April is a key figure. Her mother's motives and ambitions all include her daughter, as she has starred April in all her films. She may be the one person her mother would trust to hear difficult truths from. I don't recall any mention of April seeming oblivious to the fact that things may not be going well, that her mother may be being taken advantage of, or in danger of being taken advantage. Or that her relationship with her mom isn't close... It's not clear though if you have worked with her personally if you are doing post production, or how well she may or may not know you. It would be to your credit to approach April and layout the problems, and given the fact that you actually would (in the short term) personally gain from her mother's mistakes, that an effort to try and enlist her help to prevent her mother from making the mistakes which you would financially gain from, could gain some trust. A plus would be if you don't also hit on her. :) Once the problems or current obstacles are laid out (you may have needed to leave out some of the prior detail that may put her mother in too terrible light and make her feel defensive for her mother) you then discuss possible solutions. Together you come up with (even if you lead her, she'll need buy in and ownership in the choices) at least two reasonable options to present to her mom. This she will talk to her mom alone, but bring you in to help when her mom is ready to hear more details about what she can do to begin to stop the train wreck. The mother is able to listen to her daughter, and you, and possibly put aside the rush job, concentrate on getting an appropriately edited version (so you ultimately forgo your short term gain in favor of the groups's needs). The internist producer gets a more sober and realistic view of the present circumstance that can only help the outcome now and in the future. Trust is strengthened rather than further strained. You don't always have to let people go over the brink for them to learn. Sometimes you just have to point out to them, that they
really are on the very edge, and hope to god they listen. Am I close?
You have just outlined why I spent fifteen minutes attempting to come at it through April. That was, in fact, my first, best instinct. April actually lives closest to me (a short bike ride away). April was also a part of the proxy conversation Tom had with her (at my behest): "do you want to keep making slasher movies? Does your mother understand that the only way you can advance at this point is to get nekkid?" Being on the post side of things, I've been in the same room as April exactly once - and we didn't even speak to each other. She was definitely in the room while Dick and I proceeded to school her mother about the realities of distribution six months ago, but she was not a participant in the conversation. In other words, she knows who I am, she knows what I know, she's aware of what I'm about, but we have no rapport whatsoever. Dick and I spent ten minutes evaluating whether or not Tom had enough rapport to come at April and determined that as theirs was not a relationship based on respect, and as they had no larger relationship outside the film, and as Tom "mostly hits on her" there was no realistic way to make that work. I spent an equal amount of time with Harry trying to determine if he could come at her to make the same points, but Harry is mostly employed by June because he's a non-threatening gay man whose screenplays invariably involve dire punishment for heterosexual sex. His relationship with April is worse than Tom's - beside the fact that it took me an hour to get Harry on board in the first place. Long story short, I wanted to go that way but judged that I didn't have the framework to pull it off.... and building it ad-hoc ran the possibility of further clouding the waters.