Cemetery Dance/YouTube shorts

[JJ123]

Has Cemetery Dance given any more consideration to perhaps doing some short films, maybe between three/seven minutes in length? Or maybe a Kickstarter-type thing to film a pilot for an anthology series that could air on a cable channel? Or has the company already done this? And by the way, I do not know anything about crowd-funding science, but I happened to use Kickstarter just as a generic term -- I think there are better sites out there that actually let you keep whatever you raise, you aren't obligated to raise the whole goal (if you know what I mean), although those other sites might take a higher fee.

I just keep thinking there's got to be a better way to expand the brand and leverage the content in the magazine.

[Dan Hocker]

Nope. To my knowledge it's not really something we've talked about, and even if it was something we where interested in, it's not really something we have the time or the staff to do.

[JJ123]

Dan, thanks for the reply.

Fair enough on the answer. Perhaps it should still be considered, though, as there are probably any number of ways for such an undertaking to be done that would simultaneously respect the demands of the rest of the operation.

I think Cemetery Dance has built up so much valuable brand equity over the years that it would be a shame not to leverage it in some fashion in the digital age. Taking maybe a few stories from the magazine and adapting them in short-clip format would increase interest in the print asset. I could see maybe utilizing local talent, student filmmakers/cinematographers to quickly and efficiently shoot some quality stuff.

One thing going forward that the magazine should do is buy film/TV rights to the printed stories. A lot of writers might not like that, and that's okay, it might lessen the slush pile. Let me ask this: could Cemetery Dance buy up film/TV rights of future stories that appear in the magazine (this would obviously exclude the big names like King) and then attempt to sell them to Hollywood for filmed-content projects? Imagine that the reboot (which is supposedly active) of "Tales From the Darkside" is looking for stories to adapt. Could Cemetery Dance submit stories it owns through an agent and thus develop a new revenue stream? Could it sell a story as a basis of a full-length feature? A lot of Philip K. Dick stories have been adapted in Hollywood; why not stories from the Cemetery Dance brand?

[TJCams]

I think there is a fine line between expanding the brand, and keeping true to their loyal customers (not getting too big). Isn't that one of the great things about CD..... it's not mainstream.

[JJ123]

TJCams, you bring up an excellent point, and I agree to some extent. However, I just can't help but think that Cemetery Dance, in its own smaller way, could follow the Marvel model.

Just as Marvel finds most of its value in filmed entertainment even though its biggest asset in terms of number of stories lies in comic books, so too could Cemetery Dance create larger value and equity in generating filmed content.

At its most basic fundamental core, Cemetery Dance is a distributor of fictional ideas. The most frictionless manner in which the culture accesses fictional ideas is via filmed entertainment. I would think Mr. Chizmar wants to see his view of quality fictional ideas accessed by as mass an audience as possible. I would also think he would want to, over time, build his business up significantly so that someday he could cash out at a sustainable amount of money.

Don't misunderstand -- the phrase easier said than done applies here very strongly. I wouldn't be doing the work, so it's simple for me to just sit here and type this suggestion.

But given how far Mr. Chizmar has come, given whatever connections he had to Hollywood, isn't it time for him to take his company to the next level? Imagine he raises funds via a public-fundraising site and puts them to use to create an anthology film. Let's say he's able to raise $1 million with the help of his colleague Johnathon Schaech, who presumably has a lot of Hollywood connections. Could they make the next Creepshow? Could they get Stephen King to supply a short treatment for one of the segments, thus increasing the profile of such a hypothetical project?

Cemetery Dance is about stories, and it needs to branch out in different mediums so that more people can enjoy those stories and eventually be exposed to the print asset. Cash flow from filmed entertainment could fund expansion. Maybe someday the company could create an app, a videogame; maybe every Halloween there could be a Cemetery Dance haunted house/attraction in Maryland.

I just don't know if limited editions of books based on the same authors and/or based on books already available represent the most exciting business model for this company. It's a great model, no doubt, and it has brought satisfaction to a large number of people.

But sometimes I ask myself -- why can't Cemetery Dance produce the next Hunger Games, Walking Dead? Why can't it seek to find those kinds of concepts, film shorts of them, and then attempt to sell them to the studios?

Anyway, just food for thought...

[mhatchett]

And I think Marvel has lost it's soul to some degree becoming part of the mega entertainment industry. Don't get me wrong, made a ton of money, but that's all. Glad the direction of the company isn't in my hands. For now, I enjoy the great books that they put out.
MDH

[Dan Hocker]

And I think Marvel has lost it's soul to some degree becoming part of the mega entertainment industry. Don't get me wrong, made a ton of money, but that's all. Glad the direction of the company isn't in my hands. For now, I enjoy the great books that they put out.
MDH

Interesting. If anything I feel like Marvel being bought by Disney has benefited Marvel as a whole than if it had managed to stay on it's own, which if they company had thought it could do they never would have sold. Unfortunately comics as a whole had been a failing business for awhile, and not until Disney managed to re popularize the comic industry through the creation of the Marvel Cinematic Universe that comics really started to become popular again. Now if only Marvel could get all of it's Movie licenses back under one roof. That and if Warner Brothers would get it's act together and with the DC universe. I am really crossing my fingers for Dawn of Justice, but honestly am less than hopeful that it'll actually be good.