Janet Pierson: Last News

Pat Saperstein Deputy Editor Longtime SXSW Film & TV Festival Director Janet Pierson will transition to be Director Emeritus, the South by Southwest Conference and Festivals announced Wednesday. Her deputy Claudette Godfrey will take over leadership of the festival. Pierson served as head of the film and TV branch of SXSW for 15 years, part of her 45 years in the independent film business as producer’s rep, exhibitor and many other roles. During her time at SXSW, the festival launched a dedicated section for episodic programs, years before other festivals. In her new role, she will serve as a programmer for the next edition of the fest in 2023, where she will be feted for her contributions to SXSW and entertainment.

Janet Pierson, the longtime VP and director of the SXSW Film & TV Festival, is stepping down from her role running the annual Austin festival, the organization said Wednesday. Her longtime deputy Claudette Godfrey, the Film Festival Programming Director, will take over beginning with the 2023 edition.

The time has come to bid farewell to the South by Southwest Film Festival. Well, the name, at least.

Rachel Sennott and Lee Pace are celebrating the premiere of their new movie!

SXSW got off to an uncharacteristically chilly start last week. As the annual ode to movies, music and tech kicked off on March 11 in Austin, the Texas winds blew a cold front into the downtown streets. Between screenings and musical acts, many attendees lamented that they hadn’t packed a heavy winter jacket.

Anyone frozen to the bone today in Austin, TX from the 39-degree, piercing wind weather could find all the heat inside the Paramount Theatre as A24’s Daniels’ AGBO movie Everything Everywhere All at Once brought moviegoing roaring back to the first SXSW in three years.

SXSW festival less than a week before it was scheduled to kick off.For years, as the festival grew from a cool place to see up-and-coming bands into a multinational, multidisciplinary megalodon, it seemed like an unstoppable force. A source of both pride and annoyance for Austinites, it was also a major driver of the local economy, and its once fledgling film festival had turned into a major launching pad for everything from the most avant-garde of American indies to blockbuster studio comedies.

Matt Donnelly Senior Film WriterTwice thwarted by the COVID-19 pandemic, the SXSW Film Festival is making a major return to form this year — featuring premium studio projects from Sandra Bullock and Pete Davidson, notable indies and docs, and a closing night premiere from the new season of Donald Glover’s “Atlanta.”In 2020, the Austin-based conference was the first major event to fall to the rapidly-escalating first wave of coronavirus, and was similarly forced to go virtual in 2021 thanks to the Delta variant. Now preparing for an in-person program beginning on March 11, Hiollywood and indie hopefuls are coming out in force.Sandra Bullock and Channing Tatum’s “The Lost City,” Pete Davidson and Amandla Stenberg’s secret A24 slasher film “Bodies, Bodies, Bodies,” Richard Linklater and Jack Black’s coming-of-age story “Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Childhood,” and Nicolas Cage’s “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent” will all populate the headliners section.

South by Southwest Conference and Festivals have revealed the full program for the 28th edition of the SXSW Film Festival — and it will all take place online March 16-20.

South by Southwest Conference and Festivals have revealed the full program for the 28th edition of the SXSW Film Festival — and it will all take place online March 16-20.

By Andrew Barker

By Patrick Hipes

Friday, March 6, was a surreal day. We were putting the finishing touches on the sound mix for our film “We Are As Gods,” a feature documentary about counterculture icon and environmentalist Stewart Brand that was set to premiere at SXSW.