informed foray into neuroscience and music with myself, daniel levinson, and the great guitarist and composer, alex degrassi. now, this meeting of in forum and the commonwealth club is adjourned. [applause] >> i am the executive director

of the san francisco film commission, and really wonderful to have you all here tonight. it is a great turn out. nice to see you all here. you can't hear me. sorry. can we turn up the volume on that? thank you. i really want to thank you all for coming tonight. it's a great turn-out. i want to thank our commissioners for coming tonight. they are instrumental in having this be what it is. without their endorsement, about wouldn't have had it. marlene, one of our commissioners is here. if you could say hello. thank you for coming tonight. we appreciate it. [applause] i am grateful to have the honor to introduce a very special guest tonight. we have our newly elected mayor, ed lee, joining us tonight and introducing the film collective. [applause] and without his support this woot not be possible -- would

not be possible. he is a big backer to filming in the city. we are thankful for your support, and thank you very much. we are very excited that you are going to be our mayor for the next four years, and we intend to keep the momentum going of the film commission under your leadership. please welcome mayor ed lee. [applause] >> thank you. good evening, everyone. we are in a celebration mode. so before i begin, i want to make sure you know it is suzanna's birthday yesterday. i want to celebrate our wonderful director. [applause] >> we won't talk age. we will just talk celebration. but i want to congratulate her. i want to congratulate the san francisco film commission for starting this wonderful collective in the middle of our tenderloin in our city. i have had a chance to work

with her briefly as the city administrator and got excited about her new directorship still and things that gavinned talk todd me about. we need to get back to the wonderful film history we have in the city. that is one of those things i want to make sure we do, to resurge that ever. so i am going to be a big supporter of the film industry and particularly this type of innovation here, this thing baitor where you have independent film makers and documentaries coming together. the city can come together here, and we have helped to find space and worked with a land leonard named craig. is craig here tonight? if anybody says he is craig, we thank him because he has given us a great deal here. and also doing it in a way in

which it compliments the district here in the tenderloin. i want to thank the v.b.d. are you here? where did you go? >> here. [applause] >> ok, thank you. i am excited about revising and resources and making sure we support our independent film makers, our documentary film makers. we have a lot to talk about. i am also excited about some of the ideas that have already been on the books. but now that we have the space, we have a great -- production crews have already started here. i understand there is pot luck productions. cob great -- congratulations for being here. [applause] >> there is stampede productions here.

>> [applause] >> there is ecopoise here. [applause] >> and then there is a production company, and i will have to admit to you when i heard this name, i thought they were engaged in horror films. scary cow. [applause] >> having learned what they do, and what their reward system is and how they incentivize by rewarding the great initiatives that some of the film has, and when their popularity grows, they get rewarded to get their next film. i love that concept. i have an entry for you. it is something called too legit to quit. [laughter] anyway, i had a little bit of fun watching the producers of that come out as well. that should indicate to you there should be a lot of fun, a lot of information to share with the rest of the world,

postseason. one of these days i am sure somebody is going to do something about occupy san francisco. i know that is going to happen. please better view me. i've got some opinions. but we are working closely about that. but there is just -- in san francisco when you're a film maker, i know there are a lot topics you can cover, a lot of lines, a lot of precious stories. this is a hot bed for opinions, for postseason and for film making. and i want to make sure that that story-telling, that ability to show the postseason, the ability to educate our world and our own communities thrives and success in our great city of san francisco. and that we are also an international city. so that my hope is that when these offices are filled and the real energy of this innovation and spirit that is already reflected here, when these production companies find

their gems to produce, that you get international attention. because these stories probably will have international themes to them and will resonate all over the world. congratulations, i will be a background supporter. we will be working with the commission to support it as much as we can, and you may see something in the budget. [applause] >> thank you, mayor. just a couple of notes before we get started. for those of you that don't know about the collective, in is a space that has four minimum making grooms at this point. we have six other offices still available. there is information on how big they are and how much they cost. but we welcome you to submit an application if you are interested. we would love to have more film makers in here. it is a great environment for

collaboration, sharing ideas and just getting your work done. i think it is a pretty beautiful space. we are very fortunate to have this space here tonight. before we get started, i wanted to give thanks to pressure island wines. they are donating the wine for tonight, and it is really delicious, wonderful, and we are thankful to have their donations. let's give them a hand. [applause] i also want to acknowledge the hard work of christine monday, who is from our film office. really, this film collective is her idea, and she has put a lot of energy into it. thank you, christine, for all the work you have done. [applause] >> and again thanking our film commission for supporting this. they have really put a lot of support behind it, letting us have it to start with. and then also giving us the

go-ahead to put funds toward connecting this to high speed internet. right now we have tapped into the city's broadband network, so we have 25 up and 25 down, which not being a tech person, i don't really know everything that means. a file used to take 30 minutes to upload, and now it takes three minutes to upload. that is fantastic. in the rent, that is included. utilities and john torle are -- jantorial are included, and a common area and your own space. it is great a good deal for film makers if you are interested in participating. craig larson is the owner of the building. he has worked with us, and he has been so generous to make it where we could afford this space and where we could give it to you at an affordable rate so. thank you, craig, even though you're not here. i think that's it for now.

christine, if you would like to come up and introduce the next

[applause]

[cheers and applause] >> they were all telling me how excited they were to do an inauguration last year. but it was just for that local mayor of san francisco. and now -- i thought maybe when they were great, when they were old and you guys had kids and grandkids, you would talk about that inauguration you had at city hall. that's all going to be

forgotten now. i'm not even an asterisk. we're here because we're proud. we're here because we're proud. [applause] by the way a lot of folks are here because they're proud. it gives me tremendous pride as a san franciscan first and foremost, as mayor of this city, that our san francisco girls chorus and our san francisco boys chorus have been picked for this historic event. it is an extraordinary privilege that we collectively are being afforded. but all of these young men and women in the back are being afforded. and to all of families and friends, i know that this is something you will never forget.

as a san franciscan to see san francisco speaker nancy pelosi up there with senior senator diane feinstein front and center in this, and our boys and girls chorus -- [applause] i know not everyone of the same political persuasion. but yes, the president that we have chosen, which we chose wisely from my humble perspective. [applause] but we are from san francisco. we can say that. this is an exciting moment. we're here because these folks are extraordinarily talented. these are grammy winners. isn't that amazing? what have we done in our lives? these are grammy winners. albums, prince charles comes in, let's bring out the boys chorus and the girls chorus.

you've got all kinds of world leaders. and we just get to show off to the rest of the nation something that we get to experience more often out here in the bay area. so i'm just here to celebrate with you. we thought we would bring you together and a nice way to kick off the preinaugural ceremonies. and just to remind ourselves how blessed we are to be out here. and the great city and county of san francisco. but first, i just wanted to recognize because it's utterly appropriate, susan, come on up here. these two very talented artistic directors that have done so much and so well. we just -- we wanted to thank them for all their hard work. and all their sacrifice. and all their -- the commitment they have made to work with all of you. and to be here with you. not just on moments like this.

and moments like tuesday. but those quiet moments, practice stress and frustration and anxiety, where ian and susan were there, just keeping your spirits up and enlivanning your senses and making you believe you can do more and better. and reminding you what it's all about. and that is working together across your differences and uniting a common goal. and that's really the spirit of what a chorus is all about, isn't it? it's the sum of its parts. and there's something special in that as well. so it's in that stead and that spirit and that light that we have two certificates of honor. one recognizing our san francisco girls chorus. it's your day in the city and county of san francisco. [applause] we always have to start with the girls first. and then to your outstanding

work and we have a lot of language to attest to that. and your contribution. and to all of you young men, this is your day as well in the city and county of san francisco. we thank you. thank you. so we're going to -- so enjoy. thank you very much. and we've got the change everybody's going to look forward to enjoying on tuesday. thank you. [applause] >> ♪ o beautiful for spacious skies for amber waves of grain for purple mountains majesty

along the fruited plain america america god shed his grace on thee and from thigh good with brotherhood -- thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea ♪ o beautiful ♪ america america ♪

♪ o beautiful ♪

from sea to shining sea ♪ ♪ [cheers and applause]

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