It's been a week since D.C. received the sad news that HBO was pulling its sponsorship of Screen on the Green, the popular outdoor summer film festival on the National Mall. In that time, there has been a flurry of activity by devotees attempting to salvage the festival for this summer and hopefully into the future. Two Facebook groups sprung up almost immediately looking for support for saving SotG, and late last week the two merged into one, now over 1700 members strong. Of course, creating and getting members into a Facebook group is easy and largely a symbolic gesture taken on its own. What's pleasantly surprising is that the group's organizer, D.C. Council staffer Jesse Rauch, is taking real and substantive steps to find a new sponsor. After speaking to HBO, Rauch was able to find out the budget necessary to put on the series — $150,000 — and has been in contact with movie studio representatives and the MPAA about sponsorship, all thanks to contacts within the Facebook group.
