27/11/2012 - Cineuropa interviewed German director and producer Sylvia Nagel, one of the participants in the Closing the Gap training worshop

Cineuropa interviewed German director and producer Sylvia Nagel, one of the participants in the Closing the Gap training worshop.

Please introduce yourself and tell us about the films you have produced?
I have worked as a public TV director for 20 years, and for the past two-and-a-half years as a producer. I was commissioning editor for Arte in Hamburg before beginning work as a producer in 2009.
I produced Frontculture, a five-minute magazine film for MDR (ARD) in 2010, Linking Africa, 52 mins, distributed by Global Screen in 2011 and Digital Africa: A continent seeks connections, 15 mins, German and English versions, for WDR in 2011. I also have other films that are in development and production.

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In what ways did Closing the Gap transform your film-producing experience?
Closing the Gap helped me gain a deeper understanding of cross-media projects and the possibilities of production and distribution.

How did your own films benefit from your participation in Closing the Gap?
We could develop our ideas much more deeply and had the opportunity to pitch in front of Equity investors and partners from the game industry, which is important. Making contact with the other participants and seeing how their projects developed during the workshop was also important, and the people who ran the workshop were really nice and helped a great deal.

What are the most important lessons that you learned during the training programme?
The structure of the industry aside from broadcasters, and how a cross-media project could be financed; how to write a business plan, find my audience and distinguish my project from competitors.

What stage is your film at now? Do you think it would in the same place if you had not participated in Closing the Gap?
No, it would not. The workshop was a starting point for me as a producer, but we still have to develop the project further.

Would you recommend the Closing the Gap programme to other producers?
I would recommend the programme because of the invaluable experience that I gained, and I would tell other producers that they could similarly benefit.

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