The writer-director looks back on truths about life and love that she took from films she watched as a kid.

Nikole Beckwith (Stockholm, Pennsylvania) Talks What the Movies Taught Her About Love

core/classic-editor

Nick Dawson talks with filmmakers, musicians and comedians whose work he loves, avoiding the mundane, predictable questions they&#8217;ve heard numerous times and instead asking substantive, thoughtful questions that get to the heart of who they are.

Nobody’s Ever Asked Me That

Podcast

Nobody’s Ever Asked Me That: Charles Lane

Lily Lady is an artist from New York City. Lily&#8217;s journalism can be found in Office and Dirty Magazine and their feature film, <a href="https://www.factorytwentyfive.com/sams-world" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Sam&#8217;s World</a>, is available digitally on Tubi, Amazon Prime and more platforms via Factory 25. Lily’s full length poetry collections are quickie (2022), NDA (2024) and Blood Brother (2026). (Photo by Max Lakner.)

Lily Lady

Film

Fear Factor’s Animal Problem

Erika Burke Rossa is a writer, director, producer and actor whose feature directorial debut, <a href="https://tribecafilm.com/films/rain-reign-2026" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Rain Reign</a>, starring Paul Rudd, Jeremy Sisto, Felice Kakaletris and Gretchen Mol and based on Ann M. Martin’s bestselling novel of the same name, is now playing at the Tribeca Film Festival. Born to a Moroccan Jewish mother and Irish Catholic American father, and raised in Hong Kong and Taiwan, her multicultural and multi-faith upbringing shaped her commitment to stories that reflect the world in all its complexity. She has also directed for the stage, most recently helming Sarah DeLappe&#8217;s Pulitzer Prize-finalist play The Wolves at the Piven Theater with young actors from the Actors Training Center, where she coached and mentored young performers. Erika has also volunteered with Have Dreams, supporting children on the Autism spectrum.

Erika Burke Rossa

The Anti-Anti-Hero

Kyra Sedgwick is an Emmy Award®- and Golden Globe®-winning actress, producer and director who can currently be seen in the romantic crime thriller <a href="https://www.carolinacarolinemovie.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Carolina Caroline</a>, opposite Samara Weaving and Kyle Gallner, which is in theaters now. Sedgwick&#8217;s feature Family Movie, a horror-comedy co-directed with Kevin Bacon and starring their children Travis and Sosie Bacon, had its world premiere at the 2026 SXSW Film Festival, and she recently starred alongside Kevin Bacon and Judd Hirsch in the feature film The Best You Can. Sedgwick’s previous directing credits include the feature films Space Oddity starring Kyle Allen and Alexandra Shipp, Story of a Girl, which earned her a DGA Award nomination, and Girls Weekend, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Sedgwick has contributed her directing talents to notable series such as Ray Donovan, City on a Hill, Grace and Frankie, and others.

Kyra Sedgwick

Three Great Things: Kyra Sedgwick

Ruth Leitman is an award-winning filmmaker recognized for highlighting social justice issues in feature documentaries over the past 20 years. Her 1994 film <a href="https://vinegarsyndrome.com/products/wildwood-nj" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Wildwood, NJ</a> (1994) has enjoyed a second life as a viral film since 2009 and screened at Hot Doc’s fifteen-year anniversary festival in 2013, and is currently playing at the <a href="https://lowcinema.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Low Cinema</a> in Queens. In 2015, she directed for Kartemquin Films’ Al Jazeera America documentary series Hard Earned, which was nominated for an International Documentary Association Award and won an Alfred I. duPont Columbia University Journalism Award (2016). Premiering at Tribeca Film Festival and Hot Docs, Lipstick &amp; Dynamite (2005) won the Documentary Storytelling Prize at Nantucket Film Festival and was broadcast on Showtime and her immigration film Tony &amp; Janina’s American Wedding (2010) premiered at the Chicago International Film Festival and won a jury prize as well as several social justice awards. Alma (1998) won the Documentary Feature Jury Prize at the Hamptons Film Festival and screened at IDFA, SXSW, Director’s Guild of America, and Whitney Biennial. Learn more at her website, <a href="http://ruthlessfilms.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Ruthless Films</a>.

Ruth Leitman

That Girl in My Films

Nobody’s Ever Asked Me That: Zia Anger

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Talkhouse

Hannah Frances

All One Song :: Matt Valentine on “Berlin”

789: Mythical Kitchen’s Josh Scherer Is Food Media’s Unlikely Intellectual

955. – Jeremy Sisto

Nikole Beckwith is from Massachusetts. Her debut feature, Stockholm, Pennsylvania (Nicholl Fellowship, Blacklist), premiered at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival, Her sophomore screenplay, About Ray, will premiere at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival. She is currently a Film Fellow with San Francisco Film Society. Her comics have been featured on WNYC, The Huffington Post and The Hairpin and can be seen at <a href="http://nikolebeckwith.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">nikolebeckwith.com</a>.

Nikole Beckwith

post

Born and raised in Madrid, Spain, Lucía Aleñar Iglesias is a writer-director based in Los Angeles. Her feature debut <a href="https://grasshopperfilm.com/film/forastera/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Forastera</a> premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival and is in theaters now through Grasshopper Film as a New York Times Critic&#8217;s Pick . She holds a BFA in Film from NYU and an MFA in Screenwriting from Columbia University. Lucía‘s short film Forastera (2020) screened at numerous major international festivals, including Cannes Critics’ Week, Curtas Vila do Conde, Les Arcs, Oberhausen, and was nominated for a Gaudí Award. Lucía developed the feature version of Forastera with the Critics’ Week Next Step programme. She took part in La Résidence through Cannes Cinéfondation and received the ArteKino award during MIA Market. Lucía has worked in the casting department for the Safdie brothers’ Good Time and line-produced for Academy Award-winning Peggy Stern. (Photo by Agnès Piqué Corbera.)

Lucía Aleñar Iglesias

Forastera: Shape-Shifting Through Language