The Recent Rise of Independent Television Festivals
The television industry is on the brink of a revolution. The Internet—society’s great equalizer—enables anyone with an idea and a digital video recorder to write, produce and post their own webseries. In many ways this mirrors what happened within the music industry at the dawn of the current century when musicians, including established artists, started to bypass record labels and began producing their recordings on their own and then distributed them directly to the fans.
Even before that music revolution, however, there was one in the motion picture industry. From Robert Rodriguez to Kevin Smith, there are numerous stories of would-be film directors finding innovative ways to raise the funds needed to produce their own movies. The advent of Miramax and the Sundance Film Festival in the early 1990s only served to legitimize these indie-directors, and the motion picture industry has never been the same since.
Television, meanwhile, has been “stagnant” for so long that it is in the unique position to borrow and benefit from the transformations those other two entertainment industries have already experienced. Not only are there a multitude of independently produced webseries already available on the Internet but the last few years has also seen the rise of independent television festivals. Los Angeles is the site of two such events—the NAPTE LA TV Festival as well as the Independent Television Festival (ITVFest)—while the New York Television Festival (NYTVF) adds an East Coast alternative into the mix.
The NAPTE LA TV Festival primarily consists of round-table discussions by industry insiders offering insights and advice to would-be producers as well as a NextTV Competition geared towards the webseries medium. The event attracts an impressive array of media types as speakers, ranging from the likes of Kevin Beggs, president of the television division at Lionsgate (the producers of such shows as AMC’s Mad Men) to Chad Bennett and Jared Tobman of Reveille (the company behind NBC’s The Office), from Jason and Randy Sklar from the webseries Back on Topps to Tim Kring, the creator of the television drama Heroes.
ITVFest and the NYTVF, meanwhile, follow the more traditional format of an independent film festival by accepting submissions in a variety of categories—including drama, comedy and reality—with a select few then shown over multiple nights followed by an awards ceremony. While both started out exclusively focused on independently produced television pilots of the conventional variety, each of these festivals have seen a shift towards the webseries medium. ITVFest, for instance, now has specific categories for webseries to compete while the NYTVF accepts webseries into its pre-existing “television” categories of comedy and drama. As Tubefilter noted in regards to the 2009 NYTVF, “Of the pilots presented, whether or not they had expressly identified themselves as a webseries, well over half have already been distributed on the web, or have plans for distributing over the web in the near future.”
The definition of independent television has obviously changed since 2006 and 2007, the years that ITVFest and the NYTVF initially launched, and the ability of the two festivals to evolve as well is a testament to their commitment to the cause. As the ITVFest website states, the purpose of the festival is to “allow people who have previously had little or no access to television decision makers the forum for which they have tirelessly strived. ITVFest is an opportunity for the dreamers to take time off from their day-jobs, stop waiting for the phone to ring, and take their careers into their own hands. ITVFest is simply put, your ticket to TV.” The same obviously holds true for the NYTVF.
Which, of course, is the whole point of these festivals: to open doors and give exposure to fledging TV producers who might not otherwise have such opportunities. And the industry is not only taking notice, but giving support as well. The NYTVF, for example, has been co-sponsored through the years by ABC, FOX, NBC and TV Guide, among others. ABC even used the 2007 festival to preview Pushing Daisies, as did NBC with Chuck. The first ITVFest, meanwhile, featured a panel discussion with the cast of FX’s It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia. The series co-star/executive producer, Glenn Howerton, told The Hollywood Reporter at the time, “When we wrote the original show, we shot it on our own. It’s kind of the spirit of what this festival is about—a way for people who don’t have ‘ins’ within the industry to get seen.”
Kevin Smith sold his comic book collection, maxed out various credit cards, dipped into his college fund and spent insurance money for a car he lost in a flood so that he could film the movie Clerks. Robert Rodriguez, meanwhile, submitted his body to various medical research studies in order to raise the money to make El Mariachi. Despite their obvious levels of commitment, the sacrifices they made would have gone for not if it wasn’t for the exposure they received from independent film festivals. Although most independent television and webseries creators do not go to the extremes that Rodriguez and Smith did, they have likewise benefited from a similar independent movement nonetheless, a movement that will no doubt grow stronger over time.
The television industry is indeed on the brink of a revolution—and, yes, this one will be televised.
Anthony Letizia (August 13, 2010)
