Ilse Will Say

Vishaal Desai is a writer, director, and editor with over fifteen years of experience and a career that has taken him from Mumbai to London to Chicago. He's been a producer on the Asian Academy Award-winning series Bhak , directed the acclaimed documentary Uniting Through Yoga (crowdsourced from 500 strangers around the world with no script — yes, really), and is currently finishing post-productio...

Ever wonder what actually goes into editing a film? Like the real version, not the glamorous one? This week I sat down with Marco Rosas, a Mexican-American editor based in Los Angeles who has spent over a decade cutting everything from high-end commercials to HBO's Winning Time to Sender , a psychological thriller produced by Jamie Lee Curtis that premiered at SXSW 2026 and had critics calling out...

Nick Cartwright is a filmmaker, DP, Meisner acting teacher, and co-founder of two Chicago production companies: Cosmic Egg Productions and Film in a Bag. He started his filmmaking journey in 2023 when he and his wife turned their honeymoon into a short film production of HP Lovecraft's "The Picture in the House." Since then he has directed two more shorts, crewed on 25 others, and is currently dir...

Derry Shillitto is a writer, director, and producer from Nottingham, England — the rebel city, as he'll tell you, birthplace of Robin Hood, D.H. Lawrence, Lord Byron, and the Luddite movement. He's the founder of Foyle River Films and the director of The Correction Unit , a dystopian sci-fi thriller about young offenders in a prison run by AI, featuring Bella Ramsey as the disembodied AI voice. Vi...

This one's a little different. No guest this week - just me and my producer Jacob Cagle, flipping the mic and doing a proper debrief on the last six months. We're talking Sundance, South by Southwest, and Cannes. What worked, what didn't, and what I'd tell anyone who's scared to walk into a room full of people who seem like they belong there more than you do. We also get into something I don't tal...

Lauren Lourenço has been backed by Film Independent, Series Fest, and the Orchid Project. She's directed festival-winning shorts, an MTV music video for Anitta, and she's currently developing her first feature, Whatever Happened to Rosa Elena? — a queer horror comedy set in Palm Springs. She's also, somehow, terrified of horror films. We met at Sundance, had lunch, and I immediately understood why...

This week on Ilse Will Say , Ilse sits down with actor, musician, wine guy, and casual full-calendar haver Jake Ferree. You’ve seen Jake on The Baxters , True Detective , and more, but this episode gets into the stuff that does not fit neatly on an IMDb page: touring with his Irish punk band Hounds of Belfast, turning pandemic drinking into actual wine knowledge, why grocery store wine might be pe...

This week on Ilse Will Say , Ilse is joined by sisters Sonya and Wendy Madrigal, two Chicago artists who somehow make multi-hyphenating look genetic. Sonya is an actor, director, choreographer, and educator, while Wendy is a multidisciplinary artist, producer, puppeteer, and voiceover agent, which is exactly the kind of résumé that makes you ask, “Wait, so what exactly do you do?” in the best way....

This week on Ilse Will Say , Ilse sits down with Giselle De La Rosa , associate director at Cine Las Americas and a SXSW film festival screener , for a behind-the-scenes conversation about film festival programming, short film submissions, festival curation, and what makes a film stand out fast . Giselle shares what it’s like to watch hundreds of documentary shorts, why the first 30 seconds of a s...

You know when a scene just hits and you can’t explain why? That’s editing. Ilse sits down with editor and assistant editor Alexander Gonzalez to talk about the invisible craft that shapes everything we feel on screen. From working on Sender with Jamie Lee Curtis and Britt Lower to navigating SXSW like a pro, Alex breaks down how pacing, instinct, and collaboration turn raw footage into something u...

When your friends don’t just talk about making something… they actually do it—and then keep going? Yeah, that’s the vibe. This week, Ilse sits down with Teresa Martinez Moore and Adam Rebora, the duo behind Film in a Bag and the kind of creative partnership that makes you rethink your group chat. From improv team beginnings (bug bites and backyard shows included) to building a full-on film collect...

When someone can make you laugh, hit a note, and quietly diagnose why your last post flopped… you listen. This week, Ilse sits down with multi-hyphenate menace (compliment) Paige Galdieri — a performer who moves between comedy, music, and acting like it’s nothing, while also helping other artists figure out their digital voice behind the scenes. We get into her musical theater origin story (yes, i...

You know when a film title sounds absolutely ridiculous… and then somehow ends up hitting you right in the chest? Yeah. That’s this episode. Ilse sits down with director Jerry S. Gonzalez, the brain behind The Spaghetti Man , Intergalactic Pizza Boy , and Hamster in My Head —aka films that sound like a joke and then sneak in real human emotion when you’re not looking. They get into where ideas act...

Juan Francisco Villa is one of those artists who makes you want to raise your standards a little. In this episode, Ilse and Juan get into what real leadership looks like on set and in life, from Tom Hanks introducing himself to crew members to Mariska Hargitay knowing exactly how to make guest stars feel seen. They talk about vulnerability, protecting your energy without closing your heart, and th...

This episode starts with princess birthday parties and immediately swerves into a staircase ghost and an army of redheaded porcelain dolls living in Raven Whisnant’s basement. So yes, we are thriving. Raven is an actor-writer-director-editor-producer (casual) and the co-founder of New 32 Productions , a woman and queer-owned indie film company that actually cares about set culture and treats peopl...

Eddie Mujica is the kind of person who makes you want to take a deep breath and also… open fifteen tabs. He’s a Cuban-American actor, writer, director, and Emmy-winning producer who somehow lives in three lanes at once: stepping into the newest Second City Mainstage show with basically one rehearsal (I’m tired for him), premiering his short film LOCO at the San Diego Latino Film Festival , and sti...

Chloe Mikala is the kind of person who can destroy a stand-up set, headline a comedy variety show, play an EMT on Chicago P.D., co-captain a travel flag football team, and still insist she’s “just sending emails.” We talk about what it actually means to be Type A without being unbearable, why doing your “basic” well already puts you ahead of most people, and how to hustle without losing your mind....

A Walgreens parking lot. A father and son. A whole lot of stuff they never say out loud. That’s the kind of quiet, devastating power George Ellzey Jr. brings to filmmaking, and this conversation made my cheeks hurt from laughing and my brain do the full “wait… that’s real” pause. George is a South Side Chicago native and DePaul-trained director whose short film Cottage Grove started as a thesis pr...

This episode starts messy, stays honest, and lands somewhere unexpectedly grounding. Ilse sits down with Erick Juarez , a Guatemala-born, Chicago-raised filmmaker who studied at NIU, trained at the Moscow Art Theatre, spent years in LA, and came back with one clear realization: stop asking for permission and start making the work. They talk about acting vulnerability, learning how to warm down aft...

If you’ve ever finished a film and immediately whispered “cool… but what now?” this one is for you. Ilse sits down with Elizabeth Butler Austin , VP of Sales and Licensing at Echelon Studios , for a real-world look at how movies actually find an audience once the creative part is over. Elizabeth breaks down what distributors are thinking the second they watch a screener, why metadata and deliverab...

Ilse sits down with comedian, writer, filmmaker, and professional vocabulary flexer Mishu Hilmy for a conversation that starts in comedy craft and somehow ends in ghosts, dreams, and the psychology of “enough.” They talk about why timing and silence are the secret sauce of a joke, why making art in 2026 can feel like chasing relevance across seventeen streaming platforms, and how strategy can turn...

Ilse sits down with filmmaker (and beloved casting powerhouse) Brittani Ward for a conversation that feels like a warm pep talk… with teeth. They get into the weird in-between space between “I’m still learning” and “I’m ready,” how casting can sweep you up even when writing and directing was always the dream, and the mind game of feeling like you’re emailing into the void while someone on the othe...

This one feels like a late-December exhale. Cozy, funny, a little tender, and unexpectedly grounding. Ilse sits down with filmmaker, editor, and all-around creative Swiss Army knife Jacob Cagle for a holiday episode that drifts from Santa Claus lore to sibling dynamics to the quiet weight of showing up for your life and your work. Jacob opens up about belief, doubt, gratitude, and what it means to...

Ilse sits down with actor, writer, and director Jessie Komitor , whose debut film Chasing the Party premiered at Tribeca and somehow manages to be nostalgic, stylish, and devastating all at once. They dig into the strange magic of saying your dreams out loud, the moment Jessie finally allowed herself to claim the title of “director,” and the way girlhood imagination still sneaks into her work. Jes...

When an artist has lived ten creative lives and still shows up curious, brilliant, and fully human — you listen. Marissa Lichwick joins Ilse for a conversation that feels like a masterclass, a pep talk, and a cosmic hug all at once. They dive into the summer she spent training at UCLA, what making a film really demands, why stories are crafted three different times, and how being adopted shaped he...