5 get Franco-U.S. culture scholarships
Students receive tuition grants
The Franco-American Cultural Fund chose as recipients Jerome Duboz, a producing fellow at the American Film Institute; Tysz Cyril, enrolled in the producers' program at UCLA's School of Theater, Film & Television; and three students at USC's School of Cinema-Television -- Celine Haddad, who is in the Peter Stark program for producers; Amro Hamzawi, studying film and video production; and Caroline Bongrand, in the screen and TV writing program.
The fund -- established in May 1996 by the Directors Guild of America, the Motion Picture Assn., the Writers Guild of America and France's Society of Authors, Composers & Editors of Music -- gave as much as $20,000 for each student's tuition costs.
"For generations, American and French filmmakers have inspired each other and used each other's cinematic ideas in a form of mutual admiration," said Del Reisman, a former president of the WGA West. "These students are following in that tradition."
Gil Cates, former dean of the UCLA film school, said that giving French filmmakers money to study in the U.S. helps "to make the world a smaller place."
The fund's resources come from a levy imposed on the sale of blank tapes in France. The money is used to support several reciprocal cultural activities between France and the U.S. ., including scholarships for French and American film students, master classes, international film conferences and promotion of French film in the U.S.
For the past three years, the fund has sent prominent American filmmakers to the annual Beaune Film Forum, held each October in France; Taylor Hackford, Michael Tolkin, Peter Bogdanovich, Ed Solomon and Michael Ritchie have addressed the conference. The fund also provides for the City of Lights, City of Angels: A Week of New French Film fest.
