A tom Egoyan’s 18th world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) almost didn’t happen.

In Seven Veils, Egoyan reconnects with actor Amanda Seyfried (Chloe), who portrays a theatre director (Jeanine) staging her former mentor’s most famous work, the opera Salome. But through that work she is confronted with dark memories and trauma from her past.

Egoyan has a long connection to the opera thanks to Niv Fichman, founder of Toronto-based prodco Rhombus Media. Fichman was on the Canadian Opera Company (COC) board in the ’90s and recommended that Egoyan direct the 1996 version of Salome. Egoyan returned to direct another version of the opera for the COC in 2023 — which is when he got the idea for a modern retelling via Seven Veils.

“There are many issues I was dealing with in terms of remounting this, and this character began to emerge,” Egoyan tells Playback. “Jeanine, who was this person? It really felt as though I needed to address all these issues [she was facing] at a personal level – what it meant to remount something that was so controversial and triggering.”

When Egoyan finished writing the early draft of Seven Veils, he immediately called Fichman. Rhombus, then Seyfried, then Telefilm came on board by late 2022. (Ontario Creates arrived in 2023.) The only problem was that the team needed $3 million more for the film’s $9 million budget — and they needed it by Jan. 3.

Why the tight deadline? The team couldn’t afford to recreate Salome from scratch, but they had a production partnership in place with the COC which allowed them access to the set, cast and orchestra already in town. They just needed to film everything before the opera wrapped at the end of February.

Fichman approached several sales agents and financiers about Seven Veils, but they couldn’t commit within the short time frame. On Dec. 31, 2022, Fichman asked L.A.-based XYZ Films partner Nate Bolotin if he wanted to form a financing and sales partnership. And could he get an answer by Jan. 2?

“‘This is really a great opportunity. We can’t pass it up and you guys really need us right now,'” Fichman recalls Bolotin saying to him. “‘We’re going to do this and we’re going to make this work.'”

Fichman wouldn’t disclose the amount XYZ pitched in for sales advances and financing, but with XYZ – and Fichman and Egoyan both deferring a “significant” amount of their fees — Fichman says they secured their budget in time.

With such a tight timeline, there was no time to solicit presales, but the show will go on. On Friday (Sept. 8), Seven Veils will have a special premiere at TIFF within the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts — where it was filmed. Egoyan and Fichman both hope that this will make it stand out for sales.

This story originally appeared in Playback‘s Fall 2023 issue

Photo courtesy of Amanda Matlovich