After 17 seasons the Williamstown Film Festival is calling it quits. The nonprofit’s board of directors recently voted to close the Festival because of financial pressures, time constraints and the emergence of the affiliated Images Cinema as an event programmer.“To go to the next level and survive in this environment we’d have to staff differently, we’d have to fundraise differently and we’d have to have a realistic goal of selling a lot more tickets,” said board president Joe Finnegan. “That’s what caused the current board to say why don’t we close this chapter and see where we go next.”
Launched in 1999, the Festival has showcased independent films and hosted actors like Paul Newman, Patricia Clarkson and Alec Baldwin. Last year the Festival was reprogrammed to focus on documentaries and live performance.
This story will be updated.
