fiscal sponsorship
Drop Dead City
TYPE: Documentary Feature
GENRE: Documentary
STATUS: Post-Production
LOGLINE
NYC, 1975 - the greatest, grittiest city in the world is minutes away from bankruptcy when an unlikely alliance of rookies, rivals, fixers and flexers finds common ground, and a way out.
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SYNOPSIS
Drop Dead City charts untold history - it is the first documentary devoted to the New York City Fiscal Crisis of 1975, an extraordinary, overlooked episode in urban American history that saw an already crumbling city of 8 million people brought to the edge of bankruptcy and social chaos by a perfect storm of debt, greed, ambitious social policy, and poor governance.
The film is an immersive, ticking clock drama, following a year in the life and near-death of this iconic city. Through gritty archival footage and lucid present-day interviews with key players, the film chronicles the political and financial collapse of NYC and the drama of its aftermath, a year of strikes, protests, political stonewalling, 11th hour negotiations, of paralysis in City Hall and indifference in the White House. Drop Dead City examines the origins of the crisis and documents the increasingly desperate clashes of stakeholders - unions, banks, local, state and federal governments, and average citizens - as, together, they slide ever nearer to the unthinkable. What would bankruptcy mean? What would it look like? No one knew, which made the it all so much worse.
In the end, Drop Dead City overturns present day assumptions about politics and compromise, showing what bitter rivals achieved through shared sacrifice and stands as a cautionary tale to every city facing post-Covid challenges of plunging revenue and ever-greater public service obligations.
ARTISTIC STATEMENT
Peter and Michael hope that Drop Dead City will inform and inspire viewers who weren't around in 1975, and also remind those that were, of how, in the face of bankruptcy, how bitter antagonists came to understand that self-interest and public interest were finally indistinguishable. And how a city of 8 million not always friendly people were able to come together to forestall catastrophe.
We are coming up to the 50th anniversary of the NYC Fiscal Crisis of 1975. As we navigate a difficult present and look toward a perilous future, we feel that now is the time for us to remember what happened 50 years ago and to try to understand it. This is the mission of our film.
KEY CREW
Peter Yost - Director-Producer
Director/Producer Peter Yost is a multiple-Emmy nominated filmmaker who has produced/directed dozens of high-end documentary projects for leading broadcasters and streamers through his company, Pangloss Films. Peter recently produced and directed the acclaimed, nationally broadcast 4-part series for WGBH / PBS Mysteries of Mental Illness about the history of psychiatry. Past projects include Inside North Korea and The Color Of Oil (both Emmy nominated); and Solitary Confinement, which led to prison reforms in Colorado and elsewhere. He has also produced seven films for PBS/NOVA, including Infinite Universe Revealed and Rise of the Drones, and more than a dozen films for National Geographic’s “Specials” unit.
Michael Rohatyn - Director-Producer
Producer/Director Michael Rohatyn is a screenwriter and musician who has worked in features and documentaries such as Forty Shades of Blue (dir. Ira Sachs) and Maggie’s Plan (dir. Rebecca Miller). He scored the Emmy-nominated doc Arthur Miller: Writer for HBO. As a boy in 1975, Michael had a front row seat to many of the dramas that are featured in DROP DEAD CITY, and knew many of the players personally. Felix Rohatyn, chairman of MAC, was his father.
Don Kleszy - Editor
Don Kleszy is an award winning film editor who’s recent work includes Nazi Town USA, for American Experience; Downfall: The Case Against Boeing for Netflix; and Woodstock: Three Days That Defined a Generation, also for American Experience. He was the recipient of the 2014 IDA Award for Best Editing, honoring his work on Last Days in Vietnam, Rory Kennedy’s Academy Award nominated feature documentary. Don also received a 2016 Emmy nod, for Outstanding Editing – Documentary and Long Form, for his work on Last Days in Vietnam. In addition, many of the docs he has edited have received Emmy nominations, including Makers: Women in War; The Poisoner’s Handbook; Oswald’s Ghost; and Guerrilla: The Taking of Patty Hearst.
Jerry Risius - Camerman
Jerry Risius has a 25-year plus career dedicated to documentary cinematography. His collaborators include: HBO, Showtime, PBS (Frontline, NOVA, Nature, Wide-Angle, Independent Lens), CNN, and National Geographic, among others. He has worked on Oscar-winning and Oscar-nominated documentaries and his television work has won multiple Emmys and two Peabodys, among other festival awards. He has worked with directors ranging from Edet Belzberg to Amy Berg; From Rachel Boynton to Ricki Stern & Anna Sundberg. He shot Mann V Ford for HBO, as well as the acclaimed films The Devil Came on Horseback and Our Brand is Crisis. Recently, he has shot multiple episodes of the acclaimed CNN series, Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown.
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