Reach Film Fellowship

Mad Hot Ballroom, Marilyn Agrelo’s directorial debut was the surprise hit of summer 2005. It enjoyed a theatrical run of over 24 weeks and is among the top 10 highest grossing documentary films of all time. Marilyn’s narrative feature film debut, An Invisible Sign of My Own, based on the highly acclaimed novel and starring Jessica Alba, is currently in post-production. Born in Cuba, Marilyn came to the US with her parents and three siblings at the age of 3. She is currently at work on a personal documentary entitled Us and Them, inspired by her family life. It is being filmed in both the US and Cuba. Marilyn has worked in film for over 15 years and has directed commercials, dramatic shorts, and interactive museum installations.

Laurie Collyer is best known for producing and directing the documentary feature film, Nuyorican Dream (2000) and writing and directing the narrative feature film Sherrybaby (2006) – both of which premiered in competition at the Sundance Film Festival. Nuyorican Dream won numerous festival awards, was broadcast on HBO, and also found a home in community outreach and education programs. Collyer was a filmmaker-in-residence at the Cinefondation of the Cannes Film Festival to develop the Sherrybaby script, as well as participating in the 2001 Sundance Writer’s and Director’s Labs. Maggie Gyllenhaal was nominated for a Golden Globe for her performance in the film, which won top prizes in Karlovy Vary, Stockholm and Deauville. Collyer was also honored with the Sarah Huntington Powell Leadership Award at the Women’s Prison Association. Sherrybaby has had a long life on cable, network TV, and within institutions of criminal justice and drug treatment.

Break Thru Films founders Annie Sundberg and Ricki Stern are co-directors of the award winning and Emmy nominated films The Devil Came on Horseback, The Trials of Darryl Hunt, the forthcoming feature about comic legend Joan Rivers: A Piece of Work and Burma Soldier for HBO. In 2009, they received a Sundance/Skoll “Stories of Change” production grant for their film about the innovative program YouthBuild - following three Philadelphia youths at risk who enter a powerful year-long alternative education program to rebuild their own lives and communities. Annie developed and produced the award winning films Tully€ (2003 Spirit Award nominee), In My Corner (POV/PBS) and One Survivor Remembers (HBO). Break Thru Films also produces and directs commercial spots and foundation campaign work. They are currently in development on a feature adaptation of The Trials of Darryl Hunt and a new series for the Sundance Channel.

Jeremy Kipp Walker is a New York based producer/director and partner at independent film production company Journeyman Pictures.  His recent producing credits include Ryan Fleck and Anna Boden’s baseball odyssey Sugar, released by Sony Pictures Classics; Cold Souls (Samuel Goldwyn Films), starring Paul Giamatti, David Strathairn and Emily Watson; and the much-celebrated drama Half Nelson (THINKFilm), for which Ryan Gosling received a 2007 Best Actor Academy Award nomination.  He is currently Executive Producing Boden and Fleck’s upcoming It’s Kind of  a Funny Story (Focus Features) and developing his feature directorial debut Swollen Head.

Past mentors of the program have included: Savannah-based writer and producer Renee Bishop (Danielle Russell, RFF 2009) who was the VP/Executive Producer of the PBS series Farmers’ Almanac TV; director of the award-winning film Trembling Before G-d and producer of A Jihad for Love, Sandi DuBowski (Pia Zaragoza, RFF 2008); Rachel Grady (Annie Waldman, RFF 2008), the award-winning director of Jesus Camp and Boys of Baraka; Nicole Kassell (Jules Monteyne, RFF 2009), director of the award-winning film The Woodsman; renowned documentarian Albert Maysles (Nicholas Bruckman, RFF 2008); 2008 Nicholl Fellowship finalist Afia Nathaniel (Suel Kim, RFF 2008), the director of Neither the Veil, Nor the Four Walls; and So Yong Kim (Brendon McQueen, RFF 2009) who directed the award-winning films, In Between Days, and Treeless Mountain.