NEWS INDEX Archives 2005 October

Passes for Roger Ebert's Overlooked Film Festival go on sale Nov. 1

Craig Chamberlain, News Editor
217-333-2894; cdchambe@uiuc.edu

10/18/05

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Festival passes will go on sale Nov. 1 for the eighth annual Roger Ebert’s Overlooked Film Festival, to be held April 26-30 at the Virginia Theater in Champaign, Ill., and at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

The passes, which cover all screenings during the five-day event, are $85, the same price as for the 2005 festival. They can be purchased through the theater box office (phone: 217-356-9063; fax: 217-356-5729) or through TicketWeb by way of the festival Web site (www.ebertfest.com).

Tickets for individual films will be $9 each and available April 3.

The 1,000 festival passes available for the 2005 “Ebertfest” sold out in February, almost two months before the event, according to Mary Susan Britt, the festival’s assistant director. This marked the first time the passes had sold out even before the films were announced, she said. The same number of passes will be available again this year.

Ebert, a 1964 Illinois journalism graduate, adjunct professor and Pulitzer
Prize-winning journalist, will again host the event and select the films that he believes have been overlooked by audiences, critics and distributors. The lineup of films, along with additional information on film-associated guests and other festival events, will be announced several weeks before the festival.

Updates on the festival, an event of Illinois’ College of Communications, will be posted on the festival Web site.

Sponsors and volunteers for the festival are being sought. Those interested should contact Britt at 217-244-0552, or by e-mail at marsue@uiuc.edu.