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day before heading to the office. "My great skill that I bring to this job is that I'm a grinder," he says. "I'm willing to grind harder than most people are." In the past four years or so, Forrest's Interactive conference has officially become the king of SXSW, surpass- ing even the music festival that started it all. Interactive drew a little over 32,000 attendees last year and has essentially grown to full capac- ity. As anyone who lives in Austin knows, there's not a hotel room or guest cottage vacant in town, nor a conference room or event space available to book. "We'll have the new JW Marriott hotel this year, the largest hotel in Austin, and in two years we'll have the Fairmont, so those will allow for a little growth…. But I think if you poll most attendees, they'd say they don't want it to get any bigger. It's big enough." Limiting the size of the conference must come as somewhat of a relief to Forrest, whose relatively small staff of 25 is overwhelmed with work. This year, with an expected attendance roughly equal to that of 2014, a differ- ent kind of growth tops the team's agenda: It will build three subject-area verticals focused on sports, fashion, and food (SXSports, SXStyle, and SouthBites; see sidebar). These sub- conferences aim to better serve those who have attended the Interactive fes- tival in previous years and to draw in new headliners, like chef and publish- ing innovator David Chang of New York's Momofuku empire, Andrew Zimmern of the Travel Channel, and Victor Cruz, wide receiver of the New York Giants. Forrest is most excited about a fourth new track that doesn't have its own title, but parallels a big change in the city. "We're doing more this year on health and med tech," he says. "We're going to have a two-day expo at the JW Marriott. It will be fun to see how that plays out, partly because it's the result of a conscious decision to follow what Austin is doing with the new [University of Texas] med school ( see "view from the top," page 47) and with the Innovation Zone"—the city's planned med-tech corridor along the east side of downtown. Dates: March 13–21 Overview: The SXSW Film Conference and Festival will feature more than 150 sessions at the Austin Convention Center and hundreds of screenings, including celebrity-flled premieres and documentaries, at various theaters around the city. KeynOtes: Among the most popular sessions are the keynote addresses, which SXSW Film began last year. Keynote speakers include: • Mark Duplass, the UT grad who created and stars in the new HBO show Togetherness. Duplass, along with his brother, Jay Duplass (also a UT alum), has written, directed, and produced flms like Cyrus and Jeff, Who Lives at Home. Duplass is also a television and flm actor, appearing in The Mindy Project, The League, and Your Sister's Sister. • Ava DuVernay (shown, above right), director of the critically acclaimed movie Selma as well as the Independent Spirit Award-winning flm Middle of Nowhere. She's a founder of the African American Film Festival Releasing Movement, a collective that works on distribution for African American flms. • RZA (shown, above left), founder of the Wu-Tang Clan and a Grammy-winning producer, has scored flms for directors like Ridley Scott and Quentin Tarantino and has also appeared in movies. Opening-night mOvie: Among the world premieres at SXSW will be the kickoff flm, Brand: A Second Coming, a documentary from Ondi Timoner that traces actor and comedian Russell Brand's journey from struggling with addiction to becoming an activist. sxsw.com/flm SXSW Film The SXSW Interactive Trade Show at the Austin Convention Center was bustling in 2014 as the conference marked its 30th year. This year's event features ways to help manage the explosive growth, including new sub-conferences. photography by jamil muhaisen (expo); lester cohen/getty images for wired (chang); gabriel olsen/getty images (rza) In a great example of convergence at SXSW, comedian and actor Russell Brand will speak at Interactive as well as attend the world premiere of his documentary, Brand: A Second Coming, on the opening night of SXSW Film. 84 AUSTINWAY.com