Exploring the Magic of the Documentary Producer-Director Partnership
DPA / DOC 10 Panel exploring the documentary producer-director relationship featuring some of this year's DOC 10 filmmakers.
In a panel discussion, moderated by award-winning producer, Jessica Devaney, we’ll explore the necessary steps film teams must take to create a director-producer partnership that can withstand the trials and triumphs of a multi-year film production and release.
What are the secrets to sustaining a successful film “marriage”: from development to production, and throughout the rigors of the festival and awards circuits. We’ll discuss the importance of uplifting and crediting the critical work of producers in an industry that has historically shone the brightest spotlight on directors.
We’re joined by LET THE LITTLE LIGHT SHINE director-producers Kevin Shaw and Rachel Dickson, producers Diane Becker (NAVALNY) and Shane Boris (NAVALNY and FIRE OF LOVE). The panel discussion will include a 15-minute Q&A.
Shane Boris is an Academy Award-nominated and Peabody Award-winning producer working on films that push the boundaries of conventional form in order to tell timeless stories. His latest films, FIRE OF LOVE (NatGeo/Neon) and NAVALNY (CNN/HBO MAX/Warner Bros), both premiered at Sundance 2022 where they won an Editing Award and two Audience Awards, respectively. Previous films include: THE EDGE OF DEMOCRACY (Netflix), which won Peabody and Platino Awards and was nominated for Critics' Choice, Gotham, IDA and Academy Awards; THE LAST CRUISE (HBO), which was nominated for Critics' Choice and Cinema Eye Awards; and STRAY (Magnolia), which was nominated for Indie Spirit, Critics' Choice, and Cinema Eye Awards. Other credits include THE SEER AND THE UNSEEN (SFFLM, Golden Gate Award); ALL THESE SLEEPLESS NIGHTS (Sundance, Best Directing), OLMO AND THE SEAGULL (Locarno, Jury Award), FUCK FOR FOREST (Warsaw, Best Documentary), and YOU'RE LOOKING AT ME LIKE I LIVE HERE AND I DON'T (Camden). Shane was recently an Impact Partners Producing Fellow and was named by DOC NYC as one of the “40 under 40” working in documentary. He is also the co-founder of Joon, a multidisciplinary incubator, and has worked as a strategist for non-profits, a writing consultant for authors and academics, and a song lyricist for musicians.
Jessica Devaney (she/her) is a Brooklyn-based producer and the founder and president of Multitude Films. Her latest films include Netflix Original PRAY AWAY in partnership with Ryan Murphy and Blumhouse, Oscar-shortlisted CALL CENTER BLUES (TOPIC), and APART, an episode of the Sesame Workshop series THROUGH OUR EYES (HBO Max). She also produced Sundance award-winning and IDA-nominated ALWAYS IN SEASON (Independent Lens 2020), Livingston Reporting award-winning THE FEELING OF BEING WATCHED (POV 2019) dubbed “a real-world conspiracy thriller” by Variety, and Peabody-nominated ROLL RED ROLL (POV, Netflix 2019). Additional credits include Critic’s Choice-nominated SPEED SISTERS (Netflix), American Psychological Association award-winning LOVE THE SINNER (Amazon), and CALL HER GANDA (POV). Her films have screened at top festivals including Sundance, SXSW, Tribeca, BlackStar, and Telluride. Jessica founded QueerDoc and the Queer Producers Network and was a Sundance Edit and Story Lab fellow, Women at Sundance fellow, and Sundance Creative Producing Lab advisor. She received DOC NYC and TOPIC’s inaugural 40 Under 40 Award and the 2019 Cinereach Producers Award.
As a director, producer and cinematographer, Kevin Shaw has created award-winning work for national television networks. Shaw was a segment director and cinematographer on AMERICA TO ME, and additional cinematographer on CITY SO REAL, from Academy Award-nominated filmmaker Steve James, where they both debuted at the Sundance Film Festival and aired on Starz and Hulu respectively. Shaw’s current directorial work, LET THE LITTLE LIGHT SHINE, premiered at the True/False Film Festival in March 2022 to stellar reception, where the Chicago Tribune lauded the film for carrying “the visceral impact of all six Rocky films and a few Creed films put together.” The film will air on PBS’ award-winning series POV in December.
Diane Becker is an Emmy nominated, Peabody Award winning producer and a graduate of the American Film Institute. Her latest film, NAVALNY, won the US Documentary Audience Award and the Festival Favorite at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival and will be released by CNN Films and HBOMax this year. ON THE DIVIDE, about the last abortion clinic on the US/Mexico border, premiered at the 2021 Tribeca Film Festival and was broadcast on POV in Spring 2022. She helped produce award-winning films alongside Passion Pictures and Motto Pictures including SERGIO (2009 Oscar shortlist), MANHUNT (2013 Emmy), and THE FINAL YEAR. Diane has also produced a slate of prestigious music films including: WE ARE X, IF I LEAVE HERE TOMORROW, and the 2021 Emmy nominated TINA. Other recent credits: BELUSHI (Showtime), and docu-series FIVE CAME BACK (Netflix), TRIAL BY MEDIA (Netflix), and EQUAL (HBO Max). Diane and Melanie Miller are the co-founders of Fishbowl Films. INVENTING TOMORROW (POV) premiered
at Sundance (2018) and won a Peabody Award (2019). They were awarded the 2020 Sundance Institute/Amazon
Producer’s Award for Non-Fiction for WHIRLYBIRD. The film was awarded the International Documentary
Association’s ABC News Videosource Award for 2021. Diane was a Sundance Documentary Creative Producing
Fellow and is a member of the Producers Guild of America (PGA), the Documentary Producers Alliance (DPA),
the Television Academy (ATAS), and the Academy Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS).
Established in 2016, the Documentary Producers Alliance (DPA) is a diverse coalition of more than 300 international members, ranging from emerging to Academy Award-winning documentary producers. The DPA sets standards for inclusive, sustainable and equitable business practices based on research, collective experience and input from strategic partners, amplifying the voice of documentary producers worldwide, while educating the industry about producers’ essential role from development through financing, production and distribution.
Rachel Dickson is an independent filmmaker based in Chicago with a background in journalism and Spanish translation. She produced ‘63 BOYCOTT with Kartemquin Films, which was named on the Academy Awards shortlist for Best Documentary Short Subject, won the Jury Award for Best Short Documentary at the Nashville Film Festival, the Audience Award at the Pan African Film Festival in Los Angeles, and was an official selection of the Museum of Modern Art Doc Fortnight and the DOC NYC Short List. Dickson was the supervising producer of THE SCHOOL PROJECT, a web series collaboratively produced by Kartemquin Films, Media Process Group, Kindling Group, Free Spirit Media, and Siskel/Jacobs Productions, in partnership with WTTW/ Channel 11, the Chicago Sun-Times, and Ebony.com, and won a
Hometown Media Award. Dickson was a field producer for HARD EARNED, a Kartemquin Films production
which won the Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia University Award. Before that, she was a story producer for Central
Standard on Education, WTTW/Channel 11’s first web series with PBS Digital. Dickson has worked as a teaching
filmmaker of high school students for UChicago Impact Lab of the Urban Education Institute. She attended
Chicago Public Schools, and before working as a filmmaker, she worked as a journalist in Latin America for four years.