Securing funding for any project is never a simple feat, but forindependent films, it’s almost impossible.—but in 2001, I once again stood at the edge of that unenviable task, this time driven by the bold ambition of bringing our Orwell Project, ‘Orwell – Against the Tide,’ to life.

I don’t know if luck came into it, certainly plenty of hard work did. We applied through Media plus, a department of the European Union and were the only recipients awarded the maximum amount of Development Funding that year. This was a brilliant start, as it enabled us to write the treatment & script and begin the long search for the co-producer and Production Funding.

That year we attended all the Festivals and Forums throughout Europe supported by the MEDIA programme, where we networked with all the Commissioning Editors to pitch our idea. Barcelona was our last Festival, and by then we had got to know each other better and everyone we needed signed up.

The strength of the Orwell Story; the persuasiveness of our case and personal resilience to suffer the knockbacks, each ‘no’ taking us closer to a ‘yes’, meant we had ten broadcasters lined up across nine language zones, including the new Catalan Agency ‘Institute Catalan de les Industries Cultural’

Scottish Screen, with a lottery grant, was the major production funder and by this point we had found our Catalan co-producer Oriol Porter.  Porter was pivotal in sourcing key crew and facilities so we could film at the Aragon front(where Orwell narrowly escaped death, after being shot in the throat) and elsewhere in Spain. 

 

I had been so focused raising the money that copyright permissions from the Orwell estate had somehow slipped on to the back burner.  So now I had the money, but not the permissions!! This was a showstopper.

And so….I found myself standing in the pouring rain, staring apprehensively into a puddle reflecting the multicoloured lights of Piccadilly Circus, London.  Slowly I began to squelch my way up Shaftesbury Avenue towards the offices of A.M Heath, Lawyers and literary Agents for the George Orwell Estate….

In my next post, you’ll learn more about what took place within those hallowed walls….if you can’t wait for that, read about it in my book….’Orwell: Against the Tide’ availablefrom the National Library of Scotland at a special student price of £10.00

 

See: http://shop.nls.uk/shaping-the-shadows-2798-p.asp

See further info at: marklittlewood.org.uk

 

#Funding #ComissioningEditors #IndependentFilms #Orwell #GeorgeOrwell #DevelopmentFunding #ProductionFunding #ScottishScreen, #EuropeanUnion