Another investor, retired Sarasota physician John Welch, had already put money into a film. “About 10 years ago, I invested in Manny & Lo, which was Scarlett Johansson’s first film,” says Welch, a founder and longtime board member of the Sarasota Film Festival. “The critics liked it, but it wasn’t a hit.” Welch did get some of his money back, though. “I made $13 on it,” he says, laughing. But that poor return didn’t temper his enthusiasm for The Deal. “I liked the script, and with people like Bill Macy and Meg Ryan involved, it seemed like a no-brainer,” Welch says.

The local investors put up approximately $1.5 million, about 20 percent of the budget for The Deal. More investors were recruited in Chicago and New York, and a Canadian finance company also joined the project. Pre-production began in, of all places, Bucharest, Romania, in 2006. But then the Canadian firm dropped out, and Macy and Schachter decided they’d have to pull the plug on the production.

“But when we contacted our investors to tell them we were giving their money back, every one of them said, ‘No, keep plugging away. We have faith in you,’” Macy says. “It was amazing. One of them said, ‘Oh, you think this is bad? I built a shopping center last year. Talk about problems. This is nothing.’”

That’s when Sarasota’s Nakamoto played a key role. Through one of her contacts in the industry, she got Macy together with Peace Arch Entertainment, a film and television production and distribution company. After a meeting at the Toronto Film Festival, the firm agreed to provide the funds to get the project going again, this time in South Africa. Nakamoto also helped broker a deal with the Cadillac corporation, which provided a fleet of cars that were essential to the story.

One of three people with producer credit on the film, Nakamoto, who earned a degree in international affairs from Smith College, is a dynamic woman whose hobbies include scuba diving and skydiving. She almost missed the Sundance premiere in January when she took a tumble on a Park City ski slope and was briefly hospitalized. “Keri is terrific, very well connected, and she is fiercely protective of her investors,” Macy says of Nakamoto. “And she’s a party monster. She really knows how to throw a wrap party.”

Nakamoto spent two weeks on the Cape Town set during filming last spring. Jaymie Carter also went for a week to see how her investment was faring. “It was a wonderful experience,” Carter says. “We went to the set every day, and got to see the dailies at night. At one point, they needed more extras for a scene, so I got my three seconds of fame.”

South Africa was chosen as a location in part because of a favorable currency exchange and financial inducements offered by the government. “But the Cape Town area also looks remarkably like Los Angeles,” Macy says. “So we found all of our locations within a 30-mile radius. And our art department did a great job of creating backdrops for Prague and London, where some scenes are also set.”

Though the budget of The Deal is minuscule by Hollywood standards, Macy is proud that the movie has the look of a much more expensive film. He describes it as an affectionate poke at the pretensions and egos of Hollywood.

“It really is our love song to the business,” he says. “There are pettiness and dishonesty in the industry, sure, but there are also some wonderful people involved, and there is nothing like the camaraderie you have on a film set. Steven and I have genuine affection for all the crazy people in the business.”

Macy says Charlie Berns was a great role because, unlike some of the frustrated and distraught characters he has played, “Charlie is not a loser, not in over his head. He’s at the top of his game, and everybody else is spinning around him. He’s at a point in his life when he’s fearless, because he has nothing to lose.”

In adapting Lefcourt’s novel, Macy and Schachter made the story more of a romantic comedy. “I have wanted to do an adult romantic comedy for years, because it bores me to see 20-year-olds fall in love,” Macy says, laughing. “What do they know? And we were so lucky to get Meg Ryan, who is a master at this. And she’s one of the coolest broads I’ve ever met. She’s smart, incredibly professional and so funny. Of course, in writing it, we broke a cardinal rule, because we have our characters sleep together on page 30 instead of keeping them apart until the end. But this isn’t about sex. It’s about something bigger and more dangerous than sex. It’s about your heart and soul.”