Word is unofficially out that the man whose name will replace that of Richard Herskowitz on the Virginia Film Festival director’s chair is a vet of the Sarasota Film Festival named Jody Kielbasa. Kielbasa is a Florida fellow who blogged his trip to the Cannes Film Festival before the 2008 Sarasota fest, co-produced frequent SFF guest William H. Macy’s The Deal (which, according to Rotten Tomatoes, seemed to strive for too much in 108 minutes), and appeared in the following video to commemorate the 10th Sarasota fest:
You can get the glossy closeup on Jody Kielbasa via his personal website.
So, welcome, Mr. Kielbasa, to your new gig as Virginia Film Festival director. Let’s talk soon. In the meantime, allow me to bring you up to date on some recent cultural announcements from our area.
For starters, Fred Boyce booked Irish music legend Paddy Keenan for a gig at Rapunzel’s that pleases this music blogger for its small-space-to-big-talent ratio. And, if you really want to make an impact on local cultural scenesters, you’ll go see Jamie Dyer perform. People like him. Lots.
In exchange for my assistance, however, I’d like to enlist your help, Mr. Kielbasa. We like a good film fest in our city, and we’d love a great one. So, here’s the deal: People will post comments about what they want from the next film fest here (that’s your cue, commenters), and I’ll pass them along. Deal?
UPDATE: Deal! Jody Kielbasa spoke with Feedback this morning and told him that he plans to make his first trip to Charlottesville shortly after Memorial Day, and will settle in during June, after a trip to Los Angeles. (His family will join him in town in July.) Kielbasa said that he was aware of the Virginia Film Festival and learned of the director search via Google Alerts; he mentioned that, while he can’t make Cannes this year, he’ll plan to attend three festivals in the coming months to look for films to possibly bring to town, including the Telluride Film Festival and the AFI/Discovery Channel-backed Silverdocs documentary film festival. Happy hunting, director.
