January 2003			Utter Anxiety The Soul of Programming	E Line Sports Q&A Classes From the Field First-Person Letters Huskiana
		Byron Hurt, AS'93 Deep down inside, I knew. I was not a public relations guy. By 1999, I’d worked as a media relations specialist for nearly a year. In reality, I was a budding documentary filmmaker who, after a minor setback, was afraid to pursue his passion. Prior to landing the PR job, I had written, co-produced, and directed "I Am a Man," a documentary about black masculine identity in American culture. When the film was screened for audiences throughout the country, many considered it a perfect fit for PBS. I thought—perhaps naively—that "I Am a Man" would catapult my filmmaking career to the stars. I would be mentioned in the same breath as documentary luminaries Michael Moore, Ken Burns, and, my favorite, the late Marlon Riggs. But after I submitted the final version of the film to my major funder, the National Black Programming Consortium (NBPC), I received a letter stating that "I Am a Man" had “structural problems” and would not “meet PBS technical specifications.” NBPC also withheld my final grant installment, $15,000, and refused to release it until the project met their expectations. The documentary film that had taken me nearly five years to complete took less than two weeks for NBPC to reject. My confidence, along with my ego, was shattered. I had virtually no money, and my production company, God Bless the Child Productions, was thousands of dollars in debt from outstanding production costs. I needed a “real” job and time to think about my next move. So when Northeastern’s associate director of public relations offered me a job, I gladly accepted. At first, the job seemed like a godsend. I desperately needed income, and the distraction from my film-production woes gave me a much-needed break. I had a cozy office and friendly co-workers. I was inexperienced, but I learned the job quickly and worked hard. I thought a decent-paying gig with benefits would make me forget about my halted film project and career as a documentarian. I was dead wrong. After a few months on the job, I realized I was hiding from my production problems and from the career I truly wanted to pursue. And when I was really being honest with myself, I knew that my office belonged to someone who hungered for the job. I felt like a fraud, standing in the way of someone else’s dream, because I was afraid of embracing my own. But I was scared to make a bold move. I created excuses and let my fear of failure hold me back. Then, one day, when I was alone in my office, a voice in my head said, “Byron, it’s either now or never.” At that moment, I knew I had to stop dreaming about being a documentarian and become one. Five months shy of my thirtieth birthday, I submitted my letter of resignation. A month later, I packed my bags and moved back into my parents’ house on Long Island to resume my career. I had no job on the horizon, no resources for producing another documentary, no contacts in New York. Nothing. All I had was $3,000 saved from my stint at NU, supportive loved ones, and a burning desire to live my dream. It turns out that was all I ever needed. I set up an office in my childhood bedroom and made some personal and professional goals. I tied up all unfinished business with "I Am a Man," and for a year worked as a production assistant for Harlem-based award-winning documentarian Stanley Nelson. I began to feel like my career was back on track. After Nelson’s film on Marcus Garvey wrapped in November 2000, I decided my next challenge was to launch my second documentary project. During the two-week window before Stanley’s next venture, I wrote the film treatment and proposal for what would become my second film, "Beyond Beats and Rhymes," a documentary about masculinity in rap music and hip-hop culture. Ironically, the National Black Programming Consortium awarded me $50,000 in production money. My proposal was one of three it selected from seventy-seven submissions. I was thrilled, and my confidence was back. Shortly after NBPC gave me the good news, Nelson offered to serve as my project’s executive producer to help secure resources. Things were falling into place. However, NBPC’s funding covered only a quarter of my production budget. When Nelson told me about a San Francisco–based organization called Independent Television Service (ITVS), I applied for its upcoming open call for funding. I made it to the final round, with a final decision to come in mid-September. Then came 9/11. Resources for documentaries were poured into projects that dealt with terrorism, American foreign policy, and U.S.-Muslim relations. Needless to say, ITVS turned down my proposal. Over the next year, I reached out to twelve other funding sources, and made a second attempt to get funding from ITVS. Every rejection only strengthened my resolve. Almost three years to the day that I left PR, an ITVS official notified me that I had been selected out of a pool of more than 250 applicants for funds—to the tune of $291,612. In fact, the ITVS funding would ensure I had the money I needed to get my project shot and edited. I’m finally what I always wanted to be: a documentary filmmaker living in New York. Watch out, Michael Moore. Here comes Byron Hurt.