Journalist-turned-filmmaker Dana Richie recently announced that her company Backlot Productions, in partnership with Boundless Films (led by Founder & CCO Francesco Lucarelli), is producing a documentary titled “UNLOCKED” which reveals the lasting physical and mental health consequences of COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns.
This will be the first project in a slate of films for the collaborative partnership. The partnership has the support of Columbia University, Princeton University, The Smithsonian, The Historic New Orleans Collection, and more, who are providing oral histories for the film. We sat down with Richie to learn more about her journey from the newsroom to documentary filmmaker and entrepreneur.
Tell us a bit about your background as a female entrepreneur in entertainment.
My background as a female entrepreneur really started in college. I took some key unpaid internships and, from there, worked at some high-level news organizations to jumpstart my journalism career. CNN, ABC News 20/20, VH1 News, Series & Specials, where I was the Los Angeles Bureau chief for the New York team. Once I got the experience I needed, I parlayed that incredible journalistic experience into taking the leap and running my own production company, Backlot Productions. We are proudly celebrating over 20 years in business with the company, having started in 2002.
What have been some of the biggest challenges to breaking into the industry?
For me, one of the biggest challenges of breaking into the industry is breaking through and working with new clients. I had some very long contracts at Backlot, our longest lasted almost 15 years with VH1 News, Series and Specials / MTV Networks. For four of those years, I was an actual employee. When people know and trust you, they tend to go back to you. Repeat business is such a gratitude. But it’s important to stay open to new clients and new experiences, So breaking through to new teams and building trust, I would say, is really the most challenging part of being a female entrepreneur. But once you break in and are committed to doing great work, being adaptable, and being a team player, anything is possible.
Can you share a few of your successes/highlights of work you’ve created to date?
The highlight of my career was working on an award-winning project called GATEWAY, a documentary about the opioid crisis. GATEWAY was not meant to be a documentary, which is why I love this story. We set out to do patient testimonials with families impacted by prescription opioids or diverted prescription drugs. As we conducted interviews in the field one by one, and it was apparent how emotional all the stories were, our client decided to turn the project into a full documentary with premiere screenings in New York City and Los Angeles. I really believe that if you stay open-minded to working on all types of projects, no matter how big or small, the magic can unfold.
Why did you decide to take on the project “Unlocked”?
I’ve been lucky enough to have been able to advance Backlot through different eras of my career, which helped to foster Backlot’s growth. And we are still growing and learning! We have advanced from behind-the-scenes content and entertainment marketing…to brand content, original digital series, advertising content, and social impact documentaries. All of our work at Backlot is docu-style, so our diverse portfolio in the space made sense.
Now, most of our work at Backlot has a social impact message attached. That’s why UNLOCKED seemed like the perfect fit for Backlot. Our partner on the project, Boundless Films, has a deep healthcare background, so the partnership made sense regarding telling the timely story about the lasting consequences of COVID-19 lockdowns.
We know that by sharing our stories and experiences, we share our history. This can help people, especially future generations, to learn from the common experiences we have shared. Our stories may be different, but our humanity isn’t. We also hope people who watch it will end up having a healing component to their viewing experience.
How did the partnerships for this film (major universities) come about?
Backlot and Boundless reached out to several universities and COVID-19 Oral History projects. We learned that there are many initiatives out there of all different sizes. We understand the importance of Oral History to the preservation of our history.
As Valencia Johnson of Princeton University’s Oral History Covid project said, “It is so important to remember COVID-19 and how it not only changed the world but us as individuals. This documentary helps us preserve the memories of the pandemic and learn from personal experiences allowing us to fill in the gaps and silences in the larger narrative of the effects of 2020 and beyond”. We couldn’t agree more.
What do you hope audiences take away from the film?
For me personally, I hope audiences take away not only the severity of what we went through but also the hope that we can all find moving forward in our post-pandemic lives.
What advice do you have for other young female filmmakers/entrepreneurs?
The advice I would give to other young female filmmakers and entrepreneurs is to never give up. It may take time, you may run into obstacles, times may get hard and even unexpected. But if you believe in yourself and know that you have stories to tell that people need to hear, quitting is not an option. You WILL find your way, and you WILL be successful. It just takes a little patience, love for yourself, and the desire to reach your fullest potential.
Check out the four-minute trailer for Unlocked, out now.
