Page 288 – NYFA

NYFA Union Square Hosts PGA’s Meet the Networks Panel with ESPN

ESPN Films — Shirley Escott, John Dahl and Dan Silver

This past Tuesday, the New York Film Academy proudly hosted the Producers Guild of America’s PGA East Documentary & Non-Fiction Committees “Meet the Networks” panel with ESPN Films. The panel, moderated by Chair of the PGA East Documentary & Non-Fiction Committee Shirley Escott, included Dan Silver, Senior Director of Development and John Dahl, Vice President and Executive Producer of ESPN Films.

The two ESPN executives have been at the forefront of the award-winning 30 for 30 series on ESPN.

Silver is an Emmy Award-winning producer who manages the development of ESPN films and Exit 31’s short film series. He oversees the Peabody and Emmy winning series 30 for 30 Shorts, and the Nine for IX shorts series and is also now supervising the development and production of FiveThityEight.com’s two original short form documentary series, Signals and The Collectors, as well as the recently launched Spike Lee’s Lil’ Joints, and announced Versus (executive Produced by Eva Longoria), and Marvel and ESPN Films 1 of 1 – Genesis” and “1 of 1 – Origins.

Dahl has overseen production on all documentaries produced by ESPN Films since its launch in 2008, including the Peabody and Sports Emmy award-winning 30 for 30 series. He has produced and supervised documentaries for over 15 years going back to ESPN’s Peabody-winning “SportsCentury” initiative. Prior to the creation of ESPN Films, Dahl created the concept and oversaw production for the Baltimore Colts/New York Giants 50th anniversary documentary, The Greatest Game Ever Played, which was nominated for a Sports Emmy. He oversaw production for ESPN Films on the Peabody-winning two-part/four hour documentary Black Magic and the Spike Lee-directed film Kobe Doin’ Work. From 2002 to 2005, Dahl was Executive Producer for ESPN Classic and the company’s 32-hour programming initiative ESPN25, responsible for overseeing production and personnel for both entities. That work garnered a total of eight Sports Emmy nominations (two winners).

Speaking to a full house of producers and filmmakers alike at New York Film Academy’s Union Square theater, the main focus of the evening boiled down to the all important pitch. What stood out as the most prominent piece of advice was for filmmakers to be able to pitch their idea in one sentence. Having your idea delivered in the most concise and compelling manner is the most effective way to bring your show to life.

Considering the overall success of the evening, we look forward to hosting similar PGA events in the near future!

NYFA’s Bob Eisenhardt Editor on Audience Award Winner at Sundance

A documentary that received a lot of buzz at this year’s Sundance Film Festival, winning the Audience Award, was Meru. The story includes filmmakers Conrad Anker, Jimmy Chin and Renan Ozturk, who aim to tackle the steep ‘Shark’s Fin’ on Mount Meru in India. Along the journey, the friends face hope, sacrifice and obsession.

As the film’s official editor, New York Film Academy Documentary Editing Instructor Bob Eisenhardt had the honor of piecing this journey together. Eisenhardt teaches a Thesis Editing Master Course two nights a week for the final six weeks of each One-Year class’ Thesis Edit.

Eisenhardt is a three-time Emmy Award winner and Oscar nominee. With over 60 films to his credit, he has edited documentaries for Barbara Kopple, Maysles Films, Susan Froemke, Matt Tyrnauer, Marc Levin, David Grubin and Alex Gibney. Recent films include Wagner’s Dream, which received an Emmy nomination for editing, Valentino: The Last Emperor, Dixie Chicks: Shut Up & Sing, Living Emergency: Stories of Doctors Without Borders and Dancing in Jaffa. He is currently editing the HBO film Everything Is Copy on the life of Nora Ephron.

Eisenhardt’s next Master Class will be at the New York Film Academy in New York City on March 16th to discuss Barbara Kopple’s Shut Up and Sing.

Last Man On Earth Is Far From Last In Ratings

The Last Man on Earth was a pleasant surprise for Fox this past Sunday, having a strong showing during its debut.

The show attracted 5.7 million viewers, and a 2.3 rating in the highly sought-after 18-49 demographic. While this is only the fourth largest new comedy premiere, it also didn’t benefit from popular lead-in shows like The Big Bang Theory or The Voice as some other debuts did.

Instead, Last Man actually built on Brooklyn Nine-Nine, which lead in with a 1.8 rating. It represented a growth of 28% over Brooklyn Nine-Nine in the key 18-49 demographic, and 56% growth overall. The ratings held throughout the hour-long series premiere.

The series stars SNL alum Will Forte as, you guessed it, the last man on Earth. It looks like Phil Lord and Christopher Miller — the writing and directing partners behind 21 Jump Street and The Lego Movie — have made a habit out of creating hits in unlikely places.

The show follows along as Forte’s character tries to beat off boredom and loneliness while looking for company.

Without giving anything away, events lead to some unexpected moments that perfectly suit Forte’s style. It all creates a view of a post-apocalyptic world that we have not seen on screen before.

The concept is original, and was certainly a bit of a gamble, but in the very early stages it seems like the gamble might pay off.

Netflix Announces Premiere Dates for Orange is the New Black and Wet Hot American Summer

Already binge-watched all of House of Cards’ season three and find yourself scrambling for more streaming content to devour? Don’t worry—Netflix has you covered. The media giant announced this week the announce dates for three of their original series, as well as several other projects.

The first premiere announced is June 5 for Sense8, the anticipated series by The Matrix creators Andy and Lana Wachowski, which recently made headlines with news that it would be incorporating footage of live births. It will be followed by Orange is the New Black—Netflix’s critically and audience-adored original series that isn’t House of Cards—which will overload FCC-protected bandwidths on June 12. Shortly after that, appropriately amidst a hot summer, a star-studded series sequel to Wet Hot American Summer will debut on July 17.

Netflix has been making waves for some time now in its push to become a major league original content creator on the same level as television networks and even movie studios. It looks to be living up to that potential already this year with these original series as well as the Canadian thriller Between, the comedy specials Chris D’Elia: Incorrigible and Jen Kirkman: I’m Gonna Die Alone (And I Feel Fine), and the documentary What Happened, Miss Simone. With a ton more content currently being produced by Netflix, it’s only a matter of time before every week brings about a new premiere, so clear your schedules while you can.

Check Out the Short Film that Would Become Whiplash

One of the things that all students learn in our directing classes is that if you are unable to fund a feature-length version of your idea for a film, a short film is often a great means to attract funding for their projects.

The Oscar-winning Whiplash initially started off life as an 18-minute short film directed by Damien Chazelle in which J.K. Simmons—who would go on to earn a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his star turn—starred opposite actor Johnny Simmons, who would later be replaced by Miles Teller.

The short film, which was also titled Whiplash, is being included as part of the Blue-ray release of Whiplash and it can be viewed by clicking on the video box above. It originally appeared at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival where Simmons electric performance and the fact that it won the jury award for Best Short Film helped it to secure financing for Chazelle’s full-length version.

An interesting fact for those that were vexed why Whiplash was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay at this year’s Oscars instead of Best Original Screenplay: since the full-length version of the film was based on the short, it was considered an adaptation and not an original screenplay.

Filmmaker Chris Paine Screens ‘Revenge of the Electric Car’ at NYFA

In 2006, Chris Paine’s documentary Who Killed The Electric Car told the tale of the life and death of the EV1, the first mass-produced electric car that was recalled and destroyed by its maker, General Motors. The film had a very successful theatrical release and ignited much discussion about the future of electric cars.

Just five years later, in 2011, Paine told New York Film Academy students, the tide had turned, and he felt compelled to return to the topic with his follow-up film, Revenge of the Electric Car. The sequel follows four entrepreneurs as they fight to bring electric cars back to the world market in the midst of a global recession.

Paine discussed his creative process with the NYFA students and the difficulties of gaining access to the major automakers he profiled.

Will Smith’s Focus Leads Soft Weekend Box Office

Is Will Smith’s box office draw starting to wane? That’s the main question being asked by industry analysts today after Smith’s latest feature took the top slot at the weekend box office, taking in $19.1 million, which was under the projected $21-23 million. The film’s debut, which co-starred rising Australian star Margo Robbie, made for Smith’s second-weakest opening weekend ever, behind Seven Pounds‘ $14.8 million.

All in all, in a year where box office records are being smashed on a weekly basis, many analysts predicted this to be a slow weekend and the rough weather in the South and Midwest certainly did not help as the top twelve films brought in a meager $95.4 million collectively. In addition, this weekend also saw history being made as China’s box office totals for the month of February outpaced the US box office for the first time ever.

The other big new release of the weekend, horror flick The Lazarus Effect also failed to make a major impact, bringing in only $10.6 million, trailing both 50 Shades of Grey and The Kingsmen. The latter film was able to leapfrog over 50 Shades to take the second spot in its third week of release.

As this was the first box office weekend following the Oscars, winners Still Alice and Birdman both saw an upsurge in both ticket sales and theater expansions, as both films added roughly 500 and 800 new theaters respectively.

The top ten films for the weekend of February 27 – March 1 are as follows.

Focus	$19,100,000
The Kingsmen	$11,750,000
The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water	$11,200,000
Fifty Shades of Grey	$10,927,000
The Lazarus Effect	$10,600,000
McFarland, USA	$7,797,000
American Sniper	$7,700,000
The DUFF	$7,150,000
Still Alice	$2,695,00
Hot Tub Time Machine 2	$2,400,000

NYFA’s Sara Antkowiak Stars in ‘Pretty Babies’

Last week was the World Premiere of the new Anthony Raymond play, Pretty Babies, which stars New York Film Academy Musical Theatre Instructor Sara Antkowiak (Tales of Hoffmann/Metropolitan Opera).

The ensemble cast, directed by Raymond and produced by the critically acclaimed Elsinore County Theater Company, is led by Stacey Roca who had a recurring role as Rachel on the UK series The Office with Ricky Gervais.

Pretty Babies is a story about using the taboo and forbidden as weapons in a no-holds-barred scheme of manipulation. The play revolves around Jason and his sister Randi — two lives steeped in sex, drugs, and grifting.

Already off to a roaring start, Pretty Babies will continue its performances from now until March 21st at the newly renovated 13th St Rep Theater in New York City.

If you’re interested in checking out this wonderful play, and supporting your fellow NYFA teacher, visit here for tickets!

MFA Filmmaking Grad to Premiere ‘More Than Words’ at Cannes Short Film Corner

They say write what you know. That’s precisely what former New York Film Academy MFA Filmmaking student Gabe Chavez set out to do with his semi-autobiographical thesis film, More Than Words. Chavez suffers from a heart disorder called Aortic Stenosis, a genetic disorder that constricts his aortic valve. If left unchecked, the disorder could become life threatening. Initially, Chavez refused to take the heart disorder seriously — he wouldn’t even visit his doctor. Eventually, his girlfriend (now fiancée) Caitlin gave him an ultimatum: if you don’t want to take care of yourself, do it for me. A crucial moment not only in Chavez’s film, but in his own life. In addition to Caitlin, other characters in his film were inspired by his extended and immediate family.

Chavez’s team consisted of a number of NYFA students, including Kyle Pavlin (co writer/AD), Tripp Townsend (producer), Regina Bang (EP), Javier Del Olmo (EP), Laura Elisa Perez (DP), Badr Farha (production design), Mich Castro (1st AC, b camera op), and Yiting Lyu (2nd AC).

“This film simply could not have been made if it wasn’t for [producer] Tripp Townsend,” said Chavez. “He has been like my brother; he grew up with me in New Mexico, produced my film, and is about to graduate from the producing program this May.”

Townsend and Chavez are business partners, having teamed up to form production company Frozen Frame Productions, LLC.

“Also, my actors were fundamental in telling this story—especially my leads, Samm and Cody.”

Chavez put Samm and Cody through 6 weeks of rehearsals before filming began. While working on set, the three of them formed a very close bond of collaboration and trust that still exists today.

Praised by NYFA Los Angeles Producing Chair Tony Schwartz, Chavez’s thesis film will begin the festival circuit with its premiere at the Cannes Short Film Corner.

Chavez originally decided to enroll in the MFA Filmmaking program because of its hands-on approach and access to industry-standard equipment. The program put Chavez in a position where he could concentrate solely on filmmaking and directing.

“My directing teachers Nick Sivakumaran and Adam Nimoy along with my writing mentor Andy Guerdat really helped me with my thesis,” said Chavez. “While Nick didn’t advise me in my thesis year, it was really his teaching and constant inspiration of my films and efforts that led me to my thesis film with the tools necessary to get the most from the scenes. Adam’s advanced directing class encouraged me to experiment (especially in rehearsals), and gave me the vocabulary to talk these actors through such difficult and personal material. When it comes to Andy, he provided me with such great screenwriting advice and knowledge (coupled with my undergrad screenwriting teacher Matt McDuffie — writer of the recent Ed Harris/Annette Bening vehicle Face of Love), that lead me to the final script I wrote with my cowriter Kyle Pavlin. This story really couldn’t have come off the page without Kyle’s contribution. He really is the most excellent writer.”

Chavez hopes his film will inspire people to examine their own relationships, realizing the blessings they have in life. Beyond that hope, he intends to use this short as a springboard toward the feature film version.

In addition to showcasing More Than Words at festivals around around the country, Chavez has been working in New York City on several TV shows and movies, including Gotham, Madam Secretary, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Broad City, The Americans, Elementary, and the upcoming films Urge (with Pierce Brosnan) and Freeheld (with Academy Award Winner Julianne Moore and Inception/Juno star Ellen Page). He is also key gripping a low budget feature film that is being produced by NYFA graduates Regina Bang and Javier Del Olmo (the same team who executive produced his film).