Film-School Graduate Goes Straight To Video-Store Job

May 12, 2004 | Issue 40•19

SANTA MONICA, CA—The theatrical career of recent USC School of Cinema-Television graduate Neil Hemmitt was put on hold indefinitely as the aspiring director went straight to video-store clerking Monday. "The big studios never gave me a chance," Hemmitt said, as he shelved a Big Fish DVD at Blockbuster. "But it's because they didn't understand me." Hemmitt's producers, Harold and Francine Hemmitt, pulled his financial support in March, after calling his predicament "hardly original."