Summer Film Camps for Teens

Originally from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Miguel Silveira lives and works in NYC. After wrapping his first feature-length documentary I Am a Visitor in Your World (Official selection - Woodstock Film Festival, Thessaloniki Documentary Film Festival, Athens Film + Video Festival) Miguel completed his thesis film at Columbia University, a political thriller titled Devil's Work. The film was selected by Columbia University's festival jury as one of the seven best films to come out of the program in 2014. The film also received the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation production grant, the Caucus Foundation award for excellence in filmmaking, the DGA awards for best film in its category and it was selected as a semi-finalist at the Student Academy Awards competition. Miguel developed and directed the Venezuelan chapter of MTV's documentary series Rebel Music, executive produced by Shepard Fairey, which aired worldwide in 2015. Miguel has taught in institutions such as Columbia College Chicago, EICTV in San Antonio de Los Banos, Cuba as well as Columbia University. He is also a proud sponsor of the Telluride Film Festival City Lights Program. After receiving his MFA from Columbia University, Miguel co-founded NoPort Films and is currently in post-production for the feature film American Thief.

Missy Hernandez is a Filmmaker, Writer, Actor and Assistant Professor in the Cinema and Television Arts department at Columbia College Chicago where she teaches courses in screenwriting, television writing, and creative producing at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Hernandez graduated from Columbia University in the City of New York with a B.A. in Cinema Studies and an M.F.A. in Screenwriting. She studied Meisner Technique at the William Esper Acting Studio with Bill Esper and has taught Meisner based acting to teens and young adults at the School of Creative and Performing Arts and Northwestern University's National High School Institute where she also served as Director of the Summer Film Program. Her most recent film and television credits include Associate Producer for Terence Nance’s Peabody Award-winning television series RANDOM ACTS OF FLYNESS (produced in partnership with A24 for HBO), and Writer and Co-Producer of a feature-length narrative/documentary hybrid and social-thriller entitled AMERICAN THIEF (Jerome Foundation Grantee 2016, IFP Narrative Lab Participant 2017). Her upcoming creative work focuses on female-centric narrative stories that highlight and investigate Latinx experiences within the US and the Caribbean.

[http://www.missyhernandez.com]

Emil Benjamin is a writer, director, producer, cinematographer, and editor based out of New York City. Originally from Cleveland, Ohio, he received a BFA in Theatre Arts from Boston University and MFA in Film Directing & Screenwriting from Columbia University, where he currently serves as adjunct faculty.

Emil's feature documentary, OYATE, premiered in competition at Big Sky and is currently running the festival circuit. His short films WHITE PEOPLE, WE CAN DO IT, and THE BREAKDOWN PARABLES have screened and earned prizes at dozens of festivals around the world. Emil attended the Cine Qua Non Revision Lab with his feature, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN ENOUGH, and won the Austin Film Festival Pitch Competition with his pilot, HOPELESS. Both scripts are Reader Recommended on The Black List. Emil is the founder of Irrelevant Media.

Shana Lloyd is a (recovering) actor, (sometimes) filmmaker, and (mostly) writer hailing from suburban Maryland. She studied acting in New York at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. While in NYC, she worked off Broadway with many theaters, such as La Mama and NYTW. Shana recently got her feet wet as a director--co-directing and producing a music video. As an actor, she has shared the stage with such greats as Ed Asner and Isabella Hofmann. Shana established Crisis Management Productions in May 2011, as a vehicle to produce more female-driven socially relevant content. Their debut film was the short, "Crisis". She also has a few TV projects of her own in development, as well as with longtime collaborator and writing partner, Alison. They just sold a project to Hallmark that will air late 2023.

Shana has also written and voiced some video spots for LIVEKINDLY. She’s also an adjunct faculty member in the Screenwriting departments of AFI and Emerson. True story: many years ago, Shana was chased down the street by all five feet of Sally Struthers, in which Ms. Struthers told her she “had it” after watching her in a staged reading. This is still one of Shana’s favorite LA moments, right after being checked out by Colin Farrell in two separate Starbucks a few months apart – also true! She’s still kicking herself for blowing both encounters with Colin.

Molly Karna is a queer, Indian-American writer and director based in Los Angeles who recently completed her M.F.A. in Film and Television Production at the USC School of Cinematic Arts. Molly’s time at SCA led to her writing and directing multiple films, including her thesis Truckstop and short film Big and Small, both hybrid fiction-nonfiction short films, and Demi, a short comedy film about a demisexual sex doll in COVID-19 lockdown, which helped her earn a USC Lambda Scholarship. Outside of USC, Molly directed the short film The Rushing of the Sea, an experimental narrative short film. Prior to USC, Molly worked in both the English and Hindi film industries. In 2018, she wrote and directed Arrangement, a short narrative film which premiered at the 2018 New York Indian Film Festival and won Best Debut Short Film Award at the Cincinnati Indian Film Festival. Aside from directing, Molly served as a staff writer for the TV Asia news-comedy show Samachari News and helped produce projects including Surina and Mel and the Hindi film Chef. Prior to her film career, Molly studied gentrification and maternal health in Mumbai as a Fulbright Scholar, and graduated with a Bachelors in Biomedical Engineering at Columbia University.

Growing up the tall kid with no athletic ability, Derek quickly embraced his love of the arts and never looked back. He is a Texas native and a graduate of the American Film Institute where he received an M.F.A in Screenwriting. His Hollywood journey has taken him from writing independent films, to developing TV pitches, reading for notable screenplay contests, while still finding time to teach film theory and screenwriting to the next generation of young artists. Most recently, he was selected as part of Imagine Entertainment's content accelerator where he is developing and writing an original TV project. Derek is a proud University of Miami graduate as well as the recipient of an M.F.A. in Screenwriting from the American Film Institute.