Sarah Adelman had a long, strange road to SeriesFest.
“I was an assistant research scientist and I was working at a sperm bank studying male infertility,” Adelman said. “And that was all going really well. But no one at my job thought working at a sperm bank was funny, so I started doing standup at night to have an outlet to talk about it.”
Adelman’s comedy started taking off. Then, the “unnamed prestigious medical center in New York” where Adleman worked found out about her comedy — and the higher-ups were not impressed.
“[They] made me watch my own comedy set in front of the legal department. And it was truly humiliating,” Adelman said.
But, through the chaos, “Busted!” was born. And now, she and her colleagues are premiering their pilot at SeriesFest in Denver, which bills itself as a nonprofit television festival celebrating “the best in independent episodic content.” This year marks the festival’s 11th year.
“SeriesFest chose Denver as its home because we wanted to create a true destination festival that celebrated storytelling in a city with deep creative roots,” said founder Randi Kleiner. “My co-founder Kaily [Smith] was born and raised here and we both felt Denver's vibrant arts scene and supportive community made it the perfect fit. It’s also the birthplace of cable television, so building on that rich media history just made sense.”
Kleiner added that, at its inception, SeriesFest was backed by then-Governor Hickenlooper, as well as Film Commissioner Donald Zuckerman and Denver Film, which hosts SeriesFest at its Sie FilmCenter.
The festival has premiered acclaimed series like “Yellowstone,” “Mr. Robot,” “Dr. Death” and “New Amsterdam.” It has also hosted iconic moments like the 20th-anniversary panel for Grey’s Anatomy. Now, a new round of hopefuls are taking part, looking for their big break.
The festival welcomes national and international talent but also works to elevate local creatives. Programs such as “Pilots in Progress,” where Colorado creators screen a rough cut of their pilot for constructive feedback from industry experts, is one such opportunity. This year, there will also be a special “Inside the Indie Ecosystem” panel, which gives attendees a behind-the-scenes look at how festivals like Sundance Film Festival and SeriesFest play an essential role in the film and TV landscape. “This conversation will be especially meaningful for Colorado locals, as we look ahead to welcoming the Sundance Film Festival to our state in 2027,” said Claire Taylor, the festival’s chief program officer.
This year, many films with Colorado connections are screening at SeriesFest. We caught up with creators from four of these projects. Here’s what they had to say about their pilot episode, the festival and being creators in Colorado.
‘Busted!’ a show about what happens when your day job and your hobby don’t play nicely together
When she lost her research job at the sperm bank, Adelman shared her script for “Busted!” with college friend and Castle Rock native, Emily Everhard. From there, the show was born.
“I was drawn to [Busted!] because I was probably the world's worst personal assistant when Sarah brought this story to me,” Everhard said. “I really related to feeling like I was a really smart, ambitious young woman and just not having that not translate in my workplace.”
Co-creator Lisa Cossrow was also immediately attracted to the project. "I got so excited because it felt so completely relatable," Cossrow said. "Where you're going through life and you have two dreams, or you're trying to balance what your heart wants and what your brain wants, and then you can't make it all happen."
Now, the team is excited to share “Busted!” with a live audience at SeriesFest.
“We're hoping to take it out and pitch it and see who's interested in partnering up with us and making it happen. Making it real,” Everhard said.
“Our dream is to partner with a production company that really wants female-driven, super funny, but also smart and intelligent comedies,” Adelman said.
“Busted!” stars Adelman as a fictionalized version of herself. Other cast members include two-time Emmy award-winning writer and actor Judy Gold and SNL cast member Emil Wakim.
“Busted!” screens in the Digital Shorts Series at 3:30 p.m. on Thursday, May 1.
‘How I Met My Partner,’ a show about finding love through America’s new favorite sport, pickleball
Pickleball has taken America by storm. In certain places, the sport is even replacing other social outlets.
“In New York City, pickleball has replaced the dating apps and the singles bars,” said Gregg Stouffer, Colorado-based creator of the new digital series “How I Met My Partner.”
“I took that idea, I pitched it to Pickleball TV and got a budget to shoot a pilot,” he said.
And yes, Pickleball TV is a real streaming platform that covers live tournaments from pickleball’s two major leagues: the Professional Pickleball Association and Major League Pickleball.
A lot of pickleball enthusiasts don’t follow the sport at the major league level, Stouffer said. So, Pickleball TV needs other reasons for people to tune into the network. That’s where “How I Met My Partner” comes in.
Stouffer said the format of each episode is unique. Some feature couples recounting their pickleball “meet cutes” and others take place on the court as people meet for the first time. But there is a throughline.
“In every episode we shoot,” Stouffer said, “Everybody says, ‘When you play pickleball with someone, you get to know who they really are.’”
He said this differs from the online dating model, where people can present a polished version of themselves.
“How I Met My Partner” premieres at SeriesFest in the Unscripted Series program on Thursday, May 1, at 1:30 p.m. It premieres on Pickleball TV the same day.
But Stouffer and his team are already thinking about Season 2, and they’re casting couples in Colorado.
Stouffer said folks who want to audition should come to the screening — even if they don’t have a ticket — for an audition where they’ll be asked to tell their “how I met my partner playing pickleball” story.
“If we can tap into that zeitgeist and that enthusiasm and that fervor that the country feels about pickleball,” Stouffer said, “and show it not just at the professional level but at the human level … if we can tap into that, I think that's great.”
‘High Science,’ a show about cannabis entrepreneurs building a new industry from the ground up
“High Science” is an unscripted documentary series that follows cannabis entrepreneurs as they navigate a new, ever-changing, and uncharted industry.
Colorado filmmaker Patrick Hackett describes these entrepreneurs as people “taking huge risks akin to the gold rush with massive obstacles in their way.” He said the show was motivated by audience interest.
“There is a hunger for cannabis content, moving away from the traditional ‘Cheech & Chong’ and other stoner tropes,” Hackett said. And now, Colorado has “10-plus years of legalization to really show that the average cannabis consumer is not average.”
“High Science” is different from other cannabis content because it doesn’t try to answer consumer questions, Hackett said. “I wanted to go pull the curtain back a little bit and show the other side of this, the business side, because I think there's a lot of misconceptions about who cannabis entrepreneurs are.”
He said, though this dichotomy is reductive, the show explores whether it’s the “hippies from the sixties” or the “hedge fund people” who are succeeding in the marketplace.
“Is it the people who have risked their lives for 30, 40, 50 years looking over their shoulders, who can now finally come out into the light?” Hackett mused, “Or is it the people who have MBAs and understand business acumen, but maybe not the history or the culture of the plant?
Hackett hopes to produce more episodes in the future and would consider expanding the show’s focus to cover additional “psychedelic healing medicines” like psilocybin and other psychoactive plants.
“The general public is interested and they need a place where they can get information” about these things, Hackett said. “So I would like to put some real information out there, really explore this, find out what people are doing, how they're safeguarding it, how they're testing it.”
“High Science” premieres at SeriesFest in the Unscripted Series program on Thursday, May 1, at 1:30 p.m.
‘Bad Indian,’ a show about Native American comedians who are each approaching comedy on their own terms
“Bad Indian” isn’t your typical road trip story. It follows Colorado comedian Joshua Emerson on his journey to produce the first all-Native lineup for the “Netflix is a Joke” comedy festival in Los Angeles. Oh, and, he’s spreading his dead mother’s ashes along the way.
Emerson said the short film started with the casual idea that he and his friend and comedy collaborator Jeff Stonic should film the trip to LA. But all along, he had dreams that the project would turn into something beyond the one episode.
“I started doing comedy with this guy named Joshua Fournier, he started about a year ahead of me in Albuquerque, but I started in Durango. So I saw him from a very early point on,” Emerson said. “And so you have these two Navajo comedians named Joshua that are so different in the way they do comedy and so different in the way that they grew up, that there's these parallel lives happening.”
That’s when he realized a show profiling different native comedians was what the show should become.
Now, he’s excited to get the pilot episode in front of industry leaders at SeriesFest for a feedback session.
“When it comes to episodic television, this is one of the most premiere festivals. It's where a lot of good TV gets shown first,” he said. He also thinks it’s his ideal moment to break into the industry.
“At this point, there's never been so many Native American creatives actually doing stuff at the highest level in industry,” Emerson said. “It's not just Native American projects. They're in writing rooms all over. And so there's going to be a lot of opportunity to create stuff and start telling these native stories.”
“Bad Indian” premieres at SeriesFest in the Colorado Pilots in Progress program on Sunday, May 4, at 1:30 p.m.
Joshua Emerson is also performing “Dead Man Talking” with friend and fellow comedian Elliott Weber at the Buntport Theater in Denver on Friday, May 2, at 6 p.m. Tickets are $12.51.
Funding for public media is at stake. Stand up and support what you value today.
