The Producing Lab helps further the careers of its Fellows by introducing them to film professionals who can advise them on both the craft and business of independent producing. In addition to attending lab sessions with legal, financial and production experts, each Producing Lab Fellow will be paired with an experienced Creative Advisor with whom they’ll work to develop their project over the course of the program. Taking place during the course of two weeks in October, the Lab culminates with a pitch session with established executives, offering participants valuable practical experience and the chance to introduce their projects to a larger cross-section of the industry.

Producers may apply with feature length narrative projects that are in active development or post-production. Through the Lab, Fellows develop strategies and action plans to bring their projects to fruition.

For more information on application deadlines please visit our applications page.

Alfred P. Sloan Producers Grant

The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation will award one participant of the Film Independent Producing Lab the annual Sloan Producers Grant of $30,000 with which to further develop their project.

To apply for the Sloan Producers Grant, a filmmaker must apply to the Producing Lab and provide a statement on how the project fulfills the mission of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. The applicant must be attached as producer and possess the rights to the script with which they are applying. The screenplay should have a scientific, mathematical and/or technological theme and storyline or have a leading character that is a scientist, engineer or mathematician.

At this time, documentaries and science fiction projects are not eligible for the Sloan Producers Grant.

About The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation

The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation is a New York based, philanthropic, not-for-profit institution that makes grants in three areas: research in science, technology, and economics; quality and diversity of scientific institutions; and public engagement with science. Sloan’s program in Public Understanding of Science and Technology, directed by Doron Weber, supports books, radio, film, television, theater and new media to reach a wide, non-specialized audience and to bridge the two cultures of science and the humanities.

Sloan’s Film Program encourages filmmakers to create more realistic and compelling stories about science and technology and to challenge existing stereotypes about scientists and engineers in the popular imagination. Over the past two decades, Sloan has partnered with some of the top film schools in the country–including AFI, Carnegie Mellon, Columbia, NYU, UCLA and USC plus six public film schools–and established annual awards in screenwriting and film production, along with an annual best-of-the-best Student Grand Jury Prize administered by the Tribeca Film Institute. The Foundation also supports screenplay development programs with the Sundance Institute, Tribeca Film Institute, SFFILM, the Black List, the Athena Film Festival, the North Fork TV Festival, and Film Independent’s Producing Lab and Fast Track program and has helped develop over 25 feature films including Michael Almereyda’s Tesla, Thor Klein’s Adventures of a Mathematician, Jessica Oreck’s One Man Dies a Million Times, Michael Tyburski’s The Sound of Silence, Shawn Snyder’s To Dust,  Logan Kibens and Sharon Greene’s Operator, Morten Tyldum’s The Imitation Game, and Matthew Brown‘s The Man Who Knew Infinity. The Foundation has supported feature documentaries such as Picture a Scientist, Coded Bias, Oliver Sacks: His Own Life, The Bit Player, Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story, Particle Fever, and Jacques Perrin’s Oceans. The Foundation’s book program includes support for Margot Lee Shetterly’s Hidden Figures, which became the highest grossing Oscar-nominated film of 2017 and a social and cultural milestone.

For more information about the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, please visit www.sloan.org or follow the Foundation at @SloanPublic on Twitter and Facebook.

Who Can Apply?

The Producing Lab is open to any producer formally attached to a full-length, fiction feature film with a completed script and director in place. Applicants must control the rights to the project with which they apply. Projects do not need financing in place at the time of application. However, each application must demonstrate serious attention to the film’s budget and articulate the reasoning behind the budget level. Producing partners are welcome to apply as teams and need only submit a single application. International applicants are welcome to apply. Documentary, short film, new media and episodic projects are not eligible to apply.

How to Apply

Applicants must submit the following materials for consideration:

• A cover letter explaining your interest in the Producing Lab
• An artist statement detailing why you are attached to produce
• One complete, feature-length screenplay
• A logline and synopsis
• Bios of attached key cast and crew
• Project status and history
• Budget top sheet and finance plan
• Look book (if applicable)
• Work sample and/or rough cut

Application Fee

• FREE for Filmmaker Pro Members (limited to one waived fee per Membership year)
• $45 for Film Independent Members
• $65 for non-Members

The Fine Print

Beyond the application fee, there is no cost or tuition to participate in any of Film Independent’s Artist Development programs.

Film Independent Membership is not required when applying to Artist Development Labs. However, all participants accepted into the Labs are required to join Film Independent at the standard annual General Membership rate of $95.

Applicants will be notified three to four weeks prior to the start of the program.

Those applicants who are invited to participate in the program should plan to be in Los Angeles for the week-long duration of the Lab. Film Independent is unable to subsidize any travel, lodging and/or visa expenses for any participants attending from outside of Los Angeles. Participants are expected to attend all sessions in person. NOTE: Until further notice, all Film Independent Labs will be held virtually, via Zoom.

For more information, please email: artistdevelopment@filmindependent.org.

To learn more about Film Independent Fellows and their projects, visit our Talent Guide.