Rough Cut

The Film Festival Alliance is a community of more than 180 film festivals around the globe. It's Executive Director, Lela Meadow-Conner, and Director of Membership, Barbara Twist, come on the podcast to discuss the role of festivals in a filmmaker's career and the future of festivals amid COVID-19. https://www.roughcutpodcast.com/ Find Rough Cut on Instagram Find Host Jennie Butler on In...

Claire Gordon is the showrunner and an executive producer of "Explained" on Netflix, produced by Vox Media. Previously, she was a senior producer for two Emmy Award-winning seasons of the HBO show "Last Week Tonight with John Oliver," where the segment she produced on abortion restrictions won Television Academy Honors for using television to promote social change.  On this epi...

Joe Coscarelli is the host of NYTimes’, Diary of a Song , a video series that breaks down how pop songs get made. The series relies entirely on FaceTime interviews, cellphone footage, and in-house production, giving it a unique, pared-down feel. The show has featured artists like Taylor Swift, Lil Nas X, and Billie Eilish. https://www.roughcutpodcast.com/ Find Joe Coscarelli on Instagram Find Roug...

Rachel Mason is an artist, musician and filmmaker from Los Angeles. Her film, Circus of Books, is an intimate portrait of her parents, who owned and operated one of the largest distributors of gay porn in the U.S. Rachel discusses the challenges of making a film about her family, her decision to include herself in the film, and how she was able to get Ryan Murphy on board as Executive Producer. ht...

Erin Lee Carr is a New York-based director, producer and writer. Her true crime documentaries for HBO include Mommy Dead and Dearest , At the Heart of Gold , and I Love You, Now Die . Her latest work, the four-part docuseries How to Fix a Drug Scandal , premiered on Netflix on April 1, 2020. Find Erin on Instagram Eric Arthur Fernandez is a producer and cinematographer that specializes in document...

Wendy Cohen is the president of Picture Motion , an agency that creates social impact marketing campaigns for films. Wendy and her team work to maximize a film's impact—whether it's changing laws, bringing awareness to a social issue, or changing hearts and minds. This episode answers the question: How do you start a social movement around your film? https://www.roughcutpodcast.com/ Find...

Chloe Gbai is the director of If/Then , a Tribeca Film Institute initiative that gives grants and provides mentorship to filmmakers creating short documentaries. She was previously a programmer at PBS POV Shorts .  In this episode, Chloe gives advice on how to put together a strong grant application, and shares her insight on what makes a good shot doc. She is based in NYC. Mentioned in the episod...

Luke Lorentzen is a documentary filmmaker based in San Francisco, CA. Luke’s first feature film out of college, Midnight Family, follows a family-run ambulance business in Mexico City. Midnight Family is a verite film, shot with two cameras Luke operated simultaneously. The film has played at over 130 film festivals around the world and has won over 25 awards including a Special Jury Award for Cin...

Lance Oppenheim is a documentary filmmaker based in Brooklyn, NY. He has been collaborating with the NY Times since the beginning of college, making three Op-Docs, and now the brand’s first ever feature-length documentary, Some Kind of Heaven. The film was executive produced by Darren Aronofsky and premiered at Sundance in 2020. Some Kind of Heaven’s editor, Dan Garber , also joined the conversati...

Kevin Klauber is a documentary editor based in Los Angeles. He is best known for editing the Oscar-winning documentaries Icarus and 20 Feet from Stardom. Since then, he's contributed to numerous feature documentaries and doc series for HBO, Netflix, and others. He recently contributed to the feature documentary Fantastic Fungi , and the upcoming Netflix doc, Taylor Swift: Miss Americana. Find...

Bing Liu is a documentary filmmaker and cinematographer based in Chicago. His first feature documentary, Minding the Gap, is streaming on Hulu and was nominated for best documentary at the 2019 Academy Awards.  Find Bing on Instagram Find Rough Cut on Instagram  Find Host Jennie Butler on Instagram Find Producer Sky Dylan-Robbins on Instagram https://www.roughcutpodcast.com/ This episode is brough...

Charles Haine has worked in the film industry since 1999 as a colorist, cinematographer, and entrepreneur. He founded the production company Dirty Robber in 2008, which has produced feature films, shorts, commercials, and music videos. Haine has authored two books about filmmaking, Business & Entrepreneurship for Filmmakers and “Color Grading 101”, and currently teaches at the Feirstein Gradua...

Wonbo Woo is Wired Magazine’s Executive Producer of Video. In just over a year, Wonbo tripled Wired’s subscribers on YouTube; the channel has 5.4 million at the time of this episode’s recording. Wonbo got his start in broadcast journalism, working for ABC’s Nightline, then NBC’s Nightly News. He’s based in New York. Find Wonbo Woo on Instagram Find Rough Cut on Instagram Find Host Jennie Butler on...

Vanessa Carr is a Brooklyn-based cinematographer specializing in vérité-style shooting. Vanessa shot a handful of episodes for the New York Times docu-series, The Weekly, and has contributed to PBS Frontline, VICE, NY Times Op-Docs, and HBO.  In this episode, Vanessa discusses what’s in her field kit, how The Weekly honed its unique style, and what she wishes she knew as a younger DP. Find Vanessa...

Mohammad Gorjestani is an Iranian-American filmmaker based in San Francisco, specializing in branded films. His work has appeared at SXSW, Tribeca Film Festival, as well as on Vimeo Staff Picks, The Guardian, VICE, CNN, and The Atlantic. Gorjestani’s film Exit 12 was commissioned by Square and was later acquired by Fox Searchlight. Find Mohammad on Instagram Find Rough Cut on Instagram Find Host J...

Courtney Coupe is the head of Great Big Story , a cinematic storytelling unit of CNN. Since it launched in 2015, Great Big Story has produced countless mini-documentaries, primarily distributed on Youtube. Courtney discusses how Great Big Story has honed their brand, why she thinks certain stories go viral, and why they turn down 80% of incoming pitches, even from their own producers. Check out Gr...

Johnny Harris is a multimedia journalist at Vox . His show, Borders , is an international documentary series that explores people and culture at various border areas. Johnny also makes videos for his personal YouTube page , where he posts career advice and other musings. Johnny called in from his home in Washington DC to discuss how he was able to successfully pitch and execute Borders, his run-an...

Ed Ou is a visual journalist at NBC Left Field. He started his career as a teenager, shooting in the Middle East for Reuters and the Associated Press. He then worked for the New York Times covering East Africa and the Middle East during the 2011 Arab Spring uprisings. Ed now makes videos and short documentaries for NBC. He lives in NYC but is originally from Canada. Find Ed Ou on Twitter and Insta...

Glen Zipper is a documentary producer based in Los Angeles. One of his first films, Undefeated , won the Academy Award for Best Documentary in 2012. His more recent work includes the Netflix docu-series, Dogs , and the 2-part HBO documentary, What’s My Name: Muhammad Ali. Follow Glen on Instagram For more info on Rough Cut visit https://www.roughcutpodcast.com/ Jennie Butler on Instagram @jen_but...

Pamela B. Green directed and produced Be Natural: The Untold Story of Alice Guy-Blaché , a documentary about the first female filmmaker. For her day job, Green produces movie trailers and other marketing materials for films. Be Natural appeared at festivals including Cannes, BFI, NYFF, and made its U.S. theatrical debut in April 2019. For more info on Rough Cut visit https://www.roughcutpodcast.co...

Meghan Oretsky is a curator at Vimeo , selecting videos for its Staff Picks page . She also founded Ladies with Lenses , a Vimeo channel and NYC-based screening series featuring women filmmakers. Meghan lives and works in NYC. Links from the episode: Adman Vimeo.com/watch Bangn Media Boooooom Cartoon Brew Human Fountains The Procedure Dress Code For more info on Rough Cut visit https://www.roughcu...

Rachel Lears is a documentary producer and director based in New York. Her latest film, Knock Down the House, follows four female grassroots candidates, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, as they take on establishment candidates in the 2018 primaries. Knock Down the House won the Festival Favorite Award at Sundance and debuted on Netflix on May 1. Rachel’s last film, The Hand That Feeds was nomin...

What exactly does a film distributor do? And do filmmakers even need a distributor? Dan Berger, the president of Oscilloscope films answers all our burning questions about documentary film distribution—from what to do with a short doc, to what distribution companies are looking for in a film, to why certain films do better on Amazon than iTunes. http://oscilloscope.net For more info on Rough Cut v...

Mickey Duzyj is a sports illustrator and director living in upstate New York. His award-winning ESPN 30 for 30 short "The Shining Star of Losers Everywhere" was adapted in to the Netflix Docu-series, “Losers”, which premiered in March 2019. Mickey was the Director, Illustrator and an Executive Producer on "Losers". Mona Panchal is the Vice President of Digital at First Look Med...

Nausheen Dadabhoy is a Pakistani-American cinematographer from Southern California. She has been a Director of Photography on a handful of documentary features and spent 9 years making her own film, The Ground Beneath Their Feet. Nausheen was, at one time, the only female cinematographer in Pakistan , and she opens up about the challenges she faced working in a patriarchal environment. Nausheen al...