Sean Justin Penn is an American actor and film director. He is known for his intense leading man roles in film. Over his career, he has earned numerous accolades including two Academy Awards, a Golden Globe Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award, as well as nominations for three BAFTA Film Awards. Penn received an Honorary César in 2015.
The University of Southern California School of Cinematic Arts (SCA) houses eight academic divisions: Film & Television Production; Cinema & Media Studies; John C. Hench Division of Animation + Digital Arts; John Wells Division of Writing for Screen & Television; Interactive Media & Games; Media Arts + Practice; Peter Stark Producing Program and the Expanded Animation Research + Practice Program.
François Ozon is a French film director and screenwriter.
Jenni Olson is a writer, archivist, historian, consultant, and non-fiction filmmaker based in Berkeley, California. She co-founded the pioneering LGBT website PlanetOut.com. Her two feature-length essay films — The Joy of Life (2005) and The Royal Road (2015) — premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Her work as an experimental filmmaker and her expansive personal collection of LGBTQ film prints and memorabilia were acquired in April 2020 by the Harvard Film Archive, and her reflection on the last 30 years of LGBT film history was published as a chapter in The Oxford Handbook of Queer Cinema from Oxford University Press in 2021. In 2020, she was named to the Out Magazine Out 100 list. In 2021, she was recognized with the prestigious Special TEDDY Award at the Berlin Film Festival. She also campaigned to have a barrier erected on the Golden Gate Bridge to prevent suicides.
Outfest is an LGBTQ-oriented nonprofit that produces two film festivals, operates a movie streaming platform, and runs educational services for filmmakers in Los Angeles. Outfest is one of the key partners, alongside the Frameline Film Festival, the New York Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, & Transgender Film Festival, and the Inside Out Film and Video Festival, in launching the North American Queer Festival Alliance, an initiative to further publicize and promote LGBT film.
John Ira BaileyASC was an American cinematographer and film director known for his collaborations with directors Paul Schrader, Lawrence Kasdan, Michael Apted, and Ken Kwapis. In August 2017, Bailey was elected president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He was succeeded by casting director David Rubin in August 2019.
Sean Baker is an American filmmaker. He is best known for directing independent feature films about the lives of marginalized people, especially immigrants and sex workers. His films include Take Out (2004), Starlet (2012), Tangerine (2015), The Florida Project (2017), Red Rocket (2021), and Anora (2024), the last of which won him the Palme d'Or at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. He is also known for co-creating the Fox/IFC puppet sitcom Greg the Bunny (2002–2006) and its spin-offs.
Gary Fleder is an American film director, screenwriter, and producer. His most recently completed film, Homefront, was released by Open Road Films and Millennium Films in November 2013. In recent years he has been a prolific director of television pilots.
Yossef (Joseph) Cedar is an Israeli film director and screenwriter.
The Queer Palm is an independently sponsored prize for selected LGBT-relevant films entered into the Cannes Film Festival. The award was founded in 2010 by journalist Franck Finance-Madureira. It is sponsored by Olivier Ducastel and Jacques Martineau, filmmakers of Jeanne and the Perfect Guy, The Adventures of Felix, Crustacés et Coquillages, and L'Arbre et la forêt.
Howard A. Rodman is a screenwriter, author and professor. He is the former President of the Writers Guild of America, West, professor and former chair of the writing division at the USC School of Cinematic Arts, alumnus of Telluride Association Summer Program and an artistic director of the Sundance Institute Screenwriting Labs.
Tye Kayle Sheridan is an American actor. He is known for playing Ben Goudy in horror comedy film Scouts Guide to the Zombie Apocalypse (2015), also portrayed the young Scott Summers / Cyclops in the X-Men film series (2016–2019) and for his starring role as Wade Watts in the science fiction film Ready Player One (2018).
Cineville is an American streaming platform, production and international distribution company founded in 1990 by Carl Colpaert and Christoph Henkel. It is trademarked in the US, EU and throughout Latin America.
XYZ Films is an American independent film production and sales company founded in 2008 by Aram Tertzakian, Nate Bolotin and Nick Spicer, and is based in Los Angeles. It focuses on international genre films, including The Raid: Redemption, The Raid 2, and On the Job.
Asphalt City is a 2023 American thriller drama film directed by Jean-Stéphane Sauvaire and written by Ryan King and Ben Mac Brown, based on the 2008 novel Black Flies by Shannon Burke. It stars Sean Penn and Tye Sheridan as paramedics working in New York City. Gbenga Akinnagbe, Raquel Nave, Kali Reis, Michael Pitt, Katherine Waterston, and Mike Tyson appear in supporting roles.
Catherine Caylee Cowan is an American actress. She is best known for her roles in Sunrise in Heaven (2019), Willy's Wonderland (2021), Spinning Gold (2022), and Frank and Penelope (2022).
Daddio is a 2023 American drama film produced, written and directed by Christy Hall. It stars Dakota Johnson as a young woman returning home to Midtown Manhattan from JFK International Airport by cab after a trip, who unexpectedly ends up conversing with her taxi driver.
Sean Stuart, is an Emmy and Grammy award-winning American documentary producer, writer, and director. He is president of Sutter Road Picture Company], and a partner at Company Name with actor/director Colin Hanks. He is best known for Sly, Challenger: The Final Flight, What's My Name: Muhammad Ali, Mike Judge Presents: Tales from the Tour Bus and All Things Must Pass: The Rise and Fall of Tower Records.
Projected Picture Works is an American production company founded in 2021 by two-time Academy Award winner Sean Penn, John Ira Palmer, and John Wildermuth.
