PAOLA di FLORIO – WRITER/DIRECTOR/PRODUCER

Paola di Florio’s first independent documentary, “Speaking In Strings” premiered in competition at the Sundance Film Festival in ’99. It was bought by HBO, was theatrically distributed throughout the US and received an Academy Award® nomination for Best Documentary Feature in 2000 .The film spotlights one of the world’s most controversial and charismatic violinists, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, in a pivotal year, where she rebuilds her life after an unsuccessful suicide attempt. Prior to independent filmmaking, di Florio Executive Produced a TV series for Canal Plus, entitled “Directors on Directors,” which features unique portraits of Hollywood’s most celebrated auteurs, including Sydney Pollack, Arthur Penn, Robert Altman, Michael Mann, Roger Corman and others. The critically acclaimed series was given a special screening at the Locarno Film Festival’s 50th Anniversary. She also worked as a free-lance producer for Italian Television (RAI), CBS, NBC, FOX, TBS, and A& E, where she traveled extensively filming a variety of subjects, from Balinese spiritual healing to the Italian Mafia. di Florio is a  graduate of NYU. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband, screen and television writer, Peter Rader and her two boys, Matteo and Luca.

NANCY DICKENSON – PRODUCER

Nancy Dickenson, participated in civil rights activities in Cleveland during the Movement and as a young mother in 1965, was particularly affected by the story of Viola Liuzzo's tragic death and her family's sorrow.  She had also wished to go to Selma in response to Martin Luther King’s call, but was dissuaded because she was pregnant with her second child.  For more than thirty years, Nancy kept the story of Viola’s tragic death in her heart and was troubled that Viola Liuzzo was not widely recognized as a hero of the civil rights era and her family’s sacrifice was not acknowledged.  It was then that Dickenson decided to produce a documentary and delve into this forgotten piece of American history. Before that, she helped with the production of the critically acclaimed “The Tao of Steve” – a feature film, directed by and starring her daughters, Jenniphr and Greer Goodman, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2000 and was picked up for theatrical distribution.  Dickenson has been successfully supporting projects in both the arts and human rights for over twenty years. She directed the Cleveland Black Folk Art Exhibit and Festival in 1984, for which she received the Northern Ohio Magazine Visual Arts Award.  As a graduate of Cornell University with a BFA in Fine Arts and graduate studies in Art History at Case Western Reserve University, she directed the Mather Gallery, for five years and opened Folkways, the first contemporary folk art gallery in northern Ohio.  She is an advocate for public education, animal welfare and other community issues in Santa Fe, New Mexico where she has lived for the past 20 years.

JOAN CHURCHILL - CINEMATOGRAPHER

Joan Churchill began her career shooting Peter Watkin’s “Punishhment Park” and “Evening Land.” She also shot a series of music films, including the Maysles brothers’ “Gimme Shelter” and “No Nukes,” directed by Haskel Wexler and Barbara Kopple. Churchill also directed and shot “Jimi Plays Berkely,” a cult classic – and co-photographed the groundbreaking PBS series “An American Family,” the definitive cinema verite study of a family’s dissolution. A long-time collaborator of Nick Broomfield, the two screened their feature doc “Aileen” at the 2003 Toronto Film Festival. Some of ther other films include “Biggie and Tupak,” “Tatooed Tears,” and “Soldier Girls.” Churchill also directed an shot her own film “Assylum”—about life inside a prison for the criminally insane, which received and Emmy nomination for HBO.

THOMAS MILLER - EDITOR

Tom Miller graduated from USC’s MFA program and has been making documentary films for the past eight years. His last film, the critically acclaimed “Good Kurds, Bad Kurds” aired on PBS nationally and garnered numerous awards, including the Human Rights Prize at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival and the Audience Award at the Denver International Film Festival. Other award-winning documentaries which he edited are HBO’s “Rock the Boat,” and PBS’ “Fender Philosophers.”

STOCKARD CHANNING - NARRATOR

With two Emmy awards plus eight Emmy nominations, an Oscar nomination, a Tony award plus four Tony nominations, two Golden Globe nominations, two SAG awards, and two SAG award nominations, Stockard Channing is one of America’s most well respected, hard working actresses of our time.  Channing can currently be seen in the Merchant-Ivory production, “Le Divorce,” which co-stars Kate Hudson, Naomi Watts, and Glenn Close.  She most recently completed filming Stephen Fry’s “Bright Young Things” opposite Jim Broadbent, Dan Aykroyd, and Emily Mortimer.  Channing will next be seen in Woody Allen’s latest project titled, “Anything Else.” She just received a 2003 Emmy nomination for her Emmy-award winning role as First Lady Abigail Bartlet on NBC’s hit drama, “The West Wing.”

Channing recently received a SAG award and an Emmy award for her role in, “The Matthew Shepard Story,” opposite Sam Waterston.  She was previously seen in the feature film, “The Business of Strangers,” for which she was nominated for an AFI Actor of the Year Award, and won the London Film Critics Award for Best Performance by an Actress.

Her most recent Tony nomination was for her role as Eleanor of Aquitane in  “The Lion in Winter,” opposite Laurence Fishburne.  Channing also received a Tony nomination for the stage version of “Six Degrees of Separation” as well as an Obie, The Distinguished Performance of the Year from the New York Drama League, and an Oliver Award nomination for the London production.  She won a Tony Award for her work in “Joe Egg,” which also earned her nominations for a Drama Desk Award.  Other stage credits include “House of Blue Leaves”(Tony nomination), “Four Baboons Adoring the Sun” (Tony nomination), “The Little Foxes,” “Hapgood” (Drama Desk nomination), “Woman in Mind” (Drama Desk award), “The Rink,” “The Golden Age,” and “They’re Playing Our Song” and the original production of “Love Letters.”

For the feature film version of “Six Degrees of Separation,” Channing earned an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe nomination.  For the film, “Smoke,” Channing received a SAG Award nomination.  She won a People’s Choice Award for her role in “Grease.”  Other film credits include: “Life or Something Like It,” “Isn’t She Great,”  “Practical Magic,” for which she received a Blockbuster Award,  “Twilight,” “The First Wives Club,” “Moll Flanders,” “To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything, Julie Newmar,” “Married to It,” “Meet the Applegates,” “Staying Together,” “Destiny,” “Heartburn,” “The Men’s Club,” “The Fortune,” “The Cheap Detective,” “Sweet Revenge,” “The Big Bus,” and “Without a Trace.”

Channing appeared in the Lifetime Network movie “The Truth About Jane,” which earned her a SAG Award nomination, as well as in the Showtime mini series, “It’s A Girl Thing.”  Channing’s performance in Showtime’s, “Baby Dance,” opposite Laura Dern earned her nominations for an Emmy, a Golden Globe, and an Independent Spirit Award.  Channing starred in, “An Unexpected Life” for the USA Network, the sequel to, “An Unexpected Family,” for which she received an Emmy nomination.  Her other television credits include the Disney Channel’s “The Road to Avonlea,” for which she received an Emmy nomination, “Perfect Witness,” for HBO which also earned her an Emmy nomination, CBS’s “David’s Mother,” and an Emmy nominated performance in “Echoes in the Darkness.”  She received a Cable Ace Award for her work in HBO’s, “On Tidy Endings.” Other television credits include “Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister,” NBC’s, “The Prosecutors,” Showtime’s “Lily Dale,” The Hallmark Hall of Fame production of “The Room Upstairs,” “Silent Victory: The Story of Kitty O’Neal,” CBS’s, “The Stockard Channing Show,” and, “The Girl Most Likely To.”