There’s no business like show business, suggests the popular tune by Irving Berlin.
And there’s no better time to get into show business than now, according to the founders of Costa Mesa-based Burba Hotel Network LLC, who made their debut as film producers this past weekend at the South by Southwest Film Festival in Austin, Texas.
Burba Hotel Network is branching into the entertainment industry, encouraged by the improving global economy and steady growth in its main line of business: producing conferences that feature A-list keynoters and plenty of sizzle as they play matchmaker for hotel developers and investors around the world.
President and cofounder Jim Burba himself has described it as “the real estate piece of the hotel industry.” “It’s the capital markets side of the hotel industry,” according to Burba. “It’s the Wall Street guys—it’s the Main Street guys. It’s anybody who buys, sells and builds hotels.”
The company hosts eight conferences a year and plans to launch a ninth next month in Singapore. Its 2013 revenue was $8 million, up about 20% from a year earlier.
“We grow when the economies grow, and the world’s been a better place in the last couple of years than it has been five years ago,” Burba said. The “hospitality-related investment, travel and tourism segments are growing. We think the next three to five years will be particularly good, and this is a better time to try to launch something than it might have been, say, in 2009.”
“Space Station 76”
Burba and his business partner, Vice President Bob Hayes, invested some of their recent gains in “Space Station 76,” a sci-fi dramatic comedy by actor-turned-director Jack Plotnick.
Burba and Hayes share the “producer” title with 13 others, including Rival Pictures in Santa Monica. They met Plotnick at a party they were throwing for Lorna Luft—a friend of theirs, and Liza Minnelli’s half-sister—in Palm Springs last year.
“He was looking for people to come on board and help get the film produced,” Hayes said. “We thought maybe this is the best opportunity for us to take the plunge into the world of entertainment, and so we signed on to the film, and it’s been a great experience.”
The duo did not disclose their share of financial commitment to the film, which had a production budget of less than $5 million and was shot “under the radar,” according to the Hollywood Reporter.
They now are putting in time and energy to promote the film, relying on what Hayes calls their “expertise in live events” and hosting “parties, press junkets and things like that.”
“Space Station 76” features A-list stars—Liv Tyler and Patrick Wilson—in an offbeat script.
“Picture your favorite 1970s TV show but placed in a space station of the future,” Hayes said. “Characters are dealing with issues [such as] gender roles, inequality in the job market, but they are on a space station. We call it a ‘dramedy’—half-comedy, half-drama.”
The new venture, aside from prospective earnings, has helped expose Hayes and Burba to the inner workings of the entertainment industry.
“It’s a financial investment—of course we hope the movie makes a lot of money, but it is an investment in our future because we are going to move more in that direction,” Hayes said. “We are definitely keeping (the) live events side of things, but we are going to move more into the side of entertainment.”
The idea to “take the plunge” has been simmering for some time, Burba said. The duo was approached five years ago by producers who were looking for recommendations on “good hotel people” to feature on a reality TV show.
“The show never saw the light of day because someone beat them to the punch, but it got us thinking about similarities in producing a live show versus producing a TV show,” he said. “Obviously there are differences, but there are a lot of similarities. You have to have a concept, you have to raise money, bring talent, you have to execute it, and you have to sell tickets.”
Reality Pitch
Burba and Hayes have formed a separate company, Burba Hayes LLC, which was “set up specifically to house activities around entertainment as opposed to the conference side of things.” They share office space with their main line of business until they “outgrow it.”
Hayes said, aside from promoting “Space Station 76,” they are looking to kick off their second venture and are out shopping a book written by a friend to “see if we can get a production deal on that.”
“I have a fantastic reality show idea—not cheesy and sleazy—that will change the narrative on how things are done if we can pull this off the way I want to,” Burba said, adding that they are not committed to just producing movies. “It’s a transition from a live to produced show, so whether it’s to a large or small screen, it doesn’t really matter, does it?”
