About a year ago, brothers Jevon and Delbert Whetter had their dream of making a movie based on events from their lives crumble when the financing fell through a week before they were to start production.
Before they sent the cast and crew home, Jevon delivered a message: “Champions never quit.”
The brothers were hurdlers when they competed in track and field at Oregon School for the Deaf and took the real-life hurdles in stride.
"Flash Before the Bang," the movie telling their story of the underdog 1986 Oregon School for the Deaf boys track and field team winning a state championship, is now in full production.
The Whetter brothers have been filming scenes at the school's Salem campus, as well as at Cascade High School in Turner and Kennedy High School in Mt. Angel, for their movie with a cast that includes Russell Harvard, Daniel Durant, Alaqua Cox and Grace Byers.
Filming will continue at the School for the Deaf and other locations in Oregon through July. The movie doesn’t have distribution yet, but Delbert Whetter said he and his brother plan to shop it at festivals, and expect it to be released in 2025.
The movie is being executive produced by Ben Affleck and Matt Damon.
The brothers tried to raise money for the movie multiple times. But the biggest boost came when Affleck and Damon ("Good Will Hunting," "Dogma," "Air") came on board as executive producers in 2021.
“I’m not sure I would be here without their support,” said Delbert, the movie's producer. “They’re kind of like the wind that keeps us both floating.”
The Whetter brothers, both deaf since birth, followed the lessons taught to them by coaches from their days at the school to get their movie made.
“So many challenges have been there in front of us,” said Jevon, the writer and director. “A lot of people thought we couldn’t do it. Deaf filmmakers, it’s never been done before.”
Whetter brothers attended Oregon School for the Deaf in the 1980s
Oregon School for the Deaf was founded in 1870 as a boarding school offering free education to students who are deaf or hard of hearing. It has occupied its campus on Locust Street in north Salem since 1910.
Jevon and Delbert’s grandmother, Bonita Tussing, graduated from Oregon School for the Deaf in 1924. Their mother, Judith Ross, graduated in 1958. Two aunts also graduated from the school.
The Whetter brothers grew up in Eugene – their father, Donald, who is deaf, was a pressman for The Register-Guard – when Steve Prefontaine was running at Oregon and professionally in the area. providing them early exposure to track and field.
But at the mainstream schools in Eugene, there were few other children who were deaf.
Jevon first enrolled at Oregon School for the Deaf in the fall of 1984 as a sophomore.
He found community in sports. He played football and basketball, but it was in track and field where he was best.
In the 110 meter hurdles and 300 hurdles, he racked up wins. Jevon's career-best time in the 300 hurdles, 39.54 seconds, is still No. 4 all-time for Oregon Class 1A track and field athletes.
In the 1986 season, Jevon’s junior year, the School for the Deaf had three stars on its track and field team: Jevon, javelin thrower Mike Worthylake and distance runner Randy McBride, who roller skated from his home in Keizer to the school each day.
That year, the team won the Casco League championship, placed second to Regis at the Class A/B District 3 meet and 37th at the Oregon School Activities Association Class A/B state meet.
The most significant accomplishment was the Panthers winning the Oregon Class B State Invitational at Mt. Hood Community College in Gresham. The OSAA didn’t offer separate state championships for each classification yet, so it was an unofficial state championship. The team scored 78 points to beat Helix by one point.
Jevon won the 300 hurdles at that meet and ran on the winning 400 relay team.
It remains one of the school’s few state championships.
“It’s famous because they’re basing it on a true story,” Oregon School for the Deaf director Sharla Jones said. “This is his ’86 track team story, so it really happened. It’s our folklore.”
The Whetter brothers have long maintained an association with the Oregon School for the Deaf.
“If we have any student who has expressed interest in the film industry, (Jevon is) always willing to chat with the students,” Jones said. “He’s been a guest presenter on campus.”
Delbert was a freshman at Sheldon High School in Eugene when the team won the championship, but his parents brought him to all of his brother’s track meets. That sparked him to transfer to Oregon School for the Deaf in the fall of 1986.
“Honestly, I feel like I had already seen this movie truly because I had already watched it happen in real life as an observer,” Delbert said.
Honoring the impact of coach Fred Farrior and Nike exec Geoff Hollister
Most of the characters in the picture are fictionalized versions of real people. But there are two characters in the film are entirely based – and named – for real people, Delbert said.
Fred Farrior, who is being played by Harvard ("There Will Be Blood," "Fargo"), was Oregon School for the Deaf’s track and field coach in 1986.
Farrior coached football, basketball and track and field at the school until 1990 and continued to teach there until 2003. After retiring, he taught at South Salem High School until his death in 2011.
“I think that Farrior truly became a father figure for so many students here,” Delbert said. “People looked up to him.
“This track team who won the state championship, their potential wasn’t really identified until they got to know Farrior. And he would put them in events where they would thrive. He had that expert eye for talent and potential.”
The other real-life character is Geoff Hollister.
Hollister was a Nike employee and had been around the company since its founding. He worked with Prefontaine and promoted efforts around the Olympic trials in Eugene. Hollister died in 2012.
In researching for the movie, the Whetter brothers learned that Hollister had provided the 1986 Oregon School for the Deaf track team with Nike shoes. The Hollister character appears in several scenes in the movie to honor him.
“We found out Geoff Hollister was watching the school, the sports program for many years,” Delbert said. “He has a relationship with Chemawa (Indian School), and Geoff had a longstanding relationship with them and supported them.
“That’s kind of his brand of who he is, to provide support to underserved, marginalized communities and their sports programs.”
From Oregon School for the Deaf to the film industry
Both brothers went to college at Gallaudet University, a school in Washington, D.C., for people who are deaf and hard of hearing.
Jevon acted professionally, including playing Laertes in "Hamlet" opposite Troy Kotsur at the National Theatre of the Deaf in Connecticut in 1992. He taught performing arts at the California School for the Deaf Riverside and Cal State University Northridge.
Delbert got a law degree at George Washington University in 1997 and since 2001 has worked for Exodus Film Group producing movies.
While getting a MFA at the American Film Institute Conservatory, Jevon told a classmate about the 1986 track and field championship. About a year later, that classmate told him the story had stuck with him and suggested that Jevon should write it.
“I finished the script back in 2011,” Jevon said.
Filming at Oregon School for the Deaf
The Whetter brothers were interested in filming at least some of "Flash Before the Bang" — which refers to the starting pistol in a track race — at the state-owned school in northeast Salem.
The original dark orange cinder track remains largely the same as it was in 1986, and is one of the few remaining cinder tracks in the state.
“The track is exactly the same,” Whetter said. “And that’s where our story takes place. It’s the same (cinder) track, it hasn’t been upgraded since the ‘80s and that really made our legs so much stronger because of the material on the track. It’s like running on the beach.
“And then when you run on a regular track it feels like you’re just flying. And especially with Nike shoes.”
The small wood grandstand and huge pine trees that ring the track are largely the same as they have been for decades.
Aside from renovations as part of "Extreme Makeover Home Edition," the rest of the school is largely the same as it was when the Whetter brothers attended.
That makes it easier for them to set the movie in the 1980s.
The producers plan on filming at other schools in the area, including at Mt. Hood Community College in Gresham, where the state championship meet took place.
“Oregon is another character in our story that’s unreplaceable,” Jevon said. “We grew up in Eugene. It’s a track state.”
Delbert said 80% of the movie is being filmed at Oregon School for the Deaf, including on the track where it happened.
Deaf schools in many states are in danger of closing due to having their funding cut.
"We want to share that part of the story because we know so many deaf schools and so many deaf communities out there will connect to that part of the storyline,” Delbert said.
State incentives for movie productions in Oregon
State agency Oregon Film provides incentives for movie and TV projects filmed in Oregon.
It gives a 25% rebate for money spent in the state on goods and services and 26.2% rebate for payroll for movies in the state.
Oregon Film executive director Tim Williams said that movies and other productions that are filmed outside of the Portland metro area, like "Flash Before the Bang," are eligible for an additional 10% rebate.
The state incentivizes 30 to 40 projects each year, Williams said. Movies like "Wild," "Pig" and "Twilight" have received some of the state funds over the years.
Oregon School for the Deaf also is a part of a state agency. That means one state agency will subsidize the rental of the school from another state agency for "Flash Before the Bang."
Finding an authentically deaf cast critical for film
Representation in entertainment by people who are disabled has been rare.
There have been 28 actors who have received Oscars for characters with a disability, according to the Ruderman Family Foundation . Three of those actors were disabled.
There are approximately 11 million people (3.6%) who are deaf in the United States, according to the National Deaf Center .
Delbert is on the board of RespectAbility , a nonprofit that works to create change for how people view those with disabilities. He’s also part of a program with that organization that mentors and gives guidance to people in the entertainment industry.
That’s part of why it's been important for the brothers to have an authentically deaf cast.
The movie has eight boys on the track and field team — all first-time actors — and all are deaf, Delbert said. One character has Usher syndrome, a rare disease that affects hearing and vision. The actor they cast has it, too.
“Casting took one year nationwide,” he said. “And our goal truly was to get an authentic cast as much as possible. And again, we achieved our dream cast.”
The main actors are deaf, including Harvard. Durant ("CODA," "Switched at Birth") plays Rocco, an assistant coach for the track team and a math teacher. Cox ("Echo," "Hawkeye") plays a PE teacher and assistant coach.
Byers ("Empire," "The Blacking") plays an undisclosed principal role. She is hearing, but her parents are deaf and she communicates with them using sign language.
The Whetter brothers said they feel an obligation to their community for their movie to be authentic.
Over the years the brothers had offers to walk away and let other people tell their story. It would have been a lot easier. But they were admittedly stubborn, and now they’re finally telling their own story.
“It has to come from our hands and our eyes, it just has to,” Delbert said.
Bill Poehler covers Marion and Polk County for the Statesman Journal. Contact him at bpoehler@StatesmanJournal.com
This article originally appeared on Salem Statesman Journal: Movie based on Oregon School for the Deaf championship track team filming in Salem
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