Jun 12, 2014
Artist Development
The San Francisco Film Society today announced the appointment of veteran documentary producers and funders Julie Parker Benello and Lisa Kleiner Chanoff to its Board of Directors. These appointments occur just as the Film Society has secured long-term funding for the SFFS Documentary Film Fund, its annual cash grant program supporting feature-length documentaries in postproduction. Thanks to the generous support of Jennifer Battat and the Jenerosity Foundation, the DFF will continue to fund innovative and important documentary films for a minimum of three years.
“As film organizations become increasingly important players in documentary production, the guidance of trusted colleagues in the field is absolutely essential. We are excited to have Julie Parker Benello and Lisa Kleiner Chanoff join our incredibly talented and passionate Board of Directors under the leadership of Board President David Winton,” said SFFS Executive Director Noah Cowan. “We are also very fortunate to have the generous and forward-thinking support of Jennifer Battat and the Jenerosity Foundation, who have helped secure our position as a significant player in the realm of documentary financing. This is a very exciting time for the Film Society, and with these inspiring partners supporting our work, we’re poised to do great things in the years to come.”
Julie Parker Benello‘s work has always been driven by a shared belief in the power of women storytellers to build and sustain movements for justice, equity and health. Benello cofounded Chicken & Egg Pictures with Judith Helfand and Wendy Ettinger in 2005 to match strategically timed grants with dynamic mentorship and creative collaboration focused on story, craft and community engagement for women documentary filmmakers. She is Founder and Managing Director of Gamechanger Films, a newly launched equity fund that is actively investing in a slate of independent narrative films by women directors. Earlier in her career, she served as a Production Executive for the distribution company Non Fiction Films and as an archival researcher for the Discovery Channel series Cronkite Remembers.
Lisa Kleiner Chanoff is cofounder of Catapult Film Fund, which provides development grants for documentary films. Chanoff and filmmaker Bonni Cohen started Catapult in 2010, to fill a need in the documentary funding landscape for early support. Catapult funds powerful stories and moving storytelling across a broad spectrum of issues, topics and perspectives. Chanoff is also an investor in narrative and documentary films and a philanthropist with a long history of involvement in education and the arts, as well as health and poverty issues. Her passion for early venture support has led to crucial first funding of projects, from San Francisco area education and poverty alleviation work to providing the initial funding for a school for girls and community center in the Kibera slum of Nairobi.
Since its launch in 2011, the SFFS Documentary Film Fund has distributed more than $375,000 to advance new work by non-fiction filmmakers nationwide. The DFF has an excellent track record for championing compelling films that have gone on to earn great acclaim. Previous DFF winners include Zachary Heinzerling’s Cutie and the Boxer, which won Sundance’s Directing Award for documentary, was distributed theatrically by RADiUS-TWC and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature; Joe Brewster and Michèle Stephenson’s American Promise, which premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival and won the festival’s Special Jury Prize in the documentary category; and Shaul Schwarz’s Narco Cultura, which premiered to strong reviews at Sundance the same year. DFF-supported films from more recent grant rounds include Jimmy Goldblum and Adam Weber’s Tomorrow We Disappear and Johanna Hamilton’s 1971, both of which premiered at Tribeca 2014.
The application period for the next round of SFFS Documentary Film Fund grants opens November 10. For more information and to apply, visit sffs.org/filmmaker360/grants/documentary-film-fund. Finalists will be announced in late January 2015; winners in early March.
SFFS Documentary Film Fund grants are awarded once each year. Exact amounts of individual grants and the number of grants made are determined on an annual basis. As with all Film Society grants, in addition to the cash awards, recipients will gain access to numerous benefits through Filmmaker360, the Film Society’s comprehensive and dynamic filmmaker services program. Filmmaker360 is a leader in the field of nonprofit support of cinema and offers unparalleled assistance and opportunities designed to foster creativity and further the careers of independent filmmakers nationwide. Filmmaker360 oversees one of the largest film grant programs in the country, which disperses nearly $1 million annually to incubate and support innovative and exceptional films at every stage of production. Other elements of Filmmaker360 include project development consultation and fiscal sponsorship, FilmHouse residencies, Off the Page screenplay workshops, information resources and a membership program with various discounts and benefits. For information visit sffs.org/filmmaker360.