2005 ABC-DGA DIRECTING FELLOWS
Carlos Avila:
Carlos made his feature film debut with New Line Cinema’s 2000 release Price of Glory starring Jimmy Smits. He received the 2001 ALMA (American Latino Media Arts) Best Director award for the movie. Carlos created the critically acclaimed PBS limited series FOTO-NOVELAS. The films he submitted to the ABC Fellowship, "Broken Sky" and "Junkyard Saints," were part of the FOTO-NOVELAS series, episodes of which have been honored at numerous film festivals. A graduate of UCLA’s School of Film and Television, Carlos grew up in Los Angeles in the Echo Park neighborhood.
Alexandra Martinez Kondracke:
Alex grew up in Washington, D.C. She graduated from Dartmouth College and received her MFA from NYU’s graduate film school. Her short film “Ice Fishing” won awards at many festivals, including Sundance, and was aired on the Sundance Channel. Alex has worked as director and cinematographer on documentaries and reality shows for VH-1, the BBC, Discovery, A&E and HBO, and was an associate producer on the upcoming feature D.E.B.S. In 2002, she worked in India and Peru shooting the National Geographic series Worlds Apart. Alex was a 2002 ABC Scholarship Grant recipient for her short “Sunset Park,” which was also her submission for the Fellowship program.
Seith Mann:
A graduate of Morehouse College with an MFA from NYU’s graduate film school, Seith was named one of Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 Filmmakers to Watch.” Seith’s films include “The Apology” and “Too Close to the Darkside.” His thesis film, “five deep breaths,” was Seith’s submission for the ABC Fellowship. After premiering at Sundance, the film went on to win Best Narrative Short at the 2003 IFP L.A. Film Festival, among other awards, and has screened at many festivals, including Cannes. Most recently, Seith won the Emerging Narrative Screenplay Award and the Gordon Parks Award for Emerging African-American Filmmakers at the 26th Annual IFP/New York Market.
2006 ABC-DGA DIRECTING FELLOWS
Michael Kang
A graduate of NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Michael holds a BFA in Dramatic Writing. His feature film directorial debut, The Motel,was produced by indie veteran director Miguel Arteta (Chuck & Buck, The Good Girl) and premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2005. The Motel is the recipient of the Best Narrative Feature Award from the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival 2005 and was also awarded the 2003 Sundance/NHK International Filmmaker’s Award. In addition, Michael was a fellow at the Sundance Filmmakers Lab in 2002. In 2004, Michael worked as second unit director for Wayne Wang on his film Because of Winn-Dixie (where he got to direct a live bear).
Dennis Lee
After graduating from the University of Chicago, Dennis joined Teach for America, a non-profit organization that places recent college graduates in rural and urban school districts experiencing chronic teacher shortages. During his years in the classroom, Dennis taught kindergarten and 1st grade before co-founding an art-based charter school for at-risk middle school students in Houston. In the fall of 1999, he moved to New York to attend Columbia University’s MFA film program. Recently graduated, Dennis has written several feature scripts and directed a number of short films, and is slated to direct New Line Cinema’s feature film Slay the Bully.
Gabriela Tagliavini
Gabriela Tagliavini was named Best Director at three film festivals, including the New York Independent Film Festival, for her feature directorial debut, The Woman Every Man Wants, aka Perfect Lover. Gabriela’s second feature, Ladies Night, distributed by Disney/Buena Vista, was the #1 movie at the box office in Mexico in 2004. Tagliavini’s television film, the VH1/Maverick feature 30 Days Until I'm Famous, premiered on VH1 and was executive produced by Madonna. The writer-director is armed with a bachelor’s in film directing from the Escuela Superior de Cinematografía in Argentina and a master’s in screenwriting from AFI. In addition to directing several short films, commercials and television pilots, Tagliavini is also a renowned author and has two novels published.