It’s that time of year again! The College’s annual film and animation festival, After School Special, will take place virtually, celebrating the work of some of SVA’s most accomplished alumni in film, television, animation and visual effects. Beginning Monday, September 21, on SVA Theatre’s YouTube page, viewers can watch Q&As and special events with more than 25 graduates whose recent film and television projects include Big Little Lies, The Call of the Wild, The Midnight Gospel, The Pharmacist, Get Out, Greyhound, The Plot Against America, Pose, Schitt’s Creek, Stranger Things, Taste the Nation, Unorthodox and Welcome to Chechnya. Videos will premiere throughout the week and remain online for future viewing. For all festival updates, click here.

Now in its seventh year, After School Special invites audiences to take a deeper dive into filmmaking with behind-the-scenes insights from industry-leading professionals. Though the 2020 edition will not feature screenings of alumni work, it will offer the same curated roster of speakers, showcasing the high caliber of talent in SVA’s academic programs. This year’s lineup, more than half of whom identify as BIPOC, represents seven undergraduate and graduate departments. The majority of the works to be discussed can be viewed on major online platforms, including Netflix, Disney+, Hulu, HBO Max, Prime Video, AppleTV+, and video-on-demand services. All participants will also talk about the ways they’re working from home during the pandemic, and offer advice to students and others who are seeking careers in film and animation.

Highlights include:

Two 2020 Emmy Award nominees: BFA 2000 Film and Video alumnus Martin Ahlgren (cinematographer, The Plot Against America), and MFA 2011 Social Documentary Film alumnus Alexa Karolinski (co-creator/producer/writer, Unorthodox).

Victor Ilyukhin (MFA 2014 Social Documentary Film) and Ann Collins (MFA 2018 Art Writing) will discuss their work as documentary editors on HBO’s Welcome to Chechnya and Netflix’s The Pharmacist, respectively.

A Q&A with Quenell Jones (BFA 2003 Film and Video) and Scott Ruderman (MFA 2016 Social Documentary Film), camera operators who’ve worked on Hulu’s Taste the Nation, Netflix’s (Un)Well and Jessica Jones, and the Academy Award-winning film Get Out.

A special augmented-reality (AR) experience, made especially for the festival by alumnus Ninaad Kulkarni (MFA 2017 Computer Art) and free to download.

In lieu of the festival’s annual SVA Premieres: Best Of screening, which features work by members of SVA’s latest graduating class, this year’s After School Special will include a check-in with alumni from three departments (BFA Animation; BFA Computer Art, Computer Animation and Visual Effects; and MFA Computer Arts) via “Where Are They Now?” Q&As. Audiences will hear from several alumni whose careers started as a result of having their films featured in the SVA Premieres: Best Of screenings, including those who have worked on films and shows such as Artemis Fowl, We Bare Bears, Succession and others.

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