Interviews

For all that Rhode Island native Annie Mulhall embraces change, this casting director has gone full circle to become a fixture in her home state, and it appears she is planning on staying.

Behind every great movie, there are usually great actors. And behind every great actor is the casting director that put them in that role. In this new series, we take a look at New England’s casting directors: how they got where they are, and what they’re looking for in an actor.

Acclaimed Boston production company, 7 Fluid Oz. Productions, is celebrating ten years in the business.

In 2008, 18 high school girls from Gloucester made headlines for an alleged pregnancy pact that shocked the nation. When the news media left town, local filmmakers John Michael Williams and Kristen Grieco stayed behind to explore the many shades of gray in their story. Their documentary, The Glocuester 18, is available online via Prescreen through November.

Known best to NewEnglandFilm.com readers as the Screenplay Doctor, Susan Kouguell shares her beginnings as a screenwriter and the influences and experiences that have contributed to her new book, Savvy Characters Sell Screenplays! A comprehensive guide to crafting winning characters complete with film analyses and exercises.

The 617 area code is the site of movies, TV shows, and now its very own web series, created about Bostonians by Bostonians -- producer Amy De Paola and writer Katie Shannon.

How do you juggle day jobs and dream projects? Big movie dreams and bills to pay? We're talking to real filmmakers around New England who are balancing jobs in the industry with their personal side projects, and trying to make it in the real world. Interested in being interviewed for the series? E-mail editor@newenglandfilm.com.

With the 3rd Annual Online New England Film Festival happening on the site all this month, four of the selected filmmakers share their thoughts on the roads they’ve taken to find an audience for their independent short films. To see their films and others, check out the festival: www.newenglandfilm.com/festival.

On most independent features, a small budget is a source of constant worry. It can stifle a director’s creativity and lead to concession after concession. But director Jesse Barack isn’t letting money worries stop him from pushing his upcoming film, Polypore, to the limit.

Local actor Chuck Slavin takes matters into his own hands as an activist to sustain the local film industry. As founder of New England Talent & Crew and the man behind the monthly Filmmaker Shindig meetings, Slavin has a mantra: film tax credits bring jobs and money to our region.

Filmmakers Bess and Jay O'Brien truly believe that they live in "the Kingdom," and have worked hard to make films that explore stories of northeast Vermont since 1991. Their most recent documentary, Ask Us Who We Are, is currently making the rounds, showing audiences about the people behind Vermont's foster care system.

We get the scoop on five films from New England talent that will screen at the Independent Film Festival Boston, which starts April 27th.

The European Short Film Festival at MIT puts together a collection of shorts using the form to explore new ideas and styles.

Local writer and editor turned filmmaker Michelle Cove debunks the myths of single women in her new documentary Seeking Happily Ever After: One Generation’s Struggle to Redefine the Fairytale.

Bangor native Andrew Lanham was your typical young screenwriter in grad school at the University of Texas in Austin, when one phone call changed his career forever.

Filmmaking duo Dan Black and Ryan Convery took a crazy idea and $7,000 and turned it into Joy and the Apocalypse, an independent movie that’s now hit both television and the big screen.

As a completely volunteer-run organization, The Women’s Film Festival of Brattleboro, Vermont shows how film and the power of community work together to make a difference.

Conor Timmis directs a Korean War documentary that challenges assumptions not only about the war, but also about the entire genre.

The DocYard is a bi-weekly film and discussion series aimed at constructing a viable and vibrant dialogue amongst filmmakers and the community.

A report rejects the states' ambitious use of tax breaks to develop the film industry, but the fine print (and everything else) is contentious.

Alan Michel, Executive Director of nonprofit HOME, Inc., shares some insight into a media mentorship program that HOME, Inc. is starting, which matches high school students with media professionals in a year-long mentoring relationship.

Producer/Director Mike Grosse shares the swashbuckling story of his new TV show Bladework, a part sportscast, part reality program airing on NBC Universal Sports Boston.

The Connecticut Film Center, founded by two college buddies looking for a new outlet to express their creativity and zeal for the entertainment industry, is helping to turn the northeast into a land opportunity and prosperity.

Get the inside scoop from three local filmmakers currently using Kickstarter to raise funds for their films.

In part two of a series, NewEnglandFilm.com writer Maddy Kadish investigates the allure of attending film school in New England.

Filmmaker and Connecticut native Mark Kotlinski talks about his documentary A Connecticut Hot Dog Tour, an epicurean odyssey filled with floating hot dog stands, celebrity cameos and fiercely guarded recipes handed down through generations.

Filmmaker Robin Hessman's documentary "My Perestroika," featured in this year's Boston Jewish Film Festival, captures a confused moment in history.

This October, the Boston Palestine Film Festival showed how Palestinians could be both activists and filmmakers.

Writer-director Steven Subotnick shares his thoughts on his animated film Jelly Fishers, which tells the story of a family of hungry mole-creatures and their encounter with a jellyfish and screens as part of the 2010 Online New England Film Festival.