Welcome to Cabin Weekend.
A scrappy Minnesota film studio for funny, human, heartfelt stories from the Midwest. Built on creative freedom, transparency, and real working experience.
Founded by longtime screenwriter and working comedy writer Jon Savitt (Funny or Die, CollegeHumor, Vulture, MTV), Cabin Weekend is a Minnesota-based film studio and creative home supporting local talent. We develop, invest, connect, and advise, helping writers and filmmakers build stronger projects, find viable paths forward, and make more with what they have.
Why We’re Here
Minnesota is full of talented writers, filmmakers, and creatives worth paying attention to. But too often, the path from idea to finished film feels expensive, isolated, complicated, or built for somewhere else.
Cabin Weekend is here to help change that. We believe great films can start around a kitchen table, in a group text, at a local screening, or over one long weekend with the right people in the room (and the right snacks).
Basically, we want to see more cool things get made.
How We Help
Development
Script notes, story development, concept shaping, pitch materials, packaging guidance, and creative strategy for film projects at early or messy stages.
Connection
We help filmmakers find the right collaborators, advisors, partners, and next conversations through a national network built across entertainment, media, politics, startups, nonprofits, and brands.
Advisory
Strategic support for filmmakers, founders, producers, brands, and creative teams trying to clarify the story, audience, positioning, or path forward.
Community
Table reads, filmmaker gatherings, workshops, screenings, and future programs designed to make the local film ecosystem feel more connected and less impossible.
Selective Investment
Small-scale investment, resource-sharing, and project support for films we believe in, with a focus on Minnesota and Midwest voices.
Projects Around the Cabin
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LAKE FRIENDS
Comedy-Drama
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BUNYAN
Horror
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EVERGREEN
Comedy-Drama
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WELCOME TO MILLBROOKE
Horror-Comedy
Coming October 2026.
Creep It Reel, a thriller feature written by Cabin Weekend founder Jon Savitt, featuring Adrienne King of Friday the 13th and produced by Barbed Wire Media.
Launch Microgrant
To celebrate the launch of Cabin Weekend, we’re offering a $250 microgrant to one Minnesota filmmaker or screenwriter with a project they want to move forward.
Tell us what you’re making and what the money would help with. It could go toward a table read, short film, festival submission, props, gear, locations, childcare during a shoot, or one small next step that makes the project feel more possible.
House Rules
Every good cabin has a few rules. Ours are mostly about being helpful, honest, and not making this industry any weirder than it already is.
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No mystery pricing, vague promises, or “exposure” economics. We believe filmmakers deserve to know what things cost, what they are paying for, and what they can realistically expect in return.
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Good notes should make the work stronger, not make the person feel smaller. We give honest, specific, actionable feedback with respect for the human behind the project.
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This industry already has enough locked doors. We believe in useful introductions, shared resources, transparent guidance, and helping good people find their next right step.
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Whether we are advising, producing, investing, connecting, or gathering people together, the goal is to strengthen the local film ecosystem vs just extract from it.
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We like big ideas, but we love resourceful ones. Limited budgets, local locations, borrowed gear, favors, weird constraints, and smart creative choices are not obstacles. They are part of the fun.
“Jon Savitt is the kind of guy who landed writing jobs for MTV and CollegeHumor from his Indiana dorm room.”
— Denver Westword“Jon Savitt is one funny dude.”
— Funny or Die“Sees the comedy in everything.”
— New York PostAbout the Founder
Cabin Weekend Studio was founded by Jon Savitt, a Minnesota-based screenwriter, comedy writer, and brand strategist with 15+ years of professional writing experience.
Jon has been featured in places like CollegeHumor, Funny or Die, Vulture, USA Today, The Star Tribune, NBC News, and the New York Times, has developed and sold multiple original feature scripts across genres, has worked in numerous writers’ rooms, previously served as a staff writer on the popular series Good Mythical Morning, and has spent more than a decade helping entertainment companies craft sharper stories, campaigns, and creative strategy.
Cabin Weekend brings those worlds together. Story development, audience understanding, storytelling instincts, pitch clarity, and a practical belief that more good films can get made here when people have the right support.
Free support for emerging writers
Our team also founded and runs the Flyover Writers’ Room, a free virtual space to help emerging Minnesota writers build confidence, sharpen their voice, learn the business, and feel less alone outside traditional entertainment hubs.
What’s with the name?
A cabin weekend is where people gather, bring what they have, and leave with better stories than they came with. That’s the spirit behind Cabin Weekend Studio. Collaborative, resourceful, welcoming, and deeply Midwest.
You bring the idea.
We’ll bring the coffee.
Have a script, film idea, project, partnership, or half-formed thing you can’t stop thinking about? Pull up a chair.