Posted by Larry Gleeson
AFI ANNOUNCES THE DIRECTORS SELECTED FOR THE
AFI DWW+ CLASS OF 2026
Award-winning Filmmaker Marie Jamora Named Visitor Creative Director
Alums Embody Lesli Linka Glatter, Siân Heder, Dime Davis, Cicely Tyson, Lee Grant, Gandja Monteiro,
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE, Los Angeles, CA, February 13, 2025 – Right now, the American Movie Institute (AFI) introduced the filmmakers chosen for the AFI DWW+ Class of 2026. Based in 1974 because the Directing Workshop for Girls, AFI DWW+ is a tuition-free year-long directing program, open to all candidates, that helps rising narrative filmmakers via the manufacturing cycle of a brief movie, offering hands-on instruction led by business specialists. The brief movies will premiere on the annual DWW+ Showcase in Spring 2026.
The artists chosen for the AFI DWW+ Class of 2026 are Ragini Bhasin, Reena Dutt, Maja Fernqvist, Melissa Fisher, Ran Jing, Eunice Levis, Chaconne Martin-Berkowicz and Destinee Stewart.
The eight contributors exhibit a ardour for visible storytelling, the tenacity to pursue a directorial profession and a willingness to be taught and develop, amongst different program necessities. Every participant went via a rigorous choice course of and have been in the end chosen from 20 finalists who met with the Ultimate Choice Committee.
AFI additionally introduced that Marie Jamora (AFI DWW Class of 2020) has been named the AFI DWW+ Visitor Creative Director for the Class of 2026.
“For over 50 years, AFI DWW+ has had a significant influence on the business,” mentioned Susan Ruskin, Dean of the AFI Conservatory and Government Vice President of the American Movie Institute. “We’re honored that AFI DWW+ Alum and trailblazing director, Marie Jamora, shall be guiding the brand new cohort as they create their movies and showcase their distinctive visions. We sit up for watching the Class of 2026 flourish as administrators and encourage the subsequent technology of filmmakers.”
“AFI’s DWW modified my life – the brief movie that I produced in this system turned my calling card that launched me into the tv directing profession I aspired to,” mentioned Jamora. “The filmmakers in my class usually are not simply my dearest pals, we proceed to supply one another with assist and suggestions in our ongoing tasks. I’m honored to have the ability to give again to this system that gave me a lot, to design the curriculum organising this wonderful new cohort for achievement. Now greater than ever, we have to elevate voices like theirs to contribute to the movie business that all of us love and grew up dreaming about.”
Born and raised in Manila, Jamora is an award-winning filmmaker who has directed numerous movies and tv applications, together with episodes of FIRE COUNTRY, THE CLEANING LADY and QUEEN SUGAR. Most not too long ago, she directed an episode of the MATLOCK reboot starring Academy Award® and Emmy® winner Kathy Bates. Her brief movie, FLIP THE RECORD, gained the Grand Jury Award for Greatest Narrative Brief at Urbanworld and was shortlisted for the ninetieth Academy Awards®. Her first function, WHAT ISN’T THERE, premiered on the Slamdance Movie Competition. Jamora additionally produced and directed a undertaking for Ava DuVernay, created for Starz. After twenty years of filmmaking and educating within the Philippines, she has taught on the AFI Conservatory and Sundance Co//ab. She is among the leaders of the DGA’s Girls’s Steering Committee’s Squad Mentorship program, the founding father of the non-profit group group Cinema Sala, and proudly one of many few Filipinos within the Administrators Guild of America.
Jamora will act as a mentor for the DWW+ contributors all through the manufacturing cycle and business showcase and oversee and direct the inventive curriculum, which is taught by movie and tv professionals working at high ranges inside the business, in addition to skilled College from the AFI Conservatory.
As one of many longest-running and preeminent movie and tv workshops nationwide, AFI DWW+ has educated a whole bunch of artists whose directorial work has entertained world audiences and outlined our collective cultural panorama. Distinguished Alums of the AFI DWW+ program embody Maya Angelou, Anne Bancroft, Neema Barnette, Pippa Bianco, Tessa Blake, Tricia Brock, Ellen Burstyn, Rebecca Cammisa, Dyan Cannon, Dime Davis, Jan Eliasberg, Naomi Foner, Jennifer Getzinger, Lesli Linka Glatter, Lyn Goldfarb, Randa Haines, Siân Heder, Victoria Hochberg, Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Matia Karrell, Maggie Kiley, Lynne Littman, Nancy Malone, Gandja Monteiro, Sarah Gertrude Shapiro, Becky Smith, Cicely Tyson and Joanne Woodward. View full listing of 350+ AFI DWW Alums right here.
In regards to the AFI DWW+ Class of 2026:
Ragini Bhasin
Ragini Bhasin is a South Asian author/director and graduate of Chapman College movie faculty who focuses on on a regular basis thrillers and socially acutely aware movies advised with a feminist lens. Her shorts have screened at a number of Oscar®-qualifying festivals, together with two current shorts opening at Palm Springs ShortFest. Her movies have additionally been featured in The Wrap’s ShortList pageant, chosen as Vimeo Workers Choose, and distributed by ARTE Channel, ShortsTV, Argo Channel and PBS. She acquired the Meredith MacRae Memorial Award from WIF, was a BAFTA Newcomer (2021–2024), gained the 2022 Julia S. Gouw Brief Movie Problem hosted by CAPE and Janet Yang Productions, and was a 2023 Movie Unbiased’s Challenge Contain Directing fellow.
Reena Dutt
Reena Dutt is devoted to new and reimagined texts that catapult polarizing conversations via surprising tales of the underheard. Her brief movie, FOUND is getting used to start out conversations inside the transracial adoptee group, and TOO MANY BODIES was supported by NoRAnow.org and Survivors Empowered, advocating for gun reform. As a producer, her movies have been screened at over 80 festivals together with Sundance, Outfest, SF Dance and Frameline. She was a previous producing fellow with SFFilm, TAP and Movie Unbiased. Dutt can be a theater director working regionally within the USA and her subsequent manufacturing opens in Lengthy Seaside in March.
Maja Fernqvist
Maja Fernqvist is a multi-award-winning artistic director, with a few years of expertise within the promoting business. Fernqvist focuses on telling tales in suave and visually arresting methods. Her work contains music movies, artwork movies, commercials and brief movies formally chosen by movie festivals equivalent to LA Brief Fest and Brooklyn Movie Competition. Fernqvist was chosen by Lionsgate to direct a brief movie from the Twilight Saga Universe and chosen as one of many rising administrators for SHOOT New Administrators Showcase. Fernqvist’s work has acquired worldwide recognition from the Cannes Lions Worldwide Competition of Creativity, Clios and British Tv Promoting Awards.
Melissa Fisher
Melissa Fisher is an achieved director, author and multi-hyphenate within the business with over 12 years of expertise on Academy Award®-winning units equivalent to Damien Chazelle’s LA LA LAND and FIRST MAN, and Emmy Award®-winning reveals like GLOW and THE DROPOUT. A graduate of Chapman College’s Dodge School of Movie, Fisher’s directorial work merges technical talent with poetic imagery to create emotionally evocative drama, tackling social justice themes and highlighting marginalized communities. Fisher’s current brief BUSCANDO ALMA centered on immigration and gender identification, and gained quite a few awards together with the Oscar®-Qualifying Jury Award at Atlanta’s Out On Movie Competition.
Ran Jing
Ran Jing is a transnational author and director, acclaimed for her debut function MODEL, which was featured in Selection China, gained a number of awards at Academy Award®- and BAFTA-qualifying festivals, and had a theatrical launch in China. Named one in every of ISA’s High 25 Writers to Watch, Jing has written options for Ruyi Movies. A former storyboard artist at Blue Sky Studios, she labored on blockbusters equivalent to SPIES IN DISGUISE, THE PEANUTS MOVIE and the ICE AGE franchise. Her intensive expertise in each Hollywood and China profoundly informs her ardour for crafting nuanced, character-driven tales that discover themes of identification and belonging.
Eunice Levis
Author and director, Eunice Levis, is a first-generation Dominican American from the Bronx, New York. Levis’ work focuses on genre-bending tales that discover expertise, race, gender, historical past and diaspora identification. She was most not too long ago a 2024 NALIP Media Accelerator fellow, and a Starz #TakeTheLead Author’s Lab Intensive fellow. Levis was beforehand a Stowe Story Lab Fellow and a Netflix/NALIP Girls of Coloration Brief Movie Incubator fellow. Her newest brief, RO & THE STARDUST, a bilingual house fantasy, is at the moment streaming on Netflix. Levis is a movie adjunct professor and holds an MA from New York College.
Chaconne Martin-Berkowicz
Chaconne Martin-Berkowicz is a author and director whose work explores need, energy dynamics and the feminine gaze. Her tv writing credit embody Amazon’s CRUEL INTENTIONS and Amazon’s I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER. As a director, Martin-Berkowicz’s brief movie SCOTTY’S VAG premiered at SXSW and is now streaming on Vimeo, the place it acquired a Workers Choose. Her earlier brief, IN SYNC, premiered on the Maryland Movie Competition and is streaming on NoBudge. Martin-Berkowicz is a 2024 Sony Photos TV Various Administrators fellow and is growing her function directorial debut. She holds a BA from Johns Hopkins College.
Destinee Stewart
Destinee Stewart is a director and author from Dallas, Texas, now primarily based in Los Angeles, who explores identification, resilience and connection. Her most up-to-date movie, THE OTHER PARTNERS, premiered in 2024 on the Oscar®-qualifying RiverRun Movie Competition, and her function, WADE IN THE WATER, a psychological horror, has been supported by BendFilm: Basecamp and the Cucalorus Writing Residency. She is growing her proof-of-concept brief movie for her function WADE IN THE WATER. Beforehand, she led worldwide dubbing productions for Netflix, collaborating on world tasks like LOVE IS BLIND, REPRESENT and IN HIS SHADOW.
AFI DWW+ is a part of the AFI Conservatory’s Division of Progressive Applications, which additionally contains the AFI Cinematography Intensive Workshop. By way of a spread of studying alternatives, Progressive Applications serves a various group of aspiring visible storytellers to domesticate cutting-edge technological and media-making expertise, bridge entry to skilled networks and place contributors on an upward profession trajectory.
Study extra at Conservatory.AFI.com/
In regards to the American Movie Institute (AFI)
The American Movie Institute (AFI) is a nonprofit group with a mandate to champion the transferring picture as an artwork kind. Established in 1967, AFI launched the primary complete historical past of American movie and sparked the motion for movie preservation in the US. In 1969, AFI opened the doorways of the AFI Conservatory, a graduate-level program to coach narrative filmmakers. The Conservatory, which counts Deniese Davis, Affonso Gonçalves, Susannah Grant, Matthew Libatique, David Lynch, Melina Matsoukas and Rachel Morrison as Alumni, is ranked one of many high movie colleges in America. AFI’s enduring traditions embody the AFI Life Achievement Award, which honors the masters for work that has stood the check of time; AFI AWARDS, which celebrates the artistic ensembles of probably the most excellent display screen tales of the 12 months; and scholarly efforts such because the AFI Catalog of Function Movies and the AFI Archive that protect movie historical past for future generations. AFI exhibition applications embody AFI FEST and year-round exhibition on the AFI Silver Theatre and Cultural Heart in Maryland. AFI Film Membership is a vacation spot for film lovers from around the globe to have a good time and have interaction with the artwork kind day by day. Different pioneering applications embody workshops aimed toward elevating rising storytellers and expertise, together with AFI DWW+ and the AFI Cinematography Intensive Workshop. Examine all of those applications and extra at AFI.com and observe us on social media at Fb.com/
In regards to the AFI Conservatory
The AFI Conservatory opened its doorways in 1969 to an inaugural class that included Terrence Malick, Caleb Deschanel and Paul Schrader. Right now, the Conservatory affords a two-year MFA diploma in six filmmaking disciplines: Cinematography, Directing, Enhancing, Producing, Manufacturing Design and Screenwriting. In a collaborative manufacturing atmosphere, AFI Fellows be taught to grasp the artwork of storytelling, collectively creating as much as 175 movies a 12 months. Fellows actively take part in your complete life cycle of a movie, from growth via manufacturing and exhibition.
Alumni of this elite program, starting from trendy masters to daring new voices defining the cutting-edge kind, embody Andrea Arnold, Darren Aronofsky, Ari Aster, Deniese Davis, Sam Esmail, Brad Falchuk, Affonso Gonçalves, Susannah Grant, Liz Hannah, Patty Jenkins, Janusz Kamiński, Matthew Libatique, David Lynch, Melina Matsoukas, Polly Morgan, Rachel Morrison and Wally Pfister, amongst others.
Press contact:
American Movie Institute
Shari Mesulam, Shari@themesulamgroup.co
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