Phil Hartman's 'No Picnic' Returns to Film Forum in 4K
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- Phil Hartman wrote and directed 'No Picnic' in summer 1985, capturing the East Village's downtown demimonde with a crew that used an old VW bus as their production van, per a Film Forum note from Hartman
- 'No Picnic' won at Sundance in 1987 and played six weeks at Anthology Film Archives in 1990, where Village Voice critic Manohla Dargis called it 'the one movie about the East Village that gets it right'
- Wim Wenders' Grey City served as executive producers on the original production, and Wenders' editor Peter Pryzgodda later helped Hartman finish post-production; Christine Vachon served as assistant sound editor
- Hartman co-founded Two Boots Pizza with proceeds from the film to fund post-production, and the restaurant remains a New York institution; he also co-owned The Great Jones Cafe, which brought Cajun cooking to downtown
- The cast of the restored film includes David Brisbin, Richard Hell, Steve Buscemi, and Luis Guzmán, per Film Forum
- The Film Desk handled the 4K restoration, and IndieWire exclusively shared the fresh trailer for the Film Forum run
Why it matters: Hartman funneled the film's earnings into co-founding Two Boots Pizza, meaning a pizza empire still standing today was seeded by an indie movie most New Yorkers have never seen — and the restored print running April 17–23 is likely the widest audience the film has had since its 1990 Anthology run.
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