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Talkhouse

Matthew Shear is a filmmaker and actor based in New York. His debut feature as writer-director, <a href="https://fantasylifemovie.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fantasy Life</a>, in which he stars opposite Amanda Peet, Alessandro Nivola, Judd Hirsch and Bob Balaban, world premiered at SXSW 2025, where it won the Narrative Feature Audience Award. The film opens in New York on March 27 and plays nationwide from April 3. Shear also starred in Noah Baumbach&#8217;s Mistress America, alongside Greta Gerwig, as well as in the limited series The Alienist, opposite Dakota Fanning and Daniel Brühl. His other credits include Baumbach&#8217;s The Meyerowitz Stories, M. Night Shyamalan&#8217;s Old, Nathan Silver&#8217;s Between the Temples, and The Boy Downstairs, opposite Zosia Mamet. (Photo by Benno Kling.)

Matthew Shear

Film

Battlestar Fantasy

Jamie Sisley is an Emmy Award-winning filmmaker who wrote and directed Stay Awake, a narrative feature film starring Chrissy Metz, Wyatt Oleff and Fin Argus which is out in theaters from May 19. Stay Awake had its world premiere at the 2022 Berlin Film Festival, where it won the AG Kino Gilde Auteur Award and was Honorable Mention for the Crystal Bear. Jamie received an Emmy Nomination for his feature documentary, Farewell Ferris Wheel, which also won the Creative Promise Award from the Tribeca Film Institute, received an Imagen nomination for the positive portrayal of Latinos in entertainment, and was nationally broadcast on PBS and Netflix. Prior to film, Jamie was a manager in the music industry, working with artists such as Tim McGraw. He currently lives just outside Charlottesville, Virginia. (Photo by Eze Amos.)

Jamie Sisley

The Film Festival Therapist

Scott Friend is a New York-based filmmaker whose first feature, <a href="https://1091.tv/to-the-moon" target="_blank" rel="noopener">To the Moon</a>, is currently available VOD from 1091 Pictures, after playing at such festivals as Nightstream Film Festival, American Film Festival, Panic Film Fest and Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival. He was awarded the Director’s Award from the Polish Film Institute at AFF’s 2020 U.S. in Progress program. As an actor, he recently appeared in the Gotham Award-winning film Fourteen, directed by Dan Sallitt, and The Dark End of the Street, directed by Kevin Tran.

Scott Friend

All in the Family: Brotherhood, Addiction and My First Feature

first feature