Your Sundance 2024 Experience Depends On Why You Are There:

It’s time for the Sundance Film Festival. Every year, there are stories of arthouse premieres, celebs in parkas and rumors of a late-night musical performance with the likes of John Legend (where it wasn’t even invite only, rather it was just for those who “knew” to be there).

As a Sundance-goer for almost 20 years, I have watched this quaint film festival – where running into your L.A. friends on Main Street once felt connected and inspired – transform into a madhouse of sponsors and parties where getting into your own premiere party can feel like a hustle.

The pandemic chilled the scene in 2020 and 2021. Last year, Sundance was back in full force and in person. While the sales were not piping hot, the charm suddenly felt more apparent. Part of the festival’s magic is finding and watching great, new cinematic gems that need a platform. That is Sundance at its core. When attendees plan their festival agenda with this spirit in mind, Sundance can be an amazing and magical place.

What makes Sundance dynamic, a true business forecast of the independent film market and a curated space, where new tastes and trends percolate, isn’t just the movies or celebrity sightings. It’s the wild makeup of its crowd year after year.

From pinpointing screenings and panels to joining the fest’s networking hubs, there’s a lot to prepare before attending Sundance. That is exactly why downloading your map of Park City is just as important as planning your roadmap as to who the key players are:

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The power belongs to the buyers. They are the commerce that art needs at Sundance to ensure that dozens of independently financed films can find a home and ideally, pay back some of their high net worth investors so everyone can do it all over again. The landscape of buyers changes year after year but you always have the classic players and streamers like Sony Pictures Classics, NetflixNFLX -1%, AmazonAMZN +0.3%, Focus Features, Bleecker Street, AppleAAPL -1.1%, Neon, A24, Focus Features and Searchlight. Then you have the buyers who are screening but patiently awaiting the buzz and big players to settle and then make their own play – Oscilloscope, Vertical Entertainment, Music Box, Kino Lorber, IFC and Magnolia. Each year there may be a few emerging independent distributors who make a splashy play.

The question in 2024 is will the streamers and studios be at Sundance to buy given the full year of strikes, or will they keep the purse strings closed?

Sellers

Sellers are an ecosystem of producers, financiers and representatives who are at Sundance with a premiere ready to mobilize around a sale. In a perfect world, it’s screening at 7:30 pm, offer at 10 pm and everyone stays up all night in a bidding war to close just in time to hit the ski slopes by 8 am. In a more realistic world as of late, this may entail screenings at the festival and then links to higher ups and buyers waiting to see if there is a demand or if they can make an offer after the glitz of the festival fades out. The superheroes of selling are the agents that do this year in and year out like a well-oiled machine: WME, CAA, UTA, Cinetic and Submarine.

There is a hierarchy of importance here. There is no substitute for the A-listers who decide to schlep to Sundance and be part of the indie scene like Pedro Pascal, Kristen Stewart and Saoirse Ronan among others. The main event goes to talent who are associated with movies at Sundance. While in years past this was reserved for actors appearing in movies, more recently, documentaries have become more of a main event. Take for instance, projects like Michael J. Fox’s documentary, Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie, which drummed up promotional buzz in the Sundance festival circuit in 2023 and recently won several Emmy awards.

There is also a list of talent that ranges from year to year depending on sponsors from athletes to musicians to reality show stars. You never know who might show up and that’s what makes it a fun experience.

Sponsors

The sponsors in Sundance was culminating in years past and then took an obvious downturn with the pandemic. This year sponsors are starting to show up to provide lounges to give talent and their posse a place to regroup and stay warm.

Sundance is also infamous for its gifting suites where talent can peruse a full spectrum of freebies. With one snap of an Instagram picture, the swag is all theirs. Word of warning there is a hierarchy to swag so while the likes of Jennifer Lawrence may get a Montclair jacket, the lower-level celebrities may end up with an up-and-coming mushroom cleaner.

This is where hopes and dreams meet loud jackets and oversized hats. The crowd is a litany of people who do not “need” to be at Sundance but still manage to give the festival its buzz and traffic congestion. This crew ranges from actors on the rise who probably drove here from L.A. to the Jack Mormons of the industry who are letting their hair down for the weekend to rich movie fans who can afford the experience of starving artists. This group aspires, appropriates and gives Sundance the true feeling that you are in Vegas but on ice. It’s the city that never sleeps with sleet in the streets. Because who doesn’t love a frozen party with serious movies?!

Whoever you are, Sundance is a place where diversity and inclusion are celebrated and while the privilege of wealth or talent gets you to the front of the line, all are truly welcome (unless the fire marshal shows up).

View this article at Forbes.