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CHAPTER THREE

PATCHWORK

QUILT —

Putting Your

Project Together

“You don’t have to plan to fail. You just have to fail to plan.”

— Author Unknown

Filmmakers who come to me for advice have usually “hit the wall” in fundraising — they have tried everything possible to acquire support for a project but just can’t seem to get past a certain point. I am often placed in the position of having to determine and then tell filmmakers what they are doing wrong so we can understand why their rate of rejection is so high. I said earlier that many fundraising problems are rooted in basic career development issues (e.g. comportment, mission, professional direction). There is one other great impediment to funding: hitting the street before the filmmaker is actually ready to fully articulate the project in a logically convincing and emotionally engaging manner.

THE STORY THAT HAD TO BE TOLD

What the filmmaker must ask before beginning to fundraise is: “Do I know everything I must know about this project before I approach a funder? Can I answer any potential questions about my project that anyone might ask?” Too many filmmakers start looking for money before they have done the very basic groundwork on their project, and this lack of preparation leads to a number of quick rejections by potential funders. When I ask filmmakers how they got involved with projects, they often say, “I ran across this incredible story/person/organization and I knew immediately that this was a story that must be told.” I have heard this sentence almost word-for-word so often that it must be a virus specific to independent filmmakers.

What I have never heard a filmmaker say is, “This is a story that must be heard.” In other words, the filmmaker must realize that just because the idea for the film fills her with great excitement and she feels an overwhelming compulsion to tell it, she must prove that a lot of other people will feel the same way and want to hear her story. She will have to fully address basic questions of need, audience, distribution, marketing, crew and staff, and budget. Until these are all as well articulated as possible, it is a mistake to start looking for financial support.

Question Number One concerns “need.” Is there a need in the world for one more film about XYZ? I ask my clients the following questions: “Can you name five titles of other films that people will think of immediately when you mention your new film?” If the filmmaker says “no,” then I know more homework needs to be done.

Every film fits into some niche where it will be clustered with other similar titles or subjects. The filmmaker has to do the research that uncovers all these films. When any seem very close in content, the filmmaker must make an effort to actually see those films. No funder wants to place support behind a program that has already been made by another filmmaker. There are many ways to uncover the titles of your “competition”: filmographies available in libraries, catalogs from distributors of films in your genre or subject area, conversations with experts in the field, lists of programs aired on PBS, and the Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com).

Keep in mind that when you make your initial pitch to funders, whether or not they articulate it out loud, they will be thinking, “I know another film or two that’s about the exact same subject — how is this any different?” The filmmaker must be ready to differentiate her project from all others that have already been created. She has to be ready to say, “My program is different from all others in the following ways...”.

Here are some areas where a filmmaker can make a case for significant differentiation from another similar project:

♦ Timing: The project is much more current than anything previously created, and contains brand new information.

♦ Depth: The project is longer and goes into much more depth on the subject than any other previous film.

♦ Content: The project covers issues and aspects of the topic that have never been covered before and/or from a different perspective.

♦ Style: The project will be the first animated/narrative/vérité documentary on the subject ever made.

♦ Audience: the project will be made for a particular audience (the elderly, young children, illegal immigrants) that has never had access to this information.

The idea is a very simple and basic one: Make sure the project is significantly different from anything else currently available. Be able to convince potential donors that there is a genuine need in the world for this film, because it has something important to say in a way that hasn’t been heard before. When I cover the elements of the perfect written proposal, I will be advising the inclusion of a whole section on this topic in the grant.

One important principle to remember when differentiating your project from others is to never say anything negative about other films and/or filmmakers. It is a mistake to differentiate the program by saying “My film will be better than the others because they are all substandard works of filmmaking, and mine will be a beautiful and professional work of art.” Even if this is true, saying this only places the filmmaker in an unflattering light.

AUDIENCE/ COMMUNITY

Sooner or later the filmmaker wants the work to reach an audience. Deciding who that audience will be is something that should happen as early in the project as possible. If I ask a filmmaker who her audience is, I usually get the following answer: “Everybody!” Unfortunately, not only is this answer inaccurate and implausible (no film ever made could possibly appeal to everyone), this answer will not please funders, and it keeps the filmmaker from creating a program that is likely to really appeal to specific segments of the population.

Whom does the filmmaker want to reach? What types of people are most likely to be interested in the project? Among whom does the filmmaker want to make an impact?

Start by trying to draw circles of broad audience types, including but not limited to:

♦ Geography

♦ Age

♦ Race

♦ Gender

♦ Sex

♦ Sexual Orientation

♦ Religion

♦ Lifestyles, Hobbies, Leisure Interests

♦ Occupation

♦ Income Level

♦ Educational Background

♦ Political Affiliation

The filmmaker can begin to define the particular demographics and psychographics that make up the audience to be reached. For instance, a documentary might be geared to upper-middle-class women over thirty who live in urban environments throughout the U.S. and who are at a high risk for breast cancer, or the film might be targeted to young black males between the ages of thirteen and eighteen who come from single parent households.

There are important lessons to be learned from this exercise. The first is that the program’s content and format might need adjusting so that it is better suited to the correct audience. Another lesson might be that the intended audience cannot afford the program, so funds for distribution will have to be added to the fundraising budget. The filmmaker should consider if this list has already begun to lead to ideas for finding support (e.g., prominent individuals and affinity organizations).

For the filmmaker who sincerely believes her film is being made for everybody, I suggest a process of elimination — a reductio ad absurdum. Start making lists of just the narrowest audience types imaginable who would in no way be interested in the film: Bedouin nomads, children under six, people who belong to religions that forbid watching television or movies. Eventually this process will help the filmmaker to back in to the audience.

Occasionally a filmmaker might embark on a project and actually not know who the potential audience is; the filmmaker only knows that the topic is compelling and that somebody out there must want to see it. In that case, I advise creating a process to start finding the audience as early in the process as possible — ideally well before the project reaches completion. This can be done in any number of creative ways, including:

♦ holding works-in-progress screenings with different focus groups

♦ circulating the treatment or script to people the filmmaker trusts

♦ consulting with experts in the subject area of the film

♦ talking to distributors and exhibitors

♦ social networking on the Web (blogs, special interest Web sites, MySpace, Facebook, etc.)

It will be very difficult to get funding support from sophisticated funders until the filmmakers can articulate just who she hopes to reach.

Here is an example of how the Web and blogs can help you find your audience:

When Curt Ellis began working on King Corn, a documentary about the role that corn plays in the American diet and economy, he wasn’t sure who the film’s core audience was. Ellis was a co-producer and co-star of the movie, in which he and his friend Ian Cheney move to Iowa to grow an acre of corn. Ellis’ cousin, Aaron Woolf, was the film’s director.

“They always tell you, ‘Think about your audience from Day One, before you ever pick up a camera,’” Ellis says. “We weren’t. We were busy trying to figure out how to tell a really complicated story in a way that’d be relevant and interesting for our audience — whoever they turned out to be.”

But along the way, as Ellis and his collaborators began to conduct interviews, people introduced them to groups like Slow Food International, foundations dealing with agricultural and dietary issues and bloggers writing about sustainability and the environment.

“We realized that all those people are naturally interested in our film, and started connecting with that built-in audience,” Ellis says. Some bloggers, he says, suggested people who’d make good interviewees — or who might provide a promotional boost to the film when it was ready.

— From an ITVS case study of King Corn by Scott Kirsner, www.itvs.org (reprinted with permission)

More and more, funders are interested in the “community” you plan to reach — how you plan to create a community around your film. Here is what Todd Dagres, producer (Transiberian) and venture capitalist, had to say about this subject at a recent DIY Days Conference in Boston:

“The key to success producing content for the new medium, the digital web, is ‘community.’ If you’re a traditional TV or film person... you think of ‘audience,’ you think ‘I’ve got to make something that this demographic wants to see.’ You’re already deciding that you’re in a passive medium, and you’re already deciding that you want somebody to watch this and then go home, or watch this and then go someplace else. So you’re building an ‘audience.’ Forget the word ‘audience.’ The new word is ‘community’. you have to build a community around the content. In fact the content is nothing but a seed to build that community. The community interacts with content.”

DISTRIBUTION

Once the question of need is answered, and the target audiences have been identified, the next piece of the puzzle is distribution — how the filmmaker intends to get the completed program out to the world. This has become a central concern for funders. They are well aware of one of the sad facts of life in independent filmmaking: Many films are made, but few are seen by their full intended audience.

This is why it is smart to talk to bona fide distributors very early in the process of your thinking about and creating a project. Distributors are a great font of practical, real-world information on the potential for marketing a program and making sure it reaches viewers. Begin the process of identifying the perfect distributors of the film being made. There are lists of distributors of independent film and video programs that can be found on the Internet. Catalogs are often available in libraries and in institutions that purchase media products. Check to see who distributes the other films that you consider to be your competition. Other filmmakers are also a great source of advice about distributors.

I recommend doing some homework on distributors that are appropriate for your current and future projects, and then picking up a phone and calling them directly for a conversation (perhaps preceded by an introductory e-mail). What questions can be asked of a distributor at this early state in a project?

♦ Is there a need for my project in the marketplace?

♦ Is the project the right length and format for the audience?

♦ What is the potential for sales in dollars and units over what length of time?

♦ Are other similar projects in the pipeline?

♦ Does this program have to have a study guide and/or a Web site?

If the distributor is enthusiastic about the project, be sure to ask for a letter of support — this is the most credible evidence that can be given to a funder to help prove the eventual viability of a program. Get these letters whenever possible.

I had a client once who was creating a three-hour series for grade school children on the environment. He called a distributor who was very excited by the idea because it had not been done before and teachers were making requests for anything he might have on the topic. The filmmaker was ecstatic, until the distributor told him the following: “I love your idea, but I can’t take your series.” The filmmaker wanted to know why. The distributor answered, “Because you’re making three one-hour films. In my market, teachers want either twenty-minute or thirty-minute films.” Now the filmmaker knew that if he could cut his work to have natural twenty or thirty-minute sections he would have a much better chance at reaching his audience. Imagine how expensive this lesson would have been had he waited until after completing his three- hour series to talk to a distributor.

The filmmaker will have to resolve the entire landscape of the eventual distribution of the program. What markets will the program explore and in what sequence? Broadly, the markets include:

♦ Festivals

♦ Theatrical

♦ Cable Television (Pay-Per-View, Premium Channels, Basic

Cable, Public Access)

♦ Public Television (national and local)

♦ Commercial Broadcast Television

♦ Home Video

♦ Educational Markets

♦ Organizations, Associations, and Libraries

♦ Catalogs

♦ The Internet

♦ Domestic and International outlets for all of the above

Do not make the mistake of telling a funder that the sole intended distribution outlet is PBS. Funders want to see a distribution plan that is much more rich and varied than just public television. Increasingly, funders are also interested in knowing about specific marketing/public relations plans, community outreach plans, and whether or not a Web site and/or blog will be created in conjunction with the film.

I like to ask funders about their pet peeves. One funder confided the following to me: “If a filmmaker tells me that her only method of distribution will be a PBS broadcast, then I won’t fund her. I need to hear a distribution plan that is much more varied and multifarious than just PBS, otherwise I can’t make the grant.”

Peter Broderick, President of Paradigm Consulting, specializes in helping filmmakers and media companies develop strategies to maximize distribution, audience, and revenues. Here is a short case study where he describes that new nexus between audience/community and distribution for the documentary Note by Note:

TARGETING CORE AUDIENCES

Today independent filmmakers are taking a new approach to audience. While studios continue to spend vast amounts of money chasing general audiences, independents are learning to target core audiences successfully. They are implementing strategies designed to reach the specific audiences most likely to be interested in their films. Documentary filmmakers have been particularly effective connecting with viewers interested in the subject of their films.

Note by Note is an irresistible documentary about the making of a Steinway piano. The most thoroughly handcrafted instruments in the world, Steinway pianos are as unique and full of personality as the world-class musicians who play them. Ben Niles, the film’s director, made a major effort to define and reach the film’s core audiences, which include Steinway dealers, Steinway owners, piano students and their parents, piano teachers, piano technicians, pianists, and many others.

Ben’s priority was to first reach these core audiences, and then hopefully cross over to a wider public. He is reaching them both online and offline through his Web site, mailing list, organizational partnerships, and publications read by his audiences.

After winning awards and acclaim on the festival circuit, Note by Note opened theatrically at the Film Forum in New York City where it was a box office and critical success. Working with Argot Pictures, the filmmaker opened the film across the country, mixing regular theatrical engagements with single-night special event screenings. At a number of these screenings, it was possible to not only watch the film but also meet the main character, Steinway #L1037, and hear it played before or after the film. These special event screenings were particularly popular, selling out in many cities and extending the semi-theatrical life of the film for over a year.

Niles has been successfully selling DVDs at screenings and from his website, www.notebynotethemovie.com. In late 2009, the film will be broadcast nationally and be released in video stores around the country and online.