Independent Filmmakers Alex Ross Perry, Carlos López Estrada, Jodie Mack, Madeleine Sims-Fewer & Dusty Mancinelli, and Reid Davenport Awarded Cash & Service Grants for Upcoming Films

In the past 25 years, Rooftop Films has awarded over $2,000,000 in cash and services to notable films and filmmakers including recent Academy Award nominee Sara Dosa, Nikyatu Jusu’s Sundance-winner Nanny, Shaka King, Reinaldo Marcus Green, Penny Lane, Luke Lorentzen, David Lowery, Eliza Hittman, and Petra Costa

Brooklyn, NY - Rooftop Films, a New York cultural institution and home for independent cinema for just under three decades, today announced the recipients of their 2023 Rooftop Filmmakers Fund grants. This year, twenty-one cash and service grants will be provided to independent filmmakers to support the production of their next short or feature film, including four Rooftop Films Water Tower Feature Film cash grants generously supported by the Laurence W. Levine Foundation. Reinforcing Rooftop Films’ commitment to supporting filmmakers of diverse backgrounds, this year’s recipients include over 60% women, 30% people of color and 10% people who identify as LGBTQ+.

The Rooftop Filmmakers Fund grants are available to Rooftop Films alumni directors who have previously had their work screened during the annual Summer Series in New York City. Among the 2023 grantees are Alex Ross Perry for his avant-garde dive into legendary ‘90s band Pavement (Pavements); Carlos López Estrada for his latest fiction feature Kill Yr Idols; Jodie Mack’s experimental documentary feature Early Mourning, Tarpon Springs/Lindsey's Color Service; Honey Bunch, the sophomore fiction feature from directorial team Madeleine Sims-Fewer & Dusty Mancinelli; and Reid Davenport’s second documentary feature, Life After.

Alex Ross Perry is the celebrated director of iconoclastic independent films such as Listen Up Philip, Queen of Earth, and Her Smell, in addition to acting as co-screenwriter of Disney's Christopher Robin. His new film is a kaleidoscopic experimental documentary telling the histories, both real and imagined, of the iconic band Pavement. Carlos López Estrada is an Academy Award-nominated filmmaker from Mexico City whose debut feature, Blindspotting, screened with Rooftop Films as part of their 2018 season. His new film is a comedic coming of age punk-rock journey through the Rio Grande Valley. Jodie Mack is an animator whose short Dusty Stacks of Mom: The Poster Project screened with Rooftop as part of their 2014 season. Her latest documentary feature follows a bereaved sibling as she unearths the details of a car accident in the state of Florida. British-Canadian directorial team Madeleine Sims-Fewer & Dusty Mancinelli met in 2015 at the TIFF Filmmaker’s Lab. Their short Slap Happy played as part of Rooftop’s 2018 season; their sophomore feature is a psychological horror about what it takes to sustain a marriage. Reid Davenport makes films about disability from an overtly political perspective. His first feature documentary I Didn't See You There screened with Rooftop last year as part of their 2022 season, and his next feature examines a historic debate about state-sanctioned death and the ways in which the media treatment of said case further revealed society’s devaluation of the disabled community.

Other 2023 feature film grantees include new works from exceptionally brilliant filmmakers Cheryl Furjanic (Adventures in Miscarriage), Sierra Pettengill (Steel [working title]), James P. Gannon & Matt Ferrin (Hardpan), Elizabeth Lo (Untitled Mistress Dispeller Project), and Andrew Thomas Huang (Tiger Girl).

"We're unbelievably excited about the projects we've had the privilege of helping to fund this year! Every single one of these filmmakers approach their subjects in ways that are wholly unique to their style and vision, and we can't wait to see the finished works, as we know they'll undoubtedly be considered future pillars of independent cinema," said Rooftop Films' Senior Programmer, Maria Rhodes.

Since 2000, Rooftop Films’ Filmmakers Fund has supported the artists who have screened previous work as part of their annual Summer Series, helping alumni filmmakers produce their new work. In that time, Rooftop has awarded cash and service grants worth more then $2,000,000, supporting such notable work as Nikyatu Jusu’s Sundance-winning Nanny, Benh Zeitlin’s Beasts of the Southern Wild, Eliza Hittman’s Never Rarely Sometimes Always, Reinaldo Marcus Green’s Monsters and Men, Penny Lane’s Hail Satan?, Kirsten Johnson’s Dick Johnson is Dead, Robert Greene’s Bisbee ‘17, Petra Costa’s The Edge of Democracy, Shaka King’s Newlyweeds, Jeremy Saulnier’s Blue Ruin, Gillian Robespierre’s Obvious Child, Ana Rose Holmer’s The Fits, and Sierra Pettengill’s Riotsville, USA, as well as early work by recent breakout talents such as 2023 Academy Award nominee Sara Dosa (Fire of Love), Andrew Semans (Resurrection), Lee Isaac Chung (Minari), David Lowery (The Green Knight), John Wilson (How To With John Wilson), and Jessica Kingdon (Ascension).

“One of the most fulfilling aspects of supporting filmmakers is getting the opportunity to witness their authentic and uncompromised exploration firsthand. The characters in Carlos López Estrada’s Kill Yr Idols, jump directly off the page and into both heart and mind. Artists like Estrada, Reid Davenport, Jodie Mack, Dusty Mancinelli, and Madeleine Sims-Fewer engender a sense of trust with their audiences and creative teams, making it possible for them to create such deeply exhilarating cinema. We can’t wait to spend time with each of their works on the big screen,” said Laurence W. Levine Foundation board member James Levine.

The complete list of 2023 Rooftop Filmmakers Fund short and feature film grant recipients is below:

Water Tower Feature Film Cash Grants (Feature Film)
  - Carlos López Estrada, Kill Yr Idols FICTION FEATURE
    Combining the high energy raucous humor of Superbad with the heartfelt and place-specific introspection of Y Tu Mamá También, Kill Yr Idols is a comedic coming of age punk rock journey through the Rio Grande Valley. In 48 hours, best     friends Carlos and Leo will finally play the first show of their teenage lives, opening for local legend Ramona Casas — if they can convince anyone at their high school to show up for it.

  - Jodie Mack, Early Mourning, Tarpon Springs/Lindsey's Color Service EXPERIMENTAL DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
    An auto-ethnography by way of a personal excavation and study of Floridian car culture. A bereaved sibling unearths the details of a car accident in the state of Florida uncovering three types of ghosts: individual, collective, and     ecological.

  - Madeleine Sims-Fewer & Dusty Mancinelli, Honey Bunch FICTION FEATURE
    Honey Bunch is a psychological horror about what it takes to sustain a marriage.

  - Reid Davenport, Life After DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
    In Life After, disabled filmmaker Reid Davenport reveals that we're on the brink of a dystopia in which state-sanctioned death is unabashedly prescribed as a cure for disability.

The Water Tower Feature Film Cash Grants are made possible by generous support from the Laurence W. Levine Foundation

Eastern Effects Equipment Grant (Feature Film)
  - Alex Ross Perry, Pavements EXPERIMENTAL DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
    A kaleidoscopic portrait of the iconic band Pavement.

NYCEDC Brooklyn Army Terminal Production Office Grant (Feature Film)
  - Cheryl Furjanic, Adventures in Miscarriage DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
    After a traumatic pregnancy loss, a lesbian filmmaker navigates her grief using surrealist humor to pull back the curtain on miscarriage care in the United States.

  - Sierra Pettengill, Steel (Working Title) DOCUMENTARY FEATURE

Edgeworx Post Production Effects Grant (Feature Film)
  - James P. Gannon & Matt Ferrin, Hardpan FICTION FEATURE
    Hardpan tells the story of a young demolition derby driver who becomes stranded in the desert after crashing his car in the American Southwest. Injured and alone, he has only a case of beer to survive on and a cheesy romance novel on     tape as his sole companion. He must relay on his ingenuity to transform his wrecked car into something that can save him.

Irving Harvey Color Correction Grant (Feature Film)
  - Elizabeth Lo, Untitled Mistress Dispeller Project DOCUMENTARY FEATURE
    Wang Zhenxi works as a “mistress dispeller” in China, hired to maintain the bounds of marriage — and break up affairs — by any means necessary. Untitled Mistress Dispeller Project follows Ms. Wang’s work as she attempts to bring     couples back from the edge of crisis, offering strikingly intimate access to private lives usually hidden behind closed doors. The film will shift our sympathies between husband, wife, and mistress to explore the ways class, capital,     and cultural norms collide to shape romantic relationships in contemporary China.

Parabolic Sound Mix Grant (Feature Film)
  - Andrew Thomas Huang, Tiger Girl FICTION FEATURE
    Set in 1967 Los Angeles, Tiger Girl is a coming of age fantasy about a repressed Chinese American teenage girl haunted by a tiger lurking in her attic. When pressured by her immigrant mother’s rigid social expectations, the girl must     learn that the beast upstairs is the tiger within that will set her free.

Adrienne Shelley Foundation Grant for Women (Short Film)
  - Ash Brandon, PAT! PAT! PAT! DOCUMENTARY SHORT
    PAT! PAT! PAT! is a hybrid-documentary on Patricia "Pat" Palinkas, who in 1970 went from first-grade school teacher to overnight gridiron phenom and pariah, becoming the first woman to ever play professional football.

DCTV Grants (Short Film)
  - Julia Mendoza Friedman, Jason, Champion DOCUMENTARY SHORT
    Jason, a New York City maintenance man, moonlights as a competitive pigeon racer. He is a self-declared one of the top-three pigeon racers in Staten Island, and in 2023 New York City Viola Pigeon Race, his birds will go up against     his biggest competitor and former training partner- his Uncle.

  - Sister Sylvester (director, co-producer) & Laudiceia Calixto (co-producer), The Maids’ The Maids DOCUMENTARY SHORT
    The Maids’ The Maids is a film made in collaboration with domestic workers, in response to Jean Genet’s notorious 1947 play The Maids. Using Genet’s trope of maids role-playing as their employer, a ritual transgression that becomes a     rebellion, contemporary domestic workers stage experiences from their own lives.

Untouchable Scoring Grant (Short Film)
  - Julia Mendoza Friedman, Jason, Champion DOCUMENTARY SHORT
    Jason, a New York City maintenance man, moonlights as a competitive pigeon racer. He is a self-declared one of the top-three pigeon racers in Staten Island, and in 2023 New York City Viola Pigeon Race, his birds will go up against     his biggest competitor and former training partner- his Uncle.

Elkind Lighting & Camera Grant (Short Film)
  - Sister Sylvester (director, co-producer) & Laudiceia Calixto (co-producer), The Maids’ The Maids DOCUMENTARY SHORT
    The Maids’ The Maids is a film made in collaboration with domestic workers, in response to Jean Genet’s notorious 1947 play The Maids. Using Genet’s trope of maids role-playing as their employer, a ritual transgression that becomes a     rebellion, contemporary domestic workers stage experiences from their own lives.

Rooftop Films Kayla Thomas Filmmaker Grants (Short Film)
  - Stephen Neary, Living with a Visionary ANIMATED SHORT
    As the pandemic descends, a poet and professor cares for his wife of 50 years, learning to live alongside her worsening hallucinations. Based on the short memoir Living with a Visionary, by John Matthais, first published in The New     Yorker.

  - Sean Pecknold, Thank You, My Friend ANIMATED SHORT
    A robotic vacuum suffering from burnout quits its job at a hospital and sets out to find community and a greater purpose on a quiet street where two lonely rabbits are stuck in perpetual loops.

Rooftop Filmmakers Fund Short Film Grants
  - Don Josephus Raphael Eblahan, Antropicalia: The Modern Prometheus FICTION SHORT
    Victoria (F/63), a retired zoologist known for developing a language system used to speak to animals during the 70s, is brought out of her seclusion, plunging her back into the wild- in order to help the police locate and retrieve a     Feral Man accused of murders in a forest village

  - Kate E. Hinshaw, Teflon Body Rot EXPERIMENTAL DOCUMENTARY SHORT
    Teflon Body Rot explores the human cost of an industry that poisoned the water in coastal Carolina and the industries that benefits from this crisis through pedaling false cures.

  - Kati Skelton, The Arbiter FICTION SHORT
    Two groups of men meet once per year in a hotel ballroom to play a game of their own invention. When they enter into a dispute over the game, an arbiter appears to help them solve their conflict.

  - Ryan Weibush, The Prairie Cuts DOCUMENTARY SHORT
    Sometimes we don't know anything. Other times, all we have is an allusion to a beat poet in a book about a string of mysterious cattle deaths.

Rooftop Films was established in 1997 to support independent filmmakers. For more information, including a full list of this year’s grantees, award details, and film synopses, visit rooftopfilms.com/filmmakers-fund-grantees.