Finding ways to take creative risks in the tricky environment of corporate studio financing was a major talking point at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.
As a mixed Indigenous woman, Kali Reis, who’s featured in the drama “Rebuilding” alongside Josh O’Connor, often reflects on her own values before signing onto a role or agreeing to a new project.
“I look like a lot of misrepresented and underrepresented communities and if they see me speaking up and staying true to myself, that means more to me than getting cast in a major project,” Reis explained.
Havana Rose Liu, Logan Lerman, Cooper Raiff and Sophie Nélisse joined Reis at the “Risk Takers” panel moderated by Matt Donnelly, Variety‘s Senior Entertainment and Media Writer. The panel was presented by Variety & Acura Cocktails and Conversations at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.
“Yellowjackets” star Nélisse, who was at Sundance this year for the Canadian sex comedy “Two Women,” described never having to worry about working with Showtime and the showrunners over the course of the show’s three seasons.
“When you’re hopping onto such a big production, I make sure to choose the creatives I’m gonna work with wisely and know that we have the same vision for the characters and that we’re both creatively aligned,” Nélisse explained. “It is a show that I’ve never seen before. That was very risky at the time and I think we’ve proven everyone wrong … risks sometimes create the best outcome.”
Raiff is back at Sundance this year following his breakout “Cha Cha Real Smooth” that sold to Apple for a massive $15 million back in 2022. Although he credits working with Apple as helping him successfully move on to his next project, this time, he comes to Sundance with an independently produced project in the television series “Hal and Harper.”
“I think it’s important to remember that people in power don’t necessarily have any idea what they’re doing,” Raiff joked. “You just need to help these people sleep at night. That’s what these people really desire. If you’re trying to make special art, you would think the people with you are trying to do that too and when it feels like they’re not, maybe what’s happening here is they want more security within their life.”
Lerman, who has made a career out of working on big blockbusters like “Percy Jackson” while also jumping onto smaller-scale dramas like “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” and “Indignation,” doesn’t think about the business aspect of the industry as much.
“I just think about the script that I’m reading and choosing the best or role or script and filmmakers,” Lerman admitted. “It doesn’t about matter about size, scale or scope or how many theaters it’s going be in.”