“No one had seen this film yet when we came to a handshake agreement with Zipline. Marian Koltai-Levine (President of Zipline) said if the film got into Sundance, she would consider working with it. Now everyone there has seen it, and she liked it and the relationship continues. The terms of the deal with New Video are not to be disclosed, but they are participating at least with their labor. They are an enormous value add to this partnership as well as Zipline. They are fronting their labor and reputations.”
“On February 1st when the Kickstarter money comes in, Marian gets repaid for her company’s labor. Enough people were enthusiastic to donate money on Kickstarter to make the initial $5K and now we are raising the bar to $50K to make by Feb 1 for all of the marketing and distribution costs. And this has become a form of story in itself and gets press for us which in turn leads to more donations. Sundance is the theatrical screening. Since theatrical is a loss leader and drives the ancillary sales like DVD and VOD, instead of paying for the usual P&A associated with a theatrical run, I am going to pay Zipline that fee in its entirety, which is a relatively small fraction of $100K. I can spend that little because she and New Video can see the value in being associated with this project. They want to be involved and it is a win-win for everyone. If you give people the incentive to be involved, you don’t have to pay them because they value the experience. Now I don’t believe in not paying people. I want them to be around the project in its entirety instead of finding other work to pay for their time, the time they could be spending with me. If you are honest and do your best to maximize their equity investment, equity in the form of their labor, and you pay them back consistently, you enable a forward moving culture where people want to be associated with you and make your projects. They have to tell me what they need, when they need it, and it is my job to figure out the money and get it to them for their commitments. And I better damn well find it and I always have. I ask how much do you need to do this with me and then that is the form the budget takes. When we evaluate a project, we take these things into consideration. There are a lot of ifs. It is based on contingency upon contingency. I cannot do this by myself. Every bit of this is a group effort, nothing is done alone.”
“We did not run into any problems with Sundance. I have a relationship with Anne Lai and Caroline Labresco from over the summer at the Sundance producer’s lab when I was there with the film Skeleton Twins. Caroline called to tell me we got into the Sundance Festival. I had an initial conversation with her and sold my idea to her. I said ‘this is what I’m doing what do you think?’ So, we had to have a conversation with John Cooper. We did talk to him. Actually that conversation was preceded by an indieWire article in which John Cooper said someone was going to do this, launch a February 1 release. When I talked to him finally, I asked him if he was breaking news [with the article] and knew something I didn’t or was he guessing. Turned out it was a guess. At the end of the conversation, he said he thought that it would happen next year [a launch from Sundance], but next is now. Alluding to the NEXT category this year. My feeling was that he was pleased that someone was already thinking about it.”
“It is possible that we will be doing this model in the future for as many [films] as there are with anyone who thinks I am a viable option. I have been talking for a long time about the possibility of a micro budget slate where 90% would go back to the filmmaker, like a license deal and not acquisition. Maybe a distribution partnership. The opportunity would be win win. My reputation would be unmatched by any other producer and the filmmakers can make exactly the film they want and I will give them 90% of the gross revenue that comes to me. This is what I am working toward. “
“My goal is that filmmakers get compensated for their work and that an overall culture be promoted that is self perpetuating. I want to say this to as many producers as possible, to give them all the tools to do it themselves because the best outcome, in my mind, is that not only do they see that I am right, but that they can do it themselves. The only thing I ask is that they say where they heard it from first. They credit me with whatever credit they think is due. And if they heard these ideas from others as well, like from Ted Hope for example, then credit us both. It is way more significant to share this credit with others than to take it all myself. Because the more this idea is synthesized into more people saying it, the more other people will want to spend time talking about it and it will perpetuate.”
