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&ldquo;Acceptance, friendship, love, the feeling of family,&rdquo; Mike Wawrzynek of Luzerne said, listing the feelings he hopes audience members will take away from a locally produced film that will debut at 6:30 p.m. Friday Nov. 6 at the Moonlite Drive-In in West Wyoming.
				Co-written by Wawrzynek and Heidi Germaine Schnappauf, who have been major players in local theater and beyond, the movie is called &ldquo;F-Word.&rdquo; But don&rsquo;t jump to conclusions.
				The main character, a middle school teacher named Mike Gallagher, learns he is about to become a father. &ldquo;Of all the F-words, positive and negative, that the character has been called,&rdquo; Wawrzynek said, &ldquo;that&rsquo;s the one that catches him off guard the most.&rdquo;
				Impending fatherhood isn&rsquo;t the only challenge in the teacher&rsquo;s life, said Schnappauf, who also directed the film. The character&rsquo;s job is in jeopardy because, as a news release explains, &ldquo;when a picture of Mike gets plastered all over the school, he quickly finds out that not all of the parents at Woodward West Middle School appreciate his talent for dressing up in women&rsquo;s clothes.&rdquo;
				&ldquo;People can get crazy if a guy puts on a pair of heels,&rdquo; Schnappauf said. &ldquo;This just shows the life of a guy and how one little thing can affect the rest of his life.&rdquo;
				Inspiration for part of the story came from Wawrzynek himself, who has portrayed Dr. Frank-N-Furter in &ldquo;The Rocky Horror Show&rdquo; at Little Theatre of Wilkes-Barre. Fans of the cult classic know Frank-N-Furter appears in high heels and lingerie throughout the campy show.
				&ldquo;We were pulling from mainly the theatrical aspects of my life,&rdquo; said Wawrzynek, remembering how he wore his Frank-N-Furter costume to a midnight screening of the &ldquo;Rocky Horror Picture Show,&rdquo; at the Kirby Center in downtown Wilkes-Barre, and &ldquo;people were screaming at me out of cars&rdquo; as he walked from his car to the theater.
				While he dresses &ldquo;as conventionally as they come&rdquo; for everyday wear, Wawrzynek said he has enjoyed dressing up in all kinds of clothes since childhood, and wearing women&rsquo;s clothing in a theatrical way is &ldquo;at least for me, very freeing, very empowering &#8230; I can go out there and be the genuine, unique me and not care about what everyone else thinks.&rdquo;
				The realization that some people can react so negatively to what another person has decided to wear captured Schnappauf&rsquo;s attention when Wawrzynek told her about it.
				&ldquo;That idea of being vulnerable stuck with me,&rdquo; she said. &ldquo;If he was willing I wanted to craft a story based on his experiences.&rdquo;
				Together, they came up with a script. She outlined the scenes. They held auditions in the autumn of 2018, and shot the whole thing in Northeastern Pennsylvania over six days on weekends.
				At the same time Schnappauf&rsquo;s work as a stunt double made her life extra hectic.
				&ldquo;I feel like I slept a total 15 hours in 10 months,&rdquo; she said.
				After the film was completed, she submitted it to film festivals. &ldquo;They&rsquo;re all virtual now&rdquo; because of the coronavirus, she said.
				&ldquo;F-Word&rdquo; won an award at the Toronto Independent Film Festival, in the &ldquo;No Budget&rdquo; category, which translates to a budget of less than $25,000. It also was honored at the IndieFEST.
				In addition to Wawrzynek, other local cast members are Connie Shelhamer, Rob Klubeck, Alicia Nordstrom, Alex Gribble, Karl Kleist and Angel Berlane-Mulcahy, joined by Schnappauf&rsquo;s friend Jessica O&rsquo;Hara-Baker, from New York, who plays the protagonist&rsquo;s fiancee.
				Friday&rsquo;s screening at the Moonlite Drive-In begins at 6:30 p.m. The gate opens at 5 p.m., and admission is a suggested $5 donation or gift of non-perishable food or personal care item for NEPA Youth Shelter.
				&ldquo;I almost feel like it&rsquo;s our duty to give back,&rdquo; Schnappauf said.

Locally produced film to premiere Friday at Moonlite Drive-In