Category: News

Will Assume Newly-Created Emeritus Director Role Following 2020 Festival,
After 30 Years on Staff, 11 as Director

Legacies Include Short Film Category & Competition, New Frontier, Festivals in London & Hong Kong
Los Angeles — Sundance Institute announced today that John Cooper, Director of the Sundance Film Festival, will move into a newly-created Emeritus Director role following the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. 2020 will mark his 30th Sundance Film Festival, and his 11th year as Festival Director.
The new role will focus on special projects and overseeing the 40th anniversary of the Sundance Institute to be celebrated in 2021.

Los Angeles and Marin, CA — Sundance Institute and Skywalker Sound today announced the composers and directors selected for the Sundance Institute Film Music and Sound Design Lab, which returns to the legendary Skywalker Sound Facilities for the seventh year.
At the Lab, composers, directors and sound designers will collaborate to develop music and sound for fiction and nonfiction film projects. Workshops and creative exercises, guided by leading film composers and sound designers acting as Creative Advisors, will mentor Fellows to explore sound and music’s crucial role in storytelling.

Nonfiction Projects, All Women-Directed, Range
From Intimate Familial Explorations to Experiments in ‘Speculative Nonfiction’

Los Angeles, CA — On June 21, five boundary-pushing nonfiction film project teams will convene at the Sundance Resort in Utah for the 2019 Documentary Edit and Story Lab, Sundance Institute announced today.
Designed to provide time and space to go deep into the language, form, and meaning of these five independent nonfiction films, the Lab combines director and editor teams in the later stages of post-production, with renowned documentary filmmakers, for the process of reimagining or reconceiving dramatic structures, exploring character and story development, and refocusing around the director’s original animating vision for their work.
Documentary Film Program Director Tabitha Jackson, who oversees the process alongside Labs Director Kristin Feeley, said “By gathering these filmmakers together with some of the field’s most compelling creators, we hope to not only advance their projects through the revelatory process of editing, but also to build community and meaningfully expand the realm of imaginative possibility for the film teams themselves.

Expanded Summer Film Series Showcases Recent Festival Favorites, Including Get Out, RBG, Hearts Beat Loud and Eighth Grade

Offscreen: Visiting Filmmakers, Games, Contests and a Vote for Final Series Screening at sundance.org/utah

Park City, UT — Summer has finally arrived, which means it’s time for the return of Utah’s outdoor movie tradition, now in its 22nd year! The nonprofit Sundance Institute will once again celebrate the season and Utah’s natural beauty with free screenings of eleven Sundance Film Festival favorites, taking place in Salt Lake City, Park City, Ogden, St. George and, new this year, Coalville.

Kenneth Paul Rosenberg is an addiction psychiatrist affiliated with Weil Cornell Medical Center in New York City. He is the director of the 2019 Sundance Film Festival film Bedlam, an exploration of America’s mental health crisis that is set to premiere on Independent Lens in 2020, and he is also the author of a forthcoming book of the same name.
My life course was set when I was 14 years old and my wonderful 20-year-old sister Merle developed a horrific illness, schizophrenia.

Benefits Highlighted by 122,000 Attendees, $18 Million in State and Local Tax Revenue, 3,052 Jobs Supported
Park City, Utah — The nonprofit Sundance Institute announced today that its 2019 Sundance Film Festival, which took place in Park City, Salt Lake City and Sundance, Utah from January 24 through February 3, generated a total economic impact of $182.5 million for the state of Utah. These numbers come from an economic impact study conducted by Y² Analytics, an independent market research and data analytics group now in their third year analyzing the full impact of the Festival, giving a full and consistent picture of the Festival’s year-over-year economic benefits to the state’s economy.

25 Projects, 84% Directed or Produced by Women, Receive Over $750,000 in Grants
Los Angeles, CA — 25 nonfiction films from 12 countries are the latest Sundance Institute Documentary Fund and Stories of Change Grantees, announced today. This support includes unrestricted grants to films in the development, production, post-production and audience engagement stages, and is made possible by founding support from Open Society Foundations.
Today’s slate of grantees includes custom grants from The Kendeda Fund, providing specific support for projects addressing environmental themes and the challenges of gun violence and the Stories of Change Fund, a creative partnership with the Skoll Foundation, supporting social entrepreneurs and independent storytellers.

Los Angeles — Sundance Institute, the nonprofit organization dedicated to the discovery and development of independent artists and audiences, today announced the appointment of Michael Monroe as Chief Marketing Officer. Reporting to Institute CEO Keri Putnam, Monroe will be responsible for leading all aspects of brand, marketing, and communications strategy for the Institute, including the annual Sundance Film Festival. He begins on May 28, 2019 and will be based in the Institute’s Los Angeles offices.

Special Benefit Honors Lulu Wang with the 2019 Vanguard Award
Featuring the Los Angeles Premiere Screening of The Farewell and Afterparty: Tickets on Sale Now at sundance.org/thefarewell
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute, in collaboration with A24, invites fans and supporters of independent cinema to celebrate writer/director Lulu Wang with a special premiere screening of her film The Farewell and afterparty at The Theatre at Ace Hotel DTLA on Wednesday, June 26, 2019. Wang, an alumna of Sundance Institute’s 2017 FilmTwo Initiative, will be honored with the Institute’s annual Vanguard Award presented by Acura at the summer benefit.

Groundbreaking Group of Emerging Media Creatives Convene to Push the Boundaries of Storytelling and Technology
Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute announces six projects selected for the 2019 Sundance Institute New Frontier Story Lab, which supports independent artists working at the cutting-edge convergence of film, art, media, live performance and technology. The New Frontier Story Lab is a week-long immersive experience that empowers creatives with individual story sessions, conversations about key artistic, design and technology issues and case study presentations from experts in multiple disciplines. Past participants include Roger Ross Williams, Josephine Decker, Silas Howard, Tracy Fullerton, Yung Jake, Chris Milk, Hasan Minhaj, Tommy Pallotta, Amelia Winger-Bearskin, Hank Willis Thomas, Jillian Mayer, Heather Dewey-Hagborg, Navid and Vassiliki Khonsari, A Dandy Punk, and Nicolas Peufaillit.

This Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, we’re spotlighting some of the creators within the Sundance family whose work you can watch at home—from a darkly funny web series and audience favorite feel-good comedies to feature documentaries about less-explored aspects of the American experience.

Megha Kadakia
Producer, The Tiger Hunter

Megha Kadakia caught our attention with her work on films such as Miss India America and The Tiger Hunter before becoming an inaugural Momentum Fellow in 2018, which helped to solidify her well-earned spot as an independent producer to watch. The latter project stars Community funnyman Danny Pudi as Sami, a young Indian man in the 1970s who goes to America with high hopes of becoming an engineer only to get stuck in a low-end job—until he and his friends (including Alex, played by Jon Heder) concoct a scheme to convince his childhood crush that he’s made his dreams come true.

June Lab Convenes Filmmakers Developing Singular Feature Films

Los Angeles, CA — Filmmakers from the U.S., Lebanon, Palestine, and the United Kingdom have been selected for the 2019 Sundance Institute Directors and Screenwriters Labs, taking place at the Sundance Mountain Resort in Utah.