Media and storytelling have always been powerful ways to inform, persuade and generate empathy — key ingredients in bringing about social change. Not too long ago, I wrote about Pop Culture Collaborative, which focuses on harnessing viral videos, film and other forms of media to do just that. I’ve also explored the phenomenon known as “filmanthropy,” in which deep-pocketed funders support documentary films that seek to motivate and inform as they entertain. Increasingly, funders are using a range of media in similar ways to change hearts and minds as a path toward making a difference.
Other funders working in the space include venture capitalist Ted Leonsis, who bankrolled “Nanking,” a Sundance film about the 1937 Nanking Massacre. Leonsis has said of filmanthropy that “it brings together philanthropy and understanding how media works. You’re going to see a lot of people doing this because a studio probably wouldn’t do a story like this.” Filmmaker Lilly Hartley and her late husband Jeffrey Tarrant funded Candescent Films through their family foundation to support documentaries that illuminate social issues.
Then there’s Safe Space Pictures Foundation, a media production company in New York and Los Angeles that works at the intersection of film and philanthropy. Their inaugural film “A Private War” was a biopic about war correspondent Marie Colvin, and their new documentary, “Battleground,” tells the story about the fight for the future of abortion rights in America.
The foundation was cofounded by Jeff Sobrato, from the third generation of the billionaire Sobrato family and Nicole Shipley, a film producer. I recently connected with the duo to find out more about Safe Space and their take on how filmmaking and philanthropy can work in concert to influence the public.
A collaboration is born
Safe Space Pictures Foundation was launched in 2020 by Shipley, who serves as CEO, and Sobrato, who serves as board chair. Shipley’s husband Jaden Levitt is president. Shipley and Sobrato have been friends since their high school days in the Bay Area and kept in touch when they moved down to Los Angeles.
“We were both really passionate about film, and drawn to stories focused on a perspective that wasn’t really highlighted by mainstream media. But at the same time, film is so risky as a personal investment. So we wanted to find a way to invest funds for impact. And we discovered that you could use money from a foundation and invest it into feature films that met a strict criteria,” Shipley explained.
Sobrato said Safe Space primarily uses debt, equity and grant funding to support filmmakers and their work. On the equity front, that takes the form of mission-related investments (MRIs), and to a lesser extent, program-related investments (PRIs). While many might be familiar with PRIs, which must primarily serve a charitable purpose and in many respects are treated similarly to grants for tax purposes, an MRI is fundamentally a financial investment rather than a grant. Safe Space tends to use traditional grants for impact campaigns and also uses crowdfunding to do its work.
“I think Nicole’s aligned with me on this. We are only interested in making stuff that’s not preaching to the choir. We don’t think it creates a lot of impact if you’re not creating something that is going to generate new perspectives,” Sobrato explained.
Sobrato supports Safe Space through a donor-advised fund and through funds from his family foundation. When I profiled three generations of the Sobrato family earlier this year, they explained that they give under the umbrella of Sobrato Philanthropies, a multipronged entity that holds some $920 million in assets. A key aspect of the family’s giving is that they donate as a collective through the Sobrato Family Foundation, and also through several donor-advised funds at Silicon Valley Community Foundation so family members and couples can engage in more personal giving.
Like other, younger members of philanthropic families, Jeff Sobrato and his older brother John Matthew have pushed the family to embrace more social-justice-oriented causes.
Underrepresented narratives
Directed by Cynthia Lowen, Safe Space’s latest film, “Battleground,” premiered at the 2022 Tribeca Festival, and follows three women in charge of antiabortion organizations devoted to overturning Roe v. Wade. Shipley told me she was drawn to the film because it helps address the “believability gap,” showing how media-savvy, well-organized people on the right have been playing the long game, even as many others assumed a half-century of precedent would never be upended. “Battleground” will screen around the country starting in New York in early October.
Another upcoming film, “Fairyland,” is told from the eyes of filmmaker Alysia Abbott, who grew up with her widowed father, poet and gay activist Steve Abbott — who passed away from AIDS complications in the early 1990s.
Jeff Sobrato said that films so far have run the gamut, covering issues like sustainability, reproductive rights and criminal justice reform. And with a background in financing, Sobrato and Shipley both saw an opportunity for the creative side of filmmaking and the financing side of filmmaking to have a better relationship.
“A lot of philanthropy that goes into film comes from firms that basically provide completion financing from wealthy individuals that have no real connection. They aren’t in early. They aren’t necessarily in communication with the actual filmmakers,” Sobrato said.
Shipley added that Safe Space is eager to work with philanthropists and family foundations on issues that they are already passionate about. “We can then connect them with filmmakers who can amplify those issues, which is what we’ve done,” she said.