New Directions in Regional Filmmaking

Nov. 16 · SEC Room at Hyatt Place · 10:00 a.m.

530 S Gay St, Knoxville, TN 37902

Cinema is at a crossroads. With changes in production tools, the evolving world of exhibition, the potential to virtually connect with collaborators and audiences, and the increasing competitiveness between states to recruit out-of-state production, there have never been more opportunities and challenges producing films outside the commercial centers of Los Angeles and New York. Moderated by Scott Macaulay, film producer and Editor-in-Chief of Filmmaker Magazine, this panel will survey the landscape of regional filmmaking with five experienced directors and producers.

Scott Macaulay is a New York-based producer and the Editor-in-Chief of Filmmaker magazine, the leading American magazine devoted to independent film. As a producer, along with his partner Robin O’Hara and his production company Forensic Films, Macaulay has produced or executive-produced many award-winning features. They include Peter Sollett’s Raising Victor Vargas, Harmony Korine’s Gummo and julien donkey-boy, Alice Wu’s Saving Face, Tom Noonan’s What Happened Was and The Wife, Jesse Peretz’s The Chateau, Bryan Barber’s Idlewild, John Leguizamo’s Undefeated, and James Ponsoldt’s Off the Black. As a company, Forensic Films has been involved as a co-producer in several European productions, including Olivier Assayas’s Demonlover and Clean. In 1998 Macaulay and O’Hara were the recipients of an Independent Spirit Award for their producing work in independent film

As the founding editor of Filmmaker magazine, Macaulay directs the editorial content of each issue as well as special issues and sections such as the annual “25 New Faces of Independent Film”. He is also currently co-editor of FilmInFocus, Focus Feature’s site for movie lovers, and sits on several industry boards, including the Toronto Film Festival’s Industry Center and the Rotterdam Film Festival’s CineMart. Prior to his work in film, Macaulay was Programming Director of The Kitchen Center for video, music, dance, performance, film and literature.