Former Colorado Film Commissioner Donald Zuckerman Files Notice of Claim Against State Over His Firing

The headline to a September 25, 2025, Westword post wondered, “Is There More to Colorado Film Chief Donald Zuckerman’s Mysterious Exit Than Anyone Is Saying?” And while this question lacked a definitive answer at the time of the article’s publication, there were plenty of reasons to ask it.

Zuckerman had served as the state film commissioner since 2011 and had just scored the biggest triumph of his tenure by leading the successful effort to lure the Sundance Film Festival to Boulder from its longtime home in Utah. Yet his disappearance wasn’t announced in the sort of formal fashion befitting a figure of his stature. Instead, Eve Lieberman, executive director for Colorado’s Office of Economic Development and International Trade, the governmental branch that employed Zuckerman, revealed the change in a private and notably terse email to officials and film industry types sent a full week before the news leaked to the greater public via a September 22 item in the Denver Post.

Back then, Zuckerman wasn’t ready to share his side of the story. But he is now — and he’s got a legal team in his corner. On February 9, attorneys Max Belovol and Bruce Robinson of Denver-based Baker Law Group sent what’s described as a “formal notice of potential claims against the State of Colorado and employees of the same” to the office of Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser. Such a letter is a required precursor to the filing of a lawsuit against the state.

The document cites multiple reasons why Zuckerman’s dismissal violated his rights, including “Defamation Per Se & Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress,” “Age Discrimination” (Zuckerman is 80), and “Unlawful Retaliation…& Wrongful Discharge.”

In Zuckerman’s view, these assertions are more than justified because of the reason he was given for his sacking — Lieberman told him he was being removed due to a verbal confrontation with a subordinate — and the unusual way Lieberman chose to dispense the information about his exit.

“Eve said I could resign or be fired,” Zuckerman maintains. “And when I refused to resign, she sent out an email blast to everyone in my address book saying I was no longer an employee of OEDIT. That led them to believe I did something really bad — something like sexual harassment or stealing money.”

Instead, Zuckerman goes on, “Eve said it was because I yelled at someone” — and while Lieberman didn’t name that individual, he believes it was deputy film commissioner Arielle Brachfeld, with whom he’d had a heated conversation the previous week. But he insists that “I didn’t yell at her. I was trying to talk her off a cliff — and while I was doing that, she yelled at me several times.”

Lieberman has not responded to outreach from Westword, and Brachfeld referred an inquiry to OEDIT communications director Alissa Johnson, who provided the following statement about the notice of claim she asked to be credited generically to a department spokesperson: “OEDIT is committed to fostering a safe and healthy workplace for all while upholding workplace policies and the law. As a general practice, we do not discuss specific personnel issues in order to protect all parties. A demand letter reflects one party’s claims, not findings of fact or wrongdoing. OEDIT disputes the allegations in this demand letter.”

Johnson also provided a copy of Zuckerman’s termination letter. Dated September 12, 2025, it is a standard missive that informs Zuckerman he “is being terminated effective immediately as a result of unsatisfactory behavior.”

As for Zuckerman, he doesn’t think he was pink-slipped over a blow-up at a co-worker — an incident that wasn’t reported to him or investigated in a way that allowed him to participate prior to his ouster. Instead, he points the finger at Lieberman, whom he accuses of “needing to take credit for Sundance all the time. I’d get a call from a publication or a radio station saying they wanted to interview me about it. But when I’d go to comms [the OEDIT communication department] and tell them I was invited, they’d get back to me and say, ‘Eve’s doing it.’ What I believe is that by erasing me with this #MeToo-type thing, she can take credit for it, and there won’t be anybody to say it didn’t happen.”

Plenty of politicos have accepted laurels for the Sundance coup. But it wouldn’t have occurred without Zuckerman, who had been working on facilitating the fest’s shift for the previous two years. The key connection was Sundance board vice chair Gigi Pritzker, an old friend of Zuckerman’s with whom he produced Green Street Hooligans, a 2005 film starring Elijah Wood.

In addition to Lieberman’s alleged desire for Sundance-related laurels, Zuckerman contends that she had a personal animus toward him dating back to late 2022-early 2023. In an email thread included in the notice of claim, Jenna Culver, a senior budget analyst for OEDIT, explains to Kelly Baum, a staffer with the Colorado Office of Film, Television and Media, that what’s dubbed a legislative “whoopsie” had resulted in an additional $747,816 being available to incentivize movie or TV production in the state. Zuckerman says he and his cohorts designated the funds to a project only to be told after the fact that the money wasn’t actually available. When he found out about this reversal, Zuckerman yelled at an individual involved in the situation, “which I shouldn’t have done,” he acknowledges. But even after finding money to make up for the dollar amount in question (by shifting funds from an incentive recipient whose project had stalled), he feels Lieberman still blamed him for the situation, even though the mistake was made by others.

In the wake of the “whoopsie,” Zuckerman thinks Lieberman was waiting for an excuse to lower the boom on him, and the second account of him hollering at a colleague provided her with the excuse. Hence, the aforementioned email blast, sent at 8:31 p.m. on September 15. Here’s the message in its entirety:

The notice of claim lays out Zuckerman’s version of events in detail — but it doesn’t demand that he be given his old job back, stressing that “although Mr. Zuckerman is entitled to reinstatement, he never desires to work for Ms. Lieberman again.” Instead, he makes five demands: “a public apology from OEDIT and the Governor’s Office;” “Recission of the PIP,” shorthand for a “pretextual and procedurally irregular Performance Improvement Plan;” “Make-Whole Relief, including back pay, restoration of benefits, and front pay if reinstatement is not feasible;” “Attorneys’ Fees and Costs, and applicable statutory damages;” and “a written non-retaliation assurance and the implementation of reasonable training for involved managers on CFCA [Colorado False Claims Act] anti-retaliation and age-discrimination compliance.”

The controversy over the Zuckerman notice of claim arrives mere weeks after the January 20 announcement of Lauren Grimshaw Sloan as Colorado’s next film commissioner. Rather than being critical, Zuckerman praises the choice, noting that “I recruited her early on when I started as film commissioner. She worked for me for four years and was the first person who had the title of deputy film commissioner. I trained her — and she’s terrific.”

But even if the state film office is now in good hands, Zuckerman isn’t willing to forgive and forget. “I don’t need hundreds or thousands of people thinking I did something really bad,” he says. “I also want it known that Eve has taken a shot at me and done this. And right now, there’s no historical record of me being involved in getting Sundance. So my main goal is that I want to be recognized for what I did. I don’t want to be erased.”

Click here to read the Donald Zuckerman notice of claim.