Stowe Story Labs Announces Fellows and Honorable Mentions for 2024 Labs and Retreats
STOWE STORY LABS IS PLEASED TO ANNOUNCE THE 2024 FELLOWS AND HONORABLE MENTIONS FOR THE BELLEM ENTERTAINMENT, BLACK LIST ARTIST DEVELOPMENT, FILM FATALES, LAW FIRM OF STACEY A. DAVIS, NYX HORROR COLLECTIVE, PAGE INTERNATIONAL SCREENWRITING AWARDS, SAGINDIE, STOWE LAUNCH ADVANCED DEVELOPMENT, STUDIO SKYFIRE AND UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT FELLOWSHIPS TO THE 2024 NARRATIVE LABS AND WRITERS’ RETREATS.
The selection process was highly competitive and challenging, and we are thrilled to honor these artists and projects. Thank all who applied for the fellowships. Thank you as well to our fellowship partners who help make this possible.
Congratulations to all.
BELLEM ENTERTAINMENT FELLOW:
Karina Ansley — West Hollywood, CA, USA — We Are Okay // Drama Feature
Logline: Based on the award-winning novel by Nina LaCour. The winter break of her freshman year, 18-year-old Marin Delaney can’t bring herself to leave her desolate college dorm in upstate New York and go home to San Francisco—but when her estranged best friend Mabel visits, Marin must finally confront the ghosts of her past and the tragedy she fled from.
Bio: Karina Ansley is a 2022 GLAAD List writer born in New York City and raised in San Francisco. She is a graduate of the Creative Writing Honors program at Brown University. Karina is passionate about female-fronted narratives that speak to the unique pressures and peculiarities of coming of age in our modern era. Her first feature, an adaptation of Nina LaCour’s award-winning novel We Are Okay, was named to the 2022 GLAAD List and currently in development. She is repped by The Arlook Group and Ziffren Brittenham LLP.
BELLEM ENTERTAINMENT HONORABLE MENTION:
Rachel Serada Barth — Los Angeles, CA, USA — Fatherland // Drama, Comedy Feature
BLACK LIST ARTIST DEVELOPMENT FELLOW:
Andrea George Turner — Sherman Oaks, CA, USA — The Rule of Thirds // Drama Coming-of-Age Feature
Logline: An unhoused teenager blames herself for an accident that injures her rascally 9-year-old brother, forcing them into a group home where a strangely intuitive social worker pushes her to stop hiding the truth about their mom.
Bio: Andrea George Turner’s first screenplay, SAGE, won the Hopwood and Lawrence Kasdan Awards at the University of Michigan, and was staged in U of M’s Festival of New Works. After finishing a YA novel, THE OTHER SIDE OF SLEEP, she jumped back into screenwriting with THE RULE OF THIRDS which has now won a grand prize hat trick in Creative Screenwriting’s Unique Voices Competition, the Emerging Screenwriters Drama Screenplay Competition, and Write LA. She is absolutely thrilled to be this year’s Black List Fellow at the Stowe Narrative Lab. Although she has taught middle school English in Los Angeles for almost two decades, she misses her native Michigan, home of the Detroit Red Wings, Mackinac Island fudge, and using your hand as a map. When she’s not grading essays or writing, she can be found at Disneyland, riding the Incredicoaster with her husband, David, and sons, Lochlan and Dashiell.
BLACK LIST ARTIST DEVELOPMENT FELLOW:
Rosie Westhoff — London, England — Smoke Country // Drama Feature
LAW FIRM OF STACEY A. DAVIS FELLOW:
Lisa Lieberman — Bainbridge Island, WA, USA — All the Wrong Places // Historical Noir Dark Comedy TV – ½ hour
Logline: An ingénue actress during the McCarthy era follows her older brother, a blacklisted Hollywood screenwriter and closeted homosexual, into European exile and learns how to use her claws.
Bio: A historian of postwar Europe and a huge fan of noir, Lisa Lieberman writes dark, immersive mysteries set in the 1950s based on old movies and featuring blacklisted Hollywood people on the lam in dangerous international locales. All the Wrong Places is her adaptation of the first book in the Cara Walden historical noir series. Lieberman left the academic world in her fifties to found a nonprofit dedicated to redressing racial, ethnic, and economic inequity in public K-12 schools. One of the highlights was teaching a creative writing workshop at a public charter school in Holyoke, Massachusetts, a high-poverty community with a large percentage of Hispanic residents. She has published essays, translations, short stories and film criticism in various media and blogs about classic cinema on her website, Deathless Prose.
LAW FIRM OF STACEY A. DAVIS HONORABLE MENTION:
Leslie Hardy — Goodwater, AL, USA — County of Coosa // Drama Feature
FILM FATALES FELLOW:
Erin Li — Los Angeles, CA, USA — Oppa 오빠 // Drama TV – 1 hour
Logline: Set in present-day Koreatown, OPPA explores a hidden world in Los Angeles’ own backyard: host bars where male escorts give clientele customized “boyfriend experiences.” Inspired by true stories, the series follows a young host recruit, his co-workers, clients, family, and friends as they search for love in all the wrong places.
Bio: Erin Li is a second-gen Asian American writer and director from New Jersey. She chased what she thought was the American dream in finance before pursuing her passion for filmmaking. This journey informs her work, which often explores the dark side of ambition through drama, fantasy, and sci-fi. Li has sold scripts to 20th Century Fox and Turner, and her films have screened at SXSW, TIFF, Comic-Con, Slamdance, and LACMA. She is a 2023 Film Independent Episodic Directing Intensive fellow and has held directing fellowships with FOX and AFI Directing Workshop for Women. Li also directs commercials, and helmed spots in a campaign that launched Adidas’ Community platform. Her Citi #StopAsianHate spot garnered 6.8MM+ views.
FILM FATALES HONORABLE MENTION:
Talena Sanders — Oakland, CA, USA — Verena + Jo // Period Drama Feature
NYX HORROR COLLECTIVE FELLOWS:
Catherine Bonny — South Melbourne, VIC, Australia — Life on the Land // Sci-Fi Horror Feature
Logline: A farmers’ wife who once dreamt of saving the world, finally gets her chance when man-eating aliens invade their land.
Bio: Catherine Bonny is a screenwriter and filmmaker based in Melbourne, Australia. She survived a rural childhood by escaping into fantastical stories and while she moved away to the city, the love of stories never left her.
In 2017, she graduated from the Victorian College of Arts. Since then she has written and directed several screenplays, and worked across film, TV and advertising.
Her latest short film, Marked screened at more than twenty film festivals and won Best Australian Short Film at ‘A Night of Horror International Film Festival’, and Best International Short Film at ‘FANTAELX - X Elche International Fantastic Film Festival’. Her feature screenplays, Marked and Life on the Land have been shortlisted for The PAGE Awards, Screencraft, WeScreenplay, Shorescripts Feature and more.
Catherine is currently working on an original series, For Those Who’ve Come. Her goal is to write a story-world bigger than Star Wars.
NYX HORROR COLLECTIVE HONORABLE MENTION:
Alee Ruggieri — Brooklyn, NY, USA — Bloodletting // Mystery Horror Drama TV – 1 hour
PAGE INTERNATIONAL SCREENWRITING AWARDS FELLOW:
Michael Arlington — Tewksbury, MA, USA — Afterlife // Suspense Drama Feature
Logline: When a woman discovers her brother is murdered by his small-town fundamentalist community, she struggles to uncover the truth among the people who will stop at nothing to hide it.
Bio: Michael Arlington, a Coast Guard veteran, who grew up in religious fundamentalist communities, teaches elementary and middle school special education in Somerville, MA. His first script, “Surfacing,” about a young woman who joins her father in modern piracy, was a Quarter Finalist in the Action/Adventure category in the 2023 PAGE International Screenwriting Awards. He is a graduate of Emerson College.
PAGE INTERNATIONAL SCREENWRITING AWARDS HONORABLE MENTION:
Thomas Schrack — Washington, DC, USA — Three Sheets to the Wind // Historical Comedy Feature
SAGINDIE FELLOW:
Sue-Ellen Chitunya — Burbank, CA, USA — Black Snake // Fantasy Drama Comedy Feature
Logline: In a rural village, a family eager to start a new life is forced to face their cultural identity, when the appearance of a mysterious tree coincides with their arrival in the village.
Bio: Sue-Ellen Chitunya is a filmmaker who hails from Zimbabwe. She is a 2019 Georgia State University “40 under 40 honoree” and a graduate of the UCLA professional producing program. Her success as a short film producer was recognized with membership to AMPAS.
Chitunya has participated in various artist development programs including: Film Independent Amplifier & Producing Lab, Realness DET, WIF Emerging Producer Program, Industry Academy at Lincoln Center NY, and Rotterdam Lab. Her projects have been selected for Durban FilmMart, AT&T Untold Stories, SFFILM, The Gotham, and Red Sea Lodge. Her varied work experience includes Post-Production Coordinator on Marvel Studios’ Avengers: Endgame (2019) and Black Panther (2018) and Junior Exec on This Is US (S5 & S6) and Only Murders In The Building (S1 & S2). She recently produced the documentary For Tomorrow (2022) available on Amazon Prime and the interactive romcom, Mr. Right (2022) available on mobile app stores worldwide.
SAGINDIE FELLOW:
Morgan Webber-Ottey — New York, NY, USA — A BROAD. // Drama TV – 1 hour
Logline: After a family tragedy upends her life, a self-destructive but ambitious American au pairs in Madrid, Spain, for a star-studded family with secrets of their own.
Bio: Morgan Webber-Ottey is a writer, Bravo enthusiast, and recovering labor and employment litigator. After discovering that there is a lot less “trial strategy over takeout” in the real world than shown on TV, she made the difficult decision to hang up her lawyer hat and swap one form of self-flagellation for another: writing darkly satirical one-hour dramas.
Morgan was a Warner Bros. TV Writers’ Workshop Second Rounder in the 2022-2023 application cycle. She previously worked as the Script Coordinator on the 20-episode, fourth and final season of Manifest, a Netflix/WBTV drama series, and she is an alum of the inaugural class of the Writers Guild Foundation’s Writers’ Access Support Staff Training Program (WASSTP).
SAGINDIE HONORABLE MENTION:
Aisha Ford — Brooklyn, NY, USA — Little Rhonda // Drama Feature
STOWE LAUNCH ADVANCED DEVELOPMENT FELLOW:
Alexandra Hensley — Los Angeles, CA, USA — Hearts and Minds // War Drama Feature
Logline: While on deployment in Afghanistan an independent female Marine’s dreams of combat are thwarted when she is ordered to help build a school for local children.
Bio: Marine Corps Veteran Alexandra Hensley is a recent graduate of USC’s Peter Stark Producing Program. While at USC Alexandra was awarded the Stark Special Production Grant to write and direct the short film In the Gray which centered a born-again Christian mother of five who decides to have an abortion. In the Gray has been selected to screen at multiple film festivals, including Beverly Hills Film Festival, Vail Film Festival, and the Catalina Film Festival. Alexandra’s creative focus are stories that center women in their infinite complexities while examining how women hold power in a patriarchal world. With her first feature Hearts and Minds, Alexandra tells a war story from the female perspective, she hopes to create a space to have a more nuanced and open conversation about the far-reaching impact of the United States’ industrial war complex.
STOWE LAUNCH ADVANCED DEVELOPMENT FELLOW:
Sebastien Tobler — Los Angeles, CA, USA — Bodies of Water // Social Satire Drama Feature
Logline: Set in the fictional Mediterranean island of San Vicari, once a tuna fishing center of Europe, Joaquin Zamorra, an aging fisherman, discovers a new catch reviving the local economy and entangles him in the dark inner workings of capitalism, testing the depths of human compassion.
Bio: Sebastien is a Filipino-Swiss writer-director who draws from his mixed-race background and upbringing in seven countries to shape his storytelling. From Switzerland to the US, his diverse experiences form the essence of his artistic vision.
His feature scripts gained recognition in various competitions, and now, with his debut feature film, "THIS TIME", Sebastien continues to evolve as an artist. Each project reflects his heartfelt dedication, infusing nostalgia into the human experience. Currently, he's developing a coming-of-age feature set in 90s Bangkok and a social satire/drama about the refugee crisis in the Mediterranean. Grateful for his journey, Sebastien embraces new horizons as he continues to grow creatively.
STUDIO SKYFIRE FELLOW:
Billie Jo Mason — Simi Valley, CA, USA — Speedway // Futuristic Heist Thriller Feature
Logline: In the near future, all driving is outlawed and automatic cars rule the Speedway at 250 m.p.h., until one driver and her team outwit the system to pull off a seemingly-impossible bank heist and daring escape, for profit, thrills and ultimately revenge.
Bio: A voracious reader of sci-fi/fantasy since childhood, Billie wanted to be an astronaut and majored in engineering until she realized that her inner-ear problem meant she’d never go into space. Dream thwarted, she turned to writing, earning an MA/MFA specializing in fiction, screenwriting, and playwriting. Billie has worked as both story editor and union story analyst at several studios, though her claim to fame is smuggling a rescued baby chicken into the story department at MGM until she was caught by Alan Ladd, Jr. and forced to release the chicken back into the wilds of Tarzana. A native Angeleno, she’s won The Writers Lab and worked with visionary Showrunner Mark Protosevich on SUGAR, starring Colin Farrell on Apple+. Billie also teaches screenwriting and with limited access to hatching eggs, rarely resorts to chicken smuggling. She is owned by two dachshunds and loves The Stones and Formula 1 racing (Go, Hamilton!).
UNIVERSITY OF VERMONT FELLOW:
Emma Wapshare — Burlington, VT, USA — Thanks Mom // Drama Feature
Logline: As 21-year-old Lizzie discovers she is pregnant just after she and her boyfriend break up, she will have to navigate this life and the expectations women face in the wake of motherhood.
Bio: Emma Wapshare, is a rising senior in the University of Vermont’s Film and Television Studies program. By the spring of 2025, Emma will have her Bachelor's in both Film and TV studies, as well as History. Emma has been awarded honors in both film and history, being named UVM’s fellow of the Stowe story labs as well as joining the national history honors society Phi Alpha Theta. Going into her fourth year at UVM, Emma has worked on countless short films, and a short biopic, and written several episodes of a Vermont-based sitcom called ‘Ace.’ Along with her dedication to her film studies, Emma is a Javelin thrower on the university’s Track and Field team. She is currently working on a feature-length script and hopes to film it in her upcoming year at UVM.
CONGRATULATIONS EVERYONE!
