On February 28, the AD/UPM Council West’s Mentor Committee celebrated the ADs and UPMs of the award-winning and nominated projects honored during the 67th Annual DGA Awards. For the 12th time the Meet the AD/UPMs event gave attendees the opportunity to hear firsthand what went into the making of these celebrated movies, television episodes and commercials with a special event held in the Guild’s Los Angeles Boardroom.
The morning opened with a welcome from Mentor Committee Co-Chair Peter E. Jackson who introduced AD/UPM Council West Chair Marie Cantin. Cantin spoke to the assembled about the Council and encouraged them to get involved in their Guild. Then Jackson turned the proceedings over to 2015 Frank Capra Achievement Award Recipient Phillip M. Goldfarb who served as the event's moderator.
After a brief explanation of how the day would proceed, Goldfarb introduced the panelists: 1st AD Peter Kohn from Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s DGA Award-winning feature film Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance); 1st AD David Bernstein and 2nd AD Paula Case from Clint Eastwood’s DGA Award-nominated feature American Sniper; UPM Victor Hsu from Jill Soloway’s Comedy Series Award-winning Transparent episode “Best New Girl;” UPM Chrisann Verges from Mike Judge’s Comedy Series Award-nominated Silicon Valley episode "Minimum Viable Product;" 2nd AD Wendy Bledsoe from Lesli Linka Glatter’s Dramatic Series Award-winning Homeland episode "From A to B and Back Again" and Dan Attias’ nominated Homeland episode "13 Hours in Islamabad;" UPM Line Postmyr from Brendan & Emmett Malloy’s DGA Award-nominated Nike commercial The Huddle; and 1st AD Craig Owens from Noam Murro’s nominated Dodge commercial Ahead of Their Time.
After screening clips from the nominated and award-winning works, Goldfarb and the panelists covered a number of subjects including: how they got involved with the projects, if they had worked with the director before and if it was different this time; and how they overcame challenges in order to make the project happen. After the discussion, members were able to mingle with and ask their own questions of the panelists.
The AD/UPM Council, West Mentor Committee is chaired by Randy Turrow, and co-chaired by Peter E. Jackson. The members are: Dale Dreher, D. Scott Easton, Paul Epstein, Alicia Hailey, Mark Hansson, Sandra Milliner, Morgan, Richard Muessel, Lucille OuYang, Richard Prince, Michael Risner, Linda Rockstroh, Traceigh Scottel, Kelly Stevens, Jay Tobias, Marty Veselich, Melanie Wagor, Julian Wall, and Susan Zwerman. For more information on the AD/UPM Council, West, click here to visit their web pages.