Film reveals gems of UCLA’s 2000 season

By Greg Lewis

Daily Bruin Senior Staff

Did you miss any part of the 2000 UCLA softball season?

If you did, don’t worry, because the whole season is part
of a documentary scheduled to come out in early September titled
“Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend.”

The project started about a year ago, when Kim Turrisi of 4 Paws
Entertainment and Lynn d’Angona of Focus Entertainment
decided to take a look inside the lives of Division I athletes.

“We chose UCLA because the program is so rich in talent
and tradition,” Turrisi said. “We thought there had to
be a story there.”

The two-women crew, which followed the team on every home and
road game this season, wanted more than just the softball aspect.
They wanted to capture the everyday life of a student-athlete.
Turrisi and d’Angona followed players to their apartments and
dorms, and even to campus.

“At first it was weird,” said senior third baseman
Julie Adams. “They were in class, in the weight room. I
didn’t know what to think.”

“There was never any showboating or performing for the
camera, we just went on with our lives.”

Although similar to the recent HBO special on the National
Champion Tennessee women’s basketball team,
“Diamonds” offers a much more in-depth look at the
personal lives of the athletes. The documentary even includes
footage of head coach Sue Enquist surfing last summer.

“There were times when we didn’t really want the
cameras around, but now we’re just used to them. I would feel
weird if they weren’t there,” Adams said.

Game films and highlights will be minimal, and there will be
many one-on-one interviews. “The goal is to get a feeling of
what it’s like to be part of the team,” Turrisi said.
“We want to show kids what it is like. We are there at
practices, when the coaches pull kids aside and talk to
them.”

The producers of “Diamonds” have an all-access pass
to UCLA softball. Road trips, team vans and even the locker room
are all things that will appear in the film.

In order to get such authorization, Turrisi and d’Angona
had several meetings with people on all levels. They had to first
go through Enquist and UCLA Associate Athletic Director and Senior
Women’s Administrator Betsy Stephenson. Then the two had to
get permission from the NCAA, including special consent for the
World Series in Oklahoma City.

Finally came the endorsement of Enquist and the team. Knowing
that the cameras would be rolling in every place from the locker
room to the hotel room, the team took a vote, and unanimously
agreed to allow the movie to be shot.

“We thought it would be a great opportunity for women
athletes, especially softball players. The exposure for the sport
would be worth having the cameras around for a while,” Adams
said.

Although production will not be done until August, most of the
filming is done, and the documentary has what the producers wanted,
according to Turrisi.

“So much more than we imagined, there were stories
unfolding we couldn’t even dream of,” Turrisi said.
“We followed Courtney Dale’s therapy (from an injured
shoulder), we got the Olympians (redshirt junior Stacey Nuveman,
assistant coach Lisa Fernandez and 1999 graduate Christie Ambrosi)
interacting with the team. It was more than we could have hoped
for.”

Some of the material that will appear in “Diamonds”
that would have remained unknown to the public are events like
former UCLA basketball national champion Ann-Meyers
Drysdale’s preseason motivational speech, and quirks like the
team’s affinity for music of all kinds.

Turrisi and d’Angona captured scenes of the Bruins singing
everything from Sarah McLachlan to Bob Marley. They also filmed how
devoted the players’ families are, with scenes of parents on
road trips watching their daughters play.

From the beginning, the plan was for the film to come out just
before the Sydney Olympics. “We’re trying to build
something on the same vein as the Women’s World Cup did in
1998. Women’s soccer skyrocketed from there,” Turrisi
said.

“The WPSL is planning on expansion; every (US) Olympic
softball game will be televised. This is softball’s time to
explode.”

There were others who thought that “Diamonds”
supported a worthy cause. Various groups donated equipment to keep
the program’s budget low. Lighting, sound and camera
equipment were all subsidized from outside sources.

Even the narration will be free. ESPN’s Robin Roberts has
signed on to be the narrator. Normally Roberts’ speaking fees
are pricey, but she agreed to help with the project pro bono,
seeing it as a benefit for women’s sports.

Turrisi and d’Angona will take their first-of-its-kind
documentary to worldwide film festivals, such as Cannes and
Sundance.

After that, HBO, NBC, Lifetime and Oxygen networks will make
offers for the rights to “Diamonds”.

And don’t be surprised to see a follow up next year. The
producers feel the documentary might be successful enough to
warrant a sequel.