Focus Features Dvd
Anais Wachowski
Focus Features LLC is an American independent film production and distribution company, owned by Comcast as a division of Universal Pictures, which is itself a division of its wholly owned subsidiary of NBCUniversal. Focus Features distributes independent and foreign films in the United States and internationally.
In November 2018, The Hollywood Reporter named Focus Features "Distributor of the Year" for its success behind the year's breakout documentary film Won't You Be My Neighbor? and Spike Lee's BlacKkKlansman.[2] The studio's most successful film to date is Downton Abbey, which garnered $194.3 million at the worldwide box office.[3]
Focus Features was formed in 2002 by James Schamus[4] and David Linde[4] and formed from the divisional merger of USA Films, Universal Focus and Good Machine, as well as the several assets of the Vivendi-affiliated film studio StudioCanal.[5] USA Films was created by Barry Diller in 1999 when he purchased Interscope Communications, October Films and Gramercy Pictures from Seagram and merged the three labels together;[6][7][8] USA Films was led by Scott Greenstein.[9] Universal Focus was the specialty film arm of Universal Pictures that was created in 1999 as Universal Classics, which was led by Paul Hardart and Claudia Gray, to replace the October Films label in order to get a group of titles to be distributed by USA Films, focused on the marketing of niche-based acquisitions by Universal Pictures International, Working Title, WT2 Productions, Revolution Films and DNA Films, and eventually rebranded into Universal Focus by 2000.[10][11]
In March 2004, Focus Features revived Rogue Pictures as a genre label, which was once used by October Films in the late 1990s. Rogue Pictures would be led by the same team who led the standard Focus management.[12]
On October 2, 2013, James Schamus was fired from his position as CEO of Focus, with the New York offices being shut down in the process. He was succeeded by Peter Schlessel, whose company FilmDistrict would be merged into Focus and folded into the trade name High Top Releasing. This became effective in January 2014, and several titles developed under FilmDistrict would be released under Focus.[13] Under Schlessel, the company began to acquire films with a wider commercial appeal, much like his previous company.[14][15] In May 2015, Gramercy Pictures was revived by Focus as a genre label, that was on action, sci-fi, and horror films.[16]
In February 2016, Focus merged with Universal Pictures International Productions as part of a new strategy to "align the acquisition and production of specialty films in the global market".[17][18][19] Following this, along with several disappointing box office returns, Schlessel was let go from the company and replaced with Peter Kujawski.[20]
As a distributor, Focus' most successful release in North America to date is the 2019 film Downton Abbey, which earned $84.5 million during its first weekend at the box office and surpassing Brokeback Mountain, which earned $83 million at the North American box office.[23] However, this is not counting the domestic total of Traffic, which earned $124.1 million under the USA Films banner. The animated film Coraline was also highly profitable for the company. Although suffering its share of unsuccessful releases, Focus has been consistently profitable, and its international sales arm (unusual among studio specialty film divisions) allows it to receive the foreign as well as domestic revenues from its releases.[24] Its DVD and movie rights revenues are boosted by cult classics including Wet Hot American Summer.
When first-time writer/director Dee Rees met producer Nekisa Cooper, they bonded over their mutual desire to bring the story of a young girl yearning to find her true self to the screen. And together the two rallied different communities to help them.
Dee Rees: Actually, it all started out as a feature. I wrote the first draft of the feature script in the summer of 2005, as I was going through my own coming-out process. I'm originally from Nashville, Tennessee. Being in New York, I was kind of amazed to see these young women who were teenagers and totally out and proud. Even if I had figured out my sexuality at that age, I don't know that I would have had the courage to be that person, and that's how the idea for the film came.
I was interning on Spike Lee's Inside Man, and on lunch breaks and during some of the downtime, I would write the feature script in longhand in notebooks. At the time, I was also finishing NYU's Graduate Film program and I needed a thesis. So I took the first act from the feature script, and shot it as a short. But the feature has always been the original vision.
DR: Well, each of the main characters is a "pariah." They all have their fears, desires, strengths and weaknesses, and isolations. One thing I definitely worked on in the writing was showing the characters' struggles to connect, and their worlds away from their families - where there are attitudes and expectations that they might not know how to handle.
DR: It's semi-autobiographical. As I was coming into my sexuality, I started to become comfortable with who I was. But I didn't know how to express that. Alike struggles in the same way. In going out to clubs - and by the way, I'm totally not a club person - it felt very binary; it seemed like you had to check a box, butch or femme. And I'm neither one of those things. I struggled with myself; how should I be in this world? Should I wear baggy jeans and baseball caps? Or should I wear a skirt? None of those identities is really me, and I finally came to the conclusion that I can just be myself and don't have to fit into any category. I don't have to put on any personae; I can just continue to be who I am. And that's what Alike comes to realize in her journey.
DR: Yes, it's all mixed in there although a lot of specific things are fictional. The characters are fictional, but some of the experiences and feelings that Alike is going through are the same. Much was coming from my own experience of this new world opening up to me. Nekisa, in fact, took me to my first gay club and this explicit song was playing. I walked in and went, "Oh my God, I'm going to hell. This is it, my mom's right." I was in awe of that type of space. I'd never been in a place like that before. So some of the awe and some of the anxiety the lead character feels were things I experienced when I was coming out, coming into this world.
The principal conflicts are also similar; parental conflict is something that I really went through, although it is dramatized differently for Alike. When I came out, my parents weren't very accepting. At first my mom said, "Oh, you're in film school, this artsy thing, whatever, it's a phase." When they realized I was serious and that it wasn't a phase, both my parents came in and staged an intervention. For a few months, they sent e-mails and cards and letters and Bible verses to make me think and change. It got to the point where I told them, "Don't communicate with me if that's what it's going to be about, because my sexuality is not an option and it's not a choice." We eventually started talking again, and things are better.
DR: I'm Christian. I was raised in a Methodist church, and I still believe in God. My spirituality was another thing that I struggled with early on. Because I initially wondered, "Is this going to be okay? Does God still love me?" On a real basic level, I struggled with that and it was painful. But later as I grew, I came to the acceptance and peace of mind that God does love me and I'm okay as I am. So that's one element, a layer, of this film in addition to the love story and the search for identity. If anything, it's my spirituality that got me through the past six years. My spirituality and spiritual practice have actually gotten stronger than they were before going through this.
DR: Yes, Alice Walker has been my biggest influence as an artist, and I'm also inspired by writers from the Harlem Renaissance; and especially the writings of Audre Lorde - her work Zami, in particular. When I read her story, I felt that I wasn't alone and it gave me hope for my own journey. I always loved to write, and in learning about screenwriting and film, I knew I wanted to bring characters to life in that medium.
In specific preparation for shooting Pariah, I was inspired by the documentary Paris is Burning by Jennie Livingston for the tone of the film, and I also used it as a reference to help educate the actors about this world of the characters they were entering.
Nekisa Cooper: I met Dee while she was working with me at Colgate-Palmolive - her former life. She left the company to go to NYU's film school. When she came to me and a couple of friends and told us she was going to film school, we said, "What? You're leaving the security of this space to become a starving artist?" I didn't really get it but I remained friends with her, and wound up helping with her second-year film, Orange Bow. After that experience, I thought, "Wow, this is what I do for toothbrushes and toothpaste, but this 'product' is something I can be more passionate about." So I told Dee, "I don't really know what this producing thing is, but I enjoyed working with you and I would love to support you in whatever you're doing next." It turned out to be Pariah, and I had a very personal connection to the story. I remembered being like Alike before coming out - a chameleon - one way with my family, and other ways with other people in my life. So I quit my job, took three months off, and produced the short film - mostly to figure out whether producing was really something I wanted to do long-term. It was a huge learning curve, but pretty awesome. It was the perfect intersection of my strengths from previous work as a basketball coach and as a businesswoman.
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