Think Outside the Box Office

Jon Reiss is a critically acclaimed filmmaker, author, and media strategist. His experience releasing his documentary feature, Bomb It, with a hybrid strategy was the inspiration for writing Think Outside the Box Office, the first step-by-step guide for filmmakers to distribute and market their films. He has given workshops and spoken at conferences and festivals throughout the world.

Jasmín Mara López is a Mexican-American filmmaker living between Los Angeles and New Orleans. Born in the U.S. with familial roots in México, her childhood was affected by issues experienced on both sides of the U.S.- México border. This instilled in her a strong passion for immigrant rights, youth empowerment, and social change. Jasmín founded Project Luz, which taught Mexican youth to document stories from within their communities. Her audio documentary Deadly Divide: Migrant Death on the Border received the Society of Professional Journalists Excellence in Journalism Award in 2015.

Jennifer Takaki has a background in television production. She began her career in news with a local NBC affiliate based in Denver as a production assistant. She has produced news, entertainment, and corporate videos in Hong Kong and New York City. Jennifer is the director/producer of the feature-length documentary, Photographic Justice: The Corky Lee Story. And she has been named a 2023 recipient for the Better Angels Lavine Fellowship, a component of The Library of Congress Lavine/Ken Burns Prize for Film.

Ivey Camille Manybeads Tso is an award-winning queer Navajo filmmaker, and a recent fellow with the Firelight Media Documentary Filmmaker Lab. She started making films at the age of 9, through the Native youth media project Outta Your Backpack Media. At the age of 13 she made the award-winning fiction film In the Footsteps of Yellow Woman, based in the true story of her great-great-great grandmother Yellow Woman, who lived through the Navajo Long Walk of 1864-1868. The film screened in over 90 film festivals internationally and won 11 awards. Ivey Camille continued to refine her filmmaking craft with a full scholarship to Idyllwild Arts Academy in California. She later returned home to work on films in her community of Navajo Nation. At the age of 19, Ivey Camille began work on Powerlands, her first feature.

Recognized by Entertainment Weekly and People magazine as among the “Ones to Watch” out of Sundance 2018 for her co-starring role in White Rabbit, Writer/ Director/Actor Nana Ghana has proven her ability to stand out both on and behind the camera. Her most recent work as Director, LA Woman Rising, narrated and executive produced by Rosario Dawson, was released theatrically in October 2019. Ghana describes the project as “a love letter to the real women of Los Angeles.“ Ghana made her directorial debut with a short film entitled Water Warrior, which had the distinction of premiering at the Cannes Film Festival in 2016. Ghana was later recognized as Best Director with her follow-up short film, Electing, at the Oregon Short Film Festival in 2018. As an actor, Ghana stars in her recurring role on What/If, a Netflix original series.

Ruth Du is a director and producer, originally from Portland, Oregon. She received a B.F.A. at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts. Du produced indie feature The Archer, which premiered at SXSW in 2017. Her directorial credits include digital series Seeking, Du was the Executive Director of the AT&T Hello Lab Mentorship Program, working closely with Lena Waithe and Rishi Rajani and producing five short films. She is a 2020 Film Independent Project Involve Directing Fellow and currently resides in Los Angeles.