Starting Up My Own Production Company

After graduating from Hunter College with my Bachelor's degree, I became quickly overwhelmed with the various ways I could continue to further my career as a filmmaker. School prepared me with the fundamentals of being a good filmmaker but I didn't know how to really get into the industry. I was left trying to find any opportunities that I could latch on to but everything I saw didn't fully appeal to me. With pressure from my friends and family to be a huge success, I wanted to get something established quickly but realized it wasn't going to work out that way so easily.

I eventually realized that I would prefer to create my own opportunities instead. I have a firm belief in myself so I knew that if I keep working on my craft I can establish something special. In a very similar situation to me, my friend from high school, Adam Kostandy, was looking to establish himself as a filmmaker himself. As friends who have worked together in the past and have skills that compliment each other well, we knew that we could work together to start our very own production company.

We were quick to create our name, website, business cards and register with the state as an LLC. We established an office space and created a business plan for ourselves. The Golden Cut was born.

The plan for us was to help artists and fellow creatives create videos for themselves that best represent their art. Primarily helping musicians create music videos and other filmmakers with their short films. This was our game plan to our business and on how to make money. With this money, we would then fund our own passion projects.

Worthy is the result of all of this. It is our first passion project after graduating high school and the first short film by The Golden Cut. It tells the tale of Doug Johnson and his "heroic" death and his attempt to convince Odin that he is worthy to get into Valhalla.

The pre-production phase of this short was probably the longest phase and it was, to me, the most unique portion of the entire production. Being able to official hold auditions for a short was a huge stepping stone for me. Meeting so many actors and evaluating who would be the best fit was a tremendous task and one that really made what we were doing feel the most real. We were able to take almost 200 candidates into the 3 final main roles of the short.

The two-day shoot went just as expected. There was a lot of issues. The age-old expression of if anything can go wrong, it will go wrong, reared its ugly head. The table we had planned for the first scene shattered when we were lifting it, the camera batteries required swap outs and the nearest charging area was a bit of walk. Also, the second day of shooting took place in an extremely hot restaurant and in an even hotter kitchen.

Despite all of the adversity, we were able to wrap up everything we had listed and even were able to improvise certain elements of the short. Any adjustments we needed to make we made as best as we could. The end result is a short film that got accepted into the New Paltz Film Festival; which was the primary goal for this short. We were honored to have been able to achieve that and more as Worthy was also accepted into the Wavestock Film festival.

Co-directing this short with Adam was a great pleasure and tremendous learning moment for the both of us. It's a short that showcases how far we have come so quickly and how far we still need to go as young filmmakers.

This is just the start of The Golden Cut. We hope to continue helping artists create films/videos and ultimately create our own films.