John A. Secoges
As a clinical social worker, Tracy Schott found her calling for helping others overcome mental health and developmental disorders. But after years of private practice, when the creative side of her brain started seeking attention, she turned her talents toward a newfound passion: film production.
How did you get involved with Reading FilmFEST? This is the fifth year that FilmFEST has been run by the Reading Film Office – an organization that works to support filmmakers doing projects in Reading and Berks County. [Greater Reading Film Commission Founder and Chairman] Santo Marabella contacted me about getting involved, and at that time I had a documentary film that was just hitting festivals, so I felt like I was the right person to do this. The goal was to make the festival very filmmaker friendly, and I was seeing the good, the bad and the ugly of film festivals from that perspective.
What can attendees expect? The festival really gives film lovers an opportunity to see some unique voices that they would never have the opportunity to see. We’re screening more than 60 documentary films, features, [and] short films. This year we are shining a spotlight on films produced by women to honor the upcoming 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment. We have a new award for the Best Film by a Female Filmmaker, and we’ll have blocks of films by women filmmakers, as well as films focused on gender issues. In addition to that, we have a lot of parties to create opportunities for filmmakers to network with each other and with the audiences.
What are you working on outside of the festival? I’m a documentary filmmaker and I own my own production studio, Schott Productions, so I always have a number of projects going on. I completed a documentary four years ago called Finding Jenn’s Voice, and I’m still self-distributing and continuing to work on that. My background is in social work and the film is about domestic violence, so I do a lot of public speaking, training and special presentations of the film for different national organizations. I’m also in pre-production development for a new film called Black Out Girl, based on a memoir by Jennifer Storm that is about her experience being sexually assaulted at 12 years old, and a comedy called Le Bon Chef that I co-wrote with Sue Lang last year. And of course, in addition to the fun stuff, I do some commercial work that actually pays the bills.
It sounds like your social work experience influences a lot of your productions. It does. I enjoy those projects; I feel like I have a unique set of skills because I have master’s degrees in both social work and theater production, so I kind of come at projects very differently than most filmmakers – I approach them as a social worker.
Do you have any spare time? My life is very full. The film festival keeps me active in the community, and I have a lot of friends in the film world, so there’s always another project out there. I also like to travel, and Finding Jenn’s Voice continues to take me on the road.
Grab the Popcorn.
This year’s Reading FilmFEST opens Oct. 31 with four days of films, panels and parties. Visit readingfilmgest.com for the complete schedule.
The Award Goes To…
More than 1,500 filmmakers, crew members and movie lovers have a chance to meet and mingle at what was recently voted one of the 100 best film festivals in the world by filmmakers!
