JOHN ANTONIO JAMES DIRECTOR
John is a director, writer and producer who began his film career working for Miramax on Julie Taymor’s Frida. Siempre, Luis, a 2020 Sundance Film Festival Official Selection and his first feature documentary film, won the audience award at the 2020 Port Townsend Film Festival and was an official selection at the Urban World Film Festival. He most recently finished production on Black Table, a feature documentary that follows the largest class of black students attending Yale University during the onset of America’s culture wars. He is currently in production on The Genius which grapples with boxing’s cultural significance and storied past, while charting its descent into modern-day farce, The Ling Sisters, and Steadily Emerging with Grace, which explores America’s meth addiction and the erosion of community through the eyes of Victoria Lopez, a native of Albert Lea, Minnesota. Born in Brooklyn, John studied politics at Yale and Columbia University.
BILL MACK DIRECTOR
Bill Mack started his entertainment career on Sesame Street at the age of three. As a child actor he would become a regular on the soap opera All My Children and appeared in numerous TV commercials. Bill studied film at NYU and majored in Psychology and Film Studies at Yale. He produced and starred in the Student Academy Award-winning film Short Change in 1996. In the late 90s, Bill started a multimedia production company based in Harlem. For the next ten years, he produced films, developed websites, managed ad campaigns for numerous startups, artists, NGOs and corporations such as Urban Box Office, Ralph Lemon, MacKenzie-Childs, American Express, the Schomburg Center and AT&T. Bill runs production company, Cinomadic, producing independent films and supporting the artist community. Bill produced and starred in “The Obituary of Jasper James” – which won awards at various international Bill Mack festivals, including Best Short and Best Actor.
KATIE TABER PRODUCER
Taber’s recent documentary projects include producing Siempre, Luis, which follows Luis Miranda as he attempts to mount a production of Hamilton in Puerto Rico in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. The film premiered at Sundance 2020 and is available on HBO Max. Recent directing projects include the Emmy-nominated feature Let Me Be Me, the coming-of-age story of a young man who, as a child, underwent a controversial treatment for autism and Stranger/Sister, which follows two women, one Muslim, one Jewish, build a national organization to connect women across faiths and fight the rising tide of hate. Other projects include the PBS special Into the Night: Portraits of Life and Death and the award-winning Milwaukee 53206. Katie has worked on films for the PBS series FRONTLINE including Life and Death in Assisted Living, Dollars and Dentists, and The Child Cases. She also co-produced the four-part PBS NOVA series: The Fabric of the Cosmos and the Emmy-award-winning Katie Taber Homestretch.
LUIS A. MIRANDA, JR. EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Luis A. Miranda, Jr. has four decades of experience as a leader in the public, private, political, and advocacy sectors. He is the founding partner of The MirRam Group, founding president of the Hispanic Federation, and board chair of the Latino Victory Fund, The Public Theater, and Northern Manhattan Arts Alliance. He is recognized as a key contributor to the Senate campaigns of Senator Chuck Schumer, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, and former U.S. Senator Hillary Clinton. Luis managed Letitia James’ successful re-election campaign for New York State Attorney General. For over 40 years, Luis and the Miranda family have championed community activism and Latinx-led organizations. Through the Miranda Family Fund and Miranda Family Fellowship, they have created and fostered institutions that work with underserved populations in Upper Manhattan and communities throughout New York City, across the country, and in Puerto Rico. They are active supporters of initiatives that increase people of color’s representation throughout the arts and government, ensure access to women’s reproductive health, and promote Puerto Rico’s renaissance. Luis produced the documentary feature, Going Varsity in Mariachi, which premiered at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival; as well as the New York Times’ Op-Docs short Takeover. The HBO Documentary Film, Siempre, Luis—about Miranda’s life and storied career—made its World Premiere at the 2020 Sundance Film Festival. Additional on-screen credits and appearances include In The Heights, tick, tick…BOOM! and TV’s S.W.A.T.
SAM POLLARD EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Sam Pollard is an accomplished feature film and television video editor, and documentary producer/director. He recently partnered with his long-time collaborators Geeta Gandbhir and Alisa Payne to form a new film production company, Message Pictures. In December 2022 Peacock began streaming Lowndes County and the Road to Black Power, a film Pollard co-directed with Gandbhir, which tells the story of the courageous campaign of citizens and activists who faced violence and oppression in the struggle for the right to vote. Pollard’s two-part documentary, Bill Russell: Legend, about legendary Boston Celtic and civil rights icon premiered on Netflix on February 8. Max Roach: The Drum Also Waltzes, a film that Pollard co-directed with Ben Shapiro, had its world premiere at the SXSW Film Festival on March 12. The film follows Roach across a rich and complicated life and epic musical journey — from the revolutionary Jazz of the 1940s to the Civil Rights years. South to Black Power, inspired by New York Times columnist Charles Blow’s book, The Devil You Know: A Black Power Manifesto, was co-directed by Pollard and Llewellyn Smith and will premiere on HBO in Fall 2023. Sam Pollard is represented by Cinetic and The Gersh Agency.
Geeta Gandbhir EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Geeta Gandbhir is an award-winning filmmaker. She started her career in narrative film under Spike Lee and Sam Pollard, after working for eleven years in scripted film, she branched into documentary film. As Director she recently released the series “Born in Synanon” for Paramount, and her short film “How We Get Free” for HBO has been shortlisted for an Academy
Award. Other recent work includes and episode of the series “Eyes on the Prize” for HBO and the series “Lowndes County and the Road to Black Power” which was nominated for a 2022 Critics Choice Award, won a 2023 Emmy Award and is streaming on Peacock. She also recently directed and show- ran a 4 part series for HBO titled “Black and Missing” for HBO which won a 2022 NAACP Award for Best Directing, a 2022 Independent Spirit Award for Best Documentary Series, a 2022 ATAS Honors Award and a Cinema Eye Honors for Best Series. She also recently directed a film called “Apart” with Rudy Valdez for HBO Max which was nominated for an NAACP Award and won a 2022 Emmy Award. Her 2020 short film with Topic Studios “Call Center Blues” was shortlisted for a 2021 Academy Award, and she directed an episode of the five-part series of the “The Asian Americans” for PBS, which won the 2021 Peabody Award. Other projects include directing the six-part series “Why We Hate” for Jigsaw Productions and Amblin Entertainment for Discovery, the feature documentary “I Am Evidence” for HBO which won a 2019 Emmy, DuPont and ATAS Award, and the film “Armed with Faith” for PBS which won a 2019 News and Documentary Emmy. She also co-directed and co-produced the series “A Conversation on Race” series with The New York Times Op-Docs, which won an Online Journalism Award for Online Commentary, an AFI Documentary Film Festival Audience Award for Best Short and garnered a MacArthur Grant.
Michael Stolper EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Michael is a business advisor, commercial trial attorney and the Managing Partner of the Stolper Group, a boutique law firm that specializes in advising businesses on complex business issues and commercial disputes. He represents large and small companies as well as high-net worth individuals. Michael was the Executive Producer of the documentary feature Siempre, Luis, which was an official Sundance Film Festival selection and premiered on HBO in 2020. He is also Executive Producer of the feature documentary, Black Table, currently in post production with Fifth Season and is Executive Producer of the forthcoming The Genius, which grapples with boxing’s cultural significance and storied past, while charting its descent into modern-day farce. Michael is actively involved in supporting Amber Charter School, a network of charter schools serving the underprivileged in New York City. He graduated from Princeton University and Columbia Law School.
ALISA PAYNE EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Alisa Payne’s producing career spans over 25 years, boasting a diverse array of credits. Her most recent credits include the Academy Award shortlisted feature documentary Stamped from the Beginning based on Dr. Ibram X. Kendi’s eponymous book, the critically acclaimed HBO film special Between the World and Me and The Conversation: Revolution based on The New York Times Op Doc series A Conversation on Race. She is the Co-Executive Producer of Harlem Ice a forthcoming 5-part docu-series for Imagine / Disney+ and is the Producer of the short film Women Count (Sundance/Times Studios). Her work has garnered prestigious recognition including a Gracie Award and an African American Film Critics Association Award and several nominations including: an Emmy, Critics Choice Award, NAACP Image Awards and Cable Positive Award. Alisa is married with two children and lives in Brooklyn, NY.
