Fall, 2010

For Fall of 2010, editing work continues on Master Craftsmen in the Building Arts with Margie Hunt and Kentucky—an American Story with Dan Smith.

Margie, Neil Means and I are editing the various segments of the Craftsmen film. Right now, for example, we’re cutting a scene about adobe craftsman Albert Parra in which he is seen working with a group of his hermanos penitentes replastering a morada in Abiquiu, New Mexico.

Dan and I will be recording the Kentucky narration with Ashley Judd in Nashville later this fall and preparing the film for broadcast on Kentucky Educational Television in 2011.

Our big news here in Charlottesville is that Thoroughbred, our feature-length documentary that takes the audience inside the world of big-time horse racing, will receive its East Coast Premier at the Virginia Film Festival. The screening will be on Sunday, November 7 at 1:15 pm in the University of Virginia’s Culbreth Theater.

For ticket information, go to:

www.virginiafilmfestival.org/films-and-events/schedule/

Of course, you can learn all about Thoroughbred here on the website at: 

http://www.paulwagnerfilms.com/thoroughbred-main/

Ellen and I hope to see you at the Thoroughbred premier!

Paul Wagner

SUMMER, 2010

Summer, 2010 finds us heavy into editing on two exciting documentary projects—Master Craftsmen in the Building Arts and Kentucky—An American Story.

The Craftsmen film is a collaboration with our longtime friend and colleague Marjorie Hunt. Margie is a folklorist at the Smithsonian Institution, going back to the days when we collaborated on The Stone Carvers, our film that won the Academy Award for Best Short Documentary. The new film could be considered a “sequel” to the Stone Carvers. It profiles eight master craftsmen in a range of building arts in various materials, including stone, terra cotta, plaster, metal, glass, paint and adobe.

The Kentucky film is a two hour history of the Bluegrass State (where Paul grew up) narrated by Ashley Judd and co-produced with colleague Dan Smith, former chairperson of the University of Kentucky history department. The film takes an innovative topical approach, suggesting how the state’s history is relevant to the present and how it mirrors the larger American experience.

Both films are slated for completion in 2011.