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RIIFF 2010 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

Jocelyn Donaghue is a graduate of Princeton University and Parsons School of Design. During ten years in NYC, Jocelyn worked in advertising, film and at HBO. She lives in Jamestown, RI and has worked at the Courthouse Center for the Arts (a RIIFF venue) in West Kingston for the past ten years, where she is the Visual Arts Director.

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

Carson Grant (Actor, Artist, and Director) studied acting during the 1970’s with Lee Strasberg and has created character roles in over 300 films. His recent films include “The Hollow Tree”, “Sneakers and Soul”, “They Say Fiasco”, “Bordenia”, “The House Is Burning” (Cannes Film Festival), “God Bless America” (won the GIAA Heritage award), “Dear J”, “Spiker”, “Should Heaven Fall”, “The Crackdown”, “The Closet”, and “LogJam”.  Among his most fortunate moments is his romantic kiss with Christina Ricci in Woody Allen's “Anything Else” as Ron Keller, the acting teacher. A native Rhode Islander, he is proud to participate in the RIIFF

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.

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

Russ recently came to Rhode Island via DC to take his post here at CCA as the Executive Director. The many productions he has directed in NYC, NJ and DC include Angels in America, The Laramie Project, Wit, and The Graduate. Most recently he was a visiting professor at the American University in Tuzla, Bosnia, and a Director at Blackrock Center for the Arts in Germantown, Maryland. He has appeared in theaters throughout most of the United States. He performed in the national tours of Mack and Mabel and Pippin; he has performed at The Whole Theater, Olympia Dukakis’s theater in Montclair, New Jersey, the George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick, New Jersey, and the Alden Theater in Great Falls, Virginia. Russ, who received his Master’s degree from Upsala College, has made several independent films and recently did film work for the Discovery Channel.

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

Michele Meek pioneered the development of NewEnglandFilm.com, the premiere magazine and resource for indie filmmaking in the northeast in 1997. She also founded Little Plum Pictures and directed Red Sneakers, which premiered at the Woods Hole Film Festival in 2008 and received second place in the children's category at the Rhode Island International Film Festival. Currently she is publisher and board member of the nonprofit Independent Media Publications which has relaunched AIVF's The Independent film magazine. Respected as a young entrepreneur and champion of independent film, she received the 2005 Baldwin Award for Alumni Recognition in Film & Video by Boston College and the 2000 Image Award for Vision and Excellence by Women in Film & Video New England.

Dana Neugent • about

Dana Neugent is the Media Supervisor at the URI/Feinstein Providence Campus and an Adjunct Assistant Professor in the URI Film Media Studies Program. Dana has been in the film/video business for over 25 years working at ABC, CBS, Colony Communications and various production companies and cable systems throughout New England. He has worked on commercials, marketing videos, educational videos, documentaries, news stories and short and feature length films. Dana is currently on the Board of Directors for the Rhode Island Film Collaborative and was recently awarded the 2009 Metcalf Diversity in Media Award by Rhode Island Community for Social Justice

Philip Palumbo • about

Associate Professor, Department of Communications, Rhode Island College

Philip Palombo is a longtime New England based Media Artist teaching Undergraduate Media production courses in Communication and Graduate Media Studies in Art at RI College in Providence. He has an extensive music background and studied at Berklee College of Music and earned an MFA from Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Media [Studio Interrelated Media]. He specializes in producing music centric DVDs and documentaries.

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 is a 1985 graduate from the University of Pennsylvania with a BA in Physical Anthropology. 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. 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. In 1994, Jenny was accepted into the Directors Guild of America's Assistant Director Training Program and in 1996 she became a DGA Assistant Director. 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 award-winning screenwriter residing in Providence, Rhode Island while working in the New York and New England markets. 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. Duncan is creative producer and co-founder of OCD Associates (Original Concept Development) and is also the creator of the History Casting division of LDI Casting, finding historic reenactors extras and historic consultants for film and television productions. Recent projects have been shown at the Smithsonian Institution's Ocean Hall and on NBC television, winning two Gold Screen Awards. A public service campaign titled "Canisters" penned by Duncan won a 2009 Emmy Award.

Jim Seavor • about

Lifelong Rhode Island resident and nearly a lifelong resident of theater seats. For many years he was a reviewer and entertainment writer for the Providence Journal. He now writes for Motif and Options.

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.  Ron was a Visiting Professor of Communications at Roger Williams University in Bristol, RI in 2008 and currenly teaches at Emerson University in Boston.  

He is married to Hollywood Costume Designer, Molly Maginnis. They have two children, Annie and Sam Tippe.

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