Interview With ATX Television Festival Co-Founders Emily Gipson and Caitlin McFarland [Video]

This weekend, we attended the 2016 ATX Television Festival (Season 5) in Austin, Texas, where we had the opportunity to see casts of favorite shows reunited, listen to legendary television writers talk about their craft, and even screen a few new shows.

To kick off the festival, we spoke with co-founders Caitlin McFarland and Emily Gipson about the origins of the festival and what events had them most excited this year.

“It was a really a transition period. I was living in New York, headed to L.A. to be an assistant again and couldn’t really bear it,” McFarland explained. After conversations with co-founder Emily Gipson and their mentors, the festival was born.

“It was baby steps, and it grew,” McFarland continued. “But really, those core parts of the festival early on — third past, third current, third upcoming, half industry, half fan — has stayed true five years later.”

“We have such incredible reunions, with Rescue Me, and The West Wing, and Ugly Betty — show’s that we’ve loved for so long,” Gipson said.

“And bringing these people back together that are so excited to be back together, that’s really, for us, we love the conversations and the panels that we have, but seeing casts reunite that are really friends and enjoy their shows so much is really fun.”

We’ll have more coverage of the ATX Television Festival coming soon, so stay tuned!

Additional reporting by Christine Laskodi.