In a rare opportunity for the Chicago film community, two principals of Los Angeles' Legacy Entertainment Partners, LLC ( "Legacy" )( with offices also in New York and Budapest ), and Chicago's Benjamin Warsinske, Founder & CEO of BrandedWorld.co, and author of Groundwork: The Foundation for an Unshakeable Brand, have teamed up to offer an intensive training on the latest approaches to successfully brand, fund and distribute films. The Reel Strategy Workshop will be held on January 28, 2017 at the Chicago History Museum.

Gena Vazquez and Luis Sinibaldi of Legacy, and Warsinske together have decades of experience shepherding films through development, production, and onto the screen. The Real Strategy Workshop will be a hands-on, dynamic, educational, creative networking environment for both aspiring and seasoned filmmakers, producers, directors, screenwriters, and actors, who will learn how to establish an unshakeable film-project brand; how to acquire film financing via largely-unknown, innovative investor approaches; and the importance of evaluating distribution options from the very onset of film development. The Reel Strategy Workshop breakout groups will then provide direct project assessment, with Sinibaldi, Warsinske and Vazquez interacting with attendees as they work through applying these critical lessons to their individual film pieces.

"The majority of independent filmmakers do not realize that most film productions are now financed by private placement investments. Moreover, since this is, as of 2015, a $38.8 billion worldwide industry, some larger institutions are trying to get into our recession-proof film game, and in so doing, they are taking advantage of creatives with minimal business experience. In fact, on December 21st, 2016, per The Hollywood Reporter, Wells Fargo has been slapped with a film-finance fraud lawsuit," noted Vazquez, her film financing expertise drawn from early success in Silicon Valley venture capital.

Sinibaldi continued, "The Real Strategy Workshop was conceived to teach filmmakers some business and marketing fundamentals they must know to navigate today's entertainment industry, and to do so in an engaging, supportive, 'there-are-no-stupid-questions' setting."

"It is not called 'show art,' it is called 'show business,'" remarked Warsinske.

Vazquez added, "Filmmakers must learn to make their scripts come to life in the eyes of accredited investors. The days of submitting a script to big Hollywood film studios—and anticipating that it will be green lit on artistic merit alone—are long gone. Filmmakers must prove the strength of their project's brand, the existence of their market, and they must demonstrate that they know how to distribute the film masterfully in order to recoup the investors' money. In all? They have to think like their investors, and sell their investors on how their passion project will be a profitable film. And that's what we'll be tackling in the Reel Strategy Workshop."

To read more about and to register for the Reel Strategy Workshop go to Website Link Here .