Category: News

It’s a tall order to merely get past the title of White Girl, Elizabeth Wood’s tenacious directorial debut, without detecting hints of—or being smacked in the face by—the film’s controversy. White Girl. Is it a drug reference? A bold commentary on race and privilege? A reach for provocation? Perhaps all three, but not without leading viewers on an unflinching exploration of race, socio-economic class, and drug culture, filtered through the blurred lens of a part-sympathetic, part-maddening young woman played by the fresh-faced Morgan Saylor.

New York, NY — Six theatre directors will participate in the fourth Sundance Institute | LUMA Foundation Theatre Directors Retreat in Arles, France, July 18 through July 31. The Retreat is part of the Institute’s year-round work with the theatre community and is one of 24 residency Labs the Institute hosts each year for independent artists in theatre, film, new media and episodic content.

Under the supervision of Theatre Program Artistic Director Philip Himberg, Producing Director Christopher Hibma and Program Associate Anne Kauffman, the Retreat is the only theatre director-centered residency of its kind.

The Stories of Change Convening at the Skoll World Forum in April brought seven Sundance Institute Storytelling Fellows together with Skoll Awarded Social Entrepreneurs to explore storytelling potential. Here are some post-Forum reflections on story and change from our Fellows.
On the relationship between change and stories filmmaker Jerry Rothwell asks, “How do we square the visionary idealism required to imagine a better world, with the pragmatic politics that might take us there? What’s the relationship between demanding change (campaigning, protesting, speaking out) and making change (through community action, government, political parties)? How does a movement relate to the organizations it gives birth to? And what part do stories and images play in this process?”
Rothwell points out the kinds of stories that inspire change.

Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute announced today its return to Cuba with film screenings and filmmaker discussions open to the public as part of Sundance Film Forward, July 14-16. Local artists, students, and film lovers are invited to attend public events at venues across Havana, including Cine Yara and Casa del Festival.

Sundance Film Forward will host free screenings of acclaimed independent films Me and Earl and the Dying Girl with novelist/screenwriter Jesse Andrews and Meru with director Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi.

Riley Keough and Jena Malone in Lovesongcourtesy Sundance Institute

Sundance NEXT FEST marqueecredit: Alberto E. Rodriguez

Shamircredit: Matthew Parri Thomas

Los Angeles, CA — The snow-packed gems of the Sundance Film Festival will thaw in the summer heat of downtown LA with Sundance NEXT FEST, August 12-14 at The Theatre at Ace Hotel Downtown Los Angeles. The program, announced today, features some of the most talented new film and music artists on the verge of breaking out.

Music and Sound Design Lab 2015Credit: Lauren Janney

Music and Sound Design Lab 2014Credit: Brandon Joseph Baker

Music and Sound Design Lab 2015Credit: Rob Williamson

Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute and Skywalker Sound today announced the composers and directors selected for the Sundance Institute Music and Sound Design Labs at Skywalker Sound . This will be the fourth year the Music and Sound Design Labs take place at the Skywalker Ranch in northern California. Half of this year’s composing Fellows are women, extending the Institute’s commitment to female artists to a creative branch of filmmaking with an especially low percentage of women represented.

Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute today announced it will present its Vanguard Award to filmmaker and actor Nate Parker at NIGHT BEFORE NEXT, a summer celebration benefiting the Institute and its artists on the eve of Sundance NEXT FEST at the iconic Theatre at Ace Hotel Downtown Los Angeles on Thursday, August 11. Parker’s directorial debut, The Birth of a Nation, premiered to great response at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival, where it won both the Audience Award and Grand Jury Prize. The Vanguard Award will be presented to Parker during the cocktails and dinner portion of the evening.

Like a lot of people, I’ve spent much of the past week thinking about the recent attack at a gay nightclub in Orlando—the deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history.

Park City, Utah — Sundance Institute today announced that its 2016 Sundance Film Festival, which took place in Park City, Salt Lake City, Ogden and Sundance, Utah in January, generated an overall economic activity of $143.3 million and gross domestic product of $72.5 million in the State of Utah, according to the independent annual economic and demographic study conducted by the University of Utah’s Kem C.

Sundance Institute extends its celebration of the 10th anniversary of New Frontier this week with Virtual Reality: The New Frontier, running June 12–16 at the Walker Art Center. The presentation includes a lineup of works from the 2016 edition of New Frontier at the Sundance Film Festival along with specially selected pieces by local Minnesota artists. In the April edition of Leonardo, the Walker’s Sheryl Mousley and our own Shari Frilot (New Frontier’s chief curator) shared an illustrated survey that revisits the sprawling work of New Frontier over the last 10 years.

Los Angeles, CA — Sundance Institute announced today that it has been awarded two grants from The Academy Foundation of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to support professional training and development for emerging feature film artists from nontraditional backgrounds. The grants, which were made through the Academy’s Grants and Nicholl Fellowships programs, support the Institute’s 2016 Native Filmmakers Lab and the Feature Film Program’s June Screenwriters Lab.A $17,500 FilmCraft grant has been given to the Institute’s Native Program for its 2016 Native Filmmakers Lab.

In the immortal words of pop empress Britney Spears: “Sundance is weird. The movies are weird – you actually have to think about them when you watch them.” Lest we forget, this erudite quote has been pinned to bulletin boards around Sundance offices for years.