Eric Escobar has been selected to receive this year’s San Francisco Film Society/Hearst Screenwriting Grant for the continuing development of his script East County.  The Hearst Screenwriting Grant of $15,000 is given to a mid-career American screenwriter whose project expresses both a unique personal perspective and an artistic approach to the subject. The grant is open to those who have been practicing writers for at least five years and who have previously written a minimum of one feature screenplay. Priority is given to writers whose previous short or feature screenplays have been produced as an independent film.

Eric Escobar has been making movies since he was 15 years old. His short film One Weekend a Month screened at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival, where it was selected by the jury for an honorable mention, and at the AFI Film Festival, Aspen Shortsfest and the Mill Valley Film Festival among others. His previous shorts, A Sus Ordenes (At Your Service), Apples & Oranges and Night Light, have played at festivals across the country including the San Francisco International Film Festival, Chicago Latino Film Festival, Gen/Art Ignite NY/LA, Cine Latino San Francisco and Palm Springs Shortfest. His feature length screenplay, An Army of One, participated in the FIND 2007 Director’s Lab and was selected as a finalist for the 2006 Sundance Screenwriter’s Lab. Escobar was born and raised in Northern California and graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in 1993. He lives in Oakland and works in San Francisco as a commercial director.

East County
A deputy sheriff who is drowning in debt moonlights for his brother’s eviction agency. His calloused and bitter outlook is shaken when he discovers three children who have been abandoned by their parents in a foreclosed home. Though his search for the missing parents ends tragically, his determination to rebuild a stable life for his own family is renewed. For more information visit Kontent Films.