Experiential director Mikhael Tara Garver has joined commercial production company Furlined. She has been creating immersive entertainment and brand experiences for more than 15 years, connecting innovative live experiences to multiple media platforms.
Her clients have included BBDO Minneapolis, Serino/Coyne, Diageo, AMC Network–for Breaking Bad, Mad Men and The Walking Dead–and The Museum of Drug Policy. For the latter Garver created a place where art, politics and live performance came together to bridge nations in their quest to reframe the conversation on drug policy. The installation covered 14,000 square feet, garnered 5,000 attendees and over 158 million social media impressions.
Garver has created entertainment that lives in subways, on Facebook, in museums, through abandoned buildings, on personal phones, and inside rock clubs, to name a few. She ties event-making to organic social sharing, building immersive movements. Garver is currently directing the first immersive commission with The Goodman Theatre in Chicago, a citywide project in disused post offices. She is also leading a national conversation series entitled Breaking and Building the Walls of Immersive Work. As an educator and thought leader in the sphere of human social behavior, community engagement, deep media and entertainment, Garver lectures at NYU, Columbia University and Yale.
“I’m moved when the work really connects people to something greater than themselves, when it connects them with others and to stories that help shift perceptions to discover the poetry of the everyday” said Garver. She is adept at integrating live activations with technology and music, as evidenced by her work for the band Great Caesar at SXSW. Garver invented a way for people to follow the band as they ventured into the massive SXSW festival; with simple technology, secret installations and collateral materials, fans had the opportunity to have multi-sensory experiences of the band.
“In the Wild West of the immersive industry, it’s incredible to have the support of the Furlined team and their collaboration as we navigate the exciting new realms of immersive brand content,” said Garver of her new roost.
Diane McArter, founder and president of Furlined, said she’s looking forward to collaborating with Garver, “venturing into the future of storytelling for brands and audiences.”
Review: Malcolm Washington Makes His Feature Directing Debut With “The Piano Lesson”
An heirloom piano takes on immense significance for one family in 1936 Pittsburgh in August Wilson's "The Piano Lesson." Generational ties also permeate the film adaptation, in which Malcolm Washington follows in his father Denzel Washington's footsteps in helping to bring the entirety of The Pittsburgh Cycle — a series of 10 plays — to the screen.
Malcolm Washington did not start from scratch in his accomplished feature filmmaking debut. He enlisted much of the cast from the recent Broadway revival with Samuel L. Jackson (Doaker Charles), his brother, John David Washington (Boy Willie), Ray Fisher (Lymon) and Michael Potts (Whining Boy). Berniece, played by Danielle Brooks in the play, is now beautifully portrayed by Danielle Deadwyler. With such rich material and a cast for whom it's second nature, it would be hard, one imagines, to go wrong. Jackson's own history with the play goes back to its original run in 1987 when he was Boy Willie.
It's not the simplest thing to make a play feel cinematic, but Malcolm Washington was up to the task. His film opens up the world of the Charles family beyond the living room. In fact, this adaptation, which Washington co-wrote with "Mudbound" screenwriter Virgil Williams, goes beyond Wilson's text and shows us the past and the origins of the intricately engraved piano that's central to all the fuss. It even opens on a big, action-filled set piece in 1911, during which the piano is stolen from a white family's home. Another fleshes out Doaker's monologue in which he explains to the uninitiated, Fisher's Lymon, and the audience, the tortured history of the thing. While it might have been nice to keep the camera on Jackson, such a great, grounding presence throughout, the good news is that he really makes... Read More