Reel Sisters 26th Anniversary Awards Ceremony 2023!
Awards Journal here
On Wednesday, Oct. 11, 2023, 6:30 pm, Reel Sisters of the Diaspora Film Festival & Lecture Series will proudly honor two award-winning filmmakers: Sabrina Schmidt Gordon, a Haitian-American producer, editor, and director, and Dawn Porter, an esteemed documentary director, producer, and founder of production company Trilogy Films. Kimberly Singleton, the author of I Love My People, will pay tribute to our honorees by dedicating an excerpt from her poem.
Join us for a celebratory and inspiring evening at the awards ceremony held at The Riverside Theatre, 91 Claremont Ave, as we honor both filmmakers’ talent and impactful contributions to the film industry.
Tickets: $45 or $35 (Bring a Pal discount), plus Eventbrite fees. Special guests and artists will be announced shortly.
Reel Sisters is thrilled to recognize Sabrina Schmidt Gordon and Dawn Porter, both recipients of our Trailblazer Award, for their outstanding careers as storytellers and advocates for change. Sabrina, whose provocative films like “To the End,” “Victim/Suspect,” and “Hip Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes” center marginalized voices and leverage the power of storytelling for social change and personal transformation, is an industry field builder. In addition to her work as a producer, editor, and director, Sabrina’s leadership as Chair of the Black Documentary Collective and a founding member of Beyond Inclusion have paved the way for her to advocate for equitable representation in the industry, extending her impact beyond the screens. Sabrina is a much sought-after speaker, panelist, lecturer, juror, and mentor, and we are proud to honor her this year.
Reel Sisters Trailblazer Honorees 2023
Sabrina Schmidt Gordon
Sabrina Schmidt Gordon is an award-winning Haitian-American documentary filmmaker and impact strategist from NYC. Her films employ provocative, nuanced storytelling to center marginalized voices, illuminate diverse experiences, and explore the issues that affect our global society. Since her Emmy-winning editing debut for GBH, she has distinguished herself as a producer, editor, and director. She is a Women at Sundance Fellow, recipient of the Dear Producer Award recognizing excellence in independent filmmaking, and is an invited member of The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Sabrina’s recent films include Victim/Suspect, which premiered this year at the Sundance Film Festival, is a Netflix investigative documentary following a journalist nationwide to uncover a shocking pattern about police handling of sexual assault cases; and To the End, a Hulu documentary on Variety’s list of “films to watch” at Sundance, follows four young women of color leaders, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, on the front lines of the fight for the most sweeping climate change legislation in U.S. history.
Sabrina is the producer of critically-acclaimed Sundance film QUEST, a portrait of a North Philadelphia family for which she was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award, a Peabody, and two Emmys. A New York Times Critic’s Pick and Rolling Stone Top 10 Films of the Year, Sabrina is featured in VOGUE magazine’s, QUEST: a Documentary Disrupts American Narratives About Race. Sabrina’s directing debut was the Emmy-nominated BaddDDD Sonia Sanchez, which she co-directed, co-produced, and edited, winning the Best Film Directed by a Woman of Color award at the African Diaspora International Film Festival in 2016. She is the co-producer and editor of Documented, about undocumented journalist, Jose Antonio Vargas, which had had record viewership on CNN, and nominated for the NAACP Image Award for Best Documentary Film; Hip-Hop: Beyond Beats and Rhymes; and Mrs. Goundo’s Daughter. Sabrina is also an industry fieldbuilder, supporting the work and careers of filmmakers of African descent as Chair of the Black Documentary Collective, a founding member of Beyond Inclusion advancing equity in the documentary film industry, and a sought after speaker, panelist, juror and mentor.
For more information on Sabrina, please visit www.vespertinefilms.com.
Dawn Porter
Dawn Porter is an American documentary filmmaker and the founder of the production company Trilogy Films. Her award-winning films include Gideon’s Army (2013), about three black public defenders working in the southern United States; Spies of Mississippi (2014), about the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission (MSSC) efforts to preserve segregation during the 50s and 60s, Trapped, about the impact of anti-abortion laws on abortion providers in the South, and Bobby Kennedy for President, which debuted on Netflix. As a two-time Sundance film festival director, Porter’s work has been featured on HBO, Netflix, CNN, PBS, MSNBC, MTV Films, and other platforms.
Porter’s latest documentary, “The Lady Bird Diaries,” an all-archival documentary about Lady Bird Johnson, debuted at the 2023 SXSW Film Festival, where it won the Lone Star Prize. Her next project, entitled “Deadlocked: How America Shaped the Supreme Court,” a four-part docuseries, explores the history of the Supreme Court, the justices, decisions, and confirmation battles that have shaped the United States. The series will premiere on Paramount/Showtime on September 22nd. Other current projects include directing the MGM documentary “Cirque Du Soleil: Without a Net” which was a centerpiece at the 2022 DOC NYC Festival, and directing/executive producing a 6-part series on the continuation of the historic civil rights documentary series “Eyes on the Prize” for HBO. Additional credits include “The Me You Can’t See” (Apple TV+), “Rise Again: Tulsa and the Red Summer” (National Geographic), “The Way I See It” (Focus Features), “John Lewis: Good Trouble” (CNN, Magnolia Pictures), “37 Words” (ESPN), “Un(re)solved” (Frontline PBS), and “Gideon’s Army” (HBO).
Mistress of Ceremonies
Sheila Kay Davis
Sheila Kay Davis, founder/artistic director of New Professional Theatre, is a lifelong theatre professional. After graduating from Spelman College in Atlanta, Ga. with a degree in theatre, Sheila headed to New York City. She was immediately cast in the hit show “Little Shop of Horrors”, now a classic, in which Sheila originated the role of Ronette. She is featured on the cast album and played the role for five years. She hit the ground running racking up success in television commercials, regional theatres, and daytime dramas.
However, she noticed very few minorities having real sustainable success in the theatre world. Her thorough experience as an actress gave her insight into both the joys and frustrations of minority artists. She used this insight as her drive to found the New Professional Theatre (NPT). Armed with passion and desire, Ms. Davis set out to form a theatre company that would develop African American playwrights, a sorely underrepresented group.
Since its inception, NPT has served over 1000 playwrights with productions, cash grants, dramaturgy, business seminars and providing access to agents and producers. New Professional Theatre is the only African American theatre company located in the Broadway theatre district. NPT writers have been featured in regional theatre, television, and film. Sheila is the daughter of Carrie Meek, the first African American elected to the US Congress in the state of Florida since Reconstruction. Sheila understands developing constituencies and community mobilization. She serves her community through the NPT Education Program a program that provides mentoring, homework assistance, college prep, volunteerism and Broadway outings to New York City Public School Students. She also chairs the Arts Ministry at Antioch Baptist Church. She has received the Spelman College Alumnae Achievement Award for Arts & Media and the Arts Leadership Award from the Coalition of 100 Black/Asian/Latino women at the World of Women Leaders.
Performers & Special Guests
Kimberly Singleton
Kimberly Singleton is a filmmaker, writer and poet. She has written screen and stage plays, as well as produced short films of various genres including comedy, drama and science fiction. She earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Electrical Engineering from Howard University and was employed as the first African American woman engineer at Con Edison of New York. She later obtained an MBA from New York University’s Stern School of Business and worked for over 20 years in financial management for major media companies.
Singleton’s love for filmmaking, poetry and writing led her to study at the Frederick Douglass Creative Arts Center, the Gotham Writers Workshop and the African Voices Writers Workshop to develop her craft. Her short film “C-Lo: In the Beginning” was featured at the Cannes Film Festival Short Film Market in Cannes, France. Her screenplay, “Conscious”, which deals with a young poet living with the HIV virus, qualified her as a finalist in the BET Rap-It-Up short subject screenplay competition. The stage version of “Conscious” was selected to be performed at the 2018 New York Theater Festival and was produced by the New Jersey Creative Arts Collective in 2020.
As a poet, Singleton’s photo-illustrated, book-length poem I Love My People was published this year by Broadleaf Books, a division of 1517 Media. This poem celebrates African American culture and Black resistance.
Singleton is the Executive Producer and Host of the television show and podcast Consider It Blacklit, a weekly program highlights movies, television and plays featuring African Americans. The Consider It Blacklit television show was the winner of the Public Media Awards of Excellence “Best Informative Talk Show” in 2018 and 2019. The Consider It Blacklit show also won three awards at the 2023 B Free Awards hosted by Brooklyn Free Speech television and radio.