Director Lanre Olabisi’s mom took a second mortgage on the family home to generate some funding for her son’s feature film, August The First, which wound up earning a Gotham Award nomination last year as well as an Audience Award at the Urbanworld Film Festival.
Olabisi has since self-financed some spec spot work, including Yahoo! Personal’s “A Better Way,” which helped him gain inclusion in SHOOT’s sixth annual New Directors Showcase. He is currently seeking a commercial production house affiliation.
“A Better Way” was screened during the New Directors Showcase event on May 28 at the Directors Guild of America (DGA) Theater in New York, as was work from 29 other up-and-coming directors. The Showcase field of 30 directors consisted of 23 individual helmers, a three-person team and six directorial duos.
After the screening of the Showcase reel, Olabisi spoke during a panel discussion moderated by SHOOT editor Robert Goldrich. Olabisi was one of six directors who related their backstories and strategies for gaining industry exposure.
The session also featured ad agency perspectives from Tor Myhren, executive VP/chief creative officer of Grey New York, and Elise Greiche, executive VP/executive producer at BBDO New York.
The other five director panelists were: Adria Petty of Santa Monica-based harvest; Brian Billow of bicoastal/international Hungry Man; Guido Verweyen who’s represented regionally by Big Fish Films, Dallas; Daniel Katzenberg of Prettybird USA, Santa Monica; and James Larese, part of the directing trio Syndrome of Los Angeles-based Robot Films.
Spec value “It’s all about the work,” assessed Myhren when asked about the viability of spec fare as a means for a new director to demonstrate his or her talent. “It doesn’t matter to me if it’s spec or not as long as the work is good.”
Greiche also sees value in spec work but takes it with a grain of salt in that it’s still a different animal from real-world ad projects. Nonetheless, good spec work opens doors, she said.
The BBDO exec producer noted that the advent of new content forms beyond the traditional broadcast :30 has yielded other means that are helping emerging directors to gain meaningful exposure. Relatively inexpensive forms of production are part and parcel of YouTube and related web outlet fare. Viable projects can be made at a lower price point, translating into aspiring directors having more of an opportunity to share their vision and talent.
Myhren concurred, noting that in some cases this work reflects the fact that one doesn’t always need to rely on big-ticket spotmaking from major production houses.
Shop affiliation pivotal At the same time, though, Myhren observed that an affiliation with an established production company can make all the difference for a young, promising director.
Myhren related that he’s seen new talent flounder about until it connects with the right production house that has credibility in the marketplace.
Greiche agreed, affirming that a professional production house she has a positive track record with provides a comfort level more conducive to her making that leap of faith to award a job to a new director.
Screen time A large turnout at the DGA Theater–with attendees from the agency and production house communities–got a look-see at one piece of work, either a real-world spot, a spec commercial, a trailer, an excerpt from a documentary or short film, even a pilot for a mobile phone series, from each director in the Showcase.
In addition to the aforementioned directors in the panel discussion, that lineup of talent included: Baby (Cecilia Alvarez, Pablo Bordenabe) of Rebolucion, Buenos Aires; Keith Bearden of Mr. Hyde, Paris (U.S. affiliation: Good Films, New York); Christian Bevilacqua of Therapy Films, London; Bitstate (Peter Circuitt, Bill Sneed) of The Ebeling Group, New York; Tony Briggs of Dab Hand Media, London; Luis Carone of 02 Filmes, Sao Paulo, Brazil (U.S. affiliation, Backyard, Venice, Calif.); Eran Creevy of Sleeper Films, Santa Monica, Calif.; Rob Devor of bicoastal Nonfiction Unlimited; The Docter Twins (Matt & Jason) of DUCK Studios, Los Angeles; Ryan Ebner of bicoastal/international HSI Productions; Harold Einstein of bicoastal/international Station; Gentlemen (Brett Snider, Billy Federighi) of Uber Content, Hollywood, Calif.; Philippe Grammaticopoulos of Mr. Hyde, Paris and London (repped in the U.S. by Mr. Hyde @ Curious, N.Y.); Sam Holst of The Sweet Shop, Auckland, N.Z.; Rich Lee of DNA, Hollywood; Tony McNeal of Hydraulx Filmz, Santa Monica; Mattias Montero of Social Club, Stockholm; Benita Raphan; Guillermo Rocamora of Big Mama Productions, New York; Rozan & Schmeltz (Jeremie Rozan, Martial Schmeltz) of bicoastal/international Partizan; Keith Schofield of CaviarLA; Sumo Science (Ed Patterson, Will Studd) of Aardman Animations, Bristol, U.K.; Clay Weiner of Biscuit Filmworks, Los Angeles; and David Weinstock of Waif & Stray, New York.
The Showcase directors come from diverse backgrounds. For example, Devor is a narrative feature and documentary maker. It was his documentary Zoo that caught the eye of Nonfiction Unlimited’s Loretta Jeneski who saw the film’s debut at the 2007 Sundance Festival. Exec producer Jeneski was so impressed that she committed to helping to build Devor’s spot directing career, recently landing him a Bonefish Grill campaign out of Cliff Freeman and Partners, New York.
Meanwhile Lee made his initial mark as a pre-visualization artist. While doing pre-vis on director Francis Lawrence’s feature debut Constantine, Lee impressed Lawrence. This eventually led to Lee being welcomed into Lawrence’s roost for commercials and music videos, DNA.
Keith Schofield broke into directing on the strength of his offbeat, experimental music video work, which landed him a roster slot at CaviarLA.
And directors Ebner and Einstein made the transition from the agency creative ranks to the director’s chair.
Intros, reception Welcoming attendees to the Showcase event with introductory remarks were representatives from sponsor DGA: Jean Frost, assistant executive director of the Guild’s Eastern office; and accomplished feature, documentary and spot filmmaker Laura Belsey who’s represented for commercials by bicoastal Celsius Films.
Belsey then introduced SHOOT publisher and editorial director Roberta Griefer who provided an overview of and historical perspective for the Showcase, now in its sixth year and its fourth at the DGA venue. Griefer thanked the event’s lead sponsors–the DGA, harvest and Sony–and silver sponsors Kodak and Deluxe, New York.
Griefer also acknowledged Palace Digital Studios, South Norwalk, CT, and New York, which put together the New Directors Showcase reel that was screened for the audience.
Following the screening was the panel discussion, after which those gathered for the event went downstairs for a reception honoring the Showcase directors.
Both the 6/6 print issue and its PDF counterpart version contain a photo gallery with coverage of all of the evening’s proceedings.
To see the New Directors Showcase reel, log onto www.shootonline.com/go/newdirectorswebreel
