It’s not just all about the film screenings at the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival (KVIFF), whose 60th edition takes over the Czech Republic July 3-11. For folks working in film, TV, publishing and beyond, there is also business to be done at the expanded and broadened Industry Days program of the festival.
Hugo Rosák, head of the KVIFF Film Industry Office, has been particularly busy this year, preparing for innovations, extensions and tweaks to existing events under the umbrella of the big Czech festival.
And his team has loaded up on star power for the program running July 5-8, with David Chase coming to town for a session entitled “The Sopranos and Beyond: David Chase on Storytelling, Television, and the Future of Creative Risk,” writer, producer and actor Sharon Horgan and director Andrij Parekh (Succession) discussing “The Cinematic Series: Storytelling in the Age of Streaming,” and a spotlight on Jude Law‘s production company Riff Raff Entertainment with co-founder and producer Ben Jackson and Katie Sinclair, head of film and TV, among other programming with big names.
In a conversation about what the 2026 edition of the KVIFF industry programs will bring, whether new, improved or traditional, Rosák told THR about the need to constantly evolve in line with industry trends and needs, how the rise of AI and microdramas will be reflected in the program this year, and why the film industry shouldn’t feel safe.
Let’s start off by talking about some of the new things this year. You have unveiled 11 directors for the second edition of your KVIFF Central Stage showcase of films in the works, and you are presenting the inaugural Book-to-Screen program.
Yeah, it’s always about where an industry platform can help. The idea is that within the ecosystem we should play a certain role that can support filmmakers but also the wider industry. In our context, we really try to look at the region of Central and Eastern Europe and identify some of the things that maybe could be improved.
The issue of books actually came up quite naturally, because we saw that even though other markets have similar events, they don’t necessarily provide the chance to select books from our region. So when the possibility to partner with the Frankfurter Buchmesse came up, we felt that made a lot of sense. Adaptation rights in the region don’t work the same way as they do, say, in France or Germany or other parts of the world. Oftentimes, for producers, it’s actually very difficult, especially for independent producers, to access book titles, and the authors don’t always give up the adaptation rights to the publishing houses, but keep them. Sometimes, they give them up without necessarily being able to evaluate the different options and opportunities they have.
So, we saw the need to level out the field a little bit and offer a space where independent producers have access to and see the different titles that we helped select and, through partners, get access to the publishing world. We also wanted to start a discussion, so we will have a think tank this year to have conversations to really identify some of the issues that are missing or that are maybe problematic and that could use some support. Hopefully, next year in Karlovy Vary, we will already have a list of recommendations, or some white paper.
What role did the Berlinale book adaptation initiative have on KVIFF?
This whole idea of book adaptations is actually coming from the Berlin market. We were inspired by it, and with their kind support, we picked up the region of Central and Eastern Europe.
And adaptations can be film or series?
We’re leaving that open. A story is a story, and it’s really up to you how you see it best dealt with. So we are not saying it needs to be a cinematic type of story as nowadays series offer more time, more opportunities to go deeper with stories. So it’s open in both directions. I think these worlds are not that divided. Producers oftentimes work across both formats nowadays, and the same is true for writers and directors.
How about emerging formats?
We hope to also address other elements and formats that are on screen. This year we will dedicate some time to vertical microcramas. I see that as part of how the landscape in cinema, and in the audiovisual industry in general, is transforming so rapidly. I see the need for producers to start diversifying a little bit what they do, because they will ultimately have to face moments of survival.
So I want to focus on this idea that stories can be told in many different ways, and as producers or directors, different channels through which we work in different formats can allow us to continue doing the things we care about deeply. We are seeing this huge boom in Asia and the U.S. with the formats that are connected to phones, and even though it’s a completely different structure of storytelling, it also still requires people behind to create and craft them.
We also face, I believe, in Central Europe this issue of production value, especially with series and TV. We hope that all production value can grow, and ideally that can make different stories more exportable, so we also will have a deep dive into which tools producers can use to improve the production value.
Does this include AI?
This, of course, touches on AI as well, even though we don’t want to go into this saying, “Hey, look, there is AI!” We really want to offer some practical tools that producers can use and that they can discuss with different studios in terms of how they can be used, at what cost and in what way.
You have unveiled 11 directors for the second edition of your KVIFF Central Stage showcase, and they are not so much new faces but people with experience. Why is that?
Again, we really try to identify where we could be helpful and useful. In this case, we saw a gap in terms of how different markets and festivals support directors and producers who have already been working on their films, have already been to festivals, but who still don’t have it any easier to put together a film in the financing stage.
So, we are trying to put a better spotlight on them, give them a chance to show how they are thinking about their films, and give these usually already experienced teams, who have been working together in the current systems and still struggle to find all the money they need, a stage.
In collaboration with the U.S. embassies in Bratislava and Prague and Film Independent, the Los Angeles-based non-profit organization supporting independent filmmakers, KVIFF Industry Days will also host the U.S. Department of State’s Global Media Makers Residency, a program for 14–20 independent producers from the Czech Republic and Slovakia that is designed as an intensive, hands-on residency. Tell me about that!
We’ve been following the work of Film Independent, which is this organization in the U.S. that’s trying to bridge basically Hollywood and the rest of the world and connect filmmakers who work on independent films. For a long time, it was a bit difficult to find ways to collaborate simply for financial reasons, but this year it happened. They were able to find a grant with which we could select 15 producers.
I don’t mean to sound too pessimistic, but I really believe that in the next couple of years the world of filmmaking, in terms of how it’s financed and how films are sold, which is already going through rapid changes, will face even greater threats because there will be less funding available. I think fewer films will get to be made at the levels we were used to.
So I think filmmakers need to at least learn how to also work a little bit differently, or have slightly alternative plans. And the U.S. is an interesting system because it’s so different from Europe in terms of funding and how it relies a lot more on private equity. Putting films together is a matter of investment as well, so in order for you to put together an indie film, you need to really also package it and put it together differently. You need to think of the audience, you need to convince someone of the story, so it’s a different path from looking to convince boards of film funds to support you for cultural purposes. So, there are things we need to learn from the U.S. funding model and marketing.
Jude Law’s production firm Riff Raff Entertainment will also be in focus at Karlovy Vary!
Yes, we selected Riff Raff Entertainment as a production company in the spotlight. It is an interesting company in terms of how they compose their slate, how they work with talent and how they develop films. So, we want to hear a little bit about how they are thinking about it, what they do and how they see the future.
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