Sundance Film Festival attendees left their final film screenings in Park City and Salt Lake City Sunday, just as they have at the close of the festival for the past four decades.
But unlike past festivals, these last screenings had a sense of finality — they marked the end of Sundance’s time in Utah.
Next year, the festivalgoers, volunteers, organizers, actors, directors and thousands of others involved in the Sundance Film Festival will head to Boulder, Colorado, for a new chapter in the festival’s history.
Parts of Sundance will remain in Utah. The Sundance Institute Labs will still be held at the Sundance Mountain Resort, and the institute will keep its Utah office in Park City. But the festival’s upcoming move will still be a big change for both Sundance and Park City, and it has been at the forefront of this year’s festival.
It has certainly been a busy 11 days in Park City. While there are fewer skiers in the area this year thanks to a below-average snowpack, Sundance’s Park City swan song has drawn impressive crowds from around the world. Many restaurants have had lines out the door all week, and traffic was so packed on Main Street at one point last Saturday that passengers on one bus simply disembarked in the middle of the street because walking uphill was faster.
Will Park City be better off without the traffic? Or will it suffer without the festival’s revenue? Will Sundance be the same festival without the city it has called home since its inception?
Here’s what Sundance organizers, featured directors and locals had to say.
What is Sundance without Utah?
The Associated Press reported that many regular festivalgoers have declared this Sundance to be their last. It just won’t be the same outside of Park City, they say.
Amy Redford, member of the Sundance Institute board of trustees and daughter of Sundance founder Robert Redford, seems to disagree.
“Sometimes ... you have to change your landscape to find out what you are made of,” she said at an event Friday memorializing Sundance’s years in Park City. “I hope you will join us on this new adventure. It will be scrappy, and it will be imperfect. And it might just be a nod to our beginnings.”
Redford stressed that Sundance will still have an influence on Utah. She said it took a “Herculean effort” to keep the labs in the state, as it was a vision of her father’s.
As she looked to the future, Redford was profuse in her gratitude for Park City and Utah.
“This city and the state is the bedrock for what we’ve done,” she said. At the event’s close, she added, “Thank you, Utah. Thank you, Park City.”
Eugene Hernandez, the festival’s director, had a similar outlook. From local employees, staff and volunteers to Utah-made films, Sundance has been a part of Utah, and Utah has been a part of Sundance.
“The way the festival has been ingrained in Utah culture has fostered the growth and character of the Institute and the festival,” he said at Friday’s event. “And the way the Utah community has been part of our fabric is fundamental.”
Brian Marquez, who oversees Sundance’s volunteers, said a little more than half of Sundance’s volunteers are from Utah. Their longest standing volunteer has been with the festival for four decades.
“Our volunteers are amazing. Truly a large part of how the festival has grown over the years is because of the volunteers,” he said.
Marquez isn’t sure how many volunteers are planning to follow Sundance to Colorado, but he said there has been an air of excitement this festival — both in looking toward the future and in coming together for their last hurrah in Utah.
“It’s such a rare and unique thing to just bring everybody together in the way that we do,” he said.
Sherry Young, a former Sundance volunteer, echoed Marquez’s excitement but said the move is bittersweet.
“It’s been wonderful,” she said of her time volunteering. “But we’re sad to see it go. ... Everything has its time, I suppose, and so maybe it’s just time to move on.”
Others say the move will fundamentally change the festival — not necessarily for the worse, but that it will be a different experience.
Meri Feldman, who has attended Sundance several times, used to live in Boulder. It’s a great town, she says, and Sundance’s relocation there could be good, but it will still be a change.
“Things are not always going to be the same when it moves,” she said. “It doesn’t mean it won’t be good, but I think it will be a different vibe.”
Whatever the new experience is, Sundance leadership has reaffirmed their dedication to the festival’s mission. That mission statement, after all, doesn’t mention Park City; it focuses on elevating independent artists and giving audiences the chance to hear important stories.
One Sundance attendee, Mary Ann Hanley, said what she really loves about the festival is not its location but its content. Hanley said she never even sees movies unless she’s attending Sundance.
“Every movie (at Sundance) is so unique and different and like nothing you’ll ever see,” she said. “And it’s great that there’s always commentary and discussion, and they tell you a little more history about it.”
What is Utah without Sundance?
The Sundance Film Festival has brought billions to Utah’s economy over the years. The 2024 festival contributed $132 million to Utah’s GDP and provided 1,730 jobs for residents and $69.7 million in wages.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said in September 2024 that Utah’s tourism helped keep the state’s taxes relatively low. “We pay less in taxes as a state because we have so much tourism in the state, because other people come here and spend their dollars,” Cox said. “They spend nights in hotel rooms, they rent cars, they buy food.”
However, with Utah’s 2024 GDP at $235.7 billion and total tourism-generated tax revenue at $1.2 billion, some Utahns feel confident that Sundance’s departure won’t negatively affect the state’s economy.
“We had two years of COVID without Sundance, so we got to get a good gauge on what happens when Sundance isn’t here,” Park City Mayor Ryan Dickey told KSL. “We didn’t really see an economic impact.”
Park City is also home to several ski resorts, which contribute to the local and state economy — although resorts have suffered this year with the West’s snowpack at a record low.
Although many locals are sad to see the festival go, they also have hope for Park City’s future. A number, including Gov. Cox and Utah Jazz owner Ryan Smith, have suggested that a new festival or event will take Sundance’s place.
“I’m sure Park City and Utah will somehow replace it with something else amazing,” Sherry Young said.
When the Sundance Film Festival leaves Park City, it will leave a bit of itself behind. Sundance will always be present: in the locals who volunteered to run theaters and shovel snow, in the novice director who first received a standing ovation at Eccles Theater, in the memories of anyone who has ever waited in the freezing cold of a Sundance premiere line.
And when Sundance begins again in Boulder, it will always carry some of Park City with it. The ski town will forever be ingrained in the festival’s DNA — as its birthplace and as the forge that fostered its growth into the success it is today.
