Portsmouth Brewer Featured In “Bob and the Trees” Excerpt #1 Golf (Video)

Portsmouth Brewery Head Brewer Matt Gallagher seems to be living a double dream these days. Matt spends 40-45 hours each week managing brewing operations at New Hampshire’s original brewpub, creating delicious beers like the new Torn & Frayed IPA and the annual limited release Royal Impy Stout, but he’s also an award-winning actor — having taken home the prize for Best New Hampshire Performance at the New Hampshire Film Festival. He co-stars in BOB AND THE TREES, an internationally acclaimed narrative feature film being screened at Portsmouth’s historic Music Hall on Friday, January 15 at 7pm. A question and answer session with Gallagher, lead actor Bob Tarasuk and director Diego Ongaro will follow the screening. Tickets also include a private reception at Portsmouth Brewery.

The film, set during a deep winter in the Berkshires, follows Bob, a 50 year-old logger with a soft spot for golf and gangsta rap, who is struggling to make ends meet in a merciless industry. When a rotten investment threatens the family business, Bob begins to heed the instincts of his ever-darkening self.

Ongaro is originally from Paris, but now lives in western MA where he met Bob and Matt. While neither man had ever acted before, the roles came quite naturally to them. The real Bob is a sustainable forester and Matt, who is his son-in-law, worked with Bob prior to his brewing career.

For a film with such small town origins, BOB AND THE TREES has been quite successful on the international film festival circuit, having had its World Premiere at Sundance and its International debut at Karlovy Vary Film Festival, where it won the Grand Prize.

October’s New Hampshire Film Festival included a small screening at the Music Hall Loft but demand far exceeded the small number of seats. “I’d spent the better part of a year telling all my friends, co-workers and even strangers about this film,” said Gallagher,” so it’s really special to me and my family to be able to screen this in my home town and then host everyone at Portsmouth Brewery afterwards. The film’s producers worked extra hard to make this possible, so I hope we can fill the theatre.”