Aug 22, 2018
Artist Development
San Francisco, CA – SFFILM announced today the two filmmakers selected to receive Sloan Science in Cinema Filmmaker Fellowships, which will support the development of their narrative feature screenplays. Funded by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Sloan Science in Cinema Filmmaker Fellowships are part of the organization’s efforts to support programs that cultivate and champion films exploring scientific or technological themes and characters. SFFILM fellowships, awarded under the auspices of the organization’s artist development program, SFFILM Makers, are presented to film artists developing screenplays that tell stories related to science or technology.
SFFILM Sloan Science in Cinema Filmmaker Fellowships include a $35,000 cash grant and a two-month residency at FilmHouse, SFFILM’s suite of production offices for local and visiting independent filmmakers. Fellows will gain free office space alongside access to weekly consulting services and professional development opportunities. SFFILM will connect each fellow to a science advisor with expertise in the scientific or technological subjects at the center of their screenplays, as well as leaders in the Bay Area’s science and technology communities. In addition to the residency and grant, SFFILM’s artist development team will facilitate industry introductions to producers and casting, financing, and creative advisors-investing in fellows from early script development stages through to release with the goal to further professional development and career sustainability.
The 2018 SFFILM Sloan Science in Cinema Fellowships are writer/director Erica Liu with The Mushroomers and writer/director So Young Shelly Yo with The 11th Endeavor.
The review committee consisted of Lauren Kushner, Senior Manager of Artist Development at SFFILM; Jenny Slattery, Associate Director of Foundations and Artist Development at SFFILM; Caroline von Kühn, Director of Artist Development at SFFILM; and Doron Weber, Vice President and Program Director at the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation; along with members of the SFFILM Science Advisory Board:
Brad Balukjian, Biology Professor
Sara Bender, Oceanographer and Program Officer at the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation
Patrick House, Neuroscientist, Writer
Gaia Filicori, Director of Communications at WIRED
Kevin Ford, Data Scientist, PhD in Molecular and Cell Biology
Indre Viskontas, Neuroscientist, Musician, Professor of Psychology
The jury noted in a statement: “We are delighted to support these two immensely talented women. Each filmmaker is taking a strikingly different approach to capturing the life of a female scientist, but they share a commitment to deepening the science in their screenplays in order to more fully realize those characters and the worlds they move in.”
The 11th Endeavor
So Young Shelly Yo, writer/director; Mark Castillo, producer A fiery female biotechnologist, hoping to break ground outside the realms of her lab, competes to be Korea’s first astronaut on the nationwide televised Korean Astronaut Program. In her obsessive quest to become Korea’s first astronaut, So Yeon steps into a world of unmeasurable physical and mental stress and discovers shocking revelations about her country. Based on the true story of Yi So Yeon, South Korea’s first astronaut.
So Young Shelly Yo is a Korean-American filmmaker currently based in Los Angeles. She is a recent graduate of the MFA film program at Columba University, where her thesis film Moonwalk with Me was awarded faculty honors. Her short films have screened and received accolades at film festivals around the world including the Mecal Barcelona International Short Film Festival, Sarasota Film Festival, and New Filmmakers LA, among others. Prior to schooling, Shelly worked as a video editor for a tech company known as ZEFR and as an assistant in the freelance commercial film industry.
The Mushroomers
Erica Liu, writer/director; David Yu-Hao Su, producer Following her husband’s death, a young mycologist attempts to sublimate her grief by embarking on an offbeat project to heal a contaminated old-growth forest using only super fungi, but Mother Nature and the mechanics of her own mourning prove far fickler than she had anticipated.
Erica Liu is a Taiwanese-American writer/director based in Los Angeles. She participated in the AFI Conservatory Directing Workshop for Women in 2015. Her films have screened at Clermont-Ferrand, AFI Fest, and Palm Springs International Shortfest, among others. Springtime aired on public television nationwide via KQED and affiliate stations. The Disappointment Tour received a Will & Jada Smith Family Foundation grant. Erica earned her MFA from NYU Tisch Asia and previously spent five years working and shooting throughout Asia, collaborating with companies including BBC, Google, and China Film Group. Erica is currently incubating her first feature, The Mushroomers.
This program is a part of SFFILM and the Sloan Foundation’s Science in Cinema initiative, which is designed to develop and present new feature films and episodic content that portray fully-drawn scientist and technologist characters; immerse audiences in the challenges and rewards of scientific discovery; and sharpen public awareness of the intersection of science, technology and our daily lives. Leveraging its position in the heart of the innovation capital of the world, SFFILM seeks to forge meaningful connections between the artistic and scientific communities through a suite of programs. In addition to the Sloan Science in Cinema Filmmaker Fellowship, the initiative also features the Sloan Science in Cinema Prize, which celebrates a finished narrative feature film each fall; and Sloan Science on Screen, a spotlight program at the San Francisco International Film Festival that debuted in 2016.
For more information about SFFILM’s exhibition, education and filmmaker services programs, visit sffilm.org.
SFFILM
SFFILM is a nonprofit organization with a mission to champion the world’s finest films and filmmakers through programs anchored in and inspired by the spirit and values of the San Francisco Bay Area. Presenter of the San Francisco International Film Festival, SFFILM is a year-round organization delivering screenings and events to more than 75,000 film lovers and media education programs to more than 10,000 students and teachers annually. In addition to its public programs, SFFILM supports the careers of independent filmmakers from the Bay Area and beyond with grants, residencies, and other creative development services. For more information visit sffilm.org.
SFFILM Makers
SFFILM Makers (formerly “Filmmaker360”), the organization’s artist development program, provides significant financial and creative resources to independent filmmakers through grants, fellowships, residencies, fiscal sponsorship, and more. Since 2009, over $6 million has been disbursed to more than 150 film projects in various stages of production. Highlights include the SFFILM Rainin Grant and the SFFILM Westridge Grant, which together distribute the most nonprofit funding for narrative features in the United States; a joint effort with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to cultivate stories rooted in science and technology; and the Documentary Film Fund, a partnership with the Jenerosity Foundation. For more information, visit sffilm.org/makers.
The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
The New York-based Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, founded in 1934, is a non-profit philanthropy that makes grants for original research and education in science, technology, and economic performance. Sloan’s program in Public Understanding of Science and Technology, directed by Doron Weber, supports books, radio, film, television, theater and new media to reach a wide, non-specialized audience and to bridge the two cultures of science and the humanities.
Sloan’s Film Program encourages filmmakers to create more realistic and compelling stories about science and technology and to challenge existing stereotypes about scientists and engineers in the popular imagination. Over the past two decades, Sloan has partnered with some of the top film schools in the country—including AFI, Carnegie Mellon, Columbia, NYU, UCLA and USC—and established annual awards in screenwriting and film production, along with an annual best-of-the best Student Grand Jury Prize administered by the Tribeca Film Institute. The Foundation also supports screenplay development programs with the Sundance Institute, Tribeca Film Institute, the San Francisco Film Society, the Black List, and Film Independent’s Producing Lab and Fast Track program and has helped develop such film projects as Shawn Snyder’s To Dust, Ben Lewin’s The Catcher Was a Spy, Morten Tyldum’s The Imitation Game, Matthew Brown’s The Man Who Knew Infinity, and Michael Almereyda’s Experimenter. The Foundation has also supported theatrical documentaries such as the recently released Bombshell: The Hedy Lamarr Story, Particle Fever, and Jacques Perrin’s Oceans.
The Foundation has an active theater program and commissions about twenty science plays each year from the Ensemble Studio Theatre, Manhattan Theatre Club, and the National Theatre, as well as supporting select productions across the country and abroad. Recent grants have supported Lucy Kirkwood’s Mosquitoes, recently at the National Theatre in London, Chiara Atik’s BUMP, Nick Payne’s Constellations, Lucas Hnath’s Isaac’s Eye, and Anna Ziegler’s Photograph 51. The Foundation’s book program includes early support for Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race, the highest grossing Oscar-nominated film of 2017 and the recipient of the Sloan Science in Cinema Prize at the San Francisco Film Society.
For more information about the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, visit sloan.org. Media contact: Nick Seaver, nseaver@burness.com.
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