Persistence; Networking II

There are two organizations that I give a lot of my time to, Film Independent and Movies by Women. I started volunteering at Film Independent because I wanted to network with other filmmakers. I’ve had the privilege of meeting top professionals in varying disciplines of filmmaking and learning a great deal from them.

In 2006 I was accepted into the 2007 cycle of Project:Involve - Film Independent's signature diversity program. The program pairs you with a mentor – I was lucky to get my top choice – I chose Flower Films and have been mentored by two executives there, they have been more than kind in sharing their time and advice. Their assistant has been great at setting up my meetings and following up with me. You should always be respectful of the assistants because they are the up and coming executives and if you are nice to them they may remember you but if you are nasty they will definitely remember you.

Some of our P:I advisors included directors Billy Ray (Shattered Glass, Breach) and Doug Atchison (Akeelah and the Bee), Producer Albert Berger (Little Miss Sunshine, Little Children) among others. This is not my attempt to name drop but to let you all know how important it is to network not only amongst your peers but also with people who are established in their careers.

It was also through Film Independent that I got involved with Movies By Women. Christine and I attended our first event some four years ago. The Digital Filmmaking Series is a five week workshop that gives a thorough overview of current and emerging technologies in the film industry. Our instructor was Tara Veneruso, founder of Movies by Women. At the time, it felt like this was going to be one of the most challenging film related courses I had taken. To my surprise, I got what Tara was teaching. She is so knowledgeable and her enthusiasm is contagious. I knew I had to work with her. Today, I consider Tara a mentor and a close friend. Through my work with Movies by Women I’ve met directors Allison Anders, Grace Lee, Penelope Spheeris and most recently Kimberly Peirce and Joe Dante among others. I am one of the co-host of the Moveisbywomen.com audio podcasts and I am grateful to Tara for bringing me along on this ride.

I have a wide network of filmmaker friends that include some of my dearest friends; Christine, Laura, Danny, Gus, Tara, Stephanie, Matthew, Jenna, Jane, Lynn and Nanobah. They are so talented and I am proud to call them friends and/or collaborators and I’ve met all of them by networking.

Lucy

Persistence; Networking

Just came back from a symposium where a group of Vietnamese American filmmakers (among other artists) spoke on the "Biz".   The most important lesson, said Tim Bui (director of Green Dragon), is to be persistent.  Persistence is perhaps more important than talent.  Also speaking at the symposium was Ham Tran (Journey From the Fall) and Stephane Gauger (The Owl and the Sparrow, nominee at Independent Spirit Awards) (among others).  

While I was waiting for the symposium to start, I decided to be anti-social, so I just found a seat and started reading the schedule for the Visual Communications L.A. Asian Pacific Film Festival (www.vconline.org) in May.  A woman sat next to me and I decided to strike up a conversation (I decided not to be anti-social anymore).  I found out that she's a producer who is producing films in Vietnam.  How cool is that?!  She knows all these guys who are making films in Vietnam.  I asked her how she came to know these filmmakers, and she said she just met them at events such as this symposium.  So of course I got her contact info.  

One of my New Year's resolutions for this year is to network network network.  I would say that other than persistence, the other important key to success is learning how to establish and maintain relationships (i.e., business relationships, but I think personal relationships too, because I'm a big believer of the importance of having a support network of friends and family).  In fact, the very first piece of business advice ever given to me when I was starting out professionally is the importance of relationships.  Throughout the years, I've met so many successful people who have repeated this advice.

As part of my New Year's resolution to network, I renewed my memberships/started new memberships, with various film organizations and I'm trying to get out there to meet new people.   So far, I've met a number of truly amazing and passionate filmmakers, producers, artists, etc.  I feel incredibly fortunate to be among this community of creative people.   My sister told me about this saying, "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear."  (Sorry, I don't know the source of this quote, just that it isn't my sister's.)  I think it is also true that when you are committed to your dreams, you will meet those along the way who will help you (I'm going to give that one to Coelho, as that was a theme in The Alchemist).