Sundance Film Festival to go virtual for 2021
Pandemic spurs move to custom online site
Leave the snow boots, parkas and glove warmers in the closet, the
2021 Sundance Film Festival is coming down from the mountain and straight to your living room.
Organizers on Wednesday said that this year they will premiere over 70 films on a custom online platform during the seven-day event. There will also be some socially distanced screening opportunities around the country. The festival, which is normally held in Park City, Utah, has been preparing for various scenarios for months as the pandemic has raged on.
Festival director Tabitha Jackson said that this model, “Gives us the opportunity to reach new audiences, safely, where they are.”
Over the course of the festival, feature films will premiere throughout the day at a dedicated time followed by a live Q&A. Ticketholders will have a three-hour window to watch.
Second screenings will be available for 24 hours two days later. The rollout, organizers said, is designed to “preserve the energy of a Festival.
ere will also be limited screenings at venues across the county, including Birmingham, Alabama’s Sidewalk Drive-in, Pasadena, California’s Rose Bowl, Denver’s Sie
Film Center and Columbus, Ohio’s Gateway Film Center.
“At the heart of all this is a belief in the power of coming together, and the desire to preserve what makes a festival unique — a collaborative spirit, a collective energy and a cel
ebration of the art, artists, and ideas that leave us changed,” Jackson said.
The 2021 Sundance Film Festival runs from Jan. 28 through Feb. 3, and tickets will be available for purchase for the public beginning Jan. 7. The 2021 slate will be revealed in the coming weeks.
In other developments:
■ California has reported more than 20,000 new coronavirus case, shattering the state’s previous oneday record of 18,350 as Gov. Gavin Newsom — himself quarantined at home after his family was exposed — considers a new stay-at-home order.
■ The head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention predicted the country is about to go through “the most difficult time in the public health history of the nation.” Dr. Robert Redfield made the comment during a U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation webcast Wednesday. Redfield also signed off on an expert panel’s recommendation that health care workers and nursing home residents be the first to get coronavirus vaccinations when shots become available. His decision was posted on the CDC website Wednesday.
■ Leaders of some of Georgia’s hospitals told Gov. Brian Kemp that they are seeing increasing numbers of COVID-19 patients, though those infected with the coronavirus do not appear as gravely ill as patients hospitalized in earlier waves. During a meeting Wednesday, they said patients being admitted are younger and less likely to end up in an intensive care unit or on a ventilator.
■ A Hawaii seniors advocacy group called on the state Department of Health to release more information about nursing home inspections after a coronavirus outbreak at a veterans home caused at least 27 deaths this year.