Some thoughts from Rick Pagano

(Writer, Director, Casting Director)

There are volumes on what it means to be creative. Let me add two more metaphors to the canon.

To be an actor means to play in your own sandbox, on cue, under pressure, in front of a bunch of people who need to be reminded of their own, often misplaced sandboxes.

Buried by production, time, and personal pressures, the people sitting in many audition rooms usually look like they’ve just swallowed a half-pound of toxic waste.  The air in the room can be stale with tension.

From the blog of John Bailey,

Cinematographer and

Film Director …

No one is likely to conflate the dangerous, kinetic world of Nigerian Nollywood action movies with the benign fantasies of Lewis Carroll, although each portrays a surreal universe. The Nollywood portraits of South African photographer Pieter Hugo depict the denizens of a dark rabbit hole of third world cinema, one heralded as the world’s third most prolific production center—behind only Hollywood and Bollywood.

Some Thoughts from Rick Pagano, Writer, Director, Casting Director…

I would like to talk about discipline, specifically the discipline of the Olympic athlete and how it compares to the acting profession.

Think of Los Angeles as the Olympics of acting. This is the city where actors come, from all around the world, to compete for the “gold.” Throw a rock in this town, and you’ll hit an actor, writer, director. There are those who hate that notion; personally I find it a tremendous asset/resource/comfort for those of us who have come here to create.

But the proximity of  collaborators comes at a price.  Because they are also your competition.

A sign of the digital times, YouTube made a bit of a splash in Venice this year by awarding the first prize at the world’s oldest film festival. Not exactly front and center, but, still, the sidelines count for something, which is where YouTube announced the winner of Your Film Festival, its inaugural online competition for short films, spearheaded by director Ridley Scott and designed to find and foster new talent.

Just when VOD has settled into the lexicon, along comes TOD.

What is TOD you may ask?

As Scott Glosserman, filmmaker and founder of Gathr,

which launched in March 2012, sees it,

It’s not too late to view and vote!

The first-ever PBS Online Film Festival

doesn’t conclude its five week run

until March 30th.

According to Jake Coyle (AP, January 19, 2012),

“YouTube is launching a film festival that will play out online and ultimately send 10 finalists to the Venice Film Festival” …

As the 2012 Sundance Film Festival approaches, filmmakers whose films have been accepted by the Festival this year, or any other year for that matter, have an additional reason to be happy, thanks to an initiative set up by the Sundance Institute last summer to help Sundance alumni get their films streamed online.

Scott Macaulay wrote in Filmmaker Magazine (July 27, 2011) …

Matt D’Elia’s directorial debut film, AMERICAN ANIMAL, which premiered at SBSW in 2011, was picked up by Screen Media today for distribution in the US.

According to Indiewire:

“D’Elia, a graduate of NYU’s film program, also stars in the film which was shot on a microbudget in his downtown Los Angeles apartment.  The supporting cast of AMERICAN ANIMAL features an impressive array of up-and-coming actors including Brendan Fletcher (HBO’s “The Pacific”), Mircea Monroe (Showtime’s “Episodes”) and Angela Sarafyan (THE TWILIGHT SAGA: BREAKING DAWN Part II”) … 

New York, NY – October 15, 2011 – The RIKAROO Film Collective, in cooperation with United Digtial Filmmakers, today announced the launch of www.rikaroo.com, a place for independent filmmakers in search of exposure to submit their films for review by a jury of industry professionals and possible selection for exhibition online.

RIKAROO is the first industry-curated site for the on-line exhibition of high-quality, independent films, most of which have been denied the kind of exposure that would have found their audiences …