September 15th, 2022

SELECTED FILMMAKER HEADSHOTS HERE
THROUGH HER LENS ‘AUTHENTICITY OF ME’ SHORT FILM HERE, COURTESY OF TRIBECA

NEW YORK, NY – Tribeca and CHANEL today announced the eighth annual THROUGH HER LENS: The Tribeca CHANEL Women’s Filmmaker Program, taking place September 20 to 22, 2022. The celebrated program will welcome program finalists and jurors for in-person events while gathering esteemed industry leaders from around the globe for a program of workshops, classes, and peer-to-peer sessions for the filmmaker finalists.

 

Founded in 2015 by Tribeca and CHANEL and in collaboration with Pulse Films, the mentorship program provides industry support, artistic development, and funding to emerging U.S.-based self-identifying women and non-binary writers and directors. In a world that has seen so much change the need for THROUGH HER LENS is more vital than ever, with the program providing a crucial and continuing platform for stories that tell the triumphs and struggles of intrepid women and non-binary people.

 

“Now more than ever, the unique perspectives of women need to be front and center in cinema,” said Tribeca Co-Founder and CEO Jane Rosenthal. “Tribeca’s core belief is that art can change the world, and our long-standing partnership with CHANEL will pave the way for larger audiences to celebrate the power of storytelling through the lens of female and non-binary filmmakers.”

 

The three-day immersive program will feature a hybrid of virtual and in-person one-on-one mentorship, intimate participant masterclasses focused on script-to-screen development, music composition, costume design, producing, and directing. Participants will work with mentors to shape and refine their projects and pitches, and at the conclusion of the program, each pair will pitch their projects to a jury of industry experts. One team will receive full financing to produce their short film with support from Tribeca Studios. The four other projects will be awarded grant funds to support their films’ development.

 

To date, past fully supported projects have achieved noteworthy successes including: A.V. Rockwell’s Feathers (2016), which was acquired by Fox Searchlight after it premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival; Nikyatu Jusu’s Suicide by Sunlight (2017), which premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival; 2018's ROSA, by Suha Araj, which premiered at BlackStar Film Festival in August 2020 and is now screening on HBOMax; 2019’s CHAMP by Hannah Peterson which premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival; and 2020’s REST STOP by Crystal Kayiza which will premiere at the 2022 Toronto International Film Festival.

 

Tribeca and CHANEL have convened a diverse range of leading women and non-binary creators to share their experiences with, and provide curated guidance to, five teams of filmmakers that have been selected to receive project support for their upcoming short narrative films.

 

The 2022 Leadership Committee:

JURORS: actor and director Jennifer Morrison (“Once Upon a Time” and “This is Us”); producer Bonnie Hammer (“It Just Takes One” and “Erase the Hate”); actor Alexandra Shipp (tick, tick… BOOM! and “Love, Simon”); producer Riva Marker (Whiplash and Drive); actor Thuso Mbedu (The Woman King and “The Underground Railroad”)

 

MENTORS: actor Annette Bening (American Beauty and 20th Century Women); writer and showrunner Annie Weisman (“Physical” and “Desperate Housewives”); producer Effie Brown (“Dear White People” and But I’m a Cheerleader); producer Haifaa Al-Mansour (Wadjda and Mary Shelley); producer Maria Zuckerman (Nanny and The Mauritanian)

 

WRITING MENTORS: writer Becky Johnston (House of Gucci and The Prince of Tides); producer Kelly Carmichael (The Eyes of Tammy Faye and My Week with Marilyn); writer and showrunner Angela Kang (“The Walking Dead” and “Terriers”); writer and showrunner Deepa Mehta (Funny Boy and “Leila”); writer Jennifer Kaytin Robinson (Thor: Love and Thunder and Someone Great).

 

MASTERCLASSES: director Karyn Kusama (Jennifer’s Body and “Yellowjackets”); writer, director, and producer Patty Jenkins (Wonder Woman and Monster); writer and producer Courtney Kemp (“Power” and “The Good Wife”); composer Laura Karpman (“Ms. Marvel” and “Lovecraft Country”); casting director Carmen Cuba (“Stranger Things” and The Martian)

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The 2022 Selected Projects and Filmmakers:

 

BITTERROOT
In the wilds of a pre-contact Montana, young Kóónssko struggles to provide for his starving family after the death of his father. When an unmanned canoe takes him to a mystical village downstream, he must decide if the promise of a new love is worth the heavy cost.

• Maya Rose Dittloff (Writer/Director), or Ukkayǔ”kwīyinnimǎakii, is a Mandan, Hidatsa, and Amskapi Piikani (Blackfeet) writer, director, and producer. Maya is a member of the WGA and alumni of UCLA and the LA Skins Fest Feature Writing Lab. In 2021, Maya worked as a staff writer for AMC/AMC+ on the critically acclaimed DARK WINDS before going on as a fellow for the Native American Media Alliance Showrunner Training Program. Recently, Maya’s work was chosen for The Indigenous List, a collaboration between The Black List, The Sundance Institute, and Illuminative. Maya is currently a Founding Board Member for Young Entertainment Activists, a member of the Panavision + Made In Her Image inaugural Catalyst Cohort, and a LIFT Fellow with the Native Arts and Culture Foundation.
• Aubrey Campbell (Producer) is an independent producer of short films. Born in Alaska and raised up and down the Eastern Seaboard, Aubrey is an alumni of the UCLA School of Theater Film and Television Producers Program. Aubrey is passionate about drama development and has worked from intern to coordinator at Color Force (CRAZY RICH ASIANS, AMERICAN CRIME STORY) and Dylan Clark Productions (THE BATMAN, BIRD BOX), and TOOL OF NORTH AMERICA. Aubrey currently works both as a script consultant at Stage 32 and for EP John Goldwyn at John Goldwyn Productions. Aubrey’s previous producing credits include Khiam'e Fields' CLARA, Nissryne Dib's YOU'RE NEXT, Candace Ho's RED, Jonathan Chen’s CONFESSION, and Maya Rose Dittloff's STAG PARTIES and DOGWOOD.

 

FISHTANK
Sardonic 28-year-old Jules has been sober for a year, but she can’t stop vomiting fish. Striving to put her life back on track, she must preserve control when a fish enthusiast unexpectedly enters her life.

• Wendi Tang (Writer/Director) is a Chinese writer/director and producer based in Los Angeles. Wendi's work focuses on character-driven stories that explore various corners of female narratives. Her short films have been selected by over 30 international film festivals and won several awards. Her screenplay was a finalist in the 2021 Atlanta Film Festival screenplay competition. Wendi is a 2022 NYC Women’s Fund recipient and a Sundance Uprise Grant Fund Finalist.
• Hongwei Wu (Producer) is an international producer who splits her time between New York and China. For Hongwei, creating art is a lifelong exploration, and she takes enormous pleasure in the collaborative creative process required to make great international cinema. As a Creative Producing MFA candidate at Columbia University, she has worked on over 50 short films and produced over a dozen shorts around the world.

 

HOMECOMING AND GOING
A woman welcomes a childhood friend from Hong Kong into her London home, showing her around the neighborhood before a handover of keys. The story of one woman’s first day and the other’s last, where the lines between foreign and familiar become blurred.

• Kristie Ko (Writer/Director) is a director and writer who came of age in post-colonial Hong Kong. A graduate of the USC School of Cinematic Arts, she has worked in production in Los Angeles, London, and Hong Kong. Her short film, ATEH, was funded by the Fresh Wave International Short Film Festival before screening at Kaohsiung Film Festival and Minikino. Her work explores the spaces in-between, through narratives of belonging and nostalgia, love and loss.
• Merissa Jane Lee (Producer) was born and raised on the sunny island country of Singapore, where she started her career working at HBO Asia developing original content for the Asia-Pacific region. To further pursue her passion for storytelling, she moved to Los Angeles and earned her B.A. in Film and Television Production at USC. Jane has since produced numerous award-winning short films, showcasing them at major film festivals such as Cannes and Telluride. She is passionate about championing diverse stories from underrepresented perspectives.

 

THE LAST RAIN CLOUD OF SUMMER
Mimisworld997 - a user on an online forum for trans women - stumbles across a hidden archive of videos of two recently active users, who seem to have suddenly disappeared.

• Faye Ruiz (Writer/Director) is a filmmaker born and raised in Tucson, Arizona. Her filmmaking is guided primarily by her experiences as a Mexican trans woman. Her interests lie first and foremost in telling the stories of trans women of color. She’s also drawn to forgotten histories, alienation, mythology, and exploring the extremely vulnerable, subjective experiences of people’s lives. Her most recent short film The Lights are on, No one’s Home, was picked up for theatrical, streaming, and physical distribution by DEDZA Films in collaboration with Kino Lorber for their inaugural short film collection Who Will Start Another Fire. Faye was included on Filmmaker Magazine’s 2021 list of 25 new faces of independent cinema which recognizes new voices in independent cinema. She was also a finalist for the 2021 SFFILM Rainin Grant and a recipient of Sundance’s 2021 Uprise Grant.
• Kate Gondwe (Producer) is a recent graduate of Emerson College, a Sundance Catalyst Fellow, and the founder and president of DEDZA Films, a boutique film distributor & hybrid consulting agency dedicated to bringing nuanced films by underrepresented filmmakers to new audiences. The company's first release WHO WILL START ANOTHER FIRE, an anthology film featuring nine works by emerging filmmakers of color released in partnership with Kino Lorber, is now available on Criterion Channel. Other recent releases include the award-winning and Oscar Shortlisted film FAYA DAYI and the Saul Williams and Anisia Uzeyman’s visionary film NEPTUNE FROST which premiered at Cannes Directors’ Fortnight and screened at TIFF, NYFF, Berline, and Sundance Film Festivals. Additionally, Kate is also a campaign manager at NEON working on films released through the boutique distribution label SUPER. Kate dedicates her career to amplifying and creatively supporting exciting, diverse storytellers with a focus on the global south from early development to distribution in independent cinema. Kate was named one of 25 New Faces of Independent Film by Filmmaker Magazine.

 

THE QUEEN, THE KNIGHT, AND THE WITCH
On the eve of her 35th birthday, Amber must convince her sex partner to engage in unorthodox foreplay, through a medieval fantasy audiobook, to defeat her anxiety about skin-to-skin contact.

• Letia Solomon (Writer/Director) is an award-winning filmmaker based in Los Angeles. She studied Chemical Engineering and worked as a Materials & Processing Engineer in Aerospace before pursuing her true calling of film. Letia received an MFA in TV & Film Production from USC and her thesis film, "The Cypher", premiered at the 2020 Tribeca Film Festival, received USC’s 2020 First Look Faculty Award for Outstanding Director, and is currently streaming on HBO MAX as a finalist of the 2020 ABFF HBO Competition. She recently directed a coming of age independent pilot, "3 Blind Mice", set in Baltimore and her comedic mockumentary short film, "Clones" won the Lionsgate/STARZ Best Speculative Fiction Film Award at the 2022 BlackStar Film Festival. Letia has a bold, visual style that champions edgy, heartfelt, and comedic stories for both film and television.
• Krenée Alisha Tolson (Producer) is a producer, writer, and actress from Baltimore, MD. After graduating with a degree in Theatre from DePaul University in 2012, she received her MFA in Producing for Film/TV and New Media from USC’s Peter Stark Producing Program. Krenée received the 2018 Saul Zaentz Innovation Fund Production Grant for her debut short film Finding Phoebe which has been developed into a feature through the Black List Feature Residency Program. Krenée is a Bumble Female Force Prize Winner and a 2019 Women in Film INSIGHT Fellow.

 

The world of film, from its boldest directors and most talented actors, has been intrinsically linked to the history of CHANEL since its inception. House founder and visionary Gabrielle Chanel worked with the leading filmmakers of her time, drawing inspiration from and supporting her fellow creative peers. Her legacy of fostering creativity lives on through CHANEL’s dedication to the art of film, which is expressed through programs such as THROUGH HER LENS and the brand’s other long-standing film partnerships.

Tribeca Enterprises supports independent voices in storytelling and since the beginning has been active in propelling women and non-binary people's voices in film forward. The Tribeca Festival has been uplifting women filmmakers and has reached gender parity in programming over the last few years. THROUGH HER LENS: The Tribeca CHANEL Women's Filmmaker Program — an ongoing iteration of Tribeca’s commitment to providing a platform for new artistic voices — continues to provide resources to help empower emerging women and non-binary storytellers in the industry.

 

@Tribeca

#ThroughHerLens

#CHANELinCinema

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About Tribeca Enterprises:
The Tribeca Festival brings artists and diverse audiences together to celebrate storytelling in all its forms, including film, TV, VR, games, music, and online work. With strong roots in independent film, Tribeca is a platform for creative expression and immersive entertainment. Tribeca champions emerging and established voices; discovers award-winning filmmakers and creators; curates innovative experiences; and introduces new technology and ideas through premieres, exhibitions, talks, and live performances.

The Festival was founded by Robert De Niro, Jane Rosenthal, and Craig Hatkoff in 2001 to spur the economic and cultural revitalization of lower Manhattan following the attacks on the World Trade Center. Tribeca will celebrate its 22nd year from June 7–18, 2023.

In 2019, James Murdoch’s Lupa Systems, a private investment company with locations in New York and Mumbai, bought a majority stake in Tribeca Enterprises, bringing together Rosenthal, De Niro, and Murdoch to grow the enterprise.

 

About CHANEL:
Chanel is a private company and a world leader in creating, developing, manufacturing and distributing luxury products. Founded by Gabrielle Chanel at the beginning of the last century, Chanel offers a broad range of high-end creations, including Ready-to-Wear, Leather Goods, Fashion Accessories, Eyewear, Fragrances, Makeup, Skincare, Jewelry and Watches. Chanel is also renowned for its Haute Couture collections, presented twice yearly in Paris, and for having acquired a large number of specialized suppliers, collectively known as the Métiers d’art. Chanel is dedicated to ultimate luxury and to the highest level of craftsmanship. It is a brand whose core values remain historically grounded on exceptional creation. As such, Chanel promotes culture, art, creativity and “savoir-faire” throughout the world, and invests significantly in people, R&D and innovation. At the end of 2020, Chanel employed over 27,000 people worldwide.