Stage 32 at AFM 2023: Standing Room Only Panels + Pitch Conference Winners + Our Community

Hey, Creative Army!

For the 8th year in a row, Stage 32 continued as the official Networking and Education partner of the American Film Market! It was a whirlwind few days, but we all had an absolute blast! We had the pleasure of catching up with so many of our members, educators, executives, and Thought Leaders who were present.

This year was history in the making as Stage 32 was proud to coordinate the film market's first-ever Television panel, and to say it was a hit would be an understatement! Hundreds of people attended this jam-packed, standing-room-only session!

Panel: Developing, Pitching and Making Television

Moderated by our Stage 32 Thought Leader, Executive Director of Current Programming ABC/Disney, Nathan Varni, our phenomenal panelists including yours truly, (CEO, Stage 32, writer & producer), Leila Cohan (Emmy Award-nominated writer & producer- Bridgerton), Vijal Patel (Emmy Award-nominated writer & producer- Black-ish), and Kate Gill (Senior Vice President of Development for Paramount TV Studios, seven-time Emmy nominated Station Eleven and Made for Love on Max, and Grease: Rise of the Pink Ladies on Paramount+) all discussed the tremendous amount of variables involved in Television given the multiple-episode and multi-season format.

We answered questions such as, when developing a television project, how long should your script be? What additional material do you need in order to pitch your project? What should go into your TV pitch bible? What should you have prepared if you're on a Zoom pitch? And, once your show gets greenlit, what is the process like working with the buyer? We brought in a variety of experts to talk about the entire process and what it's like from the creative and buyer perspective.

You can review a segment of this incredible conversation by clicking on the image below! And, once the AFM Sessions make the recordings available you'll be able to watch it on demand if you had an AFM bade. 

Stage 32 + AFM Pitch Conference

Stage 32 also had the honor of partnering with AFM on their Pitch Conference! Presented by our Managing Director, Amanda Toney and moderated by Lee Jessup (Screenwriting & Career Consultant), our expert panelists- Cassian Elwes (Producer & Agent, Elevated Film Sales) and Lorelle Lynch (Manager, Development & Production, AGC Studios) instructed attendees on the essential rules and tools of pitching.

AFM participants submitted a pitch video for the opportunity to take the stage and pitch to our expert panel, who provided unvarnished feedback – explaining what worked, what didn’t – and why. Stage 32 also presented the winner, Gur-Inder, and a runner-up, Maggie Egan Cummings and Jennifer Ohara with a development package with a Stage 32 mentor following the conference! 

The Stage 32 Community

A special thank you to everyone who came by and said hello during the AFM. We absolutely get fuel from being around our community and it was a thrill to spend time with our Stage 32 community, executives, mentors, thought leaders and business partners.

Sean Pope, Attorney, Ramo Law; David Zannoni, international finance expert, Richard "RB" Botto, CEO, Stage 32; Viviana Zarragoitia, Financier & VP of Three Point Capital

Amanda Toney, Managing Director, Stage 32; Guillame Esmiol, Executive Director of Cannes Film Festival Marche du Film

Looking forward to seeing you all again in 2024!

Cheers,

RB

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