Private Project

Thin Blue Variety Show

On a day in the life behind your television, five personified cop costumes attempt to guard the line of justice under rising pressures.

Thin Blue Variety Show has played at Fantastic Fest, Hollyshorts, Fantasia Film Festival, Woodstock Film Festival, Bushwick Film Festival and The Social Justice Film Festival, where it won a gold prize for best documentary short.

  • Gretta Wilson
    Director + Animator
    Mizuko (Producer), I Want You Back, Talented Lisbaums
  • Kyle Andrews
    Producer
    Chicken Killer, Kill (What Would Tilda Swinton Do).
  • Adam Giannone
    Key Cast
    "Narrator"
    Involution, Virt
  • Max Philips
    Sound Design
  • Ben White
    VFX
  • Project Type:
    Animation, Experimental, Short
  • Genres:
    Comedy, Satire, Police
  • Runtime:
    3 minutes 30 seconds
  • Completion Date:
    December 8, 2019
  • Production Budget:
    2,000 USD
  • Country of Origin:
    United States
  • Country of Filming:
    United States
  • Language:
    English
  • Shooting Format:
    Digital Stop Motion
  • Aspect Ratio:
    16:9
  • Film Color:
    Color
  • First-time Filmmaker:
    No
  • Student Project:
    No
  • Fantasia Film Festival
    Montreal
    Canada
    August 31, 2020
    World Premiere
  • Woodstock Film Festival
    Woodstock, New York
    September 30, 2020
    US Premiere
  • Fantastic Fest
    Austin, Texas
    September 30, 2020
    Texas Premiere
  • Social Justice Film Festival
    Seattle, Washington
    Best Documentary Short
  • Hollyshorts
    Hollywood, CA
    United States
    November 11, 2020
    California
  • Bushwick Film Festival
    Brooklyn, NY
  • Blackbird Film Festival
    Cortland, NY
  • Another Hole in the Head
    San Francisco, California
  • Chattanooga Film Festival
    Chattanooga, Tennessee
Director Biography

Gretta Wilson is a director and producer based in New York City. Her short films have played at festivals like Hollyshorts, Fantastic Fest, Fantasia Film Festival and Woodstock Film Festival, and her work in documentary and fashion at the cult fashion magazine Nylon has garnered hundreds of thousands of views across all platforms. She has produced films that have gone on to play at SXSW and IDFA, and has collaborated with companies ranging from Vogue and Vice to the Hubbell Foundation.

Gretta is fascinated with the way pop culture effects public consciousness. A fanatic movie trivia enthusiast, her genre-bending films mix distinctly American archetypes to shed new light on old stories.

Add Director Biography
Director Statement

I grew up in a police family, the child of two 80s cop movie fanatics. As I got older, I was drawn to a certain discrepancy - how movie cops who sidestep bureaucracy to follow a hunch are still heralded as heroes, yet the real life police officers who trust their guts over protocol kill hundreds of black and Brown Americans every year.

In making this film, I wanted to twist the idea of "Blue Lives” to explore the complicated legacy of movie cops and their real-life counterparts, questioning the consequences of letting any individual enforce so-called justice.