City Projects Presented 'MY CITY NOW'

City Projects Presented 'MY CITY NOW'

National Media Literacy Program Coming to Your City

New Program to Introduce Filmmaking Skills to High School Students in Nine U.S. Cities

Corporation for Public Broadcasting Sponsored Contest Will Give Away Prizes

LOS ANGELES, Sept. 23 /PRNewswire/ -- MY CITY NOW, a national outreach campaign for the PBS documentary Los Angeles Now is heading to: Chicago IL, Dallas TX, Denver CO, Houston TX, Las Vegas NV, Phoenix AZ, San Antonio TX, San Diego CA, and San Francisco CA.

The campaign will accompany a PBS national rebroadcast of Los Angeles Now during this year's Hispanic Heritage Month (September/October 2005). (Check local listings for broadcast time).

MY CITY NOW is designed to encourage high school students to take an active and creative role in their communities, while encouraging interest in the documentary form and PBS programming. The program is also created to unite high school students and senior citizens in selected cities and engage them in conversations about the past, present and future of the cities in which they live.

The primary component of the program will be the Future Filmmaker Series, which will consist of a workshop series and a contest.

MY CITY NOW will:

* Provide a multigenerational and multicultural forum for today's new youth and senior citizens to communicate constructively about the changing demographics in America today;

* Encourage a sense of local history, shared future and citizenship among the high school students, while also encouraging seniors to remain active in their communities;

* Encourage a new generation of documentary filmmakers;

* Initiate sustainable relationships between PBS stations, senior organizations and Latino youth groups.

MY CITY NOW will conduct three workshops in each host city. Each workshop will run for three hours. The workshops are designed for high school students and seniors to learn with and from one another in a hands-on environment.

A video contest will follow the workshop. Students will be encouraged to go out into their own communities, conduct their own research and interviews, and create a 3-minute video essay about either the past, present, or future of their city. One video from each city will be selected by a panel of judges and streamed online at the MY CITY NOW website on Jan 15, 2006. An online vote for the winning video will take place from Jan 15 to Jan 31, 2006. The Grand prize will include a turn-key computer editing system. There will be several runners up awards including a video camcorder and editing software. The winners will also have the opportunity to have their videos streamed on local PBS websites.

MY CITY NOW activities will be accompanied by the rebroadcast of Los Angeles Now during Hispanic Heritage Month (September/October 2005). (Check local PBS station for listing.)

Los Angeles Now, made its national broadcast premiere on Independent Lens November 2005. A rare and thoughtful evocation of a city, Los Angeles Now looks beyond Baywatch and Blade Runner to create a fresh and candid portrait of America's second largest city following the close of its Anglo Century (1900-2000), a fascinating look at a city where more than half of the population is Latino and 40 percent are foreign born. The film includes conversations with a broad range of Los Angeles figures, from acclaimed actor Salma Hayek and businessman/ philanthropist Eli Broad to renowned author and essayist Richard Rodriguez and Cardinal Roger Mahony.

Far-reaching and thought-provoking, the issues explored in Los Angeles Now are relevant well beyond the borders of the city. Many agree that Los Angeles serves as a diagnostic for other urban centers. Cities from Hartford to Las Vegas inevitably face the influx of immigrants, cultural confrontations and urban sprawl. Today 1 in 7 residents is Latino within the U.S. Los Angeles Now provides a much-needed starting point for imagining our American future. If the future were a place, Los Angeles would be it.

Los Angeles Now is designed to provoke conversations about the future of our cities among Americans of different generations and ethnicities. The documentary utilizes a contemporary visual style and interviews with popular media personalities in order to appeal to young audiences. At the same time, the project's candid and intelligent appraisal of important social, political and cultural issues appeal to traditional PBS audiences.

Among the issues raised by the film: * How will the new Latino/Asian majority work with other ethnic groups to create a cultural consensus? Will the new coalitions manage to sustain the high productivity that the Anglos achieved?

* What is the future of L.A.'s unprecedented multiculturalism? Is this the beginning of a more harmonious race relations or increased racial tensions? Will L.A.'s many ethnic neighborhoods balkanize or coalesce?

* Is Los Angeles impermanent by nature? Can it retain a sense of history despite its lack of attention to its history and its seemingly insatiable desire to rebuild?

* What effects does the city's sprawl -- its freeways, diffuse borders, lack of center -- have on its citizens? Can a shared sense of the city be possible in such a centrifugal commuter culture?

Los Angeles Now, is made possible by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, PBS, The Skirball Foundation, the Independent Television Service, Latino Public Broadcasting, The California Council for the Humanities and Loyola Marymount University.

The program has two interactive companion websites www.pbs.org/losangelesnow and www.losangelesfilm.org that feature detailed information about the film, including an interview with the filmmaker, cast and crew bios, as well as links and resources pertaining to the film's subject matter. The sites also feature a "talkback" section for viewers to share their ideas and opinions, preview clips of the film and more. The MY CITY NOW interactive website launched on September 7, 2005.

MY CITY NOW is brought to you by:

City Projects is an organization dedicated to creating sustainable programs that will both educate and entertain today's broad and diverse audiences.

Our programs are comprised of unique stories designed to challenge and inspire. We believe that community outreach is an essential component for any successful educational broadcast program. We aspire to integrate cutting-edge technologies and new cultural configurations to help reinvigorate the documentary for audiences of all generations.

Corporation for Public Broadcasting

The Corporation for Public Broadcasting is a private, nonprofit corporation created by Congress in 1967. The mission of CPB is to facilitate the development of, and ensure universal access to, non-commercial high- quality programming and telecommunications services. It does this in conjunction with non-commercial educational telecommunications licensees across America.

The fundamental purpose of public telecommunications is to provide programs and services which inform, enlighten and enrich the public. While these programs and services are provided to enhance the knowledge, and citizenship, and inspire the imagination of all Americans, the Corporation has particular responsibility to encourage the development of programming that involves creative risks and that addresses the needs of unserved and underserved audiences, particularly children and minorities.

The Corporation is accountable to the public for investing its funds in programs and services which are educational, innovative, locally relevant, and reflective of America's common values and cultural diversity. The Corporation serves as a catalyst for innovation in the public broadcasting industry, and acts as a guardian of the mission and purposes for which public broadcasting was established.

Visit City Projects at www.cityprojects.net and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting at www.cpb.org .

For the program companion website, visit www.losangelesfilm.org and www.pbs.org/losangelesnow

Source: City Projects

CONTACT: Jennifer Kobzik of City Projects, +1-213-437-1301, or jennifer@cityprojects.net

Web site: http://www.cityprojects.net/ http://www.pbs.org/losangelesnow http://www.losangelesfilm.org/ http://www.cpb.org/

------- Profile: Ent