Richard Gere attends "Mustang - Journey of Transformation" at Tribeca Film Festival

Last week, I met filmmaker Will Parrinello at the Documentary Press Meet & Greet at the 2009 Tribeca Film Festival. Will's short documentary Mustang - Journey of Transformation screened Sunday night at Tribeca Cinemas where actor Richard Gere, who narrates the film, appeared for a Q&A with Will. Because I was unable to attend the screening myself, Will kindly sent me an email discussing the events of the evening. What follows is Will's email:

Will Parrinello and Richard Gere. (Photo by Amy Sussman/Getty Images for Tribeca Film Festival)

After shorts programmer Sharon Badal intro'd us, I talked about the reason I asked Richard to narrate the film (his 25 years supporting the Tibetan people, as a founder of the Tibet House NYC and Chairman of the Board of the International Campaign for Tibet). He then joked that I only selected him because I knew he knows how to pronounce all the unusual Tibetan words. Having just returned from a visit to India and Nepal, he went on to give an update about the political situation for the Tibetan's there as well as some background on the cultural significance of Mustang - once the most important outpost of western Tibet.

I was obviously thrilled and honored to have him there and appreciated how he generously and egolessly gave of himself and his time.