Bill Pence, a former VP at Janus Films who co-founded the integral Telluride Film Festival in 1974, has died. He was 82. The Telluride Daily Planet said Pence died December 6 after a long illness.
A native of Minneapolis, Pence launched the Telluride fest with his wife, Stella, along with friend and film historian James Card, who became the event co-director.
The inaugural festival at the Colorado burg’s Sheridan Opera House — and a local bar — featured tributes to Francis Ford Coppola, Gloria Swanson and Leni Riefenstahl and was a surprise sellout.
Pence guided the fest’s growth, adding three more venues by 1986. In 1991, he made a key deal with the town’s lone school to put a 500-seat theater in its gym every winter, using a small upstairs music room as a projection facility.
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