When Brendan Fraser recently won the Academy Award for his performance in “The Whale,” an audible cheer could be heard in Newburgh ”“ parts of the film were shot at Umbra Stages, a facility managed by the production company Choice Films.
Choice Films has worked with several of Hollywood”™s top film and television studios, including A24 (the company behind “The Whale”), HBO Films, Peacock, Netflix and Hallmark Channel ”“ the popular titles “Poker Face” and “Pretty Little Liars” are also among its credits. The company has been credited as being one of the driving forces in bringing A-list productions to the Hudson Valley and building a lucrative high-profile industry in the region.
But Choice Films is also preparing the next generation of potential award-winning filmmaking talent. Since 2018, the company”™s nonprofit division Below the Line Bootcamp has provided local youth with the training needed for this industry, as well as job placement in the Hudson Valley-based film world.
“It initially started off as a sort of an outreach to the community, where we were reaching out to vendors in the area for people to let them know a little bit about film business,” recalled Tony Glazer, co-founder and managing partner of Choice Films. “And it very quickly turned into this desire to involve local kids.”
Glazer noted the program specifically sought out “kids at risk, people that are underserved, and give them an open door to walk into the film business on a production assistant level.” The boot camp does not require fees or tuition, and it provides transportation for those who lack the means to travel on their own.
“It became for us a way to let the people in the community know that there’s something in it for them, that the film business isn’t just a movie that comes into town like the circus and then leaves behind the mask,” he added.
Glazer stated that the program does not mandate specific academic requirements of its participants.
“All they need to do is show up,” he explained. “They really just have to have a desire to come to be on set. The course is free, and then we give them an actual job so they can be on-site to decide if this is something they want to. But at the end of the day, it’s not contingent on any kind of academic credit. You don’t need to be at a school, you don’t need to be a graduate.”
Summer Crockett Moore, also a co-founder and managing partner in Choice Films, stressed that the program should not be viewed as a rival to film schools where students pay thousands of dollars to learn and become part of the filmmaking process.
“I would say that we are definitely not a rival,” she said. “We are looking for the ability to serve a community, specifically that couldn’t afford to go to film school and that might not be on the regular education track. The great thing about the film and television trades is that they are really technical. So, it’s almost like a technical program. And the unions themselves have great training programs and are willing to bring people in and lift them up.”
Since starting the program, Moore has witnessed a new wave of film production professionals going into the workforce.
“We’ve had 137 that we’ve trained so far,” she said. “And from that number, we’ve had 21 join different local unions in the industry. And our retention and employment rate are around 55% to 63%.”
And other production companies have sought to replicate what Choice Films has created.
“We get a lot of calls from companies, certainly from the productions that come into our stages,” said Glazer. “Sometimes, there will be a department that calls us and says, ”˜I hear you have a program. What is that like? What do you do?”™ They ask us questions and I’m sure they go ahead and try to do something similar. Because it really is a great thing to do for people locally, really is a great thing to do for people in general. It’s really just the more the merrier ”“ the more people doing it, the better it is for everyone.”
However, Moore gave credit to Newburgh”™s municipal government for creating a business environment to enable this type of endeavor to take root.
“They have a seamless permit process,” she said. “They have a dedicated film office staff. There’s a great local workforce ”“ we’re about 300 or so deep on the union level and about 120 on the non-union level. And lastly, I would say the additional tax incentive ”“ Newburgh is the first stop in that 35% below-the-line zone for the State of New York. That also was a real incentive.”
