Oscar nominee Edward James Olmos part of 'extraordinary' film with UFC's Silva

To borrow from the Beatles, Edward James Olmos hopes his latest project can get by with a little help from his friends.

And right now, those friends include the likes of Anderson Silva, Frank Shamrock – and the potential for thousands of others.

The Oscar-nominated actor is part of a new film project called “Monday Nights at Seven” that stars actor/director Marty Sader in a love and life story against the backdrop of the MMA world. But what is unique about the movie in its infancy is that the team behind it is seeking to have it funded through Kickstarter, a crowd-funding site that lets supporters contribute financially in exchange for rewards once the financing goal is hit.

Want to have a speaking role in “Monday Nights at Seven”? You can with a contribution of $10,000 toward the film’s $500,000 goal. Want Olmos to follow you on Twitter, and get a t-shirt and some other swag, too? That’ll run you $30.

Olmos, whose acting credits include the longrunning TV series “Miami Vice” and the film “Stand and Deliver,” for which he received a Best Actor Academy Awards nomination, said Kickstarter has the potential to change the way smaller films are made – projects that don’t have the backing of major studios, but still could become significant pieces of work.

“What an extraordinary contribution to the arts Kickstarter is,” Olmos recently told MMAjunkie.com Radio (www.mmajunkie.com/radio). “It’s a thing where people can give a dollar, $5, $10 and make this art form come to life. It helps support the arts in a way we never could have done before. If you had been a part of giving $10 or $20 to ‘Raging Bull’ or ‘Rocky’ or ‘Stand and Deliver,’ one of my pictures, you’d say, ‘Wow – I was able to help in the creation of this piece of work.’ That becomes something so special to the people involved.

“Their participation helped make this a possibility. That’s what’s happening here with ‘Monday Nights at Seven.’ It’s been phenomenal. There are $2.8 million worth of rewards for people to choose from, and we’re looking for $500,000 to get the film done and made.”

The Kickstarter period for “Monday Nights at Seven” lasts through the end of July. So far, toward a $500,000 goal, the project has raised just north of $10,000.

But this won’t be just another MMA movie, Olmos said.

Not only is Sader writing, directing, producing and acting in the film, should it come to fruition, but he also has been training in MMA – and will have an actual fight for Resurrection Fighting Alliance that will be part of the film’s climax. As such, the ending is open until he gets that fight – he might win, he might lose.

“We’re not trying to use this as a gimmick for the director, a first-time fighter going into the ring,” Olmos said. “It’s part of the dream Marty has had, and he’s been training four or five years and been doing extremely well. The outcome, no one’s going to know. At the end, he’s got to go fight. He’s going to go into the ring.”

Olmos will play Sader’s father in the film, and he said Silva will play his trainer and coach. Olmos described the movie as a love story about a widowed father of an 8-year-old daughter seeking love again, and perhaps a measure of redemption to not follow in the dysfunctional footsteps of his father.

“It’s a beautiful love story between a man trying to understand who is is, and he’s a widower trying to raise his daughter,” Olmos said. “It’s the triumph of moving past the obstacles life has given him. One of the things he’s given is the chance to have love again in his life, and a chance to live his dream and go into the cage. And he goes into the cage in the end – and the exciting part is he’s going in for real. That’s one of the reasons the studio can’t really take a part in it. This guy really wants to go in and fight.”

For a chance to contribute to the “Monday Nights at Seven” Kickstarter project, visit MNA7.com. You also can follow the project’s principles on Twitter – Marty Sader, Edward James Olmos, Anderson Silva and Kickstarter.

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