Before he became a fast-rising filmmaker, Anthony Nardolillo flipped the script on his entire career.
The Brooklyn, New York-bred director never imagined he’d be making movies when he was playing college football at Virginia Tech and Shepherd University more than a decade ago, but recently released his second film, “7th & Union,” and has more projects on the way.
“I did not study film. Not until my late 20s did I even have an inkling that I’d be involved in film,” Nardolillo, who played fullback and special teams, told the Daily News.
“When I graduated college — I studied finance and accounting — I was traveling for business, and I started to take salsa classes out of my love for salsa music growing up. ... I started dancing professionally, and I started dancing around the world. That brought me to L.A.”
It was in Los Angeles that Nardolillo, who is of Puerto Rican heritage, auditioned for his first movie. That project never got made, but he wrote his own script for a 2007 short film, the salsa-centered drama “Mano,” which he co-directed after another filmmaker dropped out.
“That’s when I saw what I wanted to do for the rest of my life,” Nardolillo said.
Fifteen years later, Nardolillo, 44, has “7th & Union” — a drama about an underdog Mexican boxer that drew inspiration from “Rocky” — now streaming on Amazon’s Prime Video.
The film stars popular Mexican actor Omar Chaparro as the fighter Raymundo, who retired from the sport due to injury but returns to the ring to support his struggling immigrant family. The cast also features Edy Ganem (“Devious Maids”), Oscar Torre (”The Haves and the Have Nots”) and Felipe Esparza (”Superstore”).
“(Omar is) really known for comedy, and we both ... were up for the challenge of having him lead this dramatic role. It was almost an underdog story in itself, in the actual making of the film,” Nardolillo said. “I was anxious to show audiences his dramatic chops.”
Set in Los Angeles, the movie picks up with Raymundo seeking work as a handyman on a Los Angeles street corner, where he meets a former boxer who offers to train him.
Nardolillo describes “7th & Union” as a character-driven story, and made sure that remained at the movie’s heart when distributors urged him to focus more on the fighting.
“I’m like, ‘Rocky’ had one fight,” Nardolillo said. “It was his story. You fell in love with him. That’s what I leaned on with this.”
“Just like in ‘Rocky,’ when he fights that first fight, doesn’t win, but when he fights and it’s still a victory, we’re jumping up. Not because he threw great punches, but because we fell in love with him. We rooted for him. It’s an extreme, 100% parallel. That was the goal with Ray.”
Production for “7th & Union” occurred over 17 days in 2020, with Nardolillo saying it was the first film to get approved by Hollywood unions during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Shooting during the pandemic meant new protocol, including restricting working hours to 10 hours each day, down from the standard 12 to 14. Nardolillo also navigated a 10 p.m. curfew that was in place in Los Angeles due to sweeping social justice protests in the city.
Nardolillo included English and Spanish dialogue in “7th & Union” to bring authenticity to the characters.
“That created a challenge for us with distribution, because the traditional distributors that would distribute Omar’s films were like, ‘No, we only do all-Spanish.’ And then the U.S. distributors were like, ‘Well, there’s some Spanish in it,’“ Nardolillo said.
“I think the industry is still acclimating to having films from a language perspective. From a cultural perspective, I think it’s changing, but I think today you still have to find some balance to create a cross-over element, because they are going to put you in this corner of, ‘Oh, this is a very cultural film.’ ”
Nardolillo’s first movie, “Shine,” about two Salsa-dancing brothers from East Harlem hit theaters in 2018 and was awarded best feature at HBO’s Urbanworld Film Festival.
He expects his next movie, the heist thriller “Righteous Thieves,” to arrive in the spring, and says he has two unannounced “big-studio projects” in the works as well.
Nardolillo says he briefly questioned his future after “Shine” put up modest box office numbers, but is now confident with the path he’s on.
“I was like, ‘You know what, I’m going to go out there and find the next project, use this as a stepping stone to show that I can get a movie made,’” Nardolillo said.
“I think it’s ‘7th and Union’ and this third film that have now said, ‘OK, this is where I belong.’”
———
