About Me

I make movies.

In the late ’80’s, American Independent Film burst on the media scene with the promise of new visions, new stories, and new approaches. Ted Hope was among the first producers to emerge from the pack and one of the very few today consistently delivering vital and exciting new work. With partner Anne Carey, Hope is the co-founder of New York production company This is that. In its six years, This is that has produced seventeen features. A survey of Hope’s work, numbering over fifty films, includes many highlights and breakthroughs of the last two decades. Ted’s films have received numerous awards, including three Academy Award Best Screenplay nominations.

Hope most recently wrapped production on ADVENTURELAND, by writer/director Greg (SUPERBAD) Mottola, a co-production with Miramax and Sidney Kimmel Entertainment.

Hope’s production of Oscar-winner Alan Ball’s feature film directorial debut TOWELHEAD, staring Aaron Eckhart, Toni Collette, and Maria Bello, will be released in August by Warner Independent. TOWELHEAD is Hope’s 18th production of a first time feature film director. In addition to Ball, Hope has brought the first features of Ang Lee, Hal Hartley, Nicole Holofcener, Todd Field, Michel Gondry, Moises Kaufman, and Bob Pulcini and Shari Berman among others, to the screen.

Ted had four features released in 2007. THE SAVAGES, directed by Tamara Jenkins and starring Laura Linney, Philip Seymour Hoffman and Phil Bosco, was nominated for two Academy Awards including Best Actress and Best Screenplay. It was also awarded Best Screenplay and Best Actor at The 2008 Spirit Awards. Last year saw the premieres of FAY GRIM, Hope’s ninth collaboration with Hal Hartley, THE EX, directed by Jesse Peretz, and THE HAWK IS DYING, directed by Julian Goldberger.

Among Ted’s twenty-three Sundance entries, are three Grand Jury Prize winners: AMERICAN SPLENDOR (2003), THE BROTHERS MCMULLEN (1995) and WHAT HAPPENED WAS… (1994). AMERICAN SPLENDOR also won the FIPRESCI Award at the 2003 Cannes Film Festival, the Critics prize at the 2003 Deauville Film Festival and was nominated for five Spirit Awards and one Academy Award. Ted also produced two Sundance Opening Night selections: Nicole Holofcener’s FRIENDS WITH MONEY (2006) and Moises Kaufman’s THE LARAMIE PROJECT (2002), which was nominated for five Emmys.

Among Hope’s many notable productions are 21 GRAMS, which earned two Academy Award nominations and five BAFTA nominations, IN THE BEDROOM, which earned five Academy Award nominations, and the Cannes Critics’ Prize-winning HAPPINESS, which Hope and his partners released themselves when its distributor’s corporate parent demanded they censor the film.

Hope has produced, with James Schamus, Ang Lee’s early films including RIDE WITH THE DEVIL, THE ICE STORM, PUSHING HANDS, the Academy Award nominated THE WEDDING BANQUET and EAT DRINK MAN WOMAN. Ted previously co-founded and ran the feature production and sales company Good Machine, which he and his partners sold to Universal in 2002. Good Machine was honored by a retrospective at the Museum Of Modern Art in 2001.

More Stuff On Hope

  • I have conducted a "Movie Camp" for the last 2 summers for my grandchildren and their friends ages 4 to 9. While not feature films, these kids were able in 4 afternoons of instruction to produce 4 to 6 minute films ready for "world premier" for their parents on the Friday of the week. That's a total of 16 hours which included breaks and a lot of teaching.

    I have no doubt that with the experience of the filmmakers cited by Mr. Fair, that a feature length film could be made as he describes.

    Part of my reason for working with the children each summer (yes, there is a plan for the 2011 Movie Camp) is to teach them the language of film and head off at the pass the junky YouTube fare that floods that outlet. It is a lot of hard work and a LOT of fun.

    Here are some links to the films the kids made and the backstory of the camps. Our film budget was zero and I did not charge anything for the campers. We did have parental help and the parents paid two babysitters. It cost them less than the local day camps in the area.

    http://web.me.com/tbbeqa/Movie_Camp_2010/Behind_The_Scenes.html This is from 2010

    http://web.me.com/tbbeqa/Movie_Camp_2009/Camp_Highlights.html This is from 2009

    I suggest watching the 2010 camp first. The backstory is the first film and the films made by the kids are under the Red Team and the Green Team. We were working under record breaking heat (2 days over 100F).

    In 2009, the films were a bit different and possibly not as polished (they had a year of experience for 2010!) but charming. I also made a short music film at the 2009 camp ("Pony Man") with the kids as the actors. The greatest compliment paid by the kids to me after they saw "Pony Man" was a request to "see it again."


    Tom

    Thomas B Barker
    Imaging and Photography
    1223 Lake Point Drive
    Webster, NY 14580
    (585) 265-4015
    tbbeqa@mac.com
    http://web.mac.com/tbbeqa/iWeb/Site/Welcome.html
  • Goguen
    There are two video/ film production and distribution websites in beta
    right now that I think you may find really interesting.

    Spidvid.com is a social networking site of sorts, where you can create
    and join video/ film projects, or find people to work on your
    projects. You can rate each member of the crew you’ve worked with, and
    can see what people’s ratings are before they join your crew. The site
    is set up on a system where people work collaboratively without pay,
    and then each have a stake in any distribution deals/ festival prizes
    that come of it.

    Unleashvideo.com is the sister site, where you upload completed videos
    from spidvid. The site offers $1 for every 1,000 views, and right now
    each video is getting 2,000 views already, so it’s an easy two bucks,
    and more as the site gets bigger. Right now it’s only in beta, but
    once it gets public, the payout should get ten or more times bigger
    per thousand views.
  • I was very excited about finally having the opportunity to put my ideas to the test--a known and well-connected director found the model quite compelling. But unfortunately, the entertainment start-up referenced above (with a focus on China and Asia--our point of differentiation), has not raised all of the necessary capital. So I had to move on. But my intention remains to prove this concept on a worthy project in the near future.
  • Hi, Ted. At the LAFF (DIY)istribution & Marketing Syposium you invited folks to write guests posts on your blog. I feel I have something very helpful to contribute. How can I do so, or at least pitch my post?

    Thank you, Christopher J. Boghosian
  • Any updates?
  • anna
    Great site,Ted.Please check out my book project-The Sunshine Project(working title) on Kickstart.com http://kck.st/c50zeN to coincide with the National October DVD release of my up beat award winning feature doc(theatrically released) Buddha Wild Monk in a Hut.Details on the film and book at http://kck.st/c50zeN
  • Dear Ted:

    Extra Criticum (just having been nominated ourselves) has nominated you for the Kreativ Blogger Award. It’s a great honor and a great way to get new traffic to your site.

    All you have to do is post an announcement on your site. The announcement should include:

    1) the Kreativ Blogger logo
    2) a link back to the site that nominated you (in this case: extracriticum.com)
    3) 7 things readers might not know about you
    4) you should nominate (along with links) 7 other blogs worthy of the distinction.

    For an example of one such announcement, you can take a look at ours:
    http://www.extracriticum.com/extra_criticum/2010/05/hey-weve-been-nominated-for-a-kreativ-blogger-award.html

    There’s no hurry. You can do this whenever time permits.

    Cheers!

    - Roland Tec
    (a.k.a. Rolando Teco, Founder of Extra Criticum)
  • John Sagoe
    I am new to this site. Just discovered it anyway. I am a film maker: writer, director, producer and actor living in Accra, Ghana in Africa. My highest achievement was official screening of my first feature at the New York Independent Film and Video festival in 2004. Haven't done much till now when I am readying to shoot again, a film based on an adapted game from the basketball. There aren't much outlets for distribution for African films around the world. I hope my access to you would be beneficial in that sense and also get more informed with time.

    What I have seen so far is commendable

    Looking forward to beneficial relations.

    Thanks
  • Ted:

    I thought you would be interested to know about the launch recently of Movie Monitor, the first website to comprehensively track the availability of films across the major online providers. For more information about this project, please visit moviemonitor.com/about, or contact me if you have any questions or would like a press package.
  • J. J.
    Dear Mr. Hope:

    Thank you for sharing "Thoughts on The New Festival Model", which is a very important and timely piece.

    We are witnessing a shift away from film economics based on the mass market, four-quadrant, to one that must recognize the growing importance of the niche or "long-tail" audience--and how to engage and capture them. Many in traditional Hollywood have yet to accept the changing reality, but therein lies the opportunity.

    A little over a year ago, I developed a next-generation model, one that was intended to beta on a specific feature project, for an emerging film+entertainment start-up. My model (strategic and tactical) is premised on exactly your comment: to leverage multiple, trans-media platforms to build and engage with audiences, but over the lifetime of a project. In that context, a feature release, rather than being the "destination" event, becomes one of several milestones over the life of any project. The model also assumes, for example, that pre-sales, rather than looking backward at historical comps to project likely success in the future, will, going forward, hinge on the degree to which the filmmaker can "bring" an audience (with better targeting and much less expenditure) and generate a level of awareness PRIOR to the sale. I already have anecdotal evidence that this is occuring from colleagues on the finance side.

    In the end, it would equal more attractive pre-sale opportunities for filmmakers (which would increase leverage in distribution conversations)--and ultimately, dramatically less spend on P&A (which, from a funding perspective, are hard $$ to come by these days, since the global financial implosion has impacted many studio credit lines). The net-net would be more transparency on the PROFIT story--undoubtedly a positive for filmmakers and a vast improvement from the murky status quo.

    When we add to all of this the possible efficiencies gained by leveraging digital theatres (vs the current) for a theatrical release, the implications are even more profound.

    I am firmly convinced that the entire ecosystem of film-making, much like what has already occurred in the music industry, will change. But as your article implies, this is great news--for those who can embrace the changes and ADAPT.

    I was very excited about finally having the opportunity to put my ideas to the test--a known and well-connected director found the model quite compelling. But unfortunately, the entertainment start-up referenced above (with a focus on China and Asia--our point of differentiation), has not raised all of the necessary capital. So I had to move on. But my intention remains to prove this concept on a worthy project in the near future.

    If any of this has piqued your interest, I hope that we can continue the dialogue in the near future. Many thanks for reading and for your great contribution to the broader discussion.

    BTW, I love your work.

    Sincerely,

    Julie (on LinkedIn and Twitter-@nihonmama)
blog comments powered by Disqus

This site could not have been built without the help and insight of Michael Morgenstern. My thanks go out to him.

Help save indie film and give this guy a job in web design or film!