Congratulations to the Three Queens Who Are Reel Sisters 2026 Fellows!
First, we want to thank the more than 129 women of color for submitting their stories to our Reel Sisters Micro Budget Film Fellowship — we hope you find the support you need to produce your short film, pilot or web series!
The final choice was so difficult to make because we received so many excellent screenplays with complex and interesting characters.
Our jurors chose the three micro budget fellows from a very competitive pool of 10 finalists. It is our sincere wish we could have supported our finalists.
We are asking you to support finalists who are featured on our Fellowship page as Honorable Mentions!
A special extra thanks to our jurors for making incredibly hard decisions
INTRODUCING REEL SISTERS 2026 MICRO BUDGET FELLOWS
Halle Hazzard
Halle Hazzard is a writer, director, and former track and field athlete from Long Island, New York, who represented Grenada at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games. As a first-generation Caribbean-American of Trinidadian and Grenadian heritage, Halle explores themes of identity, memory, and belonging throughout the Caribbean diaspora.
Halle came to filmmaking while still competing, earning a B.A. in English from the University of Virginia and an M.A. in Journalism and Documentary Filmmaking from the University of Southern California. In 2023, she directed, shot, and edited Finding Balance, a documentary on mental health and athlete identity in women's elite gymnastics. The film aired on Spectrum News 1 SoCal, reaching more than six million households across Southern California. Building on her documentary work, Halle has since expanded into narrative filmmaking, bringing a literary foundation in fiction and poetry to the screen. Her original screenplay, Home, a magical realist coming-of-age story rooted in Trinidadian culture, advanced to the final round of the Brooklyn Film Festival Exchange pitch competition and was also selected for a live table read with Reel Sisters of the Diaspora Film Festival. Halle has worked on professional film productions with Her House Media and Project Feel, and has served as a documentary mentor for Reel Works Teen Filmmaking. Her fiction and poetry have appeared in African Voices Magazine, Wellspring Words, and are forthcoming in The Caribbean Writer and volume 8 of PEN America’s DREAMing Out Loud Anthology.
Micro Budget Fellow Statement:
I am so honored to have been selected as a Reel Sisters Microbudget Fellow for my short film “Home”, a story I wrote in memory of my grandmother whom I dreamt of reuniting with years after her passing. Although deeply personal, this story holds a universal message that home is not just a place, but something that’s carried through the people we love, even long after they are gone. It’s heartwarming to know that Reel Sisters believes in my vision, and can provide the financial support to bring this film to life. I am endlessly grateful to be part of an organization that champions the creative minds of female POC filmmakers.
Home website: https://homebyhalle.com
Instagram: @hallehazzard
Richa Rudola
Richa Rudola is an award-winning Indian American filmmaker whose work explores women’s interior lives, particularly the identities and transformations that often go unseen. Her short Cow Heavy And Floral, inspired by her own journey into motherhood, uses inventive storytelling to examine the fractured experience of postpartum identity and has become a catalyst for conversations around maternal mental health. Her forthcoming short Zeenat And The Men Who Give Her Pause turns to midlife, exploring menopause, invisibility, longing, and self-reclamation through a South Asian woman’s quiet awakening. With a background spanning both analytical and creative worlds, she is drawn to stories that engage the mind and the heart, blending intellectual curiosity with emotional depth.
Micro Budget Fellow Statement:
I am deeply honored to be selected as a Reel Sisters Micro Budget Fellow and especially proud to return to this community as an alumna. Reel Sisters has long championed women filmmakers and stories that deserve to be seen, and its belief in Zeenat And The Men Who Give Her Pause gives our team both meaningful support and momentum as we bring this deeply personal story to the screen. I’m especially excited for the film to begin its life within a community that understands the power of women telling stories about our interior lives on our own terms.FILM PROJECT: No Ordinary Way Out, No Ordinary Way In: Chapter Two – The Needle and The Thread: Jerome Smith and the Black Masking Indians
Logline | A love letter—to my mother, to Brother Jerome, and to all Black organizers who wave the wrinkled fl ags of defi ance, hold children’s hands, and insist on claiming land, health, and legacy. It is also a challenge to the next generation: How do we honor the past while building structures strong enough to last?
NZ Hazelton
Trust and believe—poems, like babies, tinctures, biscuits–and grassroots movements, are born in the kitchen. My earliest memories are of those kitchen-table meetings: my mother, Nonkululeko Tyehemba, co-founding the Harlem Birth Action Committee, mapping ways to protect and inform expectant Black parents and families. I grew up immersed in the rhythms of grassroots organizing, where mentorship, succession planning, and the delicate art of sustaining a vision were as familiar as Mama stirring a pot of cornmeal porridge. These lessons—that care is not a weakness but a strategy; that persistence is stitched from retreat and return—have shaped everything I do as an artist and as an organizer.
No Ordinary Way Out, No Ordinary Way In is both a personal and historical exploration of Black-led community organizing, told through two chapters. This grant request supports Chapter Two: The Needle and the Thread, while the full project includes Chapter One: Look Out for Her Anyway, which centers on Harlem and my mother’s legacy. She built safe spaces for parents, mentored young families, and modeled survival through craft, refl ection, and resilience. Rooted in Harlem’s cultural landscape—from Montessori classrooms to theaters, dance studios, and music halls—her story demonstrates how creativity and care became lifelines.
Micro Budget Fellow Statement:
I am deeply honored to receive the 2027 Reel Sisters Micro Fellowship for The Needle and the Thread: Jerome Smith and the Power of Collective Leadership. It is a privilege to uplift Bro. Jerome’s voice and story, alongside the New Orleans community, through this work, and I am grateful to take this next step in partnership with Reel Sisters. I am thankful to the Most High for the chance to pursue a path of my choosing—or perhaps my calling. I am equally grateful that recognition from the community has shown up in such a practical, abundant, and generous form. This fellowship will support editing, fair pay for our crew, and archival licensing. This investment is exactly the kind of cultural and organizational reaffirmation of the choices I continue to make—and sometimes question. Thank you, Reel Sisters, for your tireless work in amplifying Blackwomen filmmakers and honoring the many different ways we show up and make space for ourselves.