Cary B.
5/5
The MOTION PICTURE & TELEVISION FUND's Wasserman Campus provides a place to thrive for retired industry professionals.
The campus is entered via Stephen Spielberg Drive. The 22 acre site is beautifully maintained with walking paths through manicured gardens, Koi ponds, topiaries, statues, cottages, apartments, a state-of-the-art movie theater, production facility, exercise and pool complex, libraries, medical facilities, dining rooms, and much, much more.
Eligibility requires years of activity in the motion picture and/or television Industries. You must be 70 years or older to register to be able to share "war" stories with your funny, warm, and brilliant colleagues. Certain medical conditions allow for earlier entry.
I registered at MPTF at 70 years. Thirteen years later, I updated my application from Inactive to Active.
Then, the process gets serious.
Admission required supplying years of industry, medical and financial records. Even our dog's vaccination record is required.
After analysing our records, we are invited to 3 hours of meetings with a social worker, nurse, recreational therapist, and the move-in coordinator. Each listened to our personal experiences and painted a picture of what to expect at MPTF. Several hours later, a telephone call notified my wife and myself, that we are invited to join the community.
We hired a downsizing expert to help with the move. Seems that living for years in the same home leads to collections of things, many, many things.
After days of packing and donating, Precision Moving, led by a team headed by Jose, moved us in a couple of days. (Not a single item was broken.)
We moved into a modern, comfortable cottage, surrounded by mature trees, flowers, and topiaries.
We are greeted by welcoming, warm colleagues and MPTF's staff. Quite honestly, it feels as though we are joining a production on the first day of a shoot.
There are 4 dining rooms. Our's is decorated with sessional displays and actor's photos. The oversized chairs are comfortable. Colorful tableclothes cover your assigned table, although you can switch tables at will. The menu changes daily. Three meals are served daily by a professional/volunteer staff. Warm entrees are delivered under protective lids. My wife and I find them quite good. I'm doing a bit of vegan cooking in our cottage's tiny kitchen, although Chef Dan's encompassing menu includes vegan dishes.
We have viewed several first run films in the 240 seat Louis B. Mayer Theater. The sound and picture are sharp and clear.
Religious services are held in the John Ford Chapel. The small building is partially constructed of parts from Mr. Ford's western features.
At a community meeting with Executive Chef Dan and members of MPTF staff, the residents discussed additions and changes to the current menu. I'm told many of the suggestions are followed. An electric cart carried us to the event across campus. Last week I was on camera introducing an animation for MPTF's private TV channel.
If you're wondering how MPTF came to life, here's the story.
The glare of electric current arcing between carbon rods produced choking smoke. Movie making required unwieldy, dangerous equipment. Production hours are impossibly long. Stunts, often too real. The "below-the-line" workers, the "little people" lived and died in poverty.
Something needed to be done.
Relief began when actress Mary Pickford placed coin boxes on stages and in commissaries where employed workers could drop spare change to help support unemployed colleagues.
Over a hundred years ago "The Motion Picture Relief Fund" officially came to life by the actions of "above-the-line" actors, Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, and director, D.W. Griffith. They realized the need to reach out to those in the business who fell upon hard times.
Today, top industry professionals (i.e., director, Steven Spielberg and actors, George Clooney, Tom Cruise and Jodie Foster) support and help grow the renamed The Motion Picture & Television Fund.
MPTF's slogan,"We Take Care Of Our Own," says it all.
