Sundance Film Festival

Each year about forty students volunteer as ushers at the Sundance Film Festival, where they get to watch films, meet filmmakers and participate in Sundance’s Ignite events for young filmmakers. Past participants have gone on to work full time for the festival.

Meet the Filmmakers

We also organize a Meet the Filmmakers event co-sponsored by the Utah Film Commission. Each year filmmakers with some of the biggest films in the festival sit down with our students and discuss their films, the effort that went into making them, and their advice for students.

Past participants have included:

2017: Joi McMullin (Moonlight/Lemon); Yance Ford (Strong Island); Brett Haley (The Hero); Brian Knappenberger (Nobody Speak); Geremy Jasper (Patty Cake$); Michael Larnell (Roxanne, Roxanne/Cronies); Shaul Schwarz & Christina Clusiau (Trophy); Sabaah Folayan & Damon Davis (Whose Streets?)

2016: Nate Parker (Birth of a Nation); Clay Tweel (Gleason); Roger Ross Williams (Life Animated); Andre Hyland (The 4th); Andrew Neel (Goat); Anna Holmer (The Fits); Rokhsareh Ghaem Maghami (Sarita); Jeff Feurerzeig (Author: The JT LaRoy Story); Kerem Sanga (The First Girl I Loved); Antonio Campos (Christine); Stephen Kijak (We are X); Rebecca Daly (Mammals); Aaron Brookner (Uncle Howard); Producer Elizabeth Destro (Joshy); Producer Kim Leadford (Joshy/Yoga Hosers)

2015: Jennifer Phang (Advantageous); Kenny Riches (The Strongest Man); Greg Whitely (Most Likely to Succeed); Qi Zhou (The Chinese Mayor)