Film based on Memphis screenwriter’s script “The Solution” to debut Oct. 28

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Faith, stage productions, screenplays and dreams intersect in the life of Peggy Garner, whose first film debuts soon at the Malco Majestic Theatre.

Peggy Garner is the screenwriter behind “The Solution.”

A native Memphian, who presents ministry through the arts, Garner’s movie is titled “The Solution” and its one-night only showing is set for Oct. 28, beginning at 7 p.m. The journey to her upcoming debut has been a winding road with real-life potholes.

Garner has written, produced and directed five stage plays from Memphis throughout Thailand. She also has created five Christian sitcoms that Garner hopes to showcase on mainstream television.

Convinced that she had more creativity to tap into, Garner wanted to venture out into screenplays. After three consecutive dreams in which she asked Tyler Perry to help her, Garner latched onto the motivation to branch out.

“Peggy just do you, just do you,” Garner recalled Perry saying in her dream.”

That’s exactly what Garner decided to do. She packed up and moved to Atlanta, looking for a break in the film industry. However, it didn’t come overnight.

For two years, Garner pushed forward, nightly asking God to use her in a different way to help people who have made bad choices and have become addicted to a life style filled with destruction – drug addicts, prostitutes, gangsters, dealers, people addicted to prison life.

“Please God. Help me help these people,” she cried. “You have enough preachers, so use me in a different way.”

One night after crying out to God, He gave her the idea for her first full-featured movie, “The Solution,” she said.

Garner wrote the script with no money and no formal training on how to do a film. Then she moved back to Memphis and began working on her film.

“It wasn’t easy. The struggle was real,” said Garner. “I didn’t really even have a place to live. I was living from pillar to post…”

Then she got ill. Her back went out on her with siatical nerve dysfunction.

“But, God opened up the widows of heaven and gave me favor,” she said. “People stepped up to the plate and helped me with my first full featured film.”

A guitarist for Gateway C.O.G.I.C., where Dr. Perry C. Little is the pastor, Garner is also a singer and songwriter. She wrote seven of the nine songs on the sound track for “The Solution” and performed four of them. Her YouTube performance of “The Solution” theme song has netted a North American Music Award nomination.

Now, Garner is working on her second film, a Christmas movie for 2020.

“With faith the size of a mustard seed, a little bit of sweat, a whole lot of perseverance and three dreams of Tyler Perry speaking just these three words, ‘Just Do You,’ I have no doubt that we really can do all things through Christ who strengthens us,” she said.