Mayhem Film Festival is returning to Broadway Cinema this October as a condensed “skeleton” edition in response to the coronavirus outbreak.
Nottingham’s premier festival for horror, sci-fi and cult cinema will take place from 15 - 18 October 2020 with a smaller film line-up to accommodate safety measures. The nickname “Skeleton Mayhem” has been chosen to reflect this smaller-scale approach to the event.
The festival will be held at its long-standing venue, Broad St.’s Broadway Cinema, which plans to open its doors again in September. Each screening will have limited capacity in order to maintain social distancing. In addition, the option to purchase full festival passes will be unavailable this year, with moviegoers instead having to buy an individual ticket for each film.
In the announcement, festival directors Steven Sheil and Chris Cooke said: “We’re really pleased to bring Mayhem back to Broadway Cinema for this year’s edition.
"The disruption of the pandemic has obviously meant changes in the way we do things, but we’re looking forward to welcoming back our audience to this year’s festival - temporarily slimmed-down from our normal programme - with the plan to be fully fleshed-out again next year.”
Programming for the festival will soon be underway, as the Mayhem team recently attended the Cannes’ Virtual Market to find new films to screen at the event. The deadline for short film submissions - which director Chris Cooke says are ““still beating at the dark heart of the festival” - has also been extended to 31 July.
Broadway’s marketing director, Stewart Terry, added: “Mayhem is a key part of Broadway’s programme and it would have been disappointing if it didn’t happen in some form this year. We’ve been working closely with the Mayhem team to get to a point where we can present it in a way that is safe for audiences but doesn’t compromise on the experience and quality Mayhemians have come to expect.”
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