Terry Lawler is the Executive Director of NYWIFT. Tune in for her picks every Tuesday.
Terry’s Picks: February 4, 2014
Image via Fox Searchlight.
Looking forward to: the NYC premiere of Amma Asante’s Belle at the Athena Film Festival on Thursday! The film is a fictionalized account of the life of Dido Elizabeth Belle, the West Indies–born biracial daughter of an African woman and Admiral Sir John Lindsay, on an English estate. Belle’s story tackles questions about society, race, and social unrest that are still extremely relevant today.
Gearing up for: the 20 features (that’s 17%) from women directors at the SXSW Film Festival in Austin, Texas, during March 7-15. We’re especially looking forward to Sarah-Violet Bliss’ Fort Tilden.
Pondering these: USA Today infographics showing that female actors’ paychecks drop significantly in Hollywood after they turn 34. To learn more about gender equity in film and television, visit NYWIFT’s State of Women in the Industry page.
PUBLISHED BY
nywift
Related Posts
Meet the New NYWIFT Member: Jackie Quinones
Welcome to NYWIFT, Jackie Quinones! Jackie is a boundary-pushing filmmaker with a career that seamlessly blends music, acting, marketing, development, and production. From her roots as a hip-hop artist to her evolution in film, she combines a rare mix of artistic vision and business savvy to create heartfelt, socially resonant stories that leave a lasting influence. Bilingual and Puerto Rican, she is a multi-hyphenate talent - writer, director, actor, and producer - whose work centers on emotionally rich, character-driven stories exploring psychology, identity, and trauma. Jackie's hybrid-genre narratives also reflect on social and political issues through the lens of fractured relationships and complex family dynamics. Committed to amplifying unheard and underrepresented voices, her work is both personal and thought-provoking. Her debut feature film Miles Away premiered at the Austin Film Festival in 2025. It went on to earn the New York Women in Film & Television (NYWIFT) Award for Excellence in Narrative Filmmaking at the Urbanworld Film Festival.
READ MOREMeet the New NYWIFT Member: Kelli Reilly
Welcome to NYWIFT, Kelli Reilly! Kelli Reilly is a producer, director, and writer working across narrative film and documentary, based between New York and Los Angeles, and the founder of Quartermaster Creative. She studied film and television at NYU Tisch with a focus in experimental cinema and got her start working on acclaimed documentaries, including Larger Than Life: The Kevyn Aucoin Story, The Vow, and Student Athlete. Her recent producing work includes I Got You, SLICK, and The Daughter, and she is currently in post-production on the feature documentary Viva La Dita. She is also in production on the period feature The Florist and is a writer and contributor to the New York Times–recommended podcast Look Behind the Look. In our interview, Kelli discussed how she shaped her artistry, her inspirations, and her upcoming work.
READ MOREMeet the New NYWIFT Member: Kasey O’Brien
Welcome to NYWIFT, Kasey O’Brien! Kasey O’Brien (she/they) is a queer-identifying filmmaker based in Queens, working across both fictional narratives and documentaries. While she has dabbled in various positions in film production (including acting, writing, camera operation, and post-production), she is most at home directing and producing. Kasey was integral to the launch of NYU Tisch’s Master‘s in Virtual Production at the Martin Scorsese Virtual Production Center, whose inaugural cohort graduated in May 2025. She serves on the board of directors of PANO Network and is a founding member of The Garret Theatre Company. MFA from The New School. In our interview, Kasey discussed her journey to working in independent film production.
READ MOREMeet the New NYWIFT Member: Carmen Matias
Welcome to NYWIFT, Carmen Matias! A graduate of Hunter College in the 1970s, producer Carmen earned a degree in Broadcast with a minor in Theatre. Television was both an escape and a source of fantasy throughout her early life, ultimately guiding her toward a career in the medium, which she came to see as the best possible profession for her creative ambitions. In our interview, Carmen discussed her experience producing and shared her advice for young creatives.
READ MORE
