La Oferta has received the following Press Release regarding Cinequest, from Kathleen J. Powell & Halfdan Hussey, Co-founders of the Festival : “The NBA, NHL, and Cinequest will remain open this weekend (through March 8) to continue providing confidence and inspiring relief to the Bay Area. Cinequest has decided to reschedule the second week of this year’s Cinequest Film & Creativity Festival to occur August 16-30, 2020. This will allow Cinequest to provide the joyful and celebratory 30th anniversary edition all deeply deserve. If you have a pass, it will be honored through this weekend and then also during the Summer Edition.
After consulting with the Mayor and our communities, we feel this is a tremendous way to honor the world premieres that are scheduled this weekend and then do something special in the Summer that you can thoroughly enjoy. Throughout this edition, Cinequest has fulfilled the Santa Clara and San Mateo County recommendations for event health practices and will continue to do so this weekend. Regardless of factors outside our control, we have been so happy to see the elated people loving what they’ve experienced at Cinequest and patronizing our community’s restaurants and businesses.
Some highlights have included Opening Night, Kaiser Permanente presenting their Thrive Award to The Year of Living Mindfully, and many powerful films, artists, and performances–all lifting people’s spirits and confidence. We have experienced only one artist cancellation and that is Hong Chau. We will be presenting Driveways tonight and playing a spectacular Tribute Video to Ms. Chau while accepting the award in her honor. Also we will attempt to reschedule the Silent Cinema, 2001, and Jesse Eisenberg Maverick Tribute events during the Summer fest because they were on the second week’s schedule. We also plan to play/replay many/most of the movies again at the Summer Fest.
Cinequest, a 501(c)3 nonprofit, has taken a really hard financially hit this week, after preparing our best festival to date, so we’d appreciate your not asking for refunds at this time in support of our efforts to retool and produce the Summer Fest. It’s been so encouraging that our supporters have backed us fully in what’s happened over the last week and backed our decisions, practices, services, and the wonderful artists, story-tellers, innovators, and audiences of Cinequest.
Thank you for your supreme support and love of Cinequest and those we serve. Please give us a couple of weeks to revert with more details on the Summer Festival. In the meantime, we hope that you’ll enjoy this weekend, if you are comfortable with attending and are healthy and washing your hands.”
