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Talkhouse

Alexi Pappas is a 2016 Olympian and an award-winning actor and writer. Alexi co-created and starred in the film Olympic Dreams alongside Nick Kroll, premiering at SXSW 2019. In 2016 Alexi co-wrote, co-directed, and starred in Tracktown, with a cast including Rachel Dratch and Andy Buckley. Alexi is currently writing a book of essays, Bravey, in partnership with Random House. Her writing has been published in the New York Times, Lenny Letter, and many more. Alexi has been profiled on the cover of the New York Times Sports Page, in Rolling Stone, on NPR&#8217;s All Things Considered, and was also featured on the cover of Runner&#8217;s World&#8216;s 50th anniversary issue alongside Kevin Hart, named as one of the two faces of the &#8220;new boom&#8221; in running. A Greek-American, Alexi is the Greek national recordholder in the 10,000 meters with a personal best of 31:36, set at the Rio Olympics.
Jeremy Teicher is a director, writer, and producer whose work blends fiction with reality. Jeremy&#8217;s third feature film, Olympic Dreams, which stars Nick Kroll and Alexi Pappas and is the first ever narrative film shot in an Olympic Village (at the Winter Olympics in South Korea), premiered to critical acclaim at SXSW 2019. His second feature film, Tracktown, co-directed with Alexi Pappas, starring Alexi, Rachel Dratch and Andy Buckley, premiered at the 2016 Los Angeles Film Festival and was distributed by Samuel Goldwyn Films, Orion Pictures, and Sony International. Jeremy&#8217;s award-winning first feature film, Tall as the Baobab Tree, which was inspired by true stories from Jeremy&#8217;s Student Academy Award-nominated short documentary This is Us, screened at over 50 festivals around the world and was distributed by Sundance Artist Services in 2013. A graduate of Dartmouth College, Jeremy was in 2013 named one of Filmmaker magazine&#8217;s 25 New Faces of Independent Film.

Alexi Pappas and Jeremy Teicher

Alexi Pappas is an award-winning writer, filmmaker, and Olympic athlete. Her new memoir, <a href="http://www.randomhousebooks.com/campaign/bravey/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Bravey: Chasing Dreams, Befriending Pain and Other Big Ideas</a>, is out now through Random House. Her writing has appeared in The New York Times, Runner’s World, Women’s Running, Sports Illustrated, The Atlantic and Outside, among other publications, and she has been profiled in The New York Times, Sports Illustrated, New York, and Rolling Stone. Pappas co-wrote, co-directed, and starred in the feature film Tracktown with Rachel Dratch and Andy Buckley. Most recently, she co-wrote and starred alongside Nick Kroll in Olympic Dreams, the first non-documentary-style movie to ever be filmed at the Olympic Games. A Greek American, Pappas holds the Greek national record in the 10,000-meters and competed for Greece in the 2016 Olympics. She lives in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Kelia Anne MacCluskey.)

Alexi Pappas

Film

On Collaborating as a Couple

Tom DeNucci is a director, writer, producer and actor; his latest film, Vault, is in theaters now. Born and raised in Cranston, Rhode Island, DeNucci serves as the president of Woodhaven Media. He has directed six feature films, all of which have received worldwide distribution. In 2013, DeNucci was the recipient of the Rhode Island International Film Festival Robert Burgess Aldrich Award, and in 2015 was named the Shooting Star Award Recipient by Imagine Magazine.

Tom DeNucci

Telling a Legendary Crime Story with Home-Field Advantage

Born in 1988, Jessie Jeffrey Dunn Rovinelli works as a film director, editor, colourist and critic living in New York. She has directed two feature films, So Pretty, (2019, Berlinale) a literary translation/transposition focusing on gender and the utopian imagination, and Empathy (2016, FID Marseille), a performative documentary following a heroin-addicted escort across the USA.

Jessie Jeffrey Dunn Rovinelli

I Make a Film, the Film Makes Me

Patricia Rozema is the writer, director and producer of Mouthpiece, which is now in theaters through Crucial Things and First Generation Films. After an Honors B.A. in Philosophy and English from Calvin College in Michigan, she distinguished herself as a writer/director with her internationally celebrated first comedy feature, I&#8217;ve Heard the Mermaids Singing, at the Director&#8217;s Fortnight in Cannes, where it won the Prix de la Jeunesse. It then opened the Toronto International Film Festival in 1987. Other highlights: writing/directing the contemporary lesbian love story When Night is Falling, adapting/directing the politically progressive Miramax JaneAusten feature Mansfield Park with Harold Pinter, and co-writing HBO’s Grey Gardens, starring DrewBarrymore and Jessica Lange, which won her a PEN Screenwriter&#8217;s award, an Emmy nomination and a Golden Globe. She also won an Emmy for writing and directing a Yo-Yo Ma/Bach film, Six Gestures. In 2015, Rozema adapted and directed the apocalyptic thriller Into the Forest, with Ellen Page and Evan Rachel Wood. She has also directed Anne with an E and Mozart in the Jungle for Netflix/CBC and Amazon. She is a member of theAcademy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Patricia Rozema

Why Me?

Gene Graham is an award-winning filmmaker with over 15 years of indie film, agency and broadcast experience. In theaters from June 7, his latest documentary, <a href="https://determinedpictures.com/project/ladies/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">This One&#8217;s for the Ladies</a>, is a hilarious, thought provoking roller-coaster that won a Special Jury Award at South By Southwest 2018. The Ladies also got picked up for distribution by Neon. His directorial debut, The Godfather of Disco, won Jury &amp; Audience Awards for Best Documentary at the Fire Island Film &amp; Video Festival and an Emerging Filmmaker Award at the Minneapolis/St. Paul International Film Festival. In 2006 Gene edited and was associate producer on Dirty Laundry, directed by Maurice Jamal, which won the Audience Award for Best U.S. Feature and Best Performance by an Actor (Loretta Devine) at the American Black Film Festival. He lives in Brooklyn.

Gene Graham

Learning the Hard Way

Marcus Lindeen’s latest film, <a href="http://pictures.metrograph.com/in-theaters/the-raft" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Raft</a>, opens in theaters on June 7. He made his debut with documentary feature Regretters, which won the prestigious Prix Europa for Best European Documentary in Berlin, the Swedish Academy Awards (Guldbagge) and the Swedish Emmy for Best Documentary in 2011. His second film, the fiction feature Glorious Accidents, premiered at the Venice Film Festival, winning the prize for Best Medium-Length film. Lindeen’s theatre work has been produced and presented at Sweden’s National Theatre (Dramaten), The National Theatre in Oslo and The Schaubühne in Berlin. In January 2017 he exhibited the art installation The Acali Experiment at Centre Pompidou in Paris. The installation was also presented as part of the CPH:DOX film festival in Copenhagen, where The Raft premiered in 2018, winning the main award of the festival. Since then, the film screened in festivals like IDFA, BFI London, Sao Paolo, Zürich, Melbourne, and Full Frame Documentary Film Festival.

Marcus Lindeen

How I Accidentally Became Just Like the Nemesis in My New Movie

Erik Nelson is the director of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tmwm4VPW7RY" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Cold Blue</a>, which airs on HBO on June 6, and the 2017 documentary A Gray State. He is the producer of Werner Herzog&#8217;s award-winning documentaries Grizzly Man, Encounters at the End of the World, Into the Abyss and Cave of Forgotten Dreams. His previous work as a director includes the Harlan Ellison documentary, Dreams with Sharp Teeth, which premiered at SXSW in 2008. (Photo by Galen Fletcher, courtesy Walker Art Center, Minneapolis.)

Erik Nelson

Nostalgia Ain’t What It Used to Be

When Hernan Barangan was 15 years old he was diagnosed with Leukemia &#8211; and he beat it. His professional path emerged during the long months undergoing treatment, as he fell in love with cinema. Barangan has since worked on numerous music videos and commercials, as well as produced various multimedia films, including 3 Apartments, a technically and creatively challenging triptych installation film. Returning to the origins of his career, Barangan turned the camera back on cancer itself. The resulting feature film, Cancer Rebellion, follows as he travels to all 50 states, conducting nearly 100 interviews with young cancer fighters. Executive Produced by Roger Daltrey of The Who, <a href="http://www.cancerrebellion.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Cancer Rebellion</a> is now available to pre-order on Amazon and iTunes. He is also currently attached as writer-director on a provocative feature film dramedy titled Something’s Fishy with Springbok Entertainment.

Hernan Barangan

My Cancer Vendetta, or The Long Road to Making Cancer Rebellion

Jill Magid’s debut feature, <a href="https://theproposal.oscilloscope.net/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Proposal</a>, is in select theaters through Oscilloscope from May 24. American artist and writer Magid’s work is deeply ingrained in her lived experience, exploring and blurring the boundaries between art and life. Through her performance-based practice, Magid has initiated intimate relations with a number of organizations and structures of authority. She explores the emotional, philosophical and legal tensions between the individual and “protective” institutions, such as intelligence agencies or the police. To work alongside or within large organizations, Magid makes use of institutional quirks, systemic loopholes that allow her to make contact with people “on the inside.” Her work tends to be characterized by the dynamics of seduction, the resulting narratives often taking the form of a love story. It is typical of Magid’s practice that she follows the rules of engagement with an institution to the letter – sometimes to the point of absurdity. She has had solo exhibitions at institutions around the world including Tate Modern, London; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York; Berkeley Museum of Art, California; Gagosian Gallery, New York; and the Security and Intelligence Agency of the Netherlands. She lives in Brooklyn.

Jill Magid

Rendezvous with Akerman

Ritesh Batra’s debut work The Lunchbox, was supported by the Sundance Institute and premiered at the Cannes Film Festival. It was nominated for the 2015 BAFTAs. He has since worked on Our Souls At Night, starring Robert Redford and Jane Fonda, and The Sense of an Ending with Jim Broadbent and Charlotte Rampling. <a href="https://www.photograph.movie/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Photograph</a>, his newest work, is in theaters through Amazon Studios from May 17. He has a passion for running, reading, and fountain pens. His favorite color is blue.

Ritesh Batra

My Favorite Car is a Bicycle, or Why I Must Create Things vs. Making Them

David Dastmalchian’s latest film <a href="http://www.samuelgoldwynfilms.com/all-creatures-here-below/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">All Creatures Here Below</a>, which he both wrote and stars in with Karen Gillan, is in theaters from May 17 through Samuel Goldwyn Films. The film is his second collaboration with director Collin Schiffli; Dastmalchian won a Special Jury Prize for Courage in Storytelling at SXSW 2014 for their previous film, Animals, which he also wrote and acted in. Dastmalchian made his feature acting debut in Christopher Nolan&#8217;s The Dark Knight and has been a regular in Denis Villeneuve&#8217;s films, including Prisoners, Blade Runner 2049 and the upcoming Dune. He played Kurt in Marvel Studios&#8217; Ant-Man and Ant-Man and the Wasp, and on TV appeared as Murdoc in MacGyver and Pit Boss Warrack in Twin Peaks: The Return.

David Dastmalchian

How Much of This Shit Should I Use?

Ash Mayfair&#8216;s new feature, <a href="https://www.filmmovementplus.com/videos/skin-of-youth-trailer" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Skin of Youth</a>, an all-consuming love story between a transgender singer and a dog-cage fighter set in 1990s Saigon, Vietnam, is out now on Film Movement Plus from June 26. She was born in Vietnam and educated in the UK and the US. Ash received a BA from Oxford University for English Literature, trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts in London for theatre directing and received an MFA in filmmaking at NYU Tisch School of the Arts. Her first feature, The Third Wife, was released by Film Movement in 2019 and is now available through leading digital platforms and Film Movement Plus. The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, where it won the NETPAC Jury Award, and also won awards at the San Sebastian, Milano, Chicago, Minsk, Kolkata and Cairo film festivals.

film essay