NYC PictureStart Film Festival

MISSION & OBJECTIVE About The FestivalThe NYC PictureStart Film Festival, among the fastest growing film festivals in the country, showcases outstanding short films from throughout the world. Founded in 2002, by Gregory Segal, Producer, Attorney, and Principal in Angel Baby Entertainment, the NYCPFF offers emerging filmmakers the opportunity to interact with industry professionals and share their work with a broad audience of hundred of enthusiastic cinema-goers.

Submissions of short films are sought from filmmakers of all backgrounds and levels of experience and entries are accepted year-round. Films are selected for Festival screenings on the basis of artist excellence and viewers determine the winners of the Best Actor, Best Actress and Best Short Film Awards. Additionally, Jury Awards for the Best Film are awarded based on juror votes. Recent festival jurors include Academy Award nominee and five time Emmy Winner Writer/Director Anthony Lover (My Brother, De Duva), Slamdance Founder Dan Mirvish, Actor/Director John Shea (Southie) Bob Reitano (Editor, Sleepless in Seattle, True Colors), Adrienne Stern (Casting Director, Eurotrip, The Insurgents) David Title (Head of Devlp., Crossroads Films), John Gallagher (Blue Moon, The Deli) and Robert Bardunias (Head of Development, National Lampoon).

The NYC PictureStart Film Festival has hosted films from filmmakers unknown and at the top of the field. Films from Wolfgang Petersen (Dir. Das Boot, Air Force One, Troy), David Koepp (Dir. Secret Window, Writer, Mission Impossible, Spiderman, Jurassic Park) and John Badham (Saturday Night Fever, WarGames) both showed in the last festival. The festival has also hosted films with performances by Tom Hanks, David Strathairn, Adrien Grenier, Heather Matarazzo, Michael York, William Shatner, Dan Lauria, Frank Vincent and many more.

The Staged at various venues over the years to accommodate increasing attendance, The Festival is traditionally hosted by an industry insider. Among those who have assumed this role at recent festivals have been Roy Frumkes, Director, Writer, Producer, Film Critic for Film In Review, and John Gallagher of the National Board of Review of Motion Pictures, Director, Producer and Film Historian.

NYC PictureStart Film Festival also enjoys distribution output arrangements for featured films with National Lampoon’s Toga TV and with short film portal, MotionFlicks.com. The website for the Festival is at www.picturestartfilmfestival.com.

Mission

The NYC PictureStart Film Festival seeks to give talented filmmakers, regardless of background or experience, a venue for their work. It recognizes the artistry of exemplary short films, and seeks to give greater exposure to those whose talents are evident in these. Encouraging the sharing of information, ideas, resources, and contacts at its events, the NYCPFF supports the growth and development of a collegial community of independent filmmakers.

About Gregory Segal
Greg Segal is a producer and entertainment attorney based in New York City.

Greg is the founder and producer of the newly-minted Slamdance Horror Script Competition Film Slate, which, beginning in 2007, will take the winning horror script from Slamdance’s wildly popular script competition and make a movie from it each year, to premiere at the Slamdance Film Festival. The slate will enlist Slamdance’s enormous marketing pull and public awareness (e.g., 32 million page clicks at Slamdance.com during January 2006) to publicize the movies produced prior to their release.

Greg is the producer of HBO American Black Film Festival Grand Jury Prize winner, Acadamy Award nominee Anthony Lover's My Brother, starring Vanessa Williams, Nashawn Kearse, Tatum O'Neal, Christopher Scott and Fredro Starr, opening March 16th in 19 cities with distributor Codeblack Entertainment in partnership with AMC/Loews Theaters. A winner of 26 awards and honors to date, My Brother is one of the most honored films targeting African American audiences since The Color Purple.

Additionally, right now, he's serving as a production executive on David Wain's The Ten, which stars Jessica Alba, Paul Rudd, Winona Ryder, Famke Jansen, Gretchen Mol, Oliver Platt, Ron Silver, Liev Schrieber, Rob Corddry, Justin Theroux and Adam Brody, to be released theatrically by ThinkFilm in Summer, 2007. He’s also working on post-production of writer-director Jeff Roenning's Hot Baby, a co-production with Apple, which stars Adam Scarimbolo (Guide to Recognizing Your Saints), Emily Grace (What Alice Found), Heidi Kristoffer, Noah Fleiss (Brick), Greg Travis (Showgirls)), Mel Gorham (Smoke, Copland), Brian Vincent (Black Dog) and Joe Coots.

His fifth feature, Scott Dacko's The Insurgents, stars John Shea, Henry Simmons, Michael Mosley, Juliette Marquis and Mary Stuart Masterson premiered at the Oldenburg Film Festival Germany's answer to Sundance, in September, 2006, and took home the Audience Award for Best Picture in its festival premiere. With multiple distribution offers in hand, The Insurgents is beginning its tour through the U.S. festival circuit.

Previously produced films include multiple fest (including Outfest and the Woodstock Film Festival) nominee Harsh Beauty, Alessandra Zeka's documentary about the eunuchs of India, which received funding from the NYFA, Sundance/Soros-Open Society, and the New York State Center for the Arts; and Take the Bridge, a dramatic feature directed by Sundance veteran Sergio Castilla, which will debut at the Tribeca Film Festival in April 2007.

His company, Angel Baby Entertainment, also produced biz partner John Andrew Gallagher's seventh feature film, New York Independent Film Festival Audience Award Winner Cupidity and a TV pilot, Acting Class. In addition, Greg founded and runs the New York City shorts festival, the NYC PictureStart Film Festival (at www.picturestartfilmfestival.com and on withoutabox.com)

Greg has lectured on the topics of film production and entertainment law at the New York Film Academy, and at New York's School For Visual Arts. Until late 2003, and his entry into the entertainment business, Greg practiced law with firms such as Cadwalader, Wickersham & Taft, Ernst & Young and Deloitte & Touche. In addition to entertainment law, Greg is an expert in the law of taxation and holds an MBA and CPA.