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Marc Fienberg Knows How to Play the Game
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MF: The script was pretty much locked by the time we hit pre-production, so, unfortunately, the “director” me decided that I wouldn’t allow the “writer” me to come to the set. The “writer” me is still bitter about that and is threatening to never work with the “director” me again.
The biggest challenge was juggling the roles of director and producer, since they are often two roles with opposite agendas. As the director, I needed a crane for a very important shot. As the producer, I needed to stay within budget and say no to the director. Usually, the producer got his way, because I realized that if the director got his way, we’d run out of money and then the writer and the producer would have to band together and kick the director’s butt for ruining the film.
MM: While many big-budget films are in theaters for only a week or two after making a few million, your film has been in release in Florida for three months and made $370,000. What do you think that says about the state of independent moviemaking today?
MF: I think it is a great success story for what good independent movies can do in the marketplace if they do it wisely. Although it’s great to spend millions of dollars to get the word out to everybody in America with a pulse so that your movie makes millions of dollars in its first week, I think that indie films can prove that, in many cases, slow and steady wins the race.
Instead of releasing the film across the entire nation, we released the film in one state: Florida. Instead of spending millions of dollars advertising our film, we spent thousands of dollars. Instead of losing money on our theatrical release, we made money on it. Instead of millions of people going to the theater on opening weekend, we had thousands. But what all this resulted in was that, instead of only being in theaters for a few weeks, we were in theaters for more than three months, and are coming back for more to theaters across the nation on August 28. That’s one way for an indie film like ours to give time for word of mouth to spread, and for the film to catch on across all demographics.
MM: Without having the marketing and distribution funds of big-budget films, what were your strategies for the marketing and distribution of the film. Did you find these strategies to be an integral part of your film’s success so far, or do you believe a good product markets itself?
MF: I believe that you need both a strategic marketing plan and a good movie that appeals to a wide market. Each is necessary, but not sufficient on it’s own. Luckily, we made a movie that appealed not only to younger singles in their teens and 20s because of the dating tricks taught by the young couple in the movie, but also appealed to baby boomers and seniors because of the storyline about senior love, companionship and sex. Naturally, we did a lot of marketing through our website, www.playthegamemovie.com, but we also did a lot of grassroots marketing to both teens/college kids and boomers/seniors. My wife, my mother, my father, my aunt and I each spent weeks at different movie theaters standing in front of every audience right before the trailer played to tell them that Play The Game was soon coming to that theater, and asking them to come see it. In one day, I spoke before 118 movies, told almost 10,000 people about the film. I ran into many of those people again on our opening weekend. I shook a lot of hands and gave a lot of autographs, and the campaign we ran felt much like I suspect a political campaign feels.
MM: What hopes do you have for the movie’s expanded release August 28?
MF: That’s easy. I hope the film exceeds even my own wildest expectations and that we are able to spread the word about the film enough so that tens of thousands of people come out on opening weekend to see the movie. And certainly I hope, and expect, that word of mouth spreads fast and wide enough so that we can not only play in theaters for months, but that we can begin to release the film in even more cities across the nation. Our test market in Florida showed us that the people that see Play The Game become the best, most virulent word of mouth advertising for the film we could ever hope for. If we’re able to make them laugh like we did in Florida, then I think I’ll be happy no matter what happens.
For more information, visit http://www.playthegamemovie.com.
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COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
- Comment by okey oyunu on 6/02/11 at 1:53 pm
Okey farklı milletler tarafından oynanılan eğlenceli bir masa oyunu olarak nitelendirilebilinir. En az iki en fazla dört kişi ile oynanılan bu oyun içerisinde şans, tecrübe, oyun bilgisi, taş takibi gibi faktörler barındırmaktadır. Elindeki taşları en hızlı şekilde oyun tahtası üzerine dizmeye dayalı bu oyun günümüzde internette oynanılmaktadır. Sizde internette oynanılan en eğlenceli ve en kalabalık okey oyunu salonuna hemen üye olun ve eğlence dünyamız içerisindeki yerinizi alın. Hemen Okey oyunu indir ve hemen gerçek kişilerle sohbet ederek oynamaya başla.
Okey oynamayı seven herkes burada, peki ya siz?
Oyun ve site hakkında daha fazla bilgi için link: http://www.okeyoyunuindir.com/sitemap.html- Comment by Carlo on 8/17/11 at 1:15 am
I have read an interview with Marc Fienberg in a magazine a couple of weeks ago where he said that, although many of his movies show him a great Casa Nova, actually he is very shy when it comes to talking to women, and that he usually prefers the free dating online services. I was very surprised to read this, as I was expecting a movie star to be more of a ladies-man. On the other hand, the fact that we both use this dating system made me feel much better about myself!
- Comment by Roxie Strittmatter on 10/30/11 at 2:01 pm
I like this director. He’s honest and outgoing, not like other producers or filmmakers, who all seem to be on a jewel quest and they’re all about making the next blockbuster. He seems to be interested in the work and that’s a great start for an artist.
- Comment by WILLIE Rutledge on 10/31/11 at 8:32 am
I haven’t seen this movie yet, but the actors who play in it are legendary and for me they can do no wrong. They could star in a reenactment of the Chupacabra games, I would still watch them. Too bad we haven’t seen more of them and the media seems to have forgotten about these great comedians.
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