AUSTIN, Texas -- The city best known for its heat, food and fun has become the psuedo home to the TV industry this weekend as the ATX TV Festival returns to the city for its 4th year -- or "season," as they call it.
This, of course, is not the first festival to make roots in Texas. Austin is already home to SXSW and the Austin City Limits music festival, among several others, but ATX is no doubt one of the quickest to take root.
Just four years ago, the festival was "7 people in a room," jokes co-founder Emily Gipson. This year, they will take over the 1,200-seat Paramount Theater for a Gilmore Girls reunion panel.
Previously, Gipson and fellow co-founder Caitlin McFarland, both Texas natives who've worked a smorgasbord of behind the scenes jobs in the TV industry, say the attendance reflected word-of-mouth growth. But this year, "it kind of exploded in the best way," Gipson told Mashable Friday night, at the festival's opening night screening of USA's new drama Complications.
"It's not like we lost control if it, but it's just a different feeling," she says.
Opening night red carpet moments! A photo posted by atxfestival (@atxfestival) on Jun 4, 2015 at 6:00pm PDT
Some of that is because of the aforementioned Gilmore event. The day it was announced, badge sales tripled, McFarland said.
But their hope is that people buy for Gilmore and stay for the overall experience, as it's one the duo has worked hard to maintain.
In addition to reunions and individual show panels, which allow networks and studios to pimp their upcoming and existing shows, the festival hosts events aimed at bringing Austin creatives together with industry success stories.
For example, on Friday morning, there's a live Pitch Competition where ten finalists get a chance to present their TV show idea to a panel of insiders in front of a crowd. The winner gets a development meeting with one of the judges and a chance to pitch to one of the festival's network partners.
Here we go! #ATX #PowerTV pic.twitter.com/Gm021YaTXN— Joy Phillips (@Joyyynpain) June 4, 2015
That balance -- between servicing the festival fans, the local industry and the bigger Hollywood machine -- is something the MacFarland and Gipson have seemingly aced with the still-young fest, but they still aim to keep it as sacred as possible.
"We don't want it to get too big," says Gipson. "There's something cool about that."
Hollywood heating up
The last 15 years or so have seen Austin's TV and Film production industry come to life in a major way.
Oscar winner Boyhood and ABC's American Crime, and From Dusk Till Dawn, which airs on Robert Rodriguez's El Rey Network, are among the recent productions to set up in the area.
"[Hollywood] realizes it's a great place," says Rodriguez, a longtime supporter of the local industry who filmed his Spy Kids and Sin City films in Austin. "It's receptive to genre films and cool films and TV series -- especially now with this Festival -- and people want to get out of their own jaded town and come somewhere where people are more excited."
Actors and creators, too, seemingly have no problem with heading down south for their work.
Girl Meets World creator Michael Jacobs postponed a week of production on the spin-off so that he could bring his stars to the festival, where the cast of Boy Meets World came together for a much buzzed about 20th Anniversary reunion. Just days later Disney officially picked up Girl Meets World.
"I love it here," Jacobs said. "We just went to [Mexican restaurant] Iron Cactus, we're going to go to [pizza joint] Home Slice later. We know where to go ... I'm happy to be part of this, really."
The sold-out ATX Television Festival is taking place through Sunday in Austin. A full list of events, including some for those without badges, is available on the festival website.