CoMPANY Films, the production house headed by executive producers Richard Goldstein and Ron Cicero, has added documentarian Sam Hobkinson to its directorial roster for representation in the U.S. spanning commercials and branded content. Just yesterday (12/15), the 2021 Sundance Film Festival’s lineup was unveiled. It included Hobkinson’s Misha and the Wolves which was one of 10 documentaries that made the cut for Sundance’s World Cinema Documentary Competition.
Hobkinson directed and wrote Misha and the Wolves, which he was in postproduction on at press time. The documentary centers on a women’s Holocaust memoir which takes the world by storm but a fallout with her publisher-turned-detective reveals her story as an audacious deception created to hide a darker truth. Hobkinson said of Misha and the Wolves, “It’s a passion project that I have been working on–on and off–for the last five years. We just started filming when the pandemic hit, so it’s a miracle that it exists at all.”
Currently Hobkinson is also making a major splash with Fear City, which is the top rated documentary series on Netflix in the U.S., Canada and Ireland.
Cicero contacted Hobkinson after viewing Fear City, a three-part docuseries chronicling the takedown of New York City’s five mob bosses in the ‘70s. “Sam (Hobkinson) has a very precise, composed, cinematic, beautifully art-directed style that is well suited for commercial and branding work,” assessed Cicero. “It separates his work from other docu-style approaches. Sam relishes the challenge to take the narrative into the short form of commercial spots.”
Hobkinson related, “To be able to use my style in short sharp bursts of narrative or pithy, witty character observations in the commercial world is very attractive to me. My documentaries often present the real as hyper-real, and I feel commercial work will allow me to push that further.”
The director added, “More than anything, a strong story that twists and turns and an emotional resonance are key–oh, and fantastic characters. Finding all in the same true story is a tricky thing to do. Ultimately a body of work is a mixture between what you pursue and what comes to you, so mine can look a bit widespread in terms of theme. The projects that I have actively pursued and become passionate about have a few linking themes. My other docs, The Love of Books, The Hunt for the Boston Bombers and Fear City are all panoramic stories of cities at the most dramatic points in their history, told through characters who experienced them. Treasures from the Wreck of the Unbelievable explores themes of belief and myth- making which have attracted me to other projects.”
Hobkinson joining CoMPANY Films marks his first production company representation in the ad arena.
