Chasing Comets: Jason Stevens leap of faith to the silver screen

Orange cinema-goers have an opportunity to catch an early screening of the new Aussie feature film written and produced by former rugby league star Jason Stevens.

Chasing Comets, directed by Jason Perini and staring Isabel Lucas and Dean Ewing, is a comedy/drama loosely based on Jason’s life and tells the story of a young footballer aspiring to leave his regional team for a shot in the NRL.

Set for national release on 23 August, you can catch Chasing Comets at the Odeon 5 Cinema in Orange from Thursday, 9 August.

A towering prop forward, Jason’s own sporting career spanned 14 seasons with the St George Dragons and Cronulla Sharks, as well as representative games for NSW and Australia.

Since retiring, Jason has gone on to have an active media career, with his own segment on the Footy Show, ABC’s The Fat, Ch 7’s Matty Johns show and currently Sydney Weekender with his wife Beck.

Chasing Comets is his first crack at writing for the silver screen and a true labour of love. Jason produced the film himself, found most of the talent, while his wife Beck was executive producer and did wardrobe and costume design.

Set in Wagga (not where Jason grew up) the film is filled with many of the characters drawn from Jason’s youth and years spent in the competitive sporting arena.

“Yeah, they say write what you know and so it helps being able to draw on personal experiences and also some of the great colourful characters in and around football codes,” said Jason.

Bringing his vision to life on screen was very much a learning process for Jason, but he has been pleased by how audiences are taking to his film.

“You are always a bit nervous ‘cause we went hard on the comedy, we hoped that would resonate with the audience and it did! So that was good,” he said.

Jason describes the film as a ‘comedy with heart’ that echoes a pivotal period in his own life.

“The driving force of the film is Dan Ewing who plays Chase Daylight and he's a footballer who has dreams and aspirations to move from his regional team to the NRL but he is kind of sabotaging himself with the decisions he is making,” said Jason.

“Then he takes leap of faith with his life and it is actually loosely based on my story  and he takes a leap of faith in that sporting environment and it is probably harder than he imagined. So we find a lot of comedy through the dramatic scenes.”

Chasing Comets is directed by Jason Perini and stars a host of great Aussie talent, including Isabel Lucas, Dan Ewing, Rhys Muldoon, Stan Walker, John Batchelor, George Houvardas, Peter Phelps, Kat Hoyos, Gary Eck, Gemma Pranita and more. The film also marks a welcomed return to screen for Justin Melvey who played the role of Dr Colin Murphy in Days of our lives, as well as showcasing the acting debut of DJ Havana Brown and Footy Show favourite Beau Ryan.