Update - February 12, 2005
“...let us strive on to finish the work we are in...”
Abraham Lincoln

Greetings

Happy 196th birthday to Abraham Lincoln. The 16th President’s birthday is a fitting day to write this initial dispatch on the Budapest to Gettysburg project. I’ll be emailing updates periodically for the duration of the project. These updates are meant to keep those involved and interested in the project aware of new developments and to encourage further support for the project as we work toward our fundraising goal.

Budapest to Gettysburg to the White House


On Friday, February 11, President Bush hosted the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission and a performance of Lincoln Seen and Heard by actor Sam Waterston and historian Harold Holzer. Gabor attended the event and I filmed much of the proceedings for potential use in the Budapest to Gettysburg film. Following Waterston and Holzer's performance, the President spoke a few words, including announcing the 2005 Lincoln Prize winners Allen Guelzo and Harold Holzer.
 
At the reception following the event, the President expressed his desire to visit Gettysburg, tour the battlefield with Gabor and "talk about presidents and history." I passed on a Budapest to Gettysburg information packet and DVD for the President.

 
 

DocuClub selects Budapest to Gettysburg for 'pitch' to top industry representatives


Last month I presented Budapest to Gettysburg to a panel of top industry executives at DocuClub's Idea Workshop. Budapest to Gettysburg was one of three films selected for the event held at the Steinhardt Building’s Makor Center in New York City.  I screened the 5 minute trailer and pitched the project.  I received numerous constructive comments that will greatly benefit the project and made several important contacts.
 
DocuClub's Idea Workshop is an intimate pitching session where selected filmmakers pitch their ideas to industry representatives who, in turn, provide feed back on the strength of the pitch and the potential markets for the film's subject matter. Audience members are also encouraged to provide feedback. The panel included Cara Mertes, Executive Director of the PBS documentary series P.O.V., Tom Quinn of Magnolia Pictures, Submarine Entertainment’s Josh Braun and Elli Hakami of Court TV.
 
Previous documentary films that have screened at DocuClub include Sister Helen which won the Directing Award for Documentary at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival and the Jury Award for Best Documentary at the Newport International Film Festival; Blue Vinyl... A Toxic Comedy which won the Documentary Excellence in Cinematography at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival; State of Denial that screened at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival, 2004 Sundance Selection Dirty Work, Aging Out and Music From the Inside Out, both broadcast on PBS, and 2005 Academy Award nominee Born Into Brothels.

 
 

The Panelists:
Josh Braun is a partner at Submarine Entertainment, a sales and distribution company. Braun was the Executive Producer of the documentary features Easy Riders, Raging Bulls (a BBC/Trio co-production) and the award winning music documentary Kill Your Idols. He also served as a sales agent for  films such as the Oscar nominated docs Super Size Me and Spellbound, as well as Dig!, Dirty Work, League of Ordinary Gentlemen, Gunner Palace, and Control Room .
 
Cara Mertes is the Executive Director of P.O.V./American Documentary.  P.O.V. is public television's annual award-winning showcase for independent non-fiction films. P.O.V. reaches over 96% of all television households nationwide, free of charge. P.O.V. programs have a long life after broadcast in classrooms and with community groups, among others. Top programs in the series attract three to five million viewers. Since joining P.O.V., she has launched P.O.V.'s Borders, a Webby-Award winning on-line showcase for original non-fiction web-based materials, Youth Views, P.O.V.'s youth-targeted national screening and training initiative, the Diverse Voices Project, a co-production and mentoring initiative for emerging filmmakers that has resulted in multiple Emmy, Peabody and duPont-Columbia Awards and, an innovative partnership with Netflix and Docurama.
 
Elli Hakami is Senior Director of Program Development for Court TV, and works with independent producers and production companies to develop one-hour original documentaries and half-hour series concepts for Court TV.
 
Tom Quinn is Head of Acquisitions at Magnolia Pictures (a 2929 company owned by Mark Cuban and Todd Wagner) where he reports to President Eamonn Bowles. His most recent acquisitions include: Ong-Bak, starring martial arts sensation Tony Jaa; last year's Woman Thou Art Loosed; and League of Ordinary Gentlemen, which chronicles the history of professional bowling. Previously Quinn headed up acquisitions for Goldwyn Films. Some of his acquisitions included Morgan Spurlock's Super Size Me and Peter Sollett's Raising Victor Vargas .
 
This event represented the first in a series of upcoming collaborations with Makor. The Makor film program offers a compelling and eclectic mix of films, including premieres, retrospectives, alternative cinema, documentaries, and festivals to highlight young talent. The screening facilities are state of the art with dolby digital surround sound. Post-screening discussions with renowned and up and coming filmmakers, guest speakers and panels accompany most screenings. Notable guests have included: Charlie Kaufman, Sydney  Lumet, Kevin Bacon, Gary Winick, Barry Levinson, Edward Norton, Paul Schrader, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Darren Aronofsky, Doug Liman, Barbara Kopple, Albert Maysles, D.A. Pennebaker and Robert Drew. Visit www.docuclub.org.
 

Budapest to Gettysburg named finalist for prestigious Roy W. Dean Grant


I have been named as a finalist for the Roy W. Dean Writers Grant, which sends a filmmaker to the South Island of New Zealand for four weeks of intensive reading, writing and research. If chosen I would used the time to read and do research related to the Budapest to Gettysburg project. The Roy W. Dean grants are administered by Carole Dean and her company From the Heart Productions. The Roy W. Dean grants distribute $370,000 worth of supplies and services to filmmakers each year.
 
In 1992 Carole created the Roy W. Dean Grant Foundation in honor of her late father. To date Carole’s grant and mentorship programs have provided filmmakers with millions of dollars in goods and services and have played an instrumental role in establishing the careers of some of the industry’s most promising filmmakers. A sough-after international speaker, Carole is currently touring the U. S. with her popular book, "The Art of Funding Your Film: Alternative Financing Concepts” in the form of workshops.

 
 

From the Heart has given close to $2,000,000 in over 25 grants. Carole has helped these documentarians to pursue their dreams from original donation of raw stock, lights and camera to the current New York Film, LA Film and LA Video grants valued at over $50,000.00 each and the new editing and writing grants that take you to New Zealand. The writer/researcher grant is a 4 week sojourn in New Zealand. This allows serious screenwriters and documentary filmmakers to work on their projects in a serene, quiet setting on the Wye River surrounded by unspoiled beauty from the surrounding hills and working sheep farms.
 
Films sponsored by the Roy W. Dean grants now showing are All Power to the People on Starz, A Chance to Grow on Discovery Save A Man to Fight on History, The Flute Player on HBO and soon to be released Stolen: The Lost Vermeer on Court TV and Double Dare. Learn more about the Roy W. Dean film grants at www.fromtheheartproductions.com.

Production Update: Viva Lincoln! Budapest to Gettysburg to Bogotá


In March, Gabor will be travel to Bogotá, Colombia, as the guest of the Colombian government to deliver lectures on Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War in a country currently fighting its own civil war. I will be shooting the trip for the documentary.
 
In 2003 Colombian President Alvaro Uribe Velez visited Gettysburg and toured the battlefield with Gabor. President Uribe was especially interested in Lincoln's path from civil war to peace. Gabor and President Uribe spent hours discussing, through interpreters, Lincoln's handling of the war. Near the end of the visit, while sitting pondside at Gabor's Gettysburg farm, Uribe stood up, banged his hands on the table, and began speaking in English. He delivered the entire Gettysburg Address.
 
While my focus is still primarily on fundraising I continue to shoot footage at opportune moments. Last fall we had several important shoots. Gabor and filmmaker Ken Burns gave a two day tour of the Gettysburg battlefield. The tour was the highest priced item at a charity auction held to benefit Room to Grow, a non-profit dedicated to enriching the lives of babies born into poverty. In October I headed west with Gabor. We traveled to South Dakota to film at his alma mater, Yankton College, where he first discovered Lincoln and America's freedoms. Ironically the campus is now a Federal Prison. We next headed to Vancouver to shoot with Gabor's 93 year old cousin who was taken to Auschwitz with Gabor's mother's family and a man from the same village who also survived the Nazi camps. Finally, we spent several days with Dr. Robert Bruce, Gabor's Pulitzer Prize winning mentor, recounting Gabor's days as a budding Lincoln scholar.

Other phases of the project have also begun. These include researching in European and American archives, logging of the 50 plus hours of footage already shot, and the search for information regarding Gabor’s childhood in Hungary.  If you have any leads regarding Budapest history between 1940-1956 please contact me.  A second trip to Hungary is also in the early planning stages.

Fundraising Update: Budapest to Gettysburg funding commitments total nearly 40 percent of budget


With the help of fundraising chairmen Jack Kemp and his brother Tom we have raised nearly 40% of the necessary budget for the project. In a few months of fundraising, $145,000.00 has been committed to the project.  Support for the project has ranged from commitments of $30,000 to a check for $100 as well as the donation of printing services allowing the production of the full color information packet and DVD.  Contact me for your own copy.
 
A grant application to the National Endowment for the Humanities did not receive support. However, one N.E.H. review panelist wrote, "This is a fascinating, unique, and exciting project. Its approach to questions of American identity, the immigrant experience, and the writing of history will be of interest to a wide range of viewers, from the Ph.D. in American history to the high school student to the new immigrant."
 
While fundraising for the project is going extremely well we still need to raise 60% of the budget or approximately $225,000.00. We intend to meet that goal by June 1, 2005 in order to release the Budapest to Gettysburg in October, 2006, the 50th anniversary of Gabor’s escape from Hungary to America.
 
 
To date supporters of this project include: Select Equity, Inc., The Kinsley Foundation, S.W. Jack Drilling Company, The Peter Jay Sharp Foundation, Jack Kemp, The Gilder Foundation, The Lehrman Institute, Times & News Publishing, The Albert & Lillian Small Foundation, The Langdon Family Foundation and James G. Basker. Thank you.
 

A Note from Fundraising Chairman Jack Kemp


Gabor's interpretations of American history are a powerful experience. It is an experience that should be shared by more than the few who are privileged to hear one of Gabor's tours or lectures. The Budapest to Gettysburg project will bring this experience to a wide audience. Abraham Lincoln is the greatest symbol of the American dream, rising from poverty to the Presidency.   Though his path was very different, Gabor similarly embraced the promise of America as millions of immigrants have. Here Gabor found, as Lincoln so eloquently spoke in Gettysburg, "a new birth of freedom."    In understanding Gabor's story we will come to a better understanding of Lincoln, our own nation and how we can teach others about America's promise. Please join me in supporting Budapest to Gettysburg .
 

Support this project and help make Budapest to Gettysburg a reality


The Budapest to Gettysburg film project is sponsored by The National Trust for Historic Gettysburg, Inc. a respected 501C(3) nonprofit organization based in Gettysburg, PA. Please check with your tax advisor, but contributions used for this project will be tax-deductible. Checks should be made payable to The National Trust for Historic Gettysburg, Inc. and mailed to the address below. Please write “Budapest to Gettysburg” on the memo line. A receipt will be issued to each contributor.
 
Contributors will be asked to make a written pledge for the full amount of their contribution; however, one third of the commitment will be required when development and research commences; the next one third will be needed and released when development is completed and production commences; the final one third will be expected and released at the beginning of post-production.
 
Contributors will be credited in the film, in related publicity materials, and at premieres and screenings. They also will be invited to premieres and other special events, including dinners planned on both coasts to coincide with the release of the film. Events will be planned for Europe as well.  The film will be produced by Boritt Films, llc (limited liability company) formed specifically for the Budapest to Gettysburg project. Should you have any interest in discussing a risk venture investment (nondeductible for tax purposes) in the project, please contact Jake Boritt.

 
 

Jake Boritt | Boritt Films, llc |111 Fourth Avenue, 3a | New York, NY 10003-5245

917-617-4401 | www.boritt.com