IndieWorks: People Lounge Farewell Recap

January 10, 2016 in IndieWorks

Wednesday evening was our last night of IndieWorks at the People Lounge. We explained in a previous post that the People Lounge is shutting down at the end of January. We were so sad about it (still are) and decided it'd be best to not have a final screening there this month, but instead have a farewell party/alumni mixer. The CongestedCat team and People Lounge staff partied one more time, and about 35 of our alumni filmmakers & friends spent the evening with us and networked further with each other. It was a lovely night, and though a sad occasion, a nice way to see the People Lounge off. We'd like to reiterate how grateful we are to Heinz Liu and the People Lounge staff for giving us the opportunity to host IndieWorks (and shoot our web series) there for almost 3 years, and for being so wonderfully supportive and welcoming the entire time. We're sure going to miss them.

Our last group photo at the People Lounge.

Here's the slideshow we had playing during the night, featuring fun moments had at the People Lounge.

We're currently still searching for our new venue. We have some promising leads, and hope to have a new space secured in time for our February screening, tentatively scheduled for February 17th. Hope to see you then!

Christina & SUMMIT featured in Newsday

January 09, 2016 in Summit, Festivals & Awards, Press

Christina was interviewed by Newsday in promotion of SUMMIT's screening next weekend at the Macabre Faire Film Festival, where it is nominated for Best Feature, Best Director, Best Sound & Best Supporting Actor (Rob Ceriello). There are 5 films nominated in each category (out of 30 features and 146 films in total). Read the full article here. And see full list of nominees here.

IndieWorks: Insider Series W/ Gerard Zarra

January 08, 2016 in IndieWorks

Part of our effort for IndieWorks is to feature & support indie filmmakers outside of our monthly screenings. We bring our winning filmmakers to your screen for a chat with one of our IndieWorks hosts in our series titled "IndieWorks: Insider Series". http://www.congestedcat.com/indieworks/

Gerard screened his short film "John Dablovski: Reality TV Star" with us in January 2015 and he took home the Audience Choice Award. We got to chat with him about his inspiration behind the film and why he loves being a New Yorker.

Gerard Zarra:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/GerardZarra11
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/gzarra

IndieWorks: Insider Series w/ Katie Carman-Lehach

January 01, 2016 in IndieWorks

Katie screened her short film "The Sucker" with us at our very first screening in June 2013; she was our first Silver Whiskers Award winner. She screened and won again at our Year 3 Halloween screening with her episode of the web series "Disturbances," which took home the Audience Choice Award. We finally got a chance to chat with her about both projects and her interest in genre filmmaking.

Katie Carman-Lehach:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/katiecarman
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/katiecarman

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Holiday & End of Year Newsletter

December 14, 2015

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Summit, Feature Film
Summit finally had its World Premiere & a successful festival run, including winning Best Horror Film at the Manhattan Film Festival & Christina winning Best Director at the Rhode Island International Film Festival's Vortex Fest. The film screens one more time next year at the Macabre Faire Film Festival, before hitting online platforms in late January.

Kelsey, The Webseries

We assumed our hit web series "Kelsey" was finished gaining an audience after its viral run in 2013 & 2014. But the LGBTQ Web Series Panel Tour 'In With the New Out' gave us a festival run and broadened the reach of the series, most notably at this year's Outfest.

We Shot a Pilot!

We decided to spin our audience demand for more LGBTQ comedy into a new pilot, "Two Gays & a Girl." We're still in post-production for it. But the 23 minute piece will be done in the Spring, and hopefully attract some funding our way for a full series and maybe even the feature we've been planning.

Short Films

A busy year for shorts. We finally premiered "Juice it" online.

Our crowdfunded shorts from last year, 'We Had Plans" & "Not Our Liv ing Room," started their local festival runs. Ryan finished his short, "F edUp." And Christina shot a new one, "Hello." We're sure to have news on them next year!

IndieWorks, Monthly Film Series

We started our 3rd Year at IndieWorks, and each month almost doubled in size compared to our first year! We've truly grown the series into a recognizable & supportive community, thanks to your help; and we believe our Year 3 Best of Fest will be the best yet! We can't wait for you to join us for that and the start of Year 4!

Check out the monthly Recaps from this year, including last month's screening.

And be sure to join us on January 6th for the last time at the People Lounge for our farewell party to say thank you & goodbye to the space that has been our home for 3 years. We move to a new venue in February. (Want to help our search? More details.)