Ok… so it’s been a while here, my apologies… there’s been both way too much going on and a lot of nothing. Let me explain, since the film fest at the end of July I’ve been packing up for the move out west and dealing with all the fun details that come with it… including the financial annoyances (ie: cost of moving) and all the details that come with not only moving myself, but also transferring our main production office as well. Basically, due to all the crazy projects I’ve got in the tubes both personally, and through my production company (Star Com Productions LLC) I felt it was time to make the move out west, but not only myself, but for the company’s main office as well. Now, don’t get me wrong, we’re not a huge company, and a lot of what we do can be done from home-offices, but the fact of the matter is, changing everything (and moving everyone) from one coast to the other is a heck of an undertaking and so while I’ve now been living in Los Angeles for about 3 weeks, it’s taken me until now to get things situated to the point of getting back to the fun world of “internetz”.

Before I get into some brief updates on ongoing film/event projects I just want to clear up one important question I’ve been asked rather frequently recently regarding the move and my continuing relationship with the Oxford International Film Festival. Yes, I know live primarily in Los Angeles, but I am continuing to work with the festival on a regular basis. A good friend of mine and a long-time supporter of the festival, Eric Chatterjee, has been very gracious in accepting the reigns as the new “Executive Director” of the festival starting in 2010, and is now handling all the day-to-day operations and planning. I’ve taken on the new position as the festival’s “Producer”. Basically what that means is that I still have the final say in most festival matters, including programming, but I’m no longer the day-to-day person. Due to the crazy amount of work involved in putting on the festival every year I felt it necessary to hand over a considerable amount of the yearly work load to someone new, not only because I’m no longer directly local (you’ll find that I’ll still be in Ohio rather frequently through – we still plan to shoot most of our productions there) but also to allow me to have more time to focus on Star Com, our ever-growing slate of films, tv projects, and concerts (not to mention my own Directing endeavors). So there you have it… no worries about the fest! I’m still a major player in the festival, but I’ve intentionally passed on the “Executive Director” title and daily duties.

That said though, we’re now all setup here in LA and getting right back into the game head-first. So, a brief update on some projects that I’ve got in the works: The “In Dreams” (formerly titled “Slipping Away”) feature is still very much alive and kicking, indie financing in this economy to be honest just plain sucks… I’m actively in talks with a couple different backers and we’re still pushing ahead, though we have not yet set production dates, and yes, we still have some VERY interesting actors in talks.

Ok, on to some NEW stuff… I’ve recently been asked to develop and write a network tv/family drama for a Disney starlet which would basically start as an online “webisode” series and then make the transition to one of 3 networks. I finished the pilot script a few weeks ago, which everyone very much liked, so like everything else, now it’s basically just a waiting game to see what the producer/studio/sponsors decide to do next. I’ve also been asked just last week to write and direct a low-budget SciFi/Thriller aimed as a SyFy channel original movie, which, I’ll be honest, I was a bit hesitant to do originally, but now I’m getting very excited about the more I think about it and continue to develop the story. We’re still very much in negotiations about it (again, like everything in this biz.. you never REALLY know if anything will ever happen until it’s finished) but I’m happy with where it’s going and really starting to get to know and like the producer (which is a good sign).
Hum… I think that’s about it for now… lots of other random things in the works, but not too much far enough along yet to really mention, but I’ll certainly let you all know if/when things start to progress, the great thing about LA (and this industry in general) is that things move SO fast (and, ironically, often SO slow) that predictability and planning is often all but irrelevant, but hey, that’s half the fun of it. 🙂

More soon.

–JC

Tags: Films, Oxford International Film Festival, Randomness // Add Comment »