BETHLEHEM, PA—From Emmy winning producers to filmmakers who have played roles in major productions like “John Wick 2,” “House of Cards” and “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” the Female Filmmaker Roundtable at the ArtsQuest Center’s Frank Banko Alehouse Cinemas, 101 Founders Way, on Nov. 2, 7:30 p.m., shines the spotlight on local women who are having a powerful impact on the nation’s film industry.
The event, presented as part of ArtsQuest’s “Artists Among Us Series,” is free to attend and features Emmy Award winning documentary producer Roberta Morris-Purdee; TV and film producer Ali Norod Pensyl; filmmaker and production company owner Koula Sossiadis Kazista; Lafayette College professor and director Nandini Sikand; and Art House Convergence Managing Director Barbara Twist. Panelists will discuss not only their personal experiences in the film industry, but also cinema’s glass ceiling and the significance of women in front of and behind the camera. Anyone interested in attending should reserve tickets in advance by calling the ArtsQuest Center Box Office at 610-332-3378 or visiting the Box Office in person.
The Female Filmmaker Roundtable is moderated by Penn State 
Lehigh Valley Film Professor Katina Sossiadis Bozikis and includes a public Q&A session. As a director and writer, Sossiadis Bozikis is known for the short film “Lynn’s Wake” and the documentary “Virgins of New York.” Following her first feature film made with sister Koula Sossiadis Kazista, she is working on the script for “Searching for Augusta,” which takes place in the Lehigh Valley. Aspiring actors are encouraged to join Sossiadis Bozikis for her upcoming workshop “Acting for Film” Nov. 4, noon-3 p.m., in the Fowler Blast Furnace Room of the ArtsQuest Center. Fee for the workshop is $44 for ArtsQuest Members and $49 for the public. Anyone interested in registering can do so at www.steelstacks.org.
About the Female Filmmaker Roundtable:
Roberta Morris-Purdee, of Williams Twp., began her career as assistant to Academy Award winning actress and Director Lee Grant. After 10 years and 14 films with Grant, Morris-Purdee opened Karmic Release, which released ground breaking documentaries like the Emmy Award winning “Baghdad ER.” Her 18 works have been honored with Emmy, Peabody, duPont-Columbia and Cine Golden Eagle awards, as well as a place on the 1999 Academy Award Short List.
Ali Norod Pensyl, a Bethlehem native, has worked in the film and television industry for more than 16 years, building her career from the ground up. Over the years, Pensyl has worked with some of the industry’s most recognized personalities, such as Meryl Streep, Mark Ruffalo, James Gandolfini, Jim Carrey, Jeff Daniels, Uma Thurman and Beyonce, as well as award winning directors and producers like Terrance Winter, Michel Gondry and Barry Sonnenfeld. Her film work includes features like “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind,” “Maria Full of Grace,” “Cadillac Records,” “The Squid and the Whale” and top-rated television shows like “The Sopranos,” “The Good Wife,”“Sex and The City” and “Blue Bloods”.
Koula Sossiadis Kazista received her Bachelor of Art in Journalism at Lehigh University and began her film career working as a script supervisor on films including “Copland,” “The Devil’s Advocate,” “Far From Heaven,” “Anger Management” and “School of Rock.” Now she and her husband own and operate their own equipment rental company, Monster Remotes, which caters to large budget films, from the chase sequences in “John Wick 2,” to various shots in “House of Cards,” “Orange Is The New Black” and “Gotham.”
Barbara Twist is a filmmaker based in Detroit, Mich. As a producer, her credits include an independent feature, “Consideration,” and as a director, her credits include “Shark Tank,” a short film which screened at the 2011 Traverse City Film Festival. In addition to her work as a filmmaker, she is the Managing Director of the Art House Convergence, an international organization for the art house and independent theater community. Twist is on the board of the Ann Arbor Film Festival and Cinema Detroit, and is also a member of Final Girls, a women’s filmmaking collective.
Nandini Sikand is an anthropologist, filmmaker and Odissi dancer. Her documentary and experimental films have screened and won awards at more than 100 domestic and international film festivals and aired on PBS. She has been awarded grants from The Jerome Foundation, the Center for Asian American Media and she is two-time awardee of New York State Council on the Arts (NYSCA) grant. Sikand’s career as a filmmaker has spanned 20 years and explored subjects such as nationalism, breast cancer, identity politics, music in the diaspora and immigration. In television, she has worked as a producer and director on projects for Channel Four: UK, Ovation, HBO, Oxygen and The History Channel. Sikand is an Associate Professor of an interdisciplinary film and media studies program at Lafayette College. She is currently working on a feature length documentary about women and mass incarceration in the Lehigh Valley.
The “Artists Among Us” program, made possible by the Bucks County-based nonprofit Art of Preservation, is dedicated to honoring artists of various mediums living and working in Bucks County and the Lehigh Valley, to encourage, excite and support the aspirations of art-makers young and old. Past “Artists Among Us” include painter Todd Stone, fashion designer Pamela Ptak of “Project Runway,” broadcast journalist Melba Tolliver, GQ and Esquire fashion editor G. Bruce Boyer, author Bathsheba Monk, record producer and musician John McClure and Marvel & DC Comics illustrator Scott Hanna. For more information on the series, visit www.artsquest.org.
Information and images provided to TVL by:
Mark Demko, ArtsQuest
http://www.artsquest.org/
