Learning Curve Producer on Today Show

Transcript from the Today Show, April 22, 2002. The Learning Curve features Majandra Delfino. The movie’s producer was interviewed last week on the Today Show.

AL ROKER: What would you do if you won a million dollars? Well, NBC’s former bureau chief for Latin America faced just that question After winning the lottery Oscar Delgado decided to follow his dream. Five years after striking it rich, he produced his first feature film, the learning curve, which is about to be released on DVD and VHS. Oscar, good to see you.

OSCAR DELGADO: Hey nice to see you Al, thanks for having me….

AL ROKER: So how much did you win?

OSCAR DELGADO: 4.2 million dollars

AL ROKER: And you kept working?

OSCAR DELGADO: Yeah, I kept working, and it was funny because as soon as I won I got a lot of calls, and what am I going to do, even the NBC president, Bob Wright, called me, and said here’s my tax attorney, lets see what you want to do, and I said you know Bob, I want to continue working, because I thought there were still some things to do, then they proceeded to send me to Bosnia so I don’t know if that was really the smartest move, but I did stay I did stay because I loved what I was doing with news, I really did.

AL ROKER: But was your dream to produce movies?

OSCAR DELGADO: My dream was to produce movies, but obviously what I wanted to do is take it one step at a time. I mean you win a lot of money, you don’t want to just say ok, because it’s a process, so I was looking for a script, I was working, I was looking for a good script and everything else, so the Learning curve came about, and I said ok, this is something I want to do.

[Al Roker’s pager begins beeping]

AL ROKER: Oh excuse me, its not me- oh my gosh, it is me- you know what, its telling me I have an interview with Oscar, telling me to get back on the set- Pretty good eh, your first big break on the today show, and your host gets beeped.

So you decided to produce this movie- tell us about the Learning curve.

OSCAR DELGADO: The Learning curve is like a thriller, romantic, type of a film where two kids get involved, and get in over their heads, and we see what happens when they try to scam their way out of the situation. Its got the independent type of originality, but has the mainstream type of actions, thriller…and everything else.

AL ROKER: The clip we’ve got, the two main characters try to shake somebody down, and they’ve got the wrong person. Let’s take a look

[Clip plays:] The main characters stage a car accident, and try to scam the victim.

AL ROKER: So they’re trying scam people?

OSCAR DELGADO: Right, they’re trying to scam people- so you saw Vincent Ventresca, who is Sci-Fi’s invisible man, and we have Monet Mazur who was in 40 days and 40 nights, and Carmine Giovinazzo who is in Black Hawk Down, but what was interesting Al, is we were able to find these actors before they hit it big. And that was something that was very important in trying to cast this movie.

AL ROKER: So your movie was released earlier this year?

OSCAR DELGADO: Yeah, in October

AL ROKER: And its coming out on DVD and VHS tomorrow. How important is DVD for an independent film?

OSCAR DELGADO: I think its become critically important, because it takes a lot of money to be able to release a film, you saw earlier with star wars….

AL ROKER: What was the budget on the movie?

OSCAR DELGADO: Under 4 million dollars, so to compete, its not just releasing the film, you have to market it, and compete, so we think that DVD now is becoming very important for the independent filmmaker to discover an audience, that may not have had an opportunity at the beginning to be able to do that.

AL ROKER: So what’s up next.

OSCAR DELGADO: Well there’s two things, I’m working on a new film, called chasing the wind, and I’m working on a documentary called our lady of all nations so I’m working on those two things at this point.

AL ROKER: So do you miss the news business at all?

OSCAR DELGADO: Not when you get beeped liked that Al- no I don’t really miss it because I’m happy with what I’m doing now- I’m very excited.

AL ROKER: Well congratulations, and if you need a role for weather man who forgets to turn off his beeper…..

OSCAR DELGADO: No problem Al, you’ll be right there Al

AL ROKER: The learning curve is going to be available on DVD and VHS tomorrow.

You can purchase the DVD at amazon.com at the following link:

Learning curve at Amazon!