Sandy Grushow Seeks Web Gems

Sandy Grushow, the guy who brought American Idol to the States as head of Fox Television Entertainment, is now seeking undiscovered superstar auteurs — on the Internet.

He’s the newly named president of Filmaka.com, a site that solicits short films from aspiring directors on specific themes. The clips are then judged by a panel of industry notables, including directors Neil LaBute (Nurse Betty), John Madden (Shakespeare in Love), Zak Penn (X-Men: The Last Stand) and Wim Wenders (Wings of Desire); writer Paul Schrader (Raging Bull); and actors Colin Firth and Bill Pullman. 

The idea: Create an “Internet studio” that unearths show-biz diamonds in the rough, attracted by Filmaka’s Hollywood cred, and give them real TV- and movie-production deals. On April 28 the company expects to announce the winner of its first competition to direct a feature film, produced by Filmaka and repped by the William Morris Agency.

The model isn’t new. Other Web-based studio ventures include Michael Eisner’s Vuguru (Prom Queen) and EQAL, formed by the producers of “lonelygirl15,” which last week secured $5 million in funding.

But Grushow’s ambitions extend beyond Web video: He wants to land on basic cable TV and in movie theaters.

Filmaka has struck a deal with FX Network, which is sponsoring a contest to develop a half-hour sitcom. Entrants will submit 3-minute comedy shorts, along with a fleshed-out synopsis for the show plot, and the eventual winner will receive $40,000 to create a pilot that FX will have the rights to buy for its fall season. Beer giant SAB Miller has signed on, too, with a contest seeking video clips promoting Miller brands.

Filmaka was founded by film producer Deepak Nayar (Bend It Like Beckham) in November 2006, and since then the site has compiled a library of more than 80 hours of content, with contributions from 3,600 filmmakers in 95 countries.

Rather than trying to be a YouTube-like destination site, the company’s goal is to be a community site for filmmakers. It makes sure only serious (or semiserious) filmmakers apply, by charging a $10 contest-entry fee.

Filmaka then distributes that contributed content, which includes 40 short-form episodic series, to other outlets. It currently has agreements with Google’s YouTube and Vuze, and with British IPTV provider Play TV UK, which will carry Filmaka-branded video-on-demand and linear channels. The company’s backers include advertising companies, film financiers and individual investors.

For Grushow — who was a principal in the 1990s telco content venture Tele-TV that essentially was overrun by the Internet — the beauty of the model is Filmaka can develop content far less expensively than typical production houses. The company, for example, has just eight Los Angeles-based employees. “We have a studio with essentially no overhead,” Grushow said.

But maybe, soon, with some stars.

CIC Game Helps Get Out 'Vote’

Schoolchildren across the nation are getting in touch with their inner Obama, their hidden Hillary and their mental McCain, via a Cable in the Classroom broadband application.

CIC has updated its presidential election online game for use in schools. “eLections: Your Adventure in Politics” has some technical enhancements, including more interactivity, a presidential host named George (Washington, not Bush) and video clips from programming partners History, C-SPAN and CNN student news.

Student candidates must do what real office hopefuls do: Decide how to spend campaign dollars, which events to attend and what to put in their platforms. Choose wisely, and make your way across the board and around Washington, D.C., landmarks all the way to the White House.

The junior politicians can dig deeply into the process, using video to learn about the good (campaign experience clips from past competitors) and the bad (mudslinging).

CIC reports that, even in pre-launch, the site (ciconline.org/elections) had 5,000 visitors and that 3,000 cable-operator co-branded versions of the game had been played.

Half of all players complete the entire presidential election process. The average time spent on the site is 17 minutes.

The Wire hopes that attention span lengthens as they become old enough to actually vote.

Philly Debate Draws a Pair

TV’s eyes were on Philadelphia last week, with the likes of Stephen Colbert descending in pursuit of Democratic presidential candidates Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.

At the National Constitution Center last Wednesday, two media notables had their eyes directly on the candidates, during the debate televised by ABC.

Caught on camera during crowd shots were Disney-ABC Television Group president Anne Sweeney and John Alchin, the retired former co-chief financial officer of Philly-based Comcast.

Sweeney attended the big ABC News event with her daughter, according to a Disney representative, and was glimpsed while Obama was tackling a question from George Stephanopoulos about affirmative action.

Alchin told the Wire: “I was with the head of Big Brothers Big Sisters Philadelphia, one of the non-for-profits that I support, and on my other side, by sheer coincidence, was John Bogle, founder of Vanguard mutual funds.”

Probably also by coincidence, when the former Comcast financier was caught on camera, Obama was answering a question about the capital-gains tax rate. Both candidates said they’d consider raising it above the current 15%.

Alchin said he’d prefer it remain at 15%.

The Wire, for now, is uncommitted.