“Dear White People” producer Effie Brown is slated to deliver the Keynote address at the 12th annual Film Independent Forum, Shadow and Act reports. Film Independent is the the non-profit arts organization behind the Film Independent Spirit Awards and the LA Film Festival.
Brown made headlines back in 2015 due to a conflict she had with fellow “Project Greenlight” producer Matt Damon. She expressed discomfort about a group of white men directing a movie about a black sex worker, and he was famously dismissive about her reservations.
But as we’ve previously written, “Saying that ‘Project Greenlight’ made Brown would be an insult to her brilliant career, as she went into the show already a successful producer with more films under her belt than you can count on two (or three) hands.” That being said, we did love watching Brown on the reality show. Her other producing credits include “Real Women Have Curves,” “Rocket Science,” and “The Inheritance.”
“What’s interesting to me is that independent film and the Hollywood studio films are sort of in two different worlds,” Brown told Women and Hollywood earlier this year. She elaborated, “The independent ‘Sundance thinker visionary types,’ they, we — I’ll include myself — know how to adapt. We weren’t afraid of digital. We love that there’s Netflix, Hulu, Amazon. Wherever we can go to show our work, absolutely. I think filmmakers, especially independent filmmakers, women, people of color, filmmakers who are creating content that is more reflective of their community, are finding an open embrace with TV, as well as those digital and streaming platforms.”
Brown will no doubt expand on these thoughts in her Keynote.
The Forum will include a celebration of the 2016 Film Independent Producing Lab Fellows, and the Alfred P. Sloan Producers Grant will be awarded to one of the Lab’s participants. The $30,000 grant supports a narrative film with themes relating to science or technology.
Panelists for the 2016 Film Independent Forum include writer-directors Sian Heder (“Tallulah,” “Orange is the New Black”) and Tina Mabry (“Mississippi Damned,” “Queen Sugar”), and a number of other producers, writers, and industry members.
The Forum takes place October 21–23 in LA. For more information and to buy passes, visit Film Independent’s site.
