EAST OF HOPE STREET:
Photo by Tom Mendoza/L.A. Daily News
Two alumni return to CAMPUS TO promote their film By Susan Wolf and visit the place ‘Where it all began’
Nate Thomas, ’79, (left) and Tim Russ, ’77, (right) on the set of “East of Hope Street” in Los Angeles.
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In many respects, the trip back to Austin and St. Edward’s University was a fluke — a plot twist that not even Nate Thomas, ’79, and Tim Russ, ’77, would have thought to weave into a story line. After spending almost eight years writing and producing their independent film in Los Angeles, Thomas and Russ learned some unexpected news: Austin would be one of the first cities to screen their movie, “East of Hope Street.” “The distributors picked Austin,” said Thomas. “It’s really something that it also happens to be where we went to school.” It had been more than 20 years since either of them had been on campus, the place both say helped launch them into their respective careers. Russ, who plays Tuvok, the Vulcan security officer on television’s “Star Trek Voyager,” and Thomas, a director, producer and tenured professor of film at California State University, Northridge (CSUN), returned to Austin in August to do some promotions and enjoy a seemingly fated homecoming. “These were formative years,” said Russ. “There are a lot of memories here. When you major in theater, it’s not like you just take classes with people and leave. You live in the theatre building, rehearsing all the time. You become like family.” The close ties between alumni are part of what helped “East of Hope Street” become a reality. Co-written and co-produced by Thomas and Russ, the independent film has been a shared dream since the early 1990s. Focusing on the plight of a teenage Hispanic girl who escapes the civil war violence of El Salvador for Los Angeles, the movie explores one girl’s struggle to survive inner city Los Angeles and the city’s labyrinthine child protective system.