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Talkhouse

Shannon Plumb has shot over 200 short films, which have been exhibited in museums, galleries, and on international screens. She started by shooting herself as various characters, acting out three-minute situations using humor and silence as her vehicles for storytelling. In 2013, her first feature film, Towheads, premiered at MoMA as part of New Directors / New Films; it is now streaming on the <a href="https://www.criterionchannel.com/towheads" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Criterion Channel</a>. You can see her short films at <a href="http://shannonplumb.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">shannonplumb.com</a> and Towheads is available on Netflix and iTunes. She lives in Brooklyn with her husband, director Derek Cianfrance, and their two sons.

Shannon Plumb

Film

“Godard Sucks!”

Alex Schmider is an award-winning producer who also serves as Senior Director of Entertainment at GLAAD, known for helping shape authentic LGBTQ+ storytelling through acclaimed film, TV and documentary projects including Disclosure (Netflix), Changing the Game (Hulu), Stay on Board: The Leo Baker Story (Netflix), Framing Agnes (Kino Lorber) and Chasing Chasing Amy (Level 33 Entertainment). Schmider was honored as part of this year’s <a href="https://www.out.com/out100/2025/educators/alex-schmider" target="_blank" rel="noopener">OUT100</a> as he continues to push representation in film and TV forward by amplifying LGBTQ+ stories. His latest project, KICK, is at DOC NYC this year as part of the festival’s PRO Pitch Day on November 13th. Alex was recently named one of DOC NYC’s 40 Under 40.

Alex Schmider

Why Sports Documentaries Will Always Matter – To Culture, and To Me

Ramon Zürcher is a Swiss writer-director whose latest film, <a href="https://filmmovement.com/product/the-sparrow-in-the-chimney" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Sparrow in the Chimney</a>, is now on digital. His first feature film, The Strange Little Cat, premiered at the Berlinale Forum in 2013 and was selected at over 80 festivals, including Toronto, Cannes, New Directors/NewFilms and Mar del Plata, winning numerous awards. His second feature film, The Girl and the Spider, also premiered at the Berlinale, where it was awarded the prize for Best Director and the FIPRESCI prize of the Encounters section. In Cahiers du Cinéma, the film ranked eighth on the 2021 Best of the Year list. The Sparrow in the Chimney is his third feature film and he is currently writing a youth drama with the working title The Young Woman with the Crowbar. (Photo by Iris Janke.)

Ramon Zürcher

The Ghosts of the Makeshift Apartment

Writer-director Rachel Wolther&#8216;s latest film, <a href="https://thefrenchitalianmovie.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The French Italian</a>, is available on VOD everywhere movies are rented and sold; you can follow the film <a href="https://www.instagram.com/thefrenchitalianfilm/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">here</a>. She is an alumna of the Sundance Screenwriter&#8217;s Lab, her work has appeared the Black List and in 2017 she was featured as one of Filmmaker magazine’s “25 New Faces of Independent Film.” Her first film was <a href="https://www.snowybingbongs.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Snowy Bing Bongs Across the North Star Combat Zone</a>, which she directed with Alex Houston Fischer.

Rachel Wolther

I Put All My Best Ideas into the Movie Itself, So Don’t Expect Much From This Essay

Julia Marchese is a filmmaker, actor, podcaster, cinephile and film programmer living in Hollywood, California. Her first film was the award-winning documentary Out of Print, about the importance of revival cinema and 35 mm exhibition to culture, and she is currently the co-host of the popular horror podcast Horror Movie Survival Guide. She recently crowdfunded on <a href="https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/i-know-what-you-need-a-stephen-king-adaptation" target="_blank" rel="noopener">IndieGoGo</a> for her forthcoming Dollar Baby short film I Know What You Need, based on Stephen King&#8217;s story of the same name from Night Shift. You can find her on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at @juliacmarchese.

Julia Marchese

Radish Rocks!

Leela Varghese (she/her) and Emma Hough Hobbs (she/they) are the writer-directors of the new animated film <a href="https://lesbianspaceprincessmovie.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Lesbian Space Princess</a>, which is in theaters from October 31. Leela is an award-winning Australian filmmaker whose short film I’m The Most Racist Person I Know was selected SXSW Austin 2025, having its world premiere in the narrative short competition. She is also known for her work as a musical comedian, television presenter and voice actor. Emma is a queer artist from Adelaide who is a filmmaker, animator and production designer. Their award winning short On Film was in competition at SXSW Sydney 2023. As a props master, they have worked on projects such as A24’s Talk to Me and Gold, starring Zac Efron. (Photo by Kyahm Ross.)

Leela Varghese and Emma Hough Hobbs

Lesbian Space Anxiety

Amy Herdy’s new documentary, <a href="https://www.parrotkindergartendoc.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Parrot Kindergarten</a>, about an attorney and cult survivor who heals by teaching her parrot to read, is in theaters from November 3. She is president and co-founder of Covetower, an investigative production company dedicated to high-impact storytelling across film and television, and has helped create some of the most impactful documentaries of the past decade. She first entered the film world as an expert researcher for the Oscar-nominated, Peabody-winning documentary The Invisible War (2012), her first, which exposed the epidemic of sexual assault in the U.S. military. With Dick and Ziering, she then produced The Hunting Ground (2015), that ignited the national conversation about campus sexual assault and reshaped school policies nationwide; The Bleeding Edge (2018), which investigated corruption in the medical device industry, catalyzing removals of dangerous devices from the market; On the Record (2020), a searing exposé at the intersection of Black Lives Matter and #MeToo; and the four-part HBO series Allen v. Farrow, which was nominated for seven Emmys. Before entering film, Ms. Herdy built her investigative skills in television news and newspapers, reporting in Florida and Kentucky before joining The Denver Post.

Amy Herdy

I Went to Film a Parrot. I Discovered a New Language.

Erik Jensen and his wife Jessica Blank are a multihyphenate creative team in film, television and theater; The New Yorker calls them “the foremost practitioners of documentary theater in the U.S.” Their new film, Brooklyn, Minnesota, starring Amy Madigan, Sadie Jensen-Blank and Erik Jensen, is currently playing festivals, with a theatrical release planned for 2026; their first feature, Almost Home, was released in 2019 by Vertical. They are currently developing a biopic of legendary rock critic Lester Bangs and have written TV for Fox, 20th TV, Gaumont, Levinson/Fontana, David Simon/Blown Deadline, and Ed Burns. Their plays include The Exonerated (Outer Critics Circle, Lortel, Drama Desk Awards), Aftermath (NYTW; two Drama League noms), How To Be a Rock Critic (CTG, Steppenwolf, Public Theater), The Line (Public Theater) and Coal Country (Public Theater, Cherry Lane/Audible; Lortel, two Drama Desk noms; original music by Steve Earle).

Erik Jensen

Finding the Light: The Making of Brooklyn, Minnesota

Deborah Goodwin is a writer-director-producer whose work in film and television began as a development executive for Sanford-Pillsbury Productions (Desperately Seeking Susan, River’s Edge, How to Make an American Quilt). Deborah’s Urbanworld Film Festival Best Screenplay win for her darkly provocative family drama Cherrys launched her filmmaking path. She has written for Emmy-winning and Independent Spirit Award-nominated producers, and for shows like the cult favorite horror series Tales from the Cryptkeeper. She is a Film Independent and IFP lab fellow and an ABC and NBC diversity showcase director, best known for her horror fable Vampires in Venice and her action/drama The Pastor, released by Fathom Events and AMC. Her Icelandic noir Snaeland, which she co-wrote and produced, premiered at the Vail Film Festival and screens in the Brooklyn Film Festival 2020. Deborah is a Sundance Collab advisor and screenwriting professor at Brooklyn College, and a newly minted co-creator and writer of the noir-crime-thriller series Hot Freeze, with Canadian producer Nomadic Pictures (Hell on Wheels, Van Helsing, Fargo).

Deborah Goodwin

My Dad Was One Battle After Another

Josh Frank is a critically acclaimed artist, entrepreneur, writer, producer, director and composer. whose current focus is spearheading his latest original project, <a href="https://www.silentsynced.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Silents Synced</a>, an independent series where Frank remasters classic silent films with contemporary music. The latest iteration of this is Silents Synced Presents: A Woman of the World vs. Pearl Jam, a reinvention of the lost 1925 classic, re-soundtracked entirely to Pearl Jam&#8217;s Vs. and Vitalogym, which premieres in U.S. cinemas on November 7. Frank is the author of Fool The World: The Oral History of the Band Called Pixies and In Heaven Everything Is Fine – The Unsolved Life of Peter Ivers. Other books include his novel, The Good Inn, co-written with Black Francis of the Pixies, and Giraffes on Horseback Salad: Salvador Dali, the Marx Brothers, and the Strangest Movie Never Made, which was nominated for an Eisner Award. His list of notable works also includes authorized adaptations of Werner Hergoz’s Stroszek, Mark Vonnegut&#8217;s The Eden Express and The Jonathan Richman Musical. Over the past decade, Frank has collaborated with some of the most innovative figures in music, film, and the arts, including Black Francis, David Lynch and Harold Ramis. He also runs the <a href="http://www.bluestarliteaustin.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Blue Starlite Mini-Urban Drive-In</a>, which he founded in 2009, in Austin, Texas.

Josh Frank

If It Weren’t for the Werner Herzog(s)

Elizabeth Lo is an award-winning filmmaker whose latest documentary feature, <a href="https://mistressdispeller.oscilloscope.net/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mistress Dispeller</a>, the intimate portrait of the disentangling of a real-life love triangle, is in theaters through Oscilloscope from October 22. Her debut feature, Stray, an intimate portrait of three dogs roaming the streets of Istanbul, came out theatrically in 2021 and her short films include Hotel 22 (2015), Bisonhead (2016), Mother’s Day (2017), The Disclosure President (2016), Notes from Buena Vista (2016), Treasure Island (2014), and Last Stop in Santa Rosa (2013). In 2017, her collected shorts were released by Video Project as a DVD, The Short Films of Elizabeth Lo. Elizabeth was born and raised in Hong Kong and holds a B.F.A. from NYU Tisch School of the Arts and an M.F.A. from Stanford University.

Elizabeth Lo

Finding Mistress Dispeller

Ido Fluk&#8216;s latest feature, <a href="https://zeitgeistfilms.com/film/koeln-75" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Köln 75</a> starring Mala Emde, John Magaro and Michael Chernus, is out now in theaters. Described by Variety as &#8220;a talent to be watched&#8221;, he was previously co-writer and director of the Tribeca competition title The Ticket (2017) and the Edinburgh title Never Too Late (2011), which also won the Regard D&#8217;Or at FIFF. He is currently working on the HBO series Empty Mansions in collaboration with Joe Wright and the legal thriller 24 Hours in June with James Schamus. Fluk is a graduate of NYU&#8217;s Tisch School of the Arts and lives in New York, where he used to play in bands but no longer does.

film essay