Heist the Documentary Filmmakers
REBECCA CAMMISA Director, Producer & Camera
Rebecca Cammisa is a two-time Academy Award® nominee and an EMMY award-winning filmmaker. Her first feature documentary film, "Sister Helen" aired on HBO and won the 2002 Sundance Film Festival's Documentary Directing Award. "Sister Helen" received an EMMY award nomination for Outstanding Cultural and Artistic Programming and an Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Documentary Film Award nomination from the Directors Guild of America. Rebecca founded Documentress Films and directed and produced the 2010 Academy Award®-nominated feature documentary, "Which Way Home", which received a Fulbright/COMEXUS Fellowship for Filmmaking. "Which Way Home" was nominated for a 2010 Independent Spirit Award for Best Documentary and was nominated for four EMMY Awards. "Which Way Home" went on to win a News & Documentary EMMY Award for Outstanding Informational Programming and the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Awards Grand Prize. Rebecca’s next film, "God is the Bigger Elvis", received a 2012 Academy Award® nomination for Best Documentary Short Subject, a 2013 EMMY award nomination for Outstanding Arts & Cultural Programming, and a 2012 International Documentary Association Award nomination in the Documentary Short Film category. Rebecca was awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship for Filmmaking and began the feature-length documentary film, "Atomic Homefront”, which received a 2016 MacArthur Foundation Film Grant and won the 2019 Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award for Domestic Television. In 2023, Rebecca directed “Yours in Freedom, Bill Baird”, a feature-length documentary about reproductive rights pioneer William Baird. The film premiered at the 2023 Doc NYC Film Festival.
ILENE KRISTEN Producer
Born in Brooklyn, Ilene has appeared on Broadway in the original companies of “Henry, Sweet, Henry,” “Grease,” and “Mayor” as well as countless Off-Broadway shows. Her television appearances include “Family”, “Third Watch”, and several “Law & Order" episodes, “The Black Donnellys”, “Deception”, “Unforgettable”, HBO's “Show Me a Hero”, “The Sopranos”, “Another World”, “Loving”, and “General Hospital”. Ilene is best known for portraying Delia on “Ryan's Hope” and Roxy on “One Life to Live”, for which she received two EMMY nominations. Ilene has shared her adventures in the 2024 book: “Grease: Tell Me More ...Tell Me More” and wrote the foreword for the book “Ryan's Hope: An Oral History”. In 1977, Ilene founded the Jean Renoir Cinema with Ray Blanco, a young Cuban emigre, and Nancy Newell, one of the first women admitted to the Projectionists Union. During this time, she produced the short film, “The Aftermath,” starring Karen Allen, and served as the producer on the 2025 film “Angels with Angles”. Her album of self-penned songs, “I'm Not Done With U Yet” is currently streaming on Amazon and iTunes.
DAVID COWAN Producer
David Cowan is a filmmaker, science philanthropist, and venture capitalist. Through his creative, professional, and charitable pursuits, David aims to advance humanism and science in our society. A member of the Directors Guild of America and the Producers Guild of America, David produced the award-winning documentary “Afghan Dreamers” (for MTV) and “Eye For An Eye”. He directed the San Jose-staged musical “Lies In The Attic” and the upcoming feature documentary “Heathens”. David is the founder of Pale Blue Dot Films. David has multiple degrees from Harvard University, where he studied math and computer science. He holds several U.S. patents and founded VeriSign and Good Technology. As a managing partner of Bessemer Venture Partners, David was listed on the annual Forbes Midas list 15 times in recognition of his early venture capital investments in dozens of successful technology startups like RocketLab, LinkedIn, Twitch, and Rigetti. His podcast “Wish I Knew" won the 2024 Webby Award for Best Business Podcast. David is a Trustee of the Center for Inquiry and Board Member of the Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.
SEBASTIAN JONES Editor
Hailing from the coast of South Florida, Sebastian Jones is an award-winning
editor and director. His films have screened everywhere from SXSW to the Cannes Film Festival to Netflix. Sebastian began his career working with established filmmakers such as Terrence Malick and Jeff Nichols, editing films such as: “A Hidden Life”, “Voyage of Time”, and “Song To Song”. Sebastian has also edited numerous documentaries and directed some of his own, including a short film about the visual artist Lauren Tsai and the feature-length documentary: “Everybody's Everything” about the life of the late rap artist Lil Peep. “Everybody's Everything” screened globally and won the Sound Award for Best Documentary at the 2019 Soundtrack Cologne Film Festival. Sebastian edited Rebecca Cammisa’s 2023 film “Yours In Freedom, Bill Baird “ which premiered at the Doc NYC Film Festival. He is a graduate of the University of Central Florida.
WENDY BLACKSTONE Composer
Wendy has composed over 130 film scores. With strengths in drama, comedy, fiction and non-fiction, Wendy aspires to create a unique score for each film. Blackstone combines experimentation with musical traditions of the past, weaving originally designed sounds with acoustic ensembles or techniques yet to be discovered. Nine films scored by Blackstone have been nominated or won Academy Awards. Wendy was the first woman signed as a film composer to CAA and was one of the first women to join the Music Branch of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. Her feature films and TV credits include: Joe Berlinger’s “Extremely Wicked”, “Lost in Florence”, “The Boy Who Cried Bitch”, "Love Walked In”, “New Jersey Drive”, and Susan Seidelman's “The Dutch Master”, “Crime Scene: The Vanishing at the Cecil Hotel” (Netflix), “The Wonderland Murders” (MGM), “Profiler”, (NBC), “New York News” (CBS), “Maybe It’s Me”, and “Master Class” (HBO). Documentary credits: “An American Bombing: The Road to April 19th” (HBO), “Let The Canary Sing”, “Ai WeiWei: Yours Truly”, Barbara Kopple’s “Desert One”, “Breslin - Hamill: Deadline Artists” (HBO), and “The Girl In the River” (HBO). Blackstone scored Anna Deavere Smith’s Tony-nominated “Twilight: Los Angeles” directed by George C. Wolfe for both NYC’s Public Theater and Broadway’s Cort Theater. Wendy divides her time between NYC and Italy.