Emily Curry spent time in four states as an Air Force brat before ending up in Columbia, South Carolina just before her freshman year of high school. Her love of film and television led her to the University of South Carolina where, in 2023, she completed her BA in Film and Media Studies. After graduation, she spent a year in Florida, participating in the Disney College Program and fulfilling her childhood dream of working at Walt Disney World. Now, she starts a new dream and returns to her state of birth to pursue a MA in Media Studies at the University of Texas. In her spare time, Emily loves to read, write, and try her hand at any sort of craft or recipe she happens across online. Areas of interest: fandom studies, gender and sexuality, and media industries.

He holds an M.F.A. in Media Studies from Boston University’s Film and Television Department, where he worked as a teaching assistant for courses on film analysis, film theory, and American Independent film. His academic paper, titled “An Industry Standard: HBO’s Construction of Authorship in The Last of Us,” won the 2025 Film and Television Studies Award for Innovative Scholarship at The Redstone Film Festival. His master’s thesis titled “Germs of the Empire” explored how contemporary Portuguese films set in Lusophone Africa scrutinize Portugal’s colonial past and its current relationship with its former colonies. He spends his free time watching horror movies, reading up on frequently weird niches (this month: ventriloquism), and drinking black coffee. Areas of Interest: Postcolonial Cinema, Lusophone Cinema, Sound Studies, Horror Studies

Elizabeth earned her BA in Film, Television, and Media from the University of Michigan, graduating with Honors for her undergraduate thesis, "Authenticity is a Must: Re-examining the Queer Legacy of Danny Kaye." Her research interests are broad, spanning queer theory, Cold War-era American culture, classical Hollywood, television studies, psychoanalysis, and cult/exploitation cinema. Her current projects include revising her undergraduate thesis for publication, as well as a study of the "biker chick" exploitation cycle of the 1960s and 1970s. When she's not working on research, Elizabeth can be found at the movies (got to pump those Letterboxd numbers up!!!), running, hitting the gym, or hunting for new additions to her collection of vinyl film soundtracks at the record store.

Chris Lawrence is a Taiwanese-American filmmaker and educator from San Francisco, California. With a focus on narratives that tackle social, racial, and systemic issues embedded with deep emotional impacts, his award-winning films have been screened at festivals in the Bay Area and throughout California. Chris studied Film Production and Education at UC Santa Cruz, leading him to pursue work in film education post-grad. He has worked for organizations such as the Latino Film Institute's Youth Cinema Project and SFFILM, where he was lead instructor for a high school-level filmmaking intensive, programmed for the annual San Francisco International Film Festival, and coordinated filmmaker school visits in local Bay Area classrooms. Chris is honored and excited to further his education and filmmaking journey in his new home city of Austin, Texas!

Taylor is a first-year doctoral candidate in media studies in the Department of Radio-Television-Film at The University of Texas at Austin. She is interested in studying Hollywood history and ephemeral media such as trade magazines and pressbooks. She received her BA in Communication at Manhattan College and her MA in Cinema Studies at NYU's Martin Scorsese Department of Cinema Studies. Prior to beginning her doctoral studies, she worked as a social media manager across the theater, television and film industries. She most recently worked for Letterboxd on their social team.

April M. Sánchez was born and raised in El Paso, TX. Growing up in a bicultural city has inspired her stories which often reflect the beauty, wonder and traditional elements of the border town Mexican American culture and beyond. Her scripts have made their way to the finalist round in competitions such as the Sundance Screenwriters AND Episodic Labs, the Universal Writers Lab, as a Semi-Finalist in The Academy Nicholl Fellowship and many others. She has participated in the NALIP Screenwriting Lab, the Stowe Story Labs, the NHMC TV Series Screenwriting Program, the Netflix Animation Writing Masterclass and the Stowe Story Labs LAUNCH development program. In 2022 April had a television pilot in development with a company that has an overall deal with Netflix. She has worked with Sundance Collab as a Course Advisor for introductory screenwriting classes led by Trey Ellis and is often hired as a story analyst and consultant by writers looking to elevate their scripts. She is represented by Aaron Kogan Management.

Khiry Duffey is a writer and photographer. Born and raised in Waco, Texas, he became captivated by the immersive power of film and TV at a young age. Seeking a career change after the COVID shutdown, he moved to Austin to attend the University of Texas at Austin, where he received his BS in Radio-Television-Film and is completing his MFA with a specialization in Screenwriting. When he's not at the nearest comic convention, he's writing, traveling, or on a lifelong quest to find the world's best pizza spot.

Xiaoan (Lucian) Zhang is a Chinese-born writer and director whose work blends restrained aesthetics with emotionally grounded storytelling. Having previously studied at SUNY Buffalo and the University of Melbourne, he draws on cross-cultural perspectives to explore disconnection, longing, and social pressure across realist and speculative genres. His films have screened at international film festivals across North America, Europe, and Australia.