Meet the 2022 'Fine Cut' Mentors
Daniel Willis
Daniel Willis is a writer/director who draws on his experience growing up on Chicago's south side. He is a 2018 Film Independent Project Involve Directing Fellow and 2017 Sony Pictures Television Directing Fellow. His short films and television projects have screened at festivals around the world including The HBO Short Film Competition at ABFF, Urbanworld Film Festival, The Global Impact Film Festival, The LA Film Festival, The Chicago International Television Festival, SeriesFest (Best Writing - Public Housing Unit), The New York Television Festival, and ITVFest (Best of Fest - Public Housing Unit). Wednesday, Daniel's latest short film, has been licensed by HBO. Daniel's TV directing credits include Freeform/Hulu's Cruel Summer, ABC's "The Rookie," NBC's "The Blacklist," and ABC's "Grey's Anatomy." On the writing front, Daniel recently served as Writer/Producer for the Lena Waithe produced comedy series: "Twenties."
Everett Downing
Everett Downing is an Oscar winning director, story artist and animator living in the Greater Los Angeles area. Born in Boulder, Colorado and raised in Denver, he studied Film, focusing on computer animation at Columbia College in Chicago. Everett began his career as a story artist at Big Idea Productions before making his break into feature film, animating at Blue Sky Studios on the original "Ice Age." He later took a position as an animator at Pixar, animating on several award-winning feature films (everything from "Ratatouille" to "Monster's University"). He then transitioned back into the story department where he boarded on "The Toy Story That Time Forgot", and "Cars 3". Since then. he's worked on films at Dreamworks, Paramount, & Sony Pictures Animation. Everett co-directed the animated short Hair Love which won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short in 2019. He's recently worked for Netflix Animation where he was the co-creator and executive producer for the upcoming animated series "My Dad the Bounty Hunter."
Grace Santos
Grace Santos is Vice President of Business Affairs and Operations and Gamechanger Films (CEO/Producer Effie T. Brown). She has worked in Business Affairs and Operations at companies and organizations that have financed, produced, and distributed hundreds of films and series, including Patriot Pictures (financier Michael Mendelsohn), Paragon Capital (financier Santosh Govindaraju), the Bentonville Film Festival (which facilitates distribution deals for the filmmakers through its studio sponsors), SP Operations / Crystal Sky (which has production deals with Paramount and Hallmark and an output distribution deal with Sony), and AMC Networks’ divisions: RLJ Entertainment, ALLBLK, and AcornTV. Grace is also an award-winning producer. Credits include Election Night by Tessa Blake, starring Peri Gilpin, Silk by Catherine Dent, starring Oscar Nominee Shohreh Aghdashloo, and A Tricky Treat by Patricia Chica. Prior to moving to Los Angeles, Grace founded the Asian Pacific American Scene, Inc, a nonprofit in Florida with a mission to produce Asian American stories. Grace was selected to be part of the 2020 Producers Guild Power of Diversity Lab. Grace achieved the competitive International Baccalaureate diploma, graduated magna cum laude from the University of Miami with a double major in International Studies and Religious Studies, Juris Doctor from Stetson University, and Producer Certificate from UCLA, School of Theatre, Film, and Television. Grace is also a Filipino-American and single mother.
James Lee Hernandez
James Lee Hernandez is a multi-Emmy and PGA Award nominated filmmaker and a critically-acclaimed podcaster. He directed, wrote and edited the 5-time Emmy® nominated HBO documentary series, "McMillion$" (Sundance 2020), with his creative partner, Brian Lazarte.
Hernandez executive produced the series with Mark Wahlberg, Stephen Levinson, Archie Gips, and Lazarte. Hernandez is a founding partner of FunMeter, a TV, film and podcast production company that specializes in stranger-than-fiction scripted and non-scripted content. Recently announced, Hernandez and Lazarte are writing, directing, and executive producing two documentary series for Apple TV+ through FunMeter — "The Big Conn" (SXSW 2022), released in May 2022, and "The Jet," slated to be released later in 2022.
Hernandez is a self-taught filmmaker who began his career in the industry writing, directing, and editing content for Hulu, Hallmark and other major, national brands.
Juan Luis Bravo
Juan Luis Bravo is a storyboard artist and filmmaker with a passion for stories about love, friendship and everyday beauty. Born and raised in Sacramento, California by Mexican immigrant parents, he was trained in live-action film production at USC and has since worked as a video producer and editor. He currently works as a storyboard artist on an unannounced Disney Junior show at Wild Canary Animation. As a filmmaker, Juan Luis aims to celebrate the beauty of everyday life and love. He believes that stories centered on compassion inspire us all for the better, especially when aimed at young audiences. His career goal is to tell stories in live-action and animation that amplify marginalized narratives while speaking to the strength of kindness.
Keely Propp
Keely Propp is a storyboard artist for animated feature films. She has most recently worked on Trolls 3 for Dreamworks Animation and Guillermo Del Toro's Pinocchio for Netflix. In her personal work, she takes skills learned in storyboarding and applies them to 2D animated and live action short films.
Marcella Ochoa
Marcella Ochoa is a filmmaker from San Antonio, Texas, and currently resides in Los Angeles. She started her career in International Publicity for Sony Pictures traveling the world and working on the marketing campaigns for the studio's major films. She left Sony to be the Head of Development at a production company working on several blockbuster films with world-renowned director, Roland Emmerich. She eventually started her own production company and wrote, directed, and produced a short film on the true story of Americanization of Mexicans in 50's Texas called "My Name is Maria de Jesus." The award-winning short premiered on HBO Latino in 2019 and she did a national university speaking tour where she screened her film and spoke to the Latino students on campus. She co-wrote a social justice thriller, "Madres," produced by Blumhouse that premiered on Amazon in 2021 where it received an IMAGEN Award Nomination for Best Primetime Movie. She wrote and directed a horror short film, "Worry Dolls," that premiered on Crypt TV and won Best US Short Film at San Antonio CineFestival. She also penned the pilot for a one-hour genre series she co-created and sold to Amazon Studios. She most recently wrote a supernatural thriller for Paramount and wrote a supernatural feature for Universal Pictures. Earlier this year, she received an NAACP Image Award Nomination for Outstanding Writing in a Television Movie for "Madres," and an IMAGEN Foundation Award Nomination for Best Short Film for "Worry Dolls." She's currently working on several new projects in different stages of development.
Matthew Schofield
Matthew Schofield grew up in Australia but started his animation career when he moved to the US to work on traditional hand-drawn feature films such as Cats Don't Dance, Prince of Egypt and The Iron Giant. Looking to broaden his skill set, he joined The Simpsons in its eleventh season as a character layout artist. He has had many roles during his time on the show, including storyboard artist, animation timer, character designer, assistant director and director. He is currently the show's Supervising Storyboard Director.
Rachel Goldberg
Rachel Goldberg is an award-winning filmmaker who has directed more than 40 productions for stage and screen, garnering over 20 awards for her work. Her directing credits include the pilot of the upcoming TV show, "Grendel," based on the Dark Horse comic by the same name, "Resident Evil," "American Gods, "Mayans," "MC," "American Horror Story," "The Sinner," "Cloak & Dagger," and "Veronica Mars." DAGGER, and VERONICA MARS.
Her directing work includes "Muted," a film about media discrepancy when a child of color goes missing, starring Chandra Wilson ("Grey's Anatomy") and Malcolm-Jamal Warner ("Sneaky Pete") which sold to HBO. This film was nominated for a Black Reel Award and is featured on Issa Rae’s Short Film Sundays.
As a writer, Rachel has penned for Screen Gems and Mar Vista Entertainment. She has been recognized by the Academy’s Nicholl Fellowship, Cinestory Foundation, Rhode Island International Film Festival and more.
Throughout her career, Rachel has also been supported by the Sundance/Women in Film Financing Initiative, AFI’s Directing Workshop for Women, Sony Pictures Diverse Directors Program, the We for She Direct Her Program, FOX Global Directors Initiative, the Fox Studio Bridge Program, Film Independent's Project Involve, the Film Independent's Screenwriting Lab and the Ryan Murphy HALF Foundation.
Rachel was recently named as 1 of 20 female filmmakers “primed for a studio directing gig” on The Alice Initiative List. She is currently attached to direct, "Rise and Shine: The Boys Choir of Harlem," written by Erika Alexander and produced by Color Farm Media.
Raamla Mohamed
Raamla Mohamed is the Creator and Showrunner/EP for Onyx Collective's first scripted drama series, "Reasonable Doubt," in conjunction with ABC Signature. Mohamed signed her first overall with ABC Signature in 2018, and has been in the Disney family since 2009, where she started as a fellow in the Disney/ABC Writing program. Mohamed was a writer/co-executive producer on the Emmy-nominated "Little Fires Everywhere" for Hulu. Prior to that, she was a writer and producer on "Scandal," where she penned eleven episodes for the series, including the seventh-season crossover episode with "How To Get Away with Murder." Her other projects include a romantic comedy feature for Universal Pictures with Malcolm Lee, and a comedy feature for Amblin starring Tiffany Haddish.
Roxy Simons
Roxy Simons is a comedy and animation writer based in Los Angeles. She is currently an executive story editor on Disney Channel's "BUNK'D." She has been a staff writer on Sesame Workshop's "Helpsters" and Dreamworks' "Madagascar: A Little Wild." She received a development deal with Sesame Studios for the original pilot she wrote during the 2018 Sesame Writers Workshop. She also studied sketch comedy at the Upright Citizens Brigade. She enjoys writing stories that center around complex girls and women, multi-generational families, absurd humor, immigrant experiences, and musical numbers. A native of South Africa, Roxy brings her unique point of view and sense of humor to all of her work.
Russell Brown
Filmmaker Russell Brown's body of work includes five narrative features, two full-length documentaries, and a number of well-regarded narrative and documentary shorts. His feature films have opened theatrically in select cities to favorable reviews after playing at more than 150 festivals around the world. Brown's work has garnered national and international awards for directing, writing, acting and editing. His diverse filmography includes "Loren & Rose," "Search Engines," "The Blue Tooth Virgin," "Annie and the Gypsy," "Karen Black: On Acting," "Conversation with a Cigarette," "Mama Laura's Boys," "The 44 Scarves of Liza Minnelli," "Above the Arroyo: A Dream of the Stairs of Los Angeles," Reality USA" and "The Kaleidescope Guy at the Market." Russell is a member of the Writer's Guild of America and is a Film Independent Producing Fellow. His films are held as part of the collection at the UCLA Film and Television archive.
Saga Elmohtaseb
Saga Elmohtaseb has been working in the entertainment industry for over 20 years. She was a Production Coordinator for E! Entertainment, then managed the Post Production facilities for LATV, a bilingual TV channel in Los Angeles.
With a passion for film, Saga was hired at Fox Studios as a production coordinator in the VFX department on box office hits such as The Devil Wears Prada, A Good Year, Eragon, and Fantastic 4. With the desire to understand studio budgets and accounting, Saga worked on global blockbuster films such as Marvel Studios Iron Man2, Sony Pictures Just Go With It, and Jack & Jill, while focusing on documentary projects that have been distributed across the world.
She successfully line-produced the Emmy Nominated PBS environmentally conscious TV series LA Foodways and is currently producing a new series for the network on the residents of Watts, which will be released in 2023 for Black History Month.
Saga is a production manager on commercial video/photo shoots for EmSculpt Neo, Umo Vogue, Vanity Fair, Harper’s Bazar, and ELLE magazines.
She is the president of Hollywood-Consulting.com where she works closely with clients on productions from development to completion.
Saga is the Director of Special Initiatives of Green Wish, a Non-Profit organization whose mission is to help make the world a safer place to live. In her free time, she volunteers at KCRW, an LA-based radio station, and GRCGLA- Golden Retriever Club of Greater Los Angeles.
Saga has been a professor at Chapman University’s Dodge School of Film & TV for over 6 years now and teaches film & TV.
