It was great to meet so many of you in person this year at Cannes! I wanted to do a Cannes check-in for those who attended - was it productive for you? What were some of your takeaways?
I found that co-productions were in full force and there was surprisingly not a lot of discussion about the strike(s). Borders have come down and we are now fully global in terms of filmmaking more than I've ever seen in the last 12 years here on Stage 32. I am piecing together the feature film script that I am producing with PE financing from South Africa, talent attachment from Asia, soft money from US and incentives from Malta. It's wild to see how much opportunity there is to make your film globally.
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Sounds like you had a great time, Amanda Toney. I've been seeing RB's Cannes videos on Twitter. He's basically been saying what you said ("Borders have come down and we are now fully global in terms of filmmaking more than I've ever seen in the last 12 years here on Stage 32").
Congratulations on making the connections/getting the resources for your feature script! Best to you on producing it!
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Thanks Maurice Vaughan! It was fun updating everyone on Cannes in the day to day, I'm glad you found the videos helpful!
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Amanda you look gorgeous. And thank you for putting on these amazing panels during the Cannes which were most informative. I was happy to be one of your Speakers. For us, it was a great Film Market - there were wonderful new projects to buy and happy to blog about some of my favorites. As a Producer I set up 3 films with international co production finance out of Italy, Greece and Hungary. Because of the strike International Writers and Projects are more in demand than ever.
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Great news Amanda Toney. Sounds like you’ve put together an awesome film finance plan! Best of luck on going into production of your feature.
You're welcome, Amanda Toney. RB's videos are always helpful. Looking forward to seeing your film!
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Hi Amanda, so great to see you on another continent! You were classy and stunning, as always.
First off, thank you for putting me on a panel to share my experiences with the community. It's always nice to talk shop with industry colleagues and help the next generation.
For me, Cannes was productive in getting to touch base with clients and associates we already know, as well as meet new people. Given the tumultuous times of our industry, it was helpful to hear different perspectives and gain insight into how others are adapting to the new paradigms.
My key takeaway is that, given the looming strikes, I'm anticipating a busy Q3-Q4 this year, as a lot of producers are pushing projects further into the year to give time for the dust to settle on any strikes. The projects aren't going anywhere, it's just a question of when they'll go.
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Thanks Alexia Melocchi for sharing your insight on how scripts are more in demand than ever on the international market. I saw that, too! The global community hasn't skipped a beat. And congrats on your co-pros! How exciting! You were everywhere at Cannes, I'm convinced you had 10 clones running around. Every corner I turned around you were there doing business!
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Thank you Viviana Zarragoitia, you did as well! That is great insight on a busy Q3 and Q4 this year - I heard the same thing that nothing has been cut, it's just stalled to start, meanwhile a lot of reading is happening to make up for the lull. Thank you for sharing your insight to the community and you did an awesome job on the panel!
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Hey, all! It was a super buzzy and exciting Cannes. Was lucky to have a booth for the first time in the new Fantastic Pavilion to showcase our branching narrative VR piece: "The Werewolf Experience"! (Should be out on Steam VR and Oculus Store by the Fall.)
But it didn't stop there, S32 were kind enough to reach out and put me on their AI and XR panel... even though we didn't get to chat XR... ;) Think we calmed some AI fears in the tent and tried to encourage all artists to work with these amazing tools... and, don't worry, the robots are not coming to get us! (At least not in the ways you're probably thinking... promise.) ;)
Takeaways: having straddled the pond since 2014 I can say that there is more "wiggle room" to work with the States now than ever before IMHO. Certainly lots of folkx are waiting on the strike(s) to settle BUT if ya'll have an in over here in Europe (or anywhere not with a US zip code) 2023 is the time to reach out!
Best of luck out there! (And, again, thanks Amanda, RB, and team organizing the talks!)
Here's to next year!
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Glad Stage 32 represented.
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Hi Amanda, your project sounds exciting - was sorry to miss the event at Cannes, will catch up with you there next year hopefully ! You're right, so many incredible global productions in evidence