Join us on May 20th from 3pm - 5pm EST for another installment of our Virtual Masterclass series with Academy Award-winning producer Mollye Asher and Spirit Award-winning producer Mynette Louie. Mollye and Mynette will discuss the myriad challenges of producing an independent film today and offer guidance on how to navigate them as you take your project from concept to audience.
Topics will include development, packaging, financing (equity, pre-sales, tax credits), production, post-production, theatrical vs. streaming, festivals + sales, publicity, and marketing.
ABOUT THE INSTRUCTORS:
Mollye Asher is an Oscar-winning producer. Most recently, she produced NOMADLAND, which won three Academy Awards, including Best Picture. It also won Best Picture at the BAFTAs, Golden Globes, Spirit Awards, Critics’ Choice, and Gotham Awards, and the Venice Golden Lion and TIFF Audience Award, among many others. The Searchlight Pictures film stars Frances McDormand and is Mollye’s third collaboration with writer-director Chloé Zhao.
Other credits include Carlo Mirabella-Davis’ Gotham, Critics’ Choice, and ASC Award-nominated SWALLOW (Tribeca 2019, IFC Films), Chloé Zhao’s THE RIDER (Cannes Directors’ Fortnight top prize, Gotham Best Picture, Sony Pictures Classics), SXSW Grand Jury Prize winner, FORT TILDEN by Sarah-Violet Bliss and Charles Rogers (MGM/ Orion), Anja Marquardt’s SHE'S LOST CONTROL (Berlinale, SXSW, Spirit Award nominee), as well as Zhao’s debut feature SONGS MY BROTHERS TAUGHT ME (Spirit Award nominee, Sundance, Cannes, Kino Lorber). She is set to premiere Josef Kubota Wladyka’s thriller, CATCH THE FAIR ONE, at the 2021 Tribeca Film Festival.
Mollye was the winner of the 2020 Independent Spirit Awards’ Producers Award. She is an adjunct professor at Rutgers University, a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and alumna of NYU’s graduate film program.
Mynette Louie is an Emmy-nominated, multiple Spirit Award-winning producer. Credits include Heidi Ewing’s double Spirit Award-nominated I CARRY YOU WITH ME (Sony Pictures Classics, Sundance 2020 NEXT Innovator & Audience Awards), Carlo Mirabella-Davis’ Gotham, Critics' Choice & ASC Award-nominated SWALLOW (Tribeca 2019, IFC Films, 23 festival awards), Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour's BLACK BOX (Amazon Studios/Blumhouse), Jennifer Fox’s Emmy, Golden Globe & Spirit Award-nominated THE TALE (Sundance 2018, HBO), Christina Choe’s Spirit Award-nominated NANCY (Sundance 2018, Goldwyn), Aaron Katz’s GEMINI (SXSW 2017, NEON/Sony), Sarah Adina Smith’s Buster’s MAL HEART (Toronto 2016, Well Go/Netflix), So Yong Kim’s Spirit Award-nominated LOVESONG (Sundance 2016, Strand), Karyn Kusama’s THE INVITATION (SXSW 2015, Drafthouse/Netflix), and Martha Stephens’ & Aaron Katz’s Spirit Award-winning LAND HO! (Sundance 2014, Sony Pictures Classics).
Mynette is on Film Independent’s Board of Directors and is a member of the executive and diversity committees in the Producers branch of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. She was named one of Business Insider’s “12 Movie Producers at the Top of Their Game to Watch in 2020 and Beyond,” Ted Hope’s “21 Brave Thinkers of Truly Free Film,” and Indiewire’s “100 Filmmakers to Follow on Twitter.” She won the 2013 Independent Spirit Piaget Producers Award.