Yazmin Monet Watkins is a poet, comedian, screenwriter, actress, educator, organizer, avid roller skater and adventurer. She can be seen on season two of Grand Crew on NBC, Comedy Central and has co-developed and written pilots with Netflix and Comedy Central alongside Lucia Aniello, Paul Downs and the all Black female comedy group, Obama s Other Daughters. Check them out on their Comedy Centra...
Tom Hartig is a disabled writer of genre-bending features & TV about the power of community and healing. In 2021, he was hired to adapt a sci-fi novel for Voyage Media, and in 2023, his poem “Ode to An Assistant” was published by Good Printed Things. He has been a finalist in the ScreenCraft Fellowship & WeScreenplay TV Pilot contests, an Austin Second-Rounder (2x), and was selected for The Dea...
As a multi-hyphenate creative, I'm hoping to connect with a director to work alongside as part of the storytelling process in the post-production phase. I find themes that resonate with me and exist most frequently in my stories are love, self-discovery, hope, identity, serendipity, friendship, sisterhood and chosen family. The genres in which I've written fall into at least one of the followin...
Stephanie Bast was abandoned in Korea, adopted by Italians and raised in a town so small and white, someone asked: “How are you gonna understand her when she starts speaking?” Fiercely loved and protected, she was taught to fear “the other” while knowing “the other” was herself. She started to write comedy to heal a wound. Now she writes to heal others, creating characters who think they re not...
Stacey Garratt is a screenwriter with 7 years of working in the industry on the creative advertising side. She was a Tracking B Top-Five Finalist and the winner of the Los Angeles International Screenplay Award, both in 2024. After discussing her work and goals for the future, she is joining the 2025 ISA's Development Slate of top tier writers. Stacey is thrilled for the opportunities for the y...
Born and raised in China, Ran is an award-winning writer, director, and animator who has crafted stories across various languages and mediums, focusing on themes of identity, immigration, and belonging. A graduate of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts, her debut feature, MODEL, was featured in Variety China and earned accolades at several Oscar-qualifying festivals. It received the Emerging Directo...
Molly Ratermann is a writer and director originally from the San Francisco Bay Area. With a passion for history and counterculture characters, Molly's storytelling is marked by a nostalgic and eccentric spirit. She embraces traditional elements with a modern, playful approach, exploring generations of female identity and the American Dream while infusing adventure and offbeat nuances to create ...
McKenzie is an award-winning writer, director, and actor based in Chicago. Driven by a revolutionary sensibility, her work uses rich imagery and an intimate lens to explore complex characters and stories of personal transformation and liberation. She is a 2023 SFFILM Rainin Grant Fellow, and a 2021 Sundance Screenwriters and Directors Lab Fellow with her upcoming feature A Real One, currently i...
Lindsay Kamikawa is a Chinese and Japanese American writer from Mission Viejo, California. She currently is developing her feature with David Oyelowo s Yoruba Saxon, and has previously developed shows with Sugar23, Josh Berman s Osprey Productions, and Will Yun Lee's Seoul Street. Lindsay has worked within the development teams at Channing Tatum and Reid Carolin s Free Association, Jon Avnet an...
KATRINA JAXSON is a writer and producer who tells stories that are unapologetic, with a sense of conviction, allowing her characters to make mistakes, challenge norms, and embrace their flaws. A winner of the inaugural Phoenix Award at the Page Turner Awards for her script “C.R.E.A.M.,” Katrina s work has also earned accolades from Page International, ScreenCraft, WeScreenplay, Fresh Voices, an...
Being the daughter of a Mexican immigrant and a career US veteran who served internationally and during two wars greatly influenced Kari's lens. Her work channels her complex heritage into deeply character-driven stories that explore themes of identity, trauma, and abuse. These stories are often centered around resilient, complex female characters. In contrast, she relishes adapting long-forgot...
Jennifer D Angelo Kircher was raised in New York on a diet of Neil Simon plays, antipasto and catholic guilt. She is a graduate of Northwestern University, and the Directors Guild of America Trainee Program. Jen got her start in the business on the movie GROUNDHOG DAY, then cut her teeth as an Assistant Director on blockbuster features and episodic TV. Having raised four children and one grown ...
Jen Butler is a comedian and storyteller who specializes in writing feature-length, multi-layered dark comedy screenplays focusing on the complex nature of humans as they navigate spiritual and emotional awakenings. When not writing screenplays, Jen tells comedic real-talk stories to her 275,000 online followers (@jenbutlersays IG, TikTok, & Threads), performs improv and stand-up comedy, practi...
“Who are we as individuals? As a society? As a species? And more importantly, where are we going? What should we be? What can we be?” These are the questions that inform my writing. After three decades in public education, spending day after day working with young people, I find myself asking these questions more and more. And the stories I write as well as the ones I read and watch bring meani...
Ali Imran Zaidi is an LA-based TV, feature, audio and game writer of thrillers, sci-fi and crime. Currently developing a TV series with Ley Line Entertainment (Everything Everywhere, Green Knight), he also developed an audio series alongside Hillman Grad Productions, with Janina Gavankar and Hasan Minhaj attached to co-produce and star. An inaugural fellow in Riz Ahmed's Pillars Fund Artist Fel...
Devin Jane Febbroriello is a North American screenwriter/director + producer that specializes in the creation of thought-provoking stories centered on lovable dysfunctional families, surreal multi-genre plots, women, and dark humor. Evocative characters blaze bold paths through thematically rich circumstances to cultivate her emotive works. Devin s practice is informed by a fierce love of cinem...
Dani Hanks (they/she) is a disabled writer/director who subverts the status quo with a bit of comedic flair. After receiving their BFA in drama at NYU Tisch, they directed the Banff-nominated political comedy web series “Fake News Writer,” which was optioned after winning the Webby Award for Video Entertainment in 2019. They are a 2024 Austin Film Festival Winner for the Josephson Entertainment...
Conor spent most of his youth in Ireland gigging in rock bands, working in a video store and reading too many Stephen King novels. When he found himself working full-time in a bank vault by the age of 21 he knew he had to course correct and follow his dreams. Conor is a writer, filmmaker and award winning podcaster from Dublin with a masters in film production from Staffordshire University. Con...
CLARISSA JACOBSON is a screenwriter/producer/director and voice over artist. She recently sold a horror feature she wrote with Rebel Minx creative partner, Shayna Weber called Bruha (out in 2025), and their co-directed/produced doc Butts is on the film circuit now. She is also the creator of the multi-award-winning comedy/horror short (46 wins) - Lunch Ladies which played at Clermont-Ferrand Fi...
CARLO AND ERIN CARERE (pronounced Ca-rare-eh) The Careres are an award-winning, husband/wife writing team.Carlo was born in Naples, Italy, and served as a Captain of the Carabinieri (the Italian equivalent of the FBI) for twelve years before switching to screenwriting full-time. An award-winning, published novelist in Italy, Carlo moved to Hollywood and became a naturalized US Citizen.Erin, bor...
A.W. "Tony" Scott and Jean Qing Su are life and work partners focusing on grounded, character-driven stories, typically with organically diverse characters: 'real heroes, not superheroes." Their scripts have placed or won outright in over 40 screenplay competitions. Four of their spec features and three of their pilots have been optioned, and they have been hired to write three other feature sc...
Alli is a queer, mixed race Japanese writer from a John Hughes-like suburb of Chicago, IL. A sickly child Alli spent a lot of time out of school watching TV and writing stories which inspired her to get a degree in screenwriting at Columbia College Chicago. She loves to tell stories that tackle tougher topics with grace, humor, and heart. They ve worked extensively in support roles, most notabl...
Alex Vincent Blumberg is an award-winning screenwriter, documentary filmmaker, and podcast producer. His nonfiction work includes writing narration for Oscar winners Meryl Streep and Helen Mirren in documentary features about endangered species and ecological recovery. Alex's historical fiction podcast BACK FIRES was released in June 2024 on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and all major audio platfo...
A native New Yorker, Adam received a BFA from Ithaca College and completed one year of his MFA at UCLA before deciding to quit because those hard wooden classroom chairs were really chafing his ass. Writing began for him when his first play was produced at the West Coast Ensemble Theater in Hollywood. A creative executive who happened to be in the audience one night called Adam the next day and...
AARON MASON is a writer of novels and screenplays. Residing in Los Angeles, he primarily writes fantasy, horror, and sci-fi, but dabbles in family friendly projects (both animation and live action) as well. Aaron loves to blend genres, and many of his projects try to stretch conventional tropes by splicing genres together. Aaron is an ISA Development Slate writer, and a Top 25 Screenwriter to W...