Back to main site.The Etown Endurance Test
Posted by Richie | Filed under Uncategorized, musings and humor
In my last post I mentioned that I was fortunate enough to inherit the footage that we captured for Etown (National Broadcast Radio show aired weekly on NPR).
What do I mean by inherit?
Well, many a month ago I started as an intern with Futuristic Films doing some assistant editing, and on my first day I was introduced to the Etown project. Originally, Etown partnered with Futuristic to concept, produce, and help distribute a film that captured the spirit, musical eclecticism, and force for positive change that is Etown. Futuristic shot about a hundred hours of unique, cinematic, and emotionally gripping footage for story development. This included hour long interviews with Nick and Helen Forster (the etown visionaries) and interviews with the entire star-studded cast for the concert etown produced during the Democratic National Convention at the Buell Theatre. *James Taylor, Ani Difranco, Irma Thomas, Tom Morello, and Crosby and Nash! I almost forgot to mention brief interviews with John Hickenlooper (Mayor of Denver), Bill Ritter (Governor), and Robert Kennedy Jr. Here’s a behind the scenes taste of Bobby Kennedy Jr….
” The reason we don’t have a clean environment is because we’ve got a news media that doesn’t work in this country. It’s broken. It was broken because in 1988, Ronald Reagan abolished the Fairness Doctrine and it eliminated the responsibility for the airwaves, which are owned by the public, to serve the public interest and to promote American democracy. So now their only obligation is to their shareholders. they meet that obligation, not by informing us, but by entertaining us, by appealing to the lowest common denominator, which is the prurient interest which all of us have, in the reptilian core of our brains for sex and celebrity gossip. So, they give us Lindsay Logan and Paris Hilton and Americans today are the best entertained and least informed people on the face of the earth. And you cannot have democracy very long if you don’t have an informed public. That is the principle role that this organization (etown) plays.” CASE CLOSED!
Anyway, I absolutely fell in love with the potential of this project, and filed the papers for adoption! There is something about experiencing hope, collective progress, empowered activism, and constructive dialogue wrapped in a sticky ball of awe-inspiring musical exhibitionism that just gets me every time.
Ugh… but man, has it been a marathon. I did not completely comprehend the infamous woes of editing long format projects i.e. live events (concerts, sport events, awards ceremonies etc.) with a half dozen cameras running simultaneously. I HAVE SEEN the Etown-DNC concert from any and every angle in the book (the unabridged version, mind you). And don’t get me wrong, the cinematography is tasty, but sifting through all the hours is like eating too much desert.
On an up-note, I have learned a ton and have brought this project through the phase for footage review and have just now put together something resembling a pre-pubescent trailer.
In the end you learn that the ups and downs of this sort of work is what you were begging to sign up for to begin with.
Onward!