Social Impact
15 July 2024
Link copied to clipboardNewFest, New York’s leading LGBTQ+ film and media organization, announced the 2024 recipients of the New Voices Filmmaker Grant, an effort in partnership with Netflix to support emerging LGBTQ+ filmmakers. Now in its third year, the artist development initiative program awards each of the four recipient filmmakers with a $25,000 grant to support their professional development and create new work, as well as provides them with access to network-building opportunities through industry events and a mentorship track facilitated by NewFest.
The 2024 recipients of the New Voices Filmmaker Grant are Apa Agbayani, Angalis Field, Clementine Narcisse, and cai thomas.
“We are delighted to announce the 2024 recipients of the New Voices Filmmaker Grant, each of whom have showcased an exceptional blend of talent, creativity, and commitment to advancing LGBTQ+ storytelling,” said NewFest Executive Director David Hatkoff and Director of Programming Nick McCarthy. “Apa, Angalis, Clementine, and cai are vibrant talents who have presented compelling stories – whether narrative or nonfiction – that reflect the richness of LGBTQ+ experiences, and we can’t wait to introduce them further into the world. As we enter the third year of this program, we are eager to see how this new group of talented filmmakers will leverage these resources to create new impactful work and make lasting contributions to the industry. We extend our heartfelt thanks to Netflix for their unwavering support in championing new voices and fostering a more inclusive film community.”
In addition to the grant’s funding, each of these four filmmakers will have the opportunity to connect with both creative and industry mentors relevant to their work and engage with partner organizations, industry markets, consultants and leaders in the field. New Voices grantees will also have their work showcased and participate in events during NewFest’s New York LGBTQ+ Film Festival, one of the largest queer film festivals in the world.
NewFest received nearly 600 applications for this year’s New Voices Filmmaker Grant via an open submission process starting in January 2024. The grant is eligible to LGBTQ+ filmmakers in America who have not previously made a feature-length film, or have never had a film (short, episodic, or feature-length) publicly distributed with an exclusive and compensated agreement. Applications and short-form work samples were reviewed by an inclusive and diverse selection of LGBTQ+ programmers, film and television industry professionals, critics, agents, community leaders, NewFest staff, and established filmmakers, and supported by NewFest’s New Voices Filmmaker Grant Coordinator Arno Mokros.
Final grantee selections for the 2024 cohort were decided by an external jury of film and industry experts, including Jess Devaney (producer/founder of Multitude Films), Rose Troche (director, producer, screenwriter of Go Fish), and Farihah Zaman (filmmaker, critic, educator, and curator).
NewFest and Netflix’s partnership began in 2021 and is part of the Netflix Fund for Creative Equity, which is an initiative to help support new voices and create more behind-the-camera opportunities for underrepresented communities within the film and TV industries.
Last year’s recipients in 2023 were Terrance Daye, Drew de Pinto, Emily May Jampel, and LaQuan Lewis. And the inaugural recipients in 2022 were Blanche Akonchong, Livia Huang, Rodney Llaverías, and Nyala Moon. Previous recipients have gone on to create new short films that have been awarded multiple festival jury prizes (Nyala Moon’s Dilating For Maximum Results), as well as additional grants and fellowships from Rooftop Films (Livia Huang), Locarno (Rodney Llaverías), and beyond.
Applications for the fourth year of the grant are expected to open in January 2025 at NewFest.org.
Learn more about the New Voices Filmmaker Grant and keep up with the latest program updates here.
2024 New Voices Filmmaker Grant Recipients
Apa Agbayani (he/him)
Apa Agbayani is a Filipino writer-director based in New York and he’s working through his feelings with magic. Apa started out directing music videos for indie artists in the Philippines then continued towards films and commercials. Currently, he’s finishing a Film MFA at Columbia University. His latest short Abutan man tayo ng house lights (When the house lights come on) was the recipient of the QCShorts production grant and premiered at the QCinema International Film Festival in the Philippines in 2023. Apa’s previous shorts are Somewhere All the Boys are Birds (2023), which premiered at NewFest35 in New York, and We Kept Warm (2021).
Angalis Field (he/him)
Angalis Field (b. 1994, Portland, Oregon) is a screenwriter, director, and photographer based in New York City. His graduate thesis film Bust (co-written with Eliza Barry Callahan) premiered at Sundance in 2024. His debut short, The Dalles, premiered at Sundance in 2023. His photography and writing has been shown in various galleries and published in Artforum, Cultured Magazine, Purple Magazine, GQ, Teen Vogue, California Sunday, OUT, The New York Times, and more. He holds an MFA in Filmmaking from NYU Tisch (2019-2024) and a B.A in English and Creative Writing from Columbia University (2012-2016).
Clementine Narcisse (she/her)
Clementine Narcisse is a black, transgender, writer/director and editor from New Jersey based in New York City. After spending many years as a freelance video editor, Clementine is now a rising senior studying film directing at the School of Visual Arts in Manhattan. In 2022, she released her debut short film As We Hold Hands, followed by her sophomore film Girl Blunt, both selections of the NewFest Film Festival. Her next film, a queer lesbian thriller, Blue Moon Angels, will be released in late 2024. Her work primarily revolves around LGBTQ Women of Color, and her primary mission as a writer/director is to expand the types of stories that they typically have on screen. Clementine is also the recipient of the 2023 NewFest Film Festival Emerging Black LGBTQ+ Filmmaker Award.
cai thomas (she/her)
cai thomas is a documentary filmmaker and cinematographer based in Chicago telling intimate stories at the intersection of location, self determination, and identity about Black youth and elders. She grew up in Miami’s Liberty City neighborhood and is deeply interested in stories rooted in place. Her filmmaking exhibits how Black folks are agitating and organizing for the world they want, whether that’s a journalist investigating police misconduct (Beneath The Surface, 2023) , a disabled lesbian elder fighting for an accessible apartment (Queenie, 2020) or young folks organizing for parks named after folks that look like them (Change The Name Film, 2021). She's currently developing a film about Black lesbians and motherhood.
Final Jury – 2024 New Voices Filmmaker Grant
Jess Devaney
Jess Devaney (they/she) is an Emmy-winning producer and Founder & President of Multitude Films. Their latest films include How We Get Free (HBO); the Indigo Girls documentary It’s Only Life After All (Sundance 2023); Emmy-nominated Lowndes County And The Road To Black Power (Peacock); Emmy-nominated Netflix Original Pray Away; Oscar-shortlisted Call Center Blues (Topic Studios); and Apart, the Emmy-winning episode of the series Through Our Eyes (HBO Max). Jess created the Ford Foundation-supported Queer Futures series and produced Sundance Award-winning and IDA-nominated Always In Season (Independent Lens) as well as The Feeling Of Being Watched (POV), dubbed “a real-world conspiracy thriller” by Variety. Additional credits include Critics' Choice-nominated Speed Sisters and Milisuthando, among others. Her films have been programmed at top festivals including Sundance, SXSW, Tribeca, BlackStar, and Telluride. Jess founded QueerDoc and was a Sundance Institute Documentary Edit and Story Lab fellow, Women at Sundance fellow, and Sundance Institute Creative Producing Lab advisor. They have been recognized with the Cinereach Producers Award, DOC NYC and Topic Studios' inaugural 40 Under 40 Award, Doc10’s inaugural Vanguard Award, and the 2023 Sundance Institute Amazon Studios Nonfiction Producers Award.
Rose Troche
Rose Troche is an award-winning writer, director, and producer of film and television. Born in Chicago and raised in a large Puerto Rican family, her first feature, Go Fish was released to wide acclaim and became a seminal film in the history of queer cinema. Go Fish premiered in competition at the Sundance Film Festival, was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award, and won the Teddy Award for Best Feature Film at the Berlin International Film Festival, the Audience Award at the Deauville Film Festival, the GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Film, and the Open Palm Award at the Gotham Awards.
Troche’s second feature, the British comedy Bedrooms And Hallways, starring Kevin McKidd, James Purefoy and Hugo Weaving, premiered at the Edinburgh and Toronto International Film Festivals, and received the Audience Award at the prestigious London Film Festival prior to its distribution by First Run Features.
Troche also wrote and directed The Safety of Objects, adapted from the book of short stories by A.M. Homes, featuring Glenn Close, Dermot Mulroney, Kristen Stewart, and Patricia Clarkson. The Safety of Objects premiered at the Toronto Film Festival, opened the San Sebastian International Film Festival, and won the Critics Award and Best Actress Award at the Deauville Film Festival before its theatrical release by IFC. In addition, Troche’s television work includes Showtime’s hit series The L Word and HBO’s Emmy-award winning Six Feet Under.
Farihah Zaman
Farihah Zaman is a queer Bangladeshi-American filmmaker, critic, educator, and curator whose award-winning work has screened at Sundance, TIFF, NYFF, Tribeca, SXSW, and more. Her first feature, Remote Area Medical, was followed by This Time Next Year, then doc-fiction hybrid Feast of The Epiphany, and several shorts (Kombit, Nobody Loves Me, American Carnage, and To Be Queen, of the Emmy Nominated NYT Op-Doc series From Here To Home). She produced the Sundance Award-winning Netflix Original Ghosts of Sugar Land, which was shortlisted for an Academy Award. Zaman has written for Reverse Shot, Film Comment, Elle, and Huffington Post, among others, and her industry experience includes roles at Magnolia Pictures, IFP, The Flaherty Seminar, and Laura Poitras-founded company Field of Vision. Zaman also contributes to the documentary community through teaching and mentoring at institutions like SVA, NYU, Sarah Lawrence, Uniondocs, and Bronx Documentary Center, and through equity collectives like Brown Girls Doc Mafia, where she served as the Director of Grants and Fellowships. Zaman programs Infinite Beauty, an ongoing monthly series that showcases Muslim and MENASA lives on screen. She was a Documentarian-in-Residence at Bard College, Doc NYC Top 40 under 40 filmmaker, and recent resident at Yaddo, Monson, and Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. Zaman is a member of the documentary branch of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences.
About NewFest
Founded in 1988, NewFest is New York’s largest presenter of LGBTQ+ film & media and the largest convener of LGBTQ+ audiences in New York City. NewFest’s mission is to give voice and visibility to the full scope of the LGBTQ+ experience through films and programs that entertain, educate, and empower. NewFest presents year-round screenings and events, including the annual New York LGBTQ+ Film Festival. In bringing diverse audiences and filmmakers together, NewFest creates spaces and conversations that have the capacity to open minds, shift cultural bias, and create positive change. NewFest is dedicated to bringing together filmmakers and audiences to build a community that encompasses the wide range of representations of the LGBTQ+ experience. For more information, visit www.NewFest.org.