Park City memories: Filmmakers reflect on decades of connection as Sundance’s Utah era ends

As Utah gets ready to say goodbye to the Sundance Film Festival, the movie professionals who attend America’s preeminent showcase for independent film are preparing to say farewell to the town where it has all happened for four decades.

With the festival set to leave Utah after the 2026 run, Jan. 22-Feb. 1, The Salt Lake Tribune talked to nine people drawn to Park City to show their movies or make deals on other people’s films. They shared stories of wild audience reactions, influential movies, odd celebrity encounters and other moments that changed their lives.

‘I heard someone gasp’

Josephine Decker directed two movies that debuted at Sundance: The 2018 backstage drama “Madeline’s Madeline,” and 2020 film “Shirley,” which starred Elisabeth Moss as the author Shirley Jackson. She is returning to Sundance as the director of “Chasing Summer,” a comedy starring and written by comedian Iliza Shlesinger.

Decker: [“Madeline’s Madeline”] was just one of those movies that I thought four people were ever going to see. It was a very indie movie about experimental theater. … The beginning sequence is really very beautiful. Like, the first five minutes of the film play, and then there’s the opening title. I’ll never forget the feeling of my blood in my body, sitting there watching it, [and thinking] “I hope they like it.”

[In the first screening,] when it landed on the title, I heard someone behind me gasp. It had already impacted them, to the point where they gasped. … To have such a visceral, tangible feeling of how the audience receives your work was so magical.

I also met my partner, [filmmaker Malik Vitthal], at Sundance, and we have two kids now. … We met at a party [in 2011], and then he invited me and [another actress] to his house for dinner, and we went. … Then, three years later, we both had films on the festival circuit. … And we hung out one night [at American Film Institute] and nothing happened. I was, like, ‘I think this guy’s into me.’ And he [said], “I have a place to stay at Sundance. Do you want to stay with me?” I was, like, “I wonder what kind of invite this is.”

It was one of those lodge places where it’s like a hotel room but it’s bigger than anyone’s house, and [a friend of his] had given it to him for free. So he had 25 friends there, people on sofas and couches and multiple bedrooms. … He was really just sharing the wealth of that amazing place. We just stayed there together, and it took him a while to make a move. … We actually celebrated our 10-year anniversary at Sundance last year.

‘You just felt the energy’

Maryam Keshavarz won the Audience Award in Sundance’s U.S. Dramatic competition twice, both for movies about queer women of Iranian heritage: The drama “Circumstance” in 2011, and the screwball comedy “The Persian Version” in 2023. She’s one of the producers on this year’s “The Friend’s House Is Here,” co-directed by her brother Hossein Keshavarz, about two women in Tehran’s underground art scene.

Keshavarz: [In 2007,] I went to the winter [screenwriters] lab, and as part of that, they gave us a pass to go see movies [at the festival]. … The first thing I saw there was Joachim Trier’s movie — now he has “Sentimental Value,” but his first film was called “Reprise.” It really affected me, that movie. It was a big influence when I made my first film, [“Circumstance”].

That was the same year as [the Irish movie] “Once.” I was there with my fellow lab people, and they were pooh-poohing it. They were, like, “There’s barely a narrative.” I said, “No, I just saw it at the premiere. This movie is really special. I think it has something.” And it ended up being put on Broadway. … You just felt the energy. Like, my God, this is such an exciting place to be.

We had no idea if anybody would like [“Circumstance”]. I had been spending so many years trying to make the film, and then we had to smuggle the film out [of] the Middle East. … It was like a dream come true. We had all these offers for theatrical [distribution], we sold the European rights. … Then the people stood up and we had a standing ovation. I was, like, “Oh my God, did they get this movie?” It kind of blew my mind.

It always was definitely very special to be cut off from the world [in Park City]. … but over the years, it’s become so hard for a filmmaker to afford Park City. [With “The Persian Version,”] I had a film in competition, we had a decent amount of money to come to Sundance, and I had to literally share my bed with somebody. … It’s become almost impossible for artists to attend. … It’s a beautiful town, but I’m super-excited to go to where Sundance is moving, to a place that’s more amenable to artists.

Dancing with a rock star

Annie Roney grew up in Utah, and has attended the Sundance Film Festival since 1992. In 2000, she founded Roco Films, a global documentary distribution company, and is its CEO.

Roney: The year Barack Obama got inaugurated [in 2009], I was looking for a documentary filmmaker, and his film was [at Sundance] that year, and they were throwing a party on Main Street. … There was a DJ, and there was dancing, which at Sundance normally isn’t the thing. So right away I’m, like, “This is kind of a different Sundance vibe.

I had my back turned to the dance floor and I’m talking to someone, when all of a sudden some stranger grabbed my shoulders and turned me around. I turn around and I see Sting standing there with a circle around him, and he’s like, “Do you want to dance?” As someone who loves to dance, I had no idea this moment was coming. … It was one dance, then it was two, then it was three. I thought, “This is great.” I mean, there’s all these people who would love to dance with him.

At one point, I looked up, and Paris Hilton, who was in a sequined dress and stiletto heels, stepped on my foot and moved in. I think [he had] one or two dances with her, then came back to dance with me.

I had started that day at 8 a.m., and now it’s close to midnight, and I had to get back to my condo. That was a classic Sundance experience — like an unexpected, super-fun, enjoyable experience.

‘This postage stamp of a town’

Joe Plummer is the president of Wavelength, a production company that has made or represented such Sundance Film Festival titles as “32 Sounds,” “Feels Good Man,” “Knock Down the House,” “Cusp,” “Where’s My Roy Cohn?,” “Selah and the Spades” and “Won’t You Be My Neighbor?”

Plummer: My first Sundance [in 2014], I didn’t know where anything was, I didn’t know who anyone was, I didn’t know where I was supposed to be. I didn’t know what was going on half the time. And I had an absolutely wonderful time sleuthing all of that out.

I ended up at quite a few Slamdance [screenings] by mistake. [The Slamdance Film Festival, Sundance’s upstart rival, started in 1995; it left Utah for California in 2024.] I remember seeing a lot of short films that I was super-excited about. I remember, perhaps more ignominiously, [now-disgraced studio chief] Harvey Weinstein traipsing down Main Street with his phalanx of toadies around him, [working] their various cellphones and shouting at people.

But I remember the town more than any of the titles I saw in those early days. I just remember being mystified as to how all these people had managed to get jammed into this postage stamp of a town.

Now, all these years later, I know where everything is, and I know most of the people who are there. And it’s wonderful for the exact opposite reason, which is that it has a familiar homecoming feel.

‘Can I bring croissants?’

Julie Christeas is a film producer and the founder and CEO of Tandem Pictures. She and her company have brought such films to Sundance as “The Sleepwalker” in 2014, “The Eyes of My Mother” in 2016 and “Black Bear” in 2020. This year, Christeas is representing “Run Amok,” writer-director NB Mager’s comedy-drama about a student staging a musical about a high school shooting.

Christeas: When we were ready to submit [our first film, “The Sleepwalker”] to film festivals, we were very nervous about sharing [online] links, very nervous about people watching anything on a form that wasn’t a movie theater. I flew to Park City with … DCPs [hard drives for movie theaters] as luggage on my lap. I got to the theater, and I was like, “Can I bring croissants to anyone? Need a coffee?’ And [the festival’s then-director] John Cooper and [programming director] Kim Yutani said, ”Absolutely not. Just leave the movie and go away.” You can’t influence anyone.

The feeling of Park City, what it wants to be, is this really intimate place where a first-time director and Guillermo Del Toro are walking down Main Street together. You have the opportunity to meet the very artists who inspired your work to begin with. Or you’re standing in line for any given movie and starting a conversation with someone who might wind up being your cinematographer or your production designer, or a chum that you’ll have for a long time. Park City itself does play a role there.

‘This is your lucky day’

Uri Singer is a producer who has premiered three movies at Sundance: 2015’s “Experimenter,” a historical drama about psychologist Stanley Milgram (Peter Sarsgaard); 2017’s “Marjorie Prime,” about a widow (Lois Smith) who gets a hologram of her deceased husband (Jon Hamm); and 2020’s “Tesla,” about the inventor Nikola Tesla (Ethan Hawke).

Park City is part of Sundance. Main Street, you can’t duplicate that. … Because it’s cold, you don’t have dresses and gowns. … It’s kind of democratizing. Everybody feels very natural. It’s the merit, not the show, not the pretentious red carpets and stuff like that.

“We were at the Netflix breakfast [in 2020], and it was crowded. Nobody could find a seat. There was this woman, and I said you could sit here. … I said, ‘Well, it’s no problem. It’s a table for four.’ She said, ‘How is your Sundance?’ Then she said, ‘I’m trying to get tickets to this movie, but they’re impossible to get. It premieres tonight. It’s “Tesla.” I said, “Well, you know, this is your lucky day. … I’m the producer and I have a few tickets for a rainy day, and it’s snowing, so I’ll give you a ticket.” And she said, “Oh my God, are you serious?”

She said she was from the Austrian Film Commission. I said, “I used to have an Austrian passport, but it expired, and then I couldn’t get a new one.” … She said, “Let me take a look at that when I get back.” To make a long story short, I have an Austrian passport now, and that’s because of the good deed that I have done.

‘Frozen anxiety’

Liz Sargent brought her short film, “Take Me Home” — which featured her sister Anna, who is cognitively disabled — to the 2023 Sundance Film Festival. This year, she is premiering a feature-length narrative film, also called “Take Me Home,” that also features her sister Anna.

Sargent: [My first screening in 2023] was just, like, frozen anxiety. The whole festival scared me to death. It was my first time at Sundance, and premiering this film was so personal. … [It was] one of the most scary, traumatic events of my life.

[In the short, Anna] put this can of soup in the microwave, and the whole audience gasped. … It was so surprising to me how emotional people were, and how a lot of people saw themselves in the film. … The people who saw it, who had a close relationship with someone with a disability, felt very seen.

In all the orientations, [Sundance organizers are] so great about reminding you about FOMO, and how the party is where you’re at. I don’t know if I believed that my first year, but my second year, when I didn’t have a film there, I was just having a good time and meeting everybody.

I met [ballet star] Misty Copeland and her partner in line at an event. Because I have this dance background, that was a super-strong relationship that came out of nowhere, and they helped connect me to organizations and producers. So, yeah, in that sense, it’s like the FOMO of wherever you are, whoever you talk to, everybody is important.

‘An accidental community’

Valerie Veatch has premiered two documentaries at Sundance: “Me @ the Zoo” in 2012, about video blogger Chris Crocker; and “Love Child” in 2014, about a South Korean couple who used internet addiction as a defense in their baby’s death. Her new film, “Ghost in the Machine,” about the “untold origins” of A.I., is scheduled to premiere at Sundance this year.

Veatch: We had the directors’ introduction call the other day, and several people were, like, “I’m excited. I’m nervous to see people in real life after months of being in [the editing] room all alone.” … There’s something really special about the vulnerability of sharing your work for the first time with an audience, and I will always associate Sundance with that feeling. … I honestly feel goosebumps just talking about it.

I’ll miss Park City, and the specialness of being on a mountaintop, and the specialness of the kind of legacy you feel in the air — like this has been a place where filmmakers have gathered. One of the reasons I was inspired to get into this vein of work is seeing that community of filmmakers we should very much associate with this place.

One time, there was an award ceremony somewhere and everyone was bused in, and then there was a snowstorm. So there were all these vans, and people diving back in. … It was my dad and the curator of [the Museum of Modern Art] at the time, and all these random people squished in a van, trying to battle through the elements. There’s just an accidental community that is spawned by the climate of being on a mountaintop that has been really fun.

Making Park City accessible

Alysa Nahmias directed this year’s Sundance entry, “Cookie Queens,” about the Girl Scouts’ annual cookie sales. She also produced two documentaries by directors with disabilities: Jennifer Brea’s “Unrest,” which premiered in Park City in 2017, and Reid Davenport’s “I Didn’t See You There,” which debuted in the virtual-only 2022 Sundance Film Festival. She started attending Sundance in the early 2010s.

Nahmias: Being able to be around just so many people who are passionate about film, and who’ve been going to the festival for so many years, felt like weaving into something that is a ritual, and becoming part of it, making it your own.

Going there with “Unrest” was also special, because [Jennifer Brea] was a director with a disability. She was a wheelchair user. … We did a lot of accessibility work with the festival, and I’ve seen the festival grow and evolve in that regard, and that’s been really gratifying. And seeing audiences respond to having accessible screenings … is a really positive memory for me.

All of everyone’s memories of Sundance, apart from one or two years when it was online, are centered in [Park City] — on Main Street, and in these incredible theaters. We’re going to be screening “Cookie Queens” at the Eccles, which is such a dream come true. To just know how many incredible films I’ve seen in that theater and at the Library, and then to be able to, as a director, share my work in those spaces does feel like being part of a lineage. There’s kind of a sacredness to that space.

Note to readers • This story is available to Salt Lake Tribune subscribers only. Thank you for supporting local journalism.