Filmmaker's Biographies

CONNIE FIELD
Producer/Director Connie Field has worked on numerous dramatic and documentary films as well as independently producing her own work. Her feature documentary, “Freedom on My Mind” (1994) is a history of the civil rights movement in Mississippi. It was nominated for an Academy Award; won the Grand Jury Prize for best documentary at the Sundance Film Festival; Best of Northern California, National Educational Film Festival; Erik Barnouw Award, Organization of American Historians; John O’Connor Award, American Historical Association; Distinguished Documentary Award, International Documentary Association; National Educational Association Award for Excellence in the Advancement of Learning through Broadcasting; and was released theatrically and named “One of the Ten Best Films” of 1994 by a variety of film critics, including the San Francisco Examiner and The Oakland Tribune. It was broadcast on “The American Experience”. She was a member of Boston Newsreel Films where she worked on productions and distribution. She was a director on “Forever Activists” (1990 Academy Award Nominee), and she produced, directed and edited the feature documentary “The Life and Times of Rosie the Riveter” (1981). “Rosie” earned fifteen international awards for Best Documentary (including Gold Hugo, Chicago; John Grierson, Blue Ribbon, American International Festival; Golden Marazzo, Festival dei Popoli; Gold Award, Houston; Cine Golden Eagle; Golden Athena, Athens Festival; British Academy Award Nominee), was released theatrically and was named “One of the Ten Best Films of the Year” by a number of publications, including the Village Voice and Film Comment, was voted “Best Independent Feature of the Year” in American Film Magazine, was translated into twenty different languages; and is listed in the National Film Registry of the Library of Congress. It was broadcast on “The American Experience”. As president of Clarity Educational Productions (which distributed “Rosie” and “Freedom” both domestically and internationally), Field is also experienced in the world of distribution with extensive contacts to educational, theatrical and television distributors worldwide. She is a recipient of the John Grierson Award as most outstanding social documentarian, and a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship. She is currently in post production on other episodes of “Have You Heard From Johannesburg”(2006), a doc series on the international effort to end apartheid in South Africa whose episode 4, “Apartheid and the Club of the West,” won Best Documentary, from the Canadian Film Board at the Vancouver Film Festival: and from The Pan African Film Festival and has just completed a new documentary, "¡Salud!" on Cuba’s role in the struggle for global health equity (Audience Award, Pan African Film Festival). She is a member of the Film Arts Foundation, The International Documentary Association and The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

MAUREEN GOSLING
Maureen Gosling has been a documentary filmmaker for more than thirty years and is best known for her twenty-year collaboration with independent director, Les Blank (Burden of Dreams, Yum, Yum, Yum!, Garlic Is As Good as Ten Mothers). Gosling has also been sought after as an editor, working with such directors as Jed Riffe (California’s “Lost” Tribes, Waiting to Inhale), Tom Weidlinger (Heart of the Congo, A Dream in Hanoi, Boys Will Be Men), Ashley James (Bomba, Dancing the Drum). Gosling’s 16mm feature documentary Blossoms Of Fire, on the legendary Zapotecs of southern Oaxaca, Mexico, won the Coral Award for Best Foreign Documentary at the Havana International Film Festival. The film was also broadcast on HBO Latino. Gosling’s current projects are Bamako Chic:Women Cloth Dyers of Mali; and No Mouse Music: The Story of Chris Strachwitz and Arhoolie Records. Productions at Fantasy: produced, directed and edited Blossoms of Fire and Sketches of Juchitán 1992; edited Bomba: Dancing the Drum, California’s “Lost” Tribes, Waiting to Inhale, Somos (producer, María Burés).

JUSTINE SHAPIRO

Justine Shapiro is an Academy Award-nominated, Emmy Award-winning documentary filmmaker and television host. As host of the PBS travel series GlobeTrekker, Justine has traveled off the beaten track to over 35 countries in 10 years, delivering her spontaneous reflections to a global audience of 40 million. Justine’s award-winning 2001 feature documentary Promises was released in theaters and broadcast nationally on PBS. Justine developed a powerful educational outreach program for Promises, which continues to serve as a springboard for discussing conflict resolution and the Palestinian/Israeli conflict in high schools and universities. In 2001, Justine gave birth to a son and entered the world of motherhood with joy, wonder and confusion. Accustomed to looking for guidance in the wisdom of other cultures, Justine was surprised to discover that aside from ethnographic studies, films exploring child rearing around the world did not exist. Thus the idea for The Global Moms Project was born.

ANN HERSHEY

Ann Hershey (Producer/Director/Editor) began as an Associate Producer for the Public Affairs Department at CBS, KPIX, Channel 5 in San Francisco in the 1970’s. She produced Public Affairs programming, documentary films and was Assistant to the Public Affairs Director for four years. She was recognized as one of two respected women cinematographers in the city. (The other was Emiko!) She began her independent documentary film career with "Mrs. Teabottle Meets Mr. Magic," about an interracial friendship among two pre-adolescents. Her second film was the award-winning, “Never Give Up - Imogen Cunningham” about the legendary San Francisco photographer. Ann taught "Woman as a Creative Agent" with Allie Light, at SF State University in one of the first women's studies classes offered there. Ann has produced, directed, shot and edited two other award-winning personal documentaries, "The Awakening of Nancy Kaye," about a disabled woman hired as Director of Special Education in the Berkeley schools who died of cancer, and Positive Women, women with HIV who wrote and performed a theater piece based on their experiences. From 1987 through 1992, Ann created the video production department of the Shanti Project, a San Francisco AIDS agency where she produced over 45 training videos and Public Service Announcements. Ann has created numerous documentaries for non-profit groups and organizations, maintaining a steady output of professional work through the years. She has also worked on many of her independent film/video colleagues’ projects, among them, "Rachel’s Daughters - a Search for the Causes of Breast Cancer” (Allie Light and Irving Saraf, producers), "Complaints of a Dutiful Daughter" (Deborah Hoffmann, producer), and "Long Night’s Journey Into Day" by Frances Reid and Deborah Hoffmann. Ann is now completing a major documentary about the life and times of writer/activist Tillie Olsen, who died on New Year's Day at the age of 94.

RICK GOLDSMITH
Rick Goldsmith, produced, directed, edited and co-wrote the Academy-Award nominated documentary feature "Tell the Truth and Run: George Seldes and the American Press," a piercing look at censorship and suppression in American journalism. It won awards at several film festivals, was broadcast nationwide on public television and cablecast on the Sundance Channel. Goldsmith also co-produced and co-directed "Everyday Heroes." He was writer and editor, and won a Cine Golden Eagle award, for "Soul of Justice: Thelton Henderson’s American Journey," a documentary film on the pioneering and controversial African-American jurist.

JUDY EHRLICH

Judith Ehrlich co-produced and co-directed the award winning ITVS documentary, "The Good War and Those Who Refused to Fight It," a story of men guided by principle to take the unpopular position of pacifism in the face of World War II. This revealing look at questions of war, conscience, activism won both major US history film awards in 2003. Ehrlich has made prize-winning educational films for two decades on subjects of the peace movement, education, citizen participation and low-income housing. Ehrlich is a graduate of UC Berkeley and teaches Documentary Film at Berkeley City College. She is Artist-in-Residence at SFSU Osher Lifelong Learning Institute for 2007.

DEAF MEDIA, INC.

Established in 1974, DEAF Media, Inc., is a nonprofit corporation dedicated to advocating for Deaf arts and to developing cultural, educational, and professional opportunities for the Deaf community. This mission is accomplished through television production, live performance, community events and special programming done in partnership with Bay Area cultural institutions, such as the San Francisco Fine Arts Museums—de Young & Legion of Honor, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, the Oakland Museum of California; as well as through technical assistance to the film and television industry. Though the organization is based in Berkeley and focuses its services on Northern California, many DEAF Media projects—including PBS's Rainbow’s End and with UC Berkeley our “Celebration: Deaf Artists and Performers” —have had national scope and created international impact, bringing the organization multiple awards for innovation and excellence, including 3 Emmy Awards, 2 California Governor’s Media Access Awards, a US Constitution Bicentennial Commission Exemplary Programming Award among others.
DEAF Media’s Executive Director—Dr. Susan Rutherford
Dr. Susan Rutherford has been the Executive Director of DEAF Media since 1980. She is the producer of DEAF Media’s television and video projects, Rainbow’s End (PBS) and American Culture: The Deaf Perspective (PBS), as well as its live programming. Dr. Rutherford also created the country's first university level course on Deaf Culture, which she taught at the University of California-Berkeley for 25 years

ALAN SNITOW

Alan Snitow is an award-winning documentary filmmaker and journalist. His films include "Ezekiel's Wheels," “Thirst”, “Secrets of Silicon Valley”, and “Blacks and Jews”. He is co-author of "Thirst: Fighting the Corporate Theft of Our Water." Prior to founding Snitow-Kaufman Productions, he was a News Producer for Bay Area Fox affiliate KTVU-TV for 12 years. As News Director at the Bay Area Pacifica Radio station KPFA-FM, he won a Corporation for Public Broadcasting Gold Award for Best Local Newscast. He is a graduate of Cornell University and lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.

DEBORAH KAUFMAN

Deborah Kaufman is a film producer and director whose documentaries "Ezekiel's Wheels," “Thirst”, “Secrets of Silicon Valley” and “Blacks and Jews” have been broadcast on PBS and throughout Europe and Asia. She is co-author of "Thirst: Fighting the Corporate Theft of Our Water." She founded and was, for 14 years, Director of the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival, the first and largest festival of its kind. A noted activist for human rights and social justice issues, Kaufman is an attorney and member of the California State Bar.

N. JED RIFFE
Jed Riffe is an award-winning independent filmmaker and new media producer. He is best known as the producer and director of "Ishi, the Last Yahi." The highly acclaimed dramatic documentary won “Best Documentary” awards at eight major national and international film festivals. "Ishi, the Last Yahi" was released theatrically and acquired for national broadcast by the PBS series The American Experience. Riffe produced and directed "Waiting to Inhale," the acclaimed feature length dramatic documentary on the controversial movement to legalize marijuana as a medicine. "Waiting to Inhale" has won three “Best Documentary” awards and a CINE Golden Eagle. The film is currently being screened in festivals across the US, Canada and Australia. According to Robert W. Butler, Entertainment writer in the Kansas City Star: “Jed Riffe's documentary ostensibly is about medical marijuana and the individuals who require it to ease a variety of ailments. But it's also a methodical and damning denunciation of this country's drug policy.” Riffe is Series Producer of California and the American Dream, a four-hour independently produced nationally broadcast PBS Series. Riffe produced, directed and co-wrote the Series’ opening episode California’s ”Lost” Tribes with co-producer Jack Kohler and editor and co-writer Maureen Gosling. Riffe produced the fourth episode, Ripe for Change with Emiko Omori who also directed. Jed Riffe and digital designer Emrah Oral created two websites for the series and , and produced four enhanced DVDs. Riffe and digital guru Emrah Oral are currently producing four interactive kiosks for the Series initiative Public Broadcasting in Public Places funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Other documentary films produced and directed by Jed Riffe include Who Owns the Past?, an hour-long, award-winning dramatic documentary on the American Indian struggle for control of their ancestral remains (Independent Lens-PBS). Rosebud to Dallas, an hour-long documentary on the relocation of American Indians (PBS). Promise and Practice, an hour-long documentary on redlining of inner city neighborhoods (PBS). Riffe directed the super 16MM and HDCAM shoots for Grotte de Chauvet, a documentary on the story behind the oldest cave paintings on earth in the south of France. Riffe line produced Convention, a feature film written by Norman Solomon and lensed in HDCAM by Vicente Franco. Riffe also produced an HDCAM shoot on the Rio Negro for Brazilian director Luiz Lobo’s series Amazonia: Mother of Nature. Riffe produced the video elements for a three-station, touch screen, interactive multi-cultural history of California for the Oakland Museum. In 2001, Riffe was awarded a Gerbode Fellowship. He is a member of the Film Arts Foundation, Bay Area Video Coalition and the International Documentary Association.