RIIFF 2009 Team

AWARDS ADJUDICATION COMMITTEE:

Keith Brown • about

Keith Brown is a native Rhode Islander who first started making films as soon as he was old enough to borrow his parent's Super 8 camera. He holds an MFA in Film Production from Boston University. His film, Tough All Over, has screened at the Boston Cinema Census, the Antelope Valley International Film Festival, the Georgetown Indy Film Fest, the Syracuse International Film and Video Festival, Film Stock, and the Rhode Island International Film Festival. His previous film, Moving Pictures, was honored with First Place Student Experimental Film at the Columbus Ohio International Film and Video Festival, First Place Experimental Film at the University of Rhode Island Visualizations Film Festival and the Best of Festival Award at the University of Rhode Island Visualizations Film Festival. Keith developed a film studies course, Representation of Youth in Film, which he taught at Tufts University in 2006. He has also recently taught film production courses at Boston University and the University of Rhode Island.  He is currently the Creative Director for Pro-Change Behavior Systems, a health research company based in Kingston, Rhode Island and is also a freelance videographer.

Stephen L. Brown •

Associate Publisher, Phoenix Media/Communications Group
Steve Brown has been the Associate Publisher of the Providence Phoenix, Rhode Island’s largest weeklynewspaper, since October of 1989. As Associate Publisher for the Providence Phoenix, he has seen the Boston-based Phoenix Media Communications Group grow immensely, adding: P2P Group, the largest provider of personal ads in the country; the Portland Phoenix, a weekly Steve helped to start in 1999 in Portland, Maine; Stuff magazine, a “Back Bay Boston” Nightlife/Lifestyle bi-weekly magazine; G8Wave, a text message/marketing company; and the expansion of WFNX Radio into New Hampshire and Portland. These new ventures are in addition to the Boston Phoenix, Mass Web Printing and the Providence Phoenix. Growth over the years has been significant, with staff increasing from from 75 to 350. Brown received his Masters in Public Administration from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and earned his bachelor’s degree in communications from the University of Vermont in 1976. From 1978-88, he created and then published his own weekly newspaper in Burlington, Vermont, The Vanguard Press, which was one of the first alternative weeklies in the country. Steve serves on the board of FirstWorks Providence, a non-profit arts organization. He lives in Jamestown with his wife Jean and their 15-year-old daughter Jessica.

Edward J. Delaney • about • Interview

Author, journalist, filmmaker and educator. Professor, Roger Williams University.

He is a recipient of a 2008 Literary Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, a winner of the 2005 PEN/Winship Award for Fiction, and a past winner of an O.Henry Prize for short story writing. As a journalist he is a past winner of the National Education Reporting Award, and well as other national and regional awards. He was born in Fall River, Mass, and attended Fairfield University (B.S. Finance, 1979), and Boston University (M.S. Mass Communication, 1982). Delaney was a staff writer at The Denver Post and at the Colorado Springs Gazette, and has been a contributing writer for The Atlantic Monthly, The Chicago Tribune Magazine, The National,The Providence Journal Magazine and other publications. He has been a National Magazine Award finalist and his work has been anthologized in Best American Short Stories. Delaney is Assistant Editor of The Nieman Journalism Lab, at The Nieman Foundation, Harvard University. Delaney has been a faculty member at Roger Williams University since 1990. He is a Professor of Communications and Creative Writing. He has also taught at The University of Colorado at Colorado Springs and Colorado State University, where he was the Gannett Foundation Professional-in-Residence. He has published two books of fiction, the novel "Warp & Weft" and the collection "The Drowning and Other Stories," and has published short stories in The Atlantic and other magazines and quarterlies. He is the co-author of "Born to Play," by Boston Red Sox second baseman and 2008 American League Most Valuable Player Dustin Pedroia. The book will be published in July 2009 by Simon Spotlight Entertainment, an imprint of Simon and Schuster. Delaney has directed and produced a documentary film, "The Times Were Never So Bad: The Life of Andre Dubus," which premiered in 2007. It received a first place at The Rhode Island International Film Festival.

Jocelyn Dongahue • about

Vin Fraioli • about

Vin Fraioli is proof that a dilettante, if he lives long enough, can become a Renaissance Man. Writer, musician, producer, and sometimes actor, he dreads the American cocktail party opener, “So, what do you do?” Born in Providence, Rhode Island in sight of the State House, he grew up in an old neighborhood “where houses still had wallpaper of the previous century in their attics and immigrant neighbors had come from all over, displaced from the two wars.” After receiving a classical education at Rhode Island's Classical High School, he went to went to Europe with his future and present wife, Deborah, to study the Renaissance lute with Rodrigo deZayas. Returning to New York City, he became a protégé of the Cuban guitarist, Rey de la Torre and made his Carnegie Recital Hall debut in 1976. He was welcomed back to Rhode Island with his appointment as Composer In Residence for the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts. He also began to teach at the University of Rhode Island and Rhode Island College. Fraioli now writes screenplays, and has just finished his first film: THE STRANGE CASE OF MARIE FRANCE.

Carson Grant • about • website

American actor and artist from the United States. Grant has created characters and stories in visual mediums as drawings, paintings, in films and on stage.

Mary Healey Jamiel • about

Assistant Professor at the University of Rhode Island.

She serves jointly in Film Media and Communication Studies. She arrived at the University in 1996 and has developed documentary and film courses for Communication Studies and the Film Media program. In 2008 she served on the National Screening Committee convened by the Institute of International Education to select Fulbright scholars. Mary Healey Jamiel produced and directed a variety of nationally launched projects, including animations, PSAs for commercial television, music videos and interactive multimedia projects for the National Institute of Health, in conjunction with the Cancer Prevention Research Center at the University of Rhode Island. Much of her work and passion concerns the study of influence, persuasion, and public health and policy issues. Her documentary film Holy Water-Gate received a 2004 CINE Golden Eagle Award for excellence in investigative journalism, and Best Documentary at the 2005 Rhode Island International Film Festival. Holy Water-Gate broadcast in 2005 on SHOWTIME NETWORKS, CBC Canada, SBS Australia, TVE Spain, DR DENMARK and SSR/TSI - Swiss Italian Television. Her film Hidden in the Leaves - broadcast in 2008 on RIPBS and examines the factors that led to the emergence of Lyme disease and related infections and why, despite awareness of these risks, the impact of tick-transmitted diseases on society continue to expand at an alarming rate.

In the Fall of 2008 Professor Healey Jamiel filmed, directed and edited a series of short films called Reel Bites—a companion series for the 2008 honors colloquium website. In the series, ten URI scientists discuss the impacts of climate change on Rhode Island ecosystems.

Daniel J. Kamil • about

Bob Leddy •

Film Historian

Retired in Nov. 2001 after 38 years at the Providence Journal, including two decades covering high school sports. He majored in journalism at URI Extension Division. For the past 41 years he has also been a contributor to the Journal-Bulletin's editorial pages, beginning with the former "In Perspective'' columns in both papers. His columns and unsigned editorials have focused on film history and criticism. Over the years, he has written numerous book reviews for the paper on film-related topics, and was a frequent lecturer on film history at Lenox (Mass.) High School, and Barrington (R.I.) High. Both schools at the time offered classes in film studies, at which he was invited to speak. He would arrange video screenings of movies, and devote classes to subjects such as film noir (both past and neo), cinematography, directing, story content, acting, etc.

Ray Lepre •

He earned B.A. Degree from RI College in Film Studies (1989). For the past 15 years he has worked for Cox Communications as a producer and Operations Manager and currently oversee Operations for Cox Sports. Co-Directed “An Uzi at the Alamo” (Scarredheel productions) 2005. Served as Director of Photography for narrative short: “Balance” (Scarredheel productions) 2006.

Russell Maitland • about

Ed Mastriano • about

Ed Mastriano is a marketing manager at Cox Communications. In his position, Mastriano leads client-driven promotions and marketing services. He is responsible for developing the Cox Media brand, driving new product launches and building partnerships with customers and cable programmers. He has a B.A. from Franklin Pierce College.

Mary Mazzio • about
Executive Producer/Director: Lemonade Stories, Apple Pie, A Hero for Daisy

An American award-winning documentary filmmaker, attorney, and olympic athtlete who participated in Rowing at the 1992 Summer Olympics. She is currently the president and founder of the independent film company 50 Eggs Inc.

Michele LaMura Meek • about

Dana Neugent • about

Philip Palumbo • about

Associate Professor, Department of Communications, Rhode Island College

Kamille Gentles-Peart • about

Assistant Professor of Communication at Roger Williams University teaching international communications.  A first-generation immigrant, born and raised in Jamaica, W.I.  she received a B.A. in Mass Communication, with a focus on multicultural journalism, from Lehman College of the City University of New York. She holds a Ph.D. in Communication from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor.  Her general research interests include the symbiotic relationship between media and the cultural settings in which they are produced.  More precisely, her scholarship addresses how the cultural identities of media audiences inform how they interpret media messages, and how media in turn shape the identities of their audiences.  Her current research explores how West Indian immigrant women in the U.S. interpret mainstream U.S. media content, and how it informs the construction of their identity. 

Jenny Peek • about

Jenny Peek hails from Pennsylvania. She was born in Allentown and then moved to Philadelphia the summer of her 16th birthday. In 1985 she graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a BA in Physical Anthropology. Though she originally considered becoming a forensic anthropologist, she switched gears and decided to pursue a career in theater. She has been working in theater since 1986. After a one year Production Residency at Playwrights Horizons, she began her career in New York City, working as a stage manager in a number of Off-Broadway theaters. Favorite shows include SPUNK and CAUCASIAN CHALK CIRCLE (both at the Public Theatre), TIME ON FIRE (Second Stage), Peter Hedge's GOOD AS NEW (Manhattan Class Company) and numerous shows with the Naked Angels Theatre Company and at Tisch School of the Arts. Regionally, she has worked at the Market Theater (in Cambridge, MA), the Long Wharf Theatre (New Haven), the Passage Theatre (Trenton, NJ) and Trinity Repertory Company (Providence). She has been the season stage manager for Festival Ballet Providence since October of 2002. She has also done work in the film & TV biz. In 1994, Jenny was accepted into the Directors Guild of America's Assistant Director Training Program. Over the next two years she worked as DGA Trainee on several feature films (HACKERS, DEAD PRESIDENTS, THE JUROR, THE FUNERAL and Woody Allen's MIGHTY APHRODITE) and episodic television shows and pilots (LAW & ORDER, FEDS and FIREHOUSE). She became a DGA Assistant Director in 1996 and has worked on a number of episodes of LAW & ORDER, the independent feature film, HUDSON RIVER BLUES, the Boston scenes for the original-but-never-aired pilot for CBS's NUMBERS and a Dunkin Donuts commercial. But her very favorite work was that which she did with the 52nd Street Project. Jenny began working with this marvelous organization in 1990, and stage managed over a dozen shows with them over the next ten years. Her first exposure to Providence came in the fall of 2000, when she was the Production Stage Manager of Trinity Rep's production of A CHRISTMAS CAROL. She fell in love with the city, realizing that it would be a wonderful place to start a 52nd Street Project replication, and moved to Providence in 2001 to do just that. Jenny was named one of the "10 People You Don't Know Now But Soon Will…" by Providence Monthly in January 2007.

Duncan B. Putney • about
Actor/Screenwriter/Historical Consultant/History Casting

Duncan is a professional actor and as yet un-produced screenwriter residing in Providence, Rhode Island while working in the New York and New England markets. You have seen him in feature films, episodic television, commercials and corporate videos. His scripts have garnered recognition at film festivals and competitions. His writings on the subjects of both film making and American history have appeared in national magazines and journals. Duncan is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, where he studied both accounting and theatre. He went on to make his career in acting in stage, film, and television, as well as an associate producer in film and theatre. He has performed stand up and improv., as well as being a published poet and historian. He has served as an officer/delegate for both SAG and AFTRA and he serves on the advisory board of the Rhode Island International Film Festival. Duncan is also the creator of the History Casting division of LDI Casting, finding historic reenactors extras and historic consultants for film and television productions

Jim Seavor • about

William Smyth • about

Ron Tippe • about

Producer at IMAGI Animation Studios

Ron Tippe has worked in the entertainment business for the last 36 years.  In that period, he has directed 52 stage plays, 100 commercials and dozens of education and business related films.   In addition he has spent the last 15 years as a Feature Animation Producer for DreamWorks Animation (SHREK – Pre-Production), WB Feature Animation (SPACE JAM), George Lucas’s Industrial Light and Magic  (FRANENSTEIN MEETS THE WOLFMAN – Pre-Production), Walt Disney Feature Animation (RUNAWAY BRAIN – Oscar nominated short), IDT Feature Animation (EVERYONE’S HERO) and most recently,  Imagi Entertainment’s  (GATCHAMAN – Pre-Production).  Ron has also produced record albums in addition to being an accomplished musician and the owner of QT Music (Ascap)and Barn Boy Music (Ascap) publishing companies.   In 2008, Ron branched out and became a certified creative empowerment coach.  Most recently Ron was a Visiting Professor of Communications at Roger Williams University in Bristol, RL.  He is married to Hollywood Costume Designer, Molly Maginnis. They have two children, Annie and Sam Tippe.

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