The Third Annual Albany Film Festival hosted by the New York State Writers Institute this Saturday has some big names coming in for the event, like Joyce Carol Oates, Rick Moody and Stephen Lang.
But for one attendee, the film festival at the University at Albany also represents a homecoming. Writer-director Nicole Gomez Fisher — whose second feature film, “Good Egg,” screens at 10:30 a.m. in the Campus Center West Auditorium — graduated from UAlbany with a communications degree, intent on becoming a TV journalist and eventually working her way up to being an anchor.
Back at home, she had the urge to write, but no ideas came to mind. “Somehow, I can’t even remember why, but I decided to go down the acting route. I just really loved the idea of entertainment and being creative.”
That led to seven years of doing stand-up comedy until a well-meaning observer gave her the good news-bad news truth: “Your writing is brilliant, but it doesn’t translate onstage.”
What: The Third Annual Albany Film Festival
Where: The University at Albany, 1400 Washington Ave., Albany
When: 10:30 a.m.-7 p.m. Saturday
Cost: Free
Contact: 518-442-5620 or albanyfilmfestival.org
Gomez Fisher decided to take a break and write a screenplay about her life.
“I had no idea what I was doing,” she says. “I started off literally reading books.”
She completed the script and started submitting it to writing competitions where it did well. Still, she had no plans for making it into an actual film.
“I just wanted to be a screenwriter and I was kind of hoping that would lead me into the world of television,” she says. A producer friend who read the script told her, “You know, you could do this for a low budget.”
Thus, was born the $300,000 “Sleeping with the…
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