The Los Angeles Film School and Kinko's challenge Hollywood to Switch to Recycled Paper April 15, 2002 - Los Angeles, CA - On April 22, 2002 (Earth Day) The Los Angeles Film School will launch its new annual initiative: "The Hollywood "Greenlight" Challenge." This unique event, sponsored by Kinko's, aims to educate Hollywood Studios on how easy and important it is to buy and use recycled paper in their offices. Each studio will receive a case of recycled paper (donated by Kinko's) along with a challenge certificate on April 22nd. This certificate will challenge each paper recipient to switch all of their company's copier and printer paper to recycled. Acclaimed actor and long-time environmental activist, Ed Begley, Jr. has shown a great deal of support for the Hollywood "Greenlight" Challenge. Says Begley, "Cutting down our ancient forests for wood and paper products is like burning Renaissance art to cook dinner. There is another way. Buying recycled paper DOES make a difference. If you're not buying recycled, you're not really recycling." According to the EPA, paper in its various forms accounts for 40% of all solid waste generated in the U.S., office paper comprising a full quarter of that. Furthermore, less than 20% of office wastepaper generated in the U.S. today is recovered for recycling. With the Hollywood "Greenlight" Challenge, the Los Angeles Film School hopes to improve these statistics by creating a sustainable demand for recycled paper. Hollywood consumes a great deal of paper each year with the sheer volume of scripts and contracts produced in studios and production companies each year. If the Hollywood community as a whole switches to using only recycled paper products, it will undoubtedly begin to result in an increased supply of recycled paper to all businesses in the U.S. Says LAFS Dean Daniele Suissa, "Hollywood has created a lot of trends throughout history. It would be nice to use that trend-setting power to help protect the environment."

The Los Angeles Film School was designed from the ground up with the overriding goal of changing the face of Hollywood. The school strives to bring new thoughts, ideas, and ways of looking at the world into Hollywood in order to push the art of filmmaking forward into the 21st Century. Says LAFS President Amedeo D'Adamo, "The Hollywood "Greenlight" Challenge goes hand-in-hand with this mission by asking the entire industry to join forces in taking a more forward-thinking, conservation-minded approach to how Hollywood does business."