzberg. Walking Man documents the Norwine’s 17-day, 220-mile walk across Missouri and their journey to shatter stigmas about mental health.
The film received the 2014 Audience Award for the best documentary at the St. Louis International Film Festival. It sold out the St. Louis Tivoli Theater. Eric signed a multiyear television and streaming deal with Gravitas Ventures. And the Norwines spent the next couple of years taking the film to schools and mental health organizations all over America.
Eric then taught social studies at Lutheran High School in St. Peters for five years.
Today, he makes videos for small businesses, nonprofits and friends. He has been talking with local leaders about, and scouting for possible locations for, filming movies in Missouri.
He says enticing moviemakers to Missouri is possible due to the state's new film incentive law, which offers 20-42% tax breaks for movies made in the state.
With his Hollywood connections and ties to local leaders (St. Charles County Executive Steve Ehlmann gave Eric’s dad swimming lessons years ago), he just might make it happen.
He’s since met the creator of the Netflix series Ozark, Bill Dubuque, who just so happens to live in an apartment overlooking the Missouri River in St. Charles.
“I’ll probably tell that story for the rest of my life."