Greta Schiller (Producer/Director) Greta Schiller is an internationally acclaimed documentary filmmaker and co-founder of Jezebel Productions. Since 1984 she has produced over a dozen films, unearthing lost histories of marginalized groups and writing them into the cultural narrative. Her work includes international favorites such as: Before Stonewall (1984 Emmy Award, 2019 National Film Registry), International Sweethearts of Rhythm (PBS, 1986 Best Doc, Philadelphia Film Festival), Paris Was a Woman (1995 Audience Award Winner, Berlinale), and The Man Who Drove with Mandela (PBS, 1998 Best Documentary at Berlinale). Her films have screened at the most prestigious international film festivals over the last 35 years, making her one of the most respected, longest-producing independent filmmakers of her generation. After earning her M.Ed in Science Education, Schiller’s investigations shifted to science, society, and the environment. Her latest film, The Land of Azaba (2020) tells a tale of epic proportions set in an ecological reserve on the Spanish-Portuguese border. An awardee of two Fulbright Fellowships: the first ever US/UK Fulbright Arts Fellowship in Film in 1989-90, and a Global Fulbright Award in 2016, Schiller is also the recipient of a Rachel Carson Fellowship, the Townsend Harris Medal: Distinguished Alumni Award, and in 2018 she was inducted into the CCNY Alumni Hall of Fame. Greta’s films have been funded by PBS, New York State Council on the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, Suffolk County Film Commission, Eurimage, VPRO, ARTE, Channel Four UK, South African Arts Council, London Production Fund, European Media Fund and The Arts Council of England.

Andrea Weiss (Producer/Director) is an Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker and founder, with Greta Schiller, of Jezebel Productions. Most recently, she is Producer/Director/Editor of Bones of Contention, a feature documentary delving into the historical memory movement in Spain and the unknown story of LGBT repression under the Franco dictatorship. Bones of Contention premiered in the 2017 Berlin Film Festival, screened on the film festival circuit around the world, and had an art-house cinema release in Spain. It won several jury and audience awards, including in St. Petersburg, Russia, and Valladolid, Spain. Her other film credits include Escape to Life: The Erika and Klaus Mann Story, Seed of Sarah, Paris Was a Woman, Before Stonewall, A Bit of Scarlet and International Sweethearts of Rhythm, among others. A nonfiction author as well, her books include Paris Was a Woman (Harper Collins, 1995; Counterpoint Press, 2013) which won a Lambda Literary Award, Vampires and Violets: Lesbians in Film (Penguin, 1992) and In the Shadow of the Magic Mountain: The Erika And Klaus Mann Story (University of Chicago Press, 2008) which won a Publishing Triangle Award for Best Nonfiction. Her books have been translated into French, Spanish, German, Korean, Swedish, Japanese, and Slovenian. Weiss has been awarded fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, National Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, the U.S./Spain Fulbright Commission, and the D.A.A.D. Artist Program in Berlin. She holds a Ph.D. in U.S. History and is Professor of Film at the City College of New York, where she co-directs the MFA Program in Film.

Stanley Nelson (Executive Producer) Stanley Nelson is among the premier documentary filmmakers working today. His body of work has garnered every major award in the industry. He is a MacArthur “Genius” Fellow, was awarded an individual Peabody Award, the 2016 Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Academy of Television Arts Sciences, and received the National Medal in the Humanities from President Barack Obama. His film, Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2019, marking Nelson’s tenth premiere at that prestigious festival, the most of any documentary filmmaker. Two of Nelson’s recent films, Tell Them We Are Rising: The Story of Black Colleges and Universities (2018) and The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution (2016), broke audience records for African American viewership on the PBS series Independent Lens. The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution won the 2016 NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Documentary Film. Freedom Riders (2010, winner of three Primetime Emmy Awards) and Freedom Summer (2014, Peabody Award), both took a fresh look at critical events in the civil rights struggles of the 1960’s. Nelson’s 2003 film The Murder of Emmett Till (Sundance Special Jury Prize), about the brutal killing of a fourteen-year-old African American boy in Mississippi in 1955, helped prompt the U.S. Department of Justice to reopen the case. In 2000, Nelson co-founded Firelight Media, a non-profit company dedicated to mentoring, inspiring and training a new generation of diverse young filmmakers.

Loretta Chan (Impact and Community Engagement Director) is thrilled to help communities use The Five Demands as a tool for positive social change. Before joining this team, she was the marketing director at Youth Communication, an award-winning NYC nonprofit organization that since 1980 has been providing curricula and professional development to New York City schools, based on true stories from teens. At Youth Communication, she led external communications efforts to amplify real stories by teen writers in order to empower young readers and to help educators create more culturally responsive, inclusive schools. Loretta is a native New Yorker and holds a BA in art history from New York University.

Tracy Daniels (Development Producer) Tracy Daniels (Development Producer) is an independent producer. Her work as a Production Assistant on Great Performances’ The Colored Museum, Warner Bros.’ New Jack City, and Alma’s Rainbow directed by Ayoka Chenzira inspired her to collaborate with filmmakers bringing untold stories to the screen. She served as Deputy Director for the Rainbow Push Coalition’s Wall Street Project initiative, headed by Reverend Jesse L. Jackson, and served on the Board of New York Women in Film and Television. Tracy co-produced the award winning short After Words: The Opposite of Foreplay which premiered at the 2017 NY International Shorts Film Festival and won the 2017 Audience Choice award at the Flicks X Chicks festival in Dallas. She served as Production Manager for The Heart Stays, a Native American feature that won the Made in New York Women’s Fund Award. Tracy holds an M.S. in Comparative Media Studies from MIT.

Linda Villarosa (Development Producer) is a journalist, author, editor, and educator. She is a contributing writer for the New York Times Magazine, where she covers race, inequality and health. Her 2017 article, “America’s Hidden HIV Epidemic,” won a National Lesbian and Gay Journalists’ award for Excellence in Journalism. Her essay on medical myths was published in The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story. Her 2022 book, Under the Skin: The Hidden Toll of Racism on American Lives and the Health of a Nation, was published by Doubleday and selected by the New York Times as a Top Ten Book of the Year. Linda holds a master’s degree in urban journalism/digital storytelling from CUNY’s Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism. She now teaches journalism courses there as well as at the City College of New York where she served for many years as Director of the Journalism Program.

Octavio Warnock-Graham (Cinematographer) works with a variety of clients including CUNY TV, Twelve Publishing, Simon and Schuster and Grand Central Press. Previous to producing and directing, he worked for over 10 years as a lighting technician and gaffer. His experience includes, Yo! MTV Raps, the Howard Stern Show, The Apprentice, the 2004 Olympics, and the RuPaul Show. He was cinematographer for Jezebel Productions’ feature documentaries U.N. Fever and No Dinosaurs in Heaven. In the fall of 2004, he returned to school to pursue an MFA at the City College of New York in documentary directing. His thesis film, Silences, won two Emmy awards and best documentary at the San Francisco Black Film Festival. The film has aired on Black Entertainment Television and Al Jazeera English and is currently distributed by New Day Films.

Bhima Aryateja (Sound Recordist) grew up in Jakarta Indonesia. Had been involved with documenting cultural events at Sacred Bridge Foundation (the first private cultural organization in Indonesia being recognized as a cultural counterpart by UNESCO), where he worked as Documentation Manager on “Listen to The World”. In 2014 he earned his bachelor’s degree in Broadcasting Journalism at Universitas Pelita Harapan in Indonesia; in 2015 he completed a conservatory documentary filmmaking program at New York Film Academy in New York; and in 202 he earned his MFA in Film at The City College of New York, with his award-winning thesis film “Dry Rain”. He currently works as a freelance sound recordist in New York.

J.T. Takagi (Sound Recordist) is an award winning independent filmmaker and sound recordist. Her films are primarily on Asian/Asian-American and immigrant issues and include BITTERSWEET SURVIVAL, THE #7 TRAIN, THE WOMEN OUTSIDE and NORTH KOREA: BEYOND THE DMZ, which all aired on PBS. As a sound engineer, she has recorded for numerous public television and theatrical documentaries with Emmy and Cinema Audio Society nominations including the 2018 Oscar nominated and Emmy winning STRONG ISLAND by Yance Ford, BLACK PANTHERS: VANGUARD OF THE REVOLUTION and TELL THEM WE ARE RISING by Stanley Nelson, and others. She also manages Third World Newsreel, a non-profit alternative media center, and serves on the boards of both community and national organizations working on peace and social justice.

Prudence Arndt (Archive Producer) is an internationally recognized archive producer who has worked on Emmy-winning TV documentaries, Oscar-nominated theatrical releases, and world-class museums. She has worked closely with directors Spike Lee, Mat Whitecross, Martin Smith, Henry Hampton, Volker Schlöndorff and John Sayles. Her credits include: Raoul Peck's acclaimed portrait of I Am Not Your Negro (Oscar nomination), The Kings (2021 Showtime series), Chasing the Moon (PBS, 2019 duPont-Columbia award winner), Tell Them We Are Rising: The Story of Black Colleges and Universities, Project Nim (BAFTA nominee, Sundance winner), Whoopi Goldberg Presents Moms Mabley, African American Lives with Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Regarding Susan Sontag, and Brother Outsider: The Life of Bayard Rustin, among others. In 2015, 2016 and 2018 she received FOCAL international research awards for her work.

Heidi Reavis (Legal Counsel) is Managing Partner of the law firm Reavis Page Jump. Her practice areas include media and intellectual property law, employment matters and dispute resolution. She has been Counsel to and on the Board of the Women’s City Club of New York and Women Make Movies, and a member of the Women’s Forum. She co-produced the award-winning documentary film, A Walk to Beautiful, for which she won an Emmy Award. A Walk to Beautiful was featured in over 35 film festivals around the world. It won the Best Feature Documentary Award from the International Documentary Association and won an Emmy® Award for the television version of the film. Prior to law school, she worked at the New York County District Attorney’s Office, Sex Crimes Prosecution Unit and Trial Division.

Kay Murray (Legal Counsel) provides legal advice to writers, journalists, artists, publishers, and producers. As a member of the BHH Law Firm, she focuses on libel and privacy, copyright and fair use, newsgathering, and licensing. In 2021, she taught Fair Use in Documentary Films as part of the Sundance Film Festival Legal Clinic. Prior to joining BHH, Kay served as Vice President, Law for First Look Institute, a publisher of investigative news, documentary films, and podcasts. She has provided pro bono counsel to numerous local nonprofit news publishers and served as Assistant General Counsel at Tribune Publishing, advising editors and business managers at six daily newspapers. As General Counsel of the Authors Guild, she taught book and freelance authors how to negotiate better contracts and advocated for their interests through strategic litigation and lobbying.

Victoria C. Anderson (Grip) is a native New Yorker currently living in Harlem. She is a product of public access’ Manhattan Neighborhood Network's producer program has over a decade of producing TV, film and commercial content for Technicolor, A&E, ABC, CBS and MTV and other NYC based companies. In 2016 she graduated from The City College of New York with an MFA in Writing and Directing for Documentary Filmmaking, graduating with her thesis film Bless + Simone. She is certified in Final Cut Pro Editing and AVID Media Composer Editing. 

Warut Snidvongs (Grip) is an award-winning cinematographer based in New York City, whose work has been shown at venues around the world such as the Sundance Film Festival, International Film Festival Rotterdam, and the Los Angeles Film Festival. He has also shot content for corporate and celebrity clients including AT&T, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Colin Powell, Methodman Redman. His is a graduate of the MFA Program in Film at The City College of New York , where he currently works as Studio Manager. 

Joann Huang (Graphics) discovered her passion for filmmaking while earning her MFA in Design and Technology at The New School’s Parsons School for Design. From there she went on to earn an MFA in Film from the City College of New York. Since 20104, she has worked as Creative Design Specialist for City College, and has also served as Editor, Graphic Artist, and Production Designer on various films including A Way Back Home, Cinema Sanctuary, For Your Smile and The Snakes. She holds a BA in Business Communication with a specialization in Graphic Design from CUNY’s Baruch College.

Frank Hooker (Additional Camera)

Emmanuel Adu-Poku (Additional Camera)

Jorge Gomez (Additional Camera)