Interview: Olivia Newman – First Match | 2015 January Screenwriters Lab

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Selected for SXSW Film Festival’s Narrative Feature Competition, Olivia Newman‘s First Match (read review) picked up an audience award before quickly bowing over at Netflix. I had the chance to speak to the filmmaker back in 2015 during the Sundance Film Festival – as she was invited with her feature debut in script form for the 2015 January Screenwriters Lab. We got a sense of what her influences are (the Dardenne Bros.) and the long process of building a text about estrangement parallel to encouragement (found in team sports) with a short and then into a feature.

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During the 2015 edition of the Sundance Film Festival, I got to individually chat with the filmmakers who participated in the Sundance Institute’s 2015 January Screenwriters Lab.

Sophia Al-Maria – Beretta
Yung Chang – Eggplant
Elizabeth Chomko – What They Had
Laure de Clermont-Tonnerre – Mustang
Nia DaCosta – Little Woods
Christopher Makoto Yogi – I Was a Simple Man
Jonathan Minard & Scott Rashap – Archive
Olivia Newman – First Match

Eric Lavallée
Eric Lavalléehttps://www.ericlavallee.com
Eric Lavallée is the founder, CEO, editor-in-chief, film journalist, and critic at IONCINEMA.com, established in 2000. A regular at Sundance, Cannes, and Venice, Eric holds a BFA in film studies from the Mel Hoppenheim School of Cinema. In 2013, he served on the narrative competition jury at the SXSW Film Festival. He was an associate producer on Mark Jackson’s "This Teacher" (2018 LA Film Festival, 2018 BFI London). He is a Golden Globes Voter, member of the ICS (International Cinephile Society) and AQCC (Association québécoise des critiques de cinéma).

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