Menorah in the D // Event Production
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"Justin and his team were great at helping us frame the possibilities. ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐"
– Benji Rosenzweig, Producer, Menorah in the D
Project Overview
It was supposed to be the 10th anniversary of Menorah in the D – metro Detroit's largest public Chanukah event downtown that routinely attracts thousands of excited Jews and non-Jews alike to Campus Martius in the heart of the city. Then COVID-19 hit, and organizers had to figure out how to celebrate Judaism's festival of lights with millions quarantining at home with their menorahs.
Flow Video stepped up. My team and I partnered with Chabad Lubavitch of Michigan, the main organizer of the event, to safely livestream the event from downtown to homes across metro Detroit – and the world. Instead of 5,000 attendees, the live broadcast and accompanying interactive Zoom menorah lighting room together attracted over 38,000 viewers across the country and around the world, coming together in a time of isolation and sadness to celebrate with joy and light.
Execution
Each year from 2020 to 2024, we expanded upon our production, growing the capacity to both livestream the event in 4K HD as well as provide an engaging and multimedia experience for the renewed crowds each year that were able to return downtown as the pandemic receded. Our crew consisted of 10 team members operating multi-camera live setups, led by our Director on wide-screen monitors in the production tent. We coordinated closely with AV7, the house A/V team that oversaw all elements of the house event production: staging, lighting, IMAG ("jumbotron" screen), house audio array and high-mounted audio and video repeaters to ensure the large crowds could view and hear the stage from over one city block back.
Our Lead Producers, Jamie Savalle and Celeste Peake, worked under my direction and in tight coordination with Client and A/V team throughout the planning process and day-of to bring together this sprawling staff.
A parallel crew oversaw all of the creative content either (1) being used to promote the event, (2) the narrative videos debuting at the event, and then (3) footage captured at the event to broadcast afterwards – including in some years an entire dedicated behind-the-scenes (BTS) production team for documenting the "making of" the event. It was a major undertaking!
Benji Rosenzweig, veteran Menorah in the D Producer with Chabad Lubavitch of Michigan, remarked in his public review of our work: "We had close to a dozen staff members involved in pre-production and the event itself. We had people that put the scripts together, work on timelines and budget, and the structure of the event. On the day of, we worked with sound, lighting, stage, and other tech help. We also had a director."
Results
Over the course of three years, we enabled thousands of individuals and families to participate in the magic of Chanukah both live and remotely through our work – and the seamless execution led to remarkably few technical errors. Our client consistently evaluated our work as exceeding expectations, and it was a tremendous pleasure overall.
In the words of Mr. Rosenzweig again:
"We had an idea of what we wanted but knew that we needed more information. Justin and his team discussed different options and ideas with us to ensure we were making the right decisions. They were all over us in a good way. They made sure that deadlines were understood, acknowledged, and kept. We got everything done, some of it last minute, but everything was done."
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