Coffee Break with Liz and Kate

Kate Goes on an Adventure – to the Sundance Film Festival 2010…

Join Kate as she plays paparazzi at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, UT.

Guess who’s in this pic?!?!?!

I have lived in Utah for the past 10 years and have never made it to the Sundance Film Festival in Park City. I’ve always wanted to, but somehow life always gets in the way of what a mom “wants” to do and what she gets to “do”. Thanks to a new camera (I finally got a Nikon digital SLR) and a persistent younger brother, who is also a photography buff, I finally made it to the premier independent film event of the year.

If you’re not familiar with the Sundance Film Festival, here’s the gist of how it works. Independent filmmakers make low budget, innovative, and often quirky movies, without the backing of big studios. They premier these flicks  in the beautiful ski resort town of Park City, UT.(one of the all time coolest places I’ve ever been), in hopes of getting their film picked up by a major studio. (Recent Sundance flicks…Precious, Napoleon Dynamite, Little Miss Sunshine, Reservoir Dogs, and Blair Witch Project).

That’s the “official” purpose of the film festival. The reality of it, though, is that it’s a place for filmmakers, film lovers, celebs,  studio execs, the media, trendy ski types, fans, and the paparazzi to meet up in one tiny little ski town for 11 days…to see and be seen.

My goal for my adventure to the film festival was to “play” at being a paparazzi for a day. Plain and simple, I wanted to get some great celeb shots. Thanks to my ultra organized brother, we were armed with a spread sheet containing the the swag spots, the staged media locales, and the venues, times and who’s who of each movie. We then used our best guesses to determine where to position ourselves for optimal celebrity sightings.

I have also learned, however, never to underestimate the value of sheer luck when taking photos.  “Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than to be good,” says my good friend, Drew, who is a Mr. Big Wig in the photo business. (He is the editor-in-charge at the Global Pictures desk for a company which I can’t name, but it rhymes with loiters and starts with an “R”. Hee hee…this is due to an unfortunate incident where his bosses didn’t much like the fact that he wrote a pro-American guest rant or two for us once upon a time, which apparently was a no no.)

Anyway, the photo that I teased you with at the beginning of this story is a direct product of the sheer luck of being in the right place at the right time. My brother and I were stopped on the sidewalk across the street from one of the swag/media spots, regrouping and trying to determine where to go next. All of the fans and paparazzi were across the street from us, hoping to catch a celebrity going into the building.  Just then, one of the limo SUV’s pulled up right in front of us, and as luck would have it, the driver let the mystery celebrity out on OUR side of the street. And here she is…

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…Miss Paris Hilton!

Did you guess it? I am pretty sure my brother and I got the only non-official photos of Paris, as she spent the rest of the day dashing  quickly from building to building using back doors and alleyways.

I have to admit that I got totally sucked into the paparazzi mentality trying to follow Paris around to get another shot of her. I am embarrassed to say that I stooped to a new lifetime low…

I chased down a side street after Paris Hilton!

As in I was actually running through the snow and slush to catch her before she went into a restaurunt for dinner. I mean, I don’t even like the girl. Geez.

Anyway, if you’ll allow me to pat myself on the back for a moment, here’s the shot of Paris that ran in my local paper, the Daily Herald.

Oh wait a minute, ummmm…Paris isn’t actually in the shot, but the caption does say that this person was looking through the window trying to get a glimpse of her. Hee hee…

Make sure to come back on Thursday to see which other celebs I got pics of, in Part 2 of my Adventure to the Sundance Film Festival.

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• Robert Redford: Indie cinema isn’t dead yet (cnn.com)
• Sundance: Stars, Swag, Soirees, Screenings (abcnews.go.com)
• Sundance aims indie films beyond festival confines (seattletimes.nwsource.com)

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