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Meet Tigran Mutafyan of Glasscore Entertainment in Burbank

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Today we’d like to introduce you to Tigran Mutafyan.

Thanks for sharing your story with us Tigran. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
1972. I was born in Gumri, Armenia. The second city of Armenia that people call the city of Arts and Crafts. The most important thing I have learned from my dad was – “Do whatever you want, but learn the craft and achieve the art of it”. My choice of my future major landed on Math though. I wanted to be a mathematician being very proud of the fact that the word Mathematica comes from Armenia, which means (Mat e Mat i ga – finger after finger you count the result). I graduated with a silver medal from a special school of Mathematics and Physics (Balaton), in Gumri and was planning to enter to Moscow State University, Russia. All my planes were ruined by the devastating earthquake of 1988 in my city. My help was needed at home, so I became a student of economics in Armenian National University of Economy in Yerevan (capital of Armenia).

1991. Soviet Union collapsed. The war with Azerbaijan was on. The barbaric times always start with the wars. We have no electricity, no food, and a lot of criminals were born from desperation and hunger… The whole country and people suffered for 5 dark years. My family moved to Russia to live with my brother because my dad had heart condition and he wouldn’t be able to survive in Armenia. I stayed. I had to finish my 1st Master degree in Economics. Around 2 M Armenians left the country those years. It’s more than the half of the all population.

I had to find a way to survive. I decided to “use” the dark circumstances for spiritual development, instead of stealing food, in order to survive. I stop going to University, because I was losing to much energy, that couldn’t be replaced properly with minerals and vitamins. So I stayed at bed, trying not to move much and ate 2 apples per day to be able to survive. I was questioning the meaning of my life, but then I understood, that if I am an important unit for the future of humanity then I will not die. Somehow everything will get sorted. There was no any hope because my family also were hardly surviving in Saint Petersburg, Russia. I started reading a lot and meditating.

My goal was to get into deep meditations so I don’t remember about the food and cold. The winter of 1993 was the worst in my life. Sometimes having -14C in the room I have to have a technology to survive. I have found at some point. It help me to go through an enormous cleansing, that after decades I truly believe, that I have found the core of my “life poethics”. I was enlightened by a thought that there were no enemies in my life, and if there was an enemy, that’s the one who was trying to create the enemies for me. My life got much better and there were many unbelievable consequences that helped me to survive.

1994, May. I got a call from my brother from Russia. He was about to finish his medical school, but the massive crime of 90s in Russia went so deep into all aspects of life, that criminals started racketeering the students. My brother had to pay 3000$ (huge money for that time), in order to be able to finish his education. It was not corruption of the faculty, but criminals that were robing students of prestigious schools. I went to Russia at the end of November, because there was no chance to avoid from criminals.

1994-1996 – We were fighting together with my brother through the crime organizations, in order to have just rights to live and finish the education. My brother’s dream was to live in the US. He moved to USA in 1996 and continued his education here. He became a well-known surgeon, MD. He lives and works in Glendale, CA. My inner peace and moral values were destroyed in fights with Russian criminal structures. I was confused about the reality and the nature of human beings. My brain needed answers after the hell of early 90s…

1996, September, I went to get my second degree in Psychology. I was working to help my family and learning to fix my state. One day I went through a passport control and was arrested. The police told me I was wanted intentionally. It appears to be that after 1991 when Soviet Union collapsed all Armenian students oversees the age of under 40, suddenly became wanted by government of Armenia. The war with Azerbaijan got much more intense. The government decided by that action to return the youth into the country. Hundreds of thousand students suddenly were chased by Interpol as criminals. The Russian police were very brutal to us. It was a nice chance for them to use physical abuse staying innocent. It was impossible to live anymore in Russia of 90s with their renown fascism, corrupted and criminal police, hatred to international people, and plus being wanted in my case…

I decided to go back to Armenia after accomplishing my 2nd master degree in Psychology in Saint Petersburg State University. I thought I will be arrested and putted into prison like many innocent students, but I got very lucky. Armenian people were celebrating the anniversary (1700 years) of Christianity as the first Cristian Nation. All the youth could get an amnesty from 2000-2001 by the request of Armenian Apostolic Church. I went to Armenia with an intention to live there the rest of my life, but the first night I saw a dream that was almost not a dream. I went back to Russia to accomplish whatever I saw in my dream the very next day. Almost a year I was just working and building my company there not having a clue why the dream was important so much until once I figured the real intentions of my dearest business partner.

Our advertising agency “Tezaurus” was well–known and was developing very good. One day my partner has told me that he came from Ukraine not for the business, but for his dream to become an actor and director. He told me that he has to leave the company, because he was going to compete with others to get into one of the most famous and prestigious Russian drama schools with traditional Stanislavski system of training actors and directors. I was dumbfounded. I was not sure if I can continue working without him in our company. So I decided make him cancel his idea. He was stubborn and I planned to make fun of him and record his acting exam and show to our VIP partners how he plays a fox from a fable. That “shame” in front of our clients should help me to stop him from his childhood memory dream to be an artist. I had to get to the exam somehow to record it and the only way I found was to fill up the application and pretend that I want to be a student. I got the pass to the exams and tried to accomplish my secret plan. I ended up eventually in front of the examination committee and got accepted as a student by myself!

At that time I didn’t know even who was Stanislavski, but the chair of the committee, regardless my horrible knowledge about the art and artists almost forced me to become their student. I felt that was the meaning of the dream I saw. It had changed all my life and started a new one with me becoming an Artist. I went through very intensive trainings from true legends Alexander Melentiev, Valeriy Smirnov, Veniamin Filshtinsky, and internationally famous Lev Dodin. My dear business partner at some point went back to Ukraine and, unfortunately, passed away. It was a very hard loss. It seemed to me he came to help me to find myself. God gave me through him a second chance to live my life in a peace and creative crafts. God bless his soul.

2005. The Russian State Academy of Theater Arts offered me to stay and work as a teacher with my masters. I was invited by Valeriy Smirnov to direct with him a 2M USD budget movie in 2007. I was in the middle of shooting my feature when I got a big issue with the Academy new security members that were fascists. Even the principle of my school was not able to help me to avoid the conflicts… My brother in the US knew that I fell in love with filmmaking and offered me to move to Los Angeles if I want to be a filmmaker. He paid all my tuition fees and life expenses until I got another Master degree in filmmaking from NYFA (New York Film Academy), Los Angeles.

I moved to the US in 2010. My family has joined me in 2013. I was working hard to earn some professional achievements.

2015. I created a company Glasscore Entertainment and invited a team of great professional to collaborate with me. We were working together and doing the cross promotions of each other. Glasscore teams first project got shortlisted by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (Oscar’18), in 2018. Our team members work also internationally. We all continue shooting as freelancers in the US and different countries creating our own content.

Has it been a smooth road?
When I graduate NYFA I couldn’t find enough money to do my directing thesis. I was invited though to shoot the thesis projects of my classmates as a cinematographer. So, I got additional training for 6 mouths and start working as a cinematographer. My experience was just a little, but I used my knowledge of drama in cinematography. Somehow NYFA students were inviting me to shoot their shorts and I had to learn the cinematography while I was shooting different projects.

My first feature I shot with multiple award winning Iranian writer/director Sam Khoze. My friends recommended me as cinematographer and he liked my reel. It was his ‘dream come true movie’ called Zoya. We had to shoot it in the studio in a cell with the transparent walls. We have to deal with tons of reflections in the glasses. It was a very low budget movie and we had only 11 days to shoot it. In one of the meetings the director told me that he wants me to shoot the way I want, because he believes I’m a true artist. It was a huge responsibility and moreover I have never considered me as an experienced artist, so I offered him to find someone else. He agreed at the beginning, but a couple of days later he called me again. He told me that he doesn’t mind to do the shortlist and storyboard, but he wants to shoot Zoya only with me. So we meet again and I agreed. On set he threw away all his paperwork and told me again, that he wants me as an artist to make choices of shots. I was very upset, but it was late to quit. Me and my dear partner Yash Khanna were working so crazily, so we have finished the whole movie in 9 days instead of 11. The director was very happy with the footage and we won eventually several awards and got nominated in various festivals.

One day my friend Pashs Shapiro called me. There was a chance to shoot one of the Black Eyed Peas music videos with Nicole Scherzinger called Mona Lisa Smile. The director Michael Jurkovac explained that he wanted the lighting to be the same way as it was in the Louvre paintings. To understand how to approach to the lighting I have read everything I could find about the spaces that are in the paintings and the choices that the specific artist made by placing the models there. I had to only recreate the light of that imaginary world I have created in my mind. The Louvre invited us to premier the music video in Paris, in the Louvre.

Shooting in China for the American cinematographer is full of challenges. My first project was shot in Tibetan part of China on the altitude of 15000-18000ft above the sea level. The crew and cast were having the height sickness and had a bad reaction. For one shot we had to go to the highest point and shoot the main actor as well as the whole crew were not able to get so high. Me with the camera and the mountain guide went there and I had to operate and shoot my own hand in the shot, so we get shot accomplished. On this project the producing was so bad, so we had to work 22-23 hours per day and we still lost some scenes. The crew was so big that we couldn’t even pass through and it was also slowing down the work. Everybody were in panic that we will not be able to finish the project. I oppose that it’s easy if they do everything right. The executive producer asked me to take over the project. I have fired 45 people the same day and we have finished the second day with no issues and also we got all the missing scenes. Day 3 we have worked 8 hours only. 4th – 5 hours. The day six there was nothing left to shoot after 2 hours. We planned 2 weeks of shoot though. I have saved them a lot of money and time they told me.

The second project was in Hainan. The last DP they invited left the project by saying that he can’t take a shit standing. There are no toilet bowls in the restrooms. I got the job with no translator. There was no communication between crew and me. When the translator came she knew English very bad. She needed money though, so she was translating wrong, in order to keep the job. We several time did the fully resets of the whole production. At some point the Gaffer snapped on her, that they were understanding me better without translation than with. So we have fired the translator and I was keep communicating with fingers and gestures. Once I had to replay the actor’s role to be understood what I meant. They loved it and later one they offered me a role in the movie. My Russian training of acting and directing was very useful.

So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Glasscore Entertainment story. Tell us more about the business.
Glasscore’s narrative films, documentaries, music videos and commercials earned official selections, nominations and awards in many festivals, including Cannes, Sundance, Raindance, and others. Glasscore entertainment is comprised of people that that creates, produces and distributes motion pictures, television programs, and commercials, along with music videos and games. Glasscore represents a select few, outstanding and award winning directors, writers and cinematographers from the different parts of the world and maintains a keen sense for creative production solutions. Glasscore provides tailor made solutions for our clients’ needs.

How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
The equipment becomes cheaper and very advanced. A lot of people can afford drones, cameras, steadicams, etc. etc. That means a lot of position in the crew will be combined in one and one will be able to replace a lot of positions. The role of a filmmaker becomes more important than the role of the director. So a lot of people semi-professional people will join the industry and as a result low quality of the stories that made cheap. To keep the quality high, the producers will choose to learn directing and direct and produce by themselves. A lot of cheap content and low level production with destroy the reputation of the movies of being something good or fun. The audience will move to the game industry. VR will be used as a storytelling tool.

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