2019 HBO BOOT CAMP

“ … my expectations were exceeded …The wealth of knowledge the instructors were willing to share with us were crucial to turning our dreams to reality.” – 2019 Stockade Works Boot Camper

This past February, 24 trainees gathered at Marist College in Poughkeepsie, NY, for Stockade Works’ 2019 Crew Boot Camp in partnership with HBO.

The training program consisted of lectures, demonstrations, and hands-on training. Participants were broken into small departmental group sections and after three and a half days of intensive training, the participants were assigned to departments with award-winning, industry-leading professionals who lead each group. The training culminated in a mock shoot of a scene from a screenplay in development, Kids Like Us, written by Jeremy Davidson and directed by Mary Stuart Masterson.  Marist College donated a number of classroom and exterior spaces for our training and mock shoot and many other local partners supported the boot camp with in-kind donations of professional equipment, food, beverages and other critical items.

The participants varied in education and work experience and included military veterans, college students, and individuals who had previous film/theater production experience as well as those who had no previous production experience at all. Boot camp participants hailed from various counties throughout the Hudson Valley region, ranged in age from 18-64, and were diverse in gender, cultural and racial groups: over 50% of trainees were female, 48% were persons of color. 80% of applicants who would otherwise have been unable to participate were offered full and partial scholarships to enroll in the program.

HBO committed to hiring successful Boot Camp graduates for a limited series shooting in the Hudson Valley, I Know This Much Is True, produced by and starring Hudson Valley resident Mark Ruffalo. To date 11 trainees have worked on the HBO production. Stockade Works received over three hundred applicants from local residents throughout the region, demonstrating a need for film industry training and development. Since Stockade Works first boot camp in 2017, over 70 referrals have been made to Hudson Valley based productions.

“[Stockade Works’ Boot Camp] is an excellent program which I found to be very effective at introducing it’s students to the basic principles of a real world film shoot. I very much enjoyed participating as an instructor and was inspired by the students desire to learn and grow along their paths to becoming legitimate crew members. I congratulate … the Stockade Works staff in this well-designed program and it’s part in the development of the Hudson Valley as a viable and promising film production community.” – Stockade Works 2019 Boot Camp Instructor