![Emily Gipson and Caitlin McFarland - ATX Television Festival Co-Founders ATX Television Festival Co-Founders on Diversity in Hollywood and What Shows They’d Like to Bring Back to the Festival [Video] Emily Gipson and Caitlin McFarland - ATX Television Festival Co-Founders on the opening night red carpet for Euphoria](https://telltaletv.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/IMG_5223-e1560178335593-730x486.png "Emily Gipson and Caitlin McFarland - ATX Television Festival Co-Founders | Tell-Tale TV")
ATX Television Festival Co-Founders on Diversity in Hollywood and What Shows They’d Like to Bring Back to the Festival [Video]
Every year, we head to the ATX Television Festival in Austin, Texas (otherwise known as TV Camp for Grown Ups), to screen new shows, listen to topical panels, and be a part of some really great conversations about television.
This year’s festival, which ended yesterday, featured an opening night screening of the upcoming HBO series Euphoria, a GREEK reunion, an early look at Prodigal Son, an in-depth conversation with ATX Television Festival awardee Phylicia Rashad, and panels with topics like mental health.
There were also screenings and panels with cast members and writers from Grey’s Anatomy, One Day at a Time, Younger, and Veronica Mars, among others.
On the opening night of the festival, we caught up with festival co-founders Emily Gipson and Caitlin McFarland on the red carpet to talk about what TV shows they’d love to see return to the festival and why they work so hard to make sure festival panels are diverse.
“Friday Night Lights will always, always be a part of this festival,” Caitlin McFarland began, noting that they’d like to bring something bigger back show in a few years.
“Doing a reunion of Parenthood is high on the list,” Emily Gipson said, noting that that show was a part of the festival twice while it was still on the air.
“Ugly Betty, too. They were just really great,” McFarland added.
On the ATX Television Festival’s podcast, Gipson and McFarland gave a behind-the-scenes look at what goes into the making of the festival, and one of the important parts of that was putting together panels that were diverse. They talked with us a bit more about this on the red carpet.
“We feel very strongly that what you see on TV matters, and that it really affects the way you see the world,” Gipson explained. “We want whatever comes out of the festival to represent what Hollywood should look like, not necessarily what it does look like, and we feel like if we can start that here, and even be a small part of that, it can affect really big change.”
Watch the full interview with Emily Gipson and Caitlin McFarland here:
*Additional reporting by Caralynn Lippo.Check out all of our coverage of the ATX Television Festival right here. There is a lot more to come!
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Ashley Bissette Sumerel
Ashley Bissette Sumerel is a television and film critic living in Wilmington, North Carolina. She is editor-in-chief of Tell-Tale TV as well as Eulalie Magazine. Ashley has also written for outlets such as Rolling Stone, Paste Magazine, and Insider. Ashley has been a member of the Critics Choice Association since 2017 and is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic. In addition to her work as an editor and critic, Ashley teaches Entertainment Journalism, Composition, and Literature at the University of North Carolina Wilmington.