2026 Shorts Showcase: Creators & Cast Panel | New York, Night 2

All right. Well, thank you for coming out for this. So I got to watch all of these earlier today and I have to say it really reiterated that famous Roger Ebert quote that movies are like machines that generate empathy. And these films in particular, all of them I felt really kind of nailed that notion on the head. They're all really empathetic, empathic films. And I want to congratulate all of you who are involved with them on delivering them as such. Now, I know not all of you are the directors, writers or so, but I'm hoping that we can pick your brains a little bit about where these projects came from. If you know, feel free to answer. If you don't, that's okay. You don't have to. But so, where did the impetus from this film? Do you have any idea? I know you were, you composed the music, but do you know where this project came from? Yes. Is this on? Yeah. So our director, Jorge Parra Jr., it's sort of about him. He played, it wasn't slide trombone, but it was trumpet. And he sort of pushed away his roots, perhaps a little bit musically speaking. So this sort of came from his own life experience, from what I'm told. And he actually ended up playing some trumpet on the, trombone on the movie, come to think of it. But it really came from him. And Megan Truax, our producer. Great. Yeah. Our story for Jordon comes from, well, the actress who was playing my mother in the film, who was also one of the co-writers and co-directors and producer. And she wore a lot of hats, but this is her story. I play her brother who, like we stated at the end is, he's still in Dominican Republic to this day and has yet to return since he was deported. But yeah, this story is hers and pretty much like her and her family's upbringing and how that unfolds, you know, across like multiple different levels, what that looks like growing up in the Bronx and just how that story unfolded and how it affected that family. Such a beautiful film. So Greg, the writer-director of Meeting Your Maker, who I am not, he told me basically that this is in a way sort of just a summation about his own sort of growing feelings about just how impossible it can feel sometimes to keep going doing what all of us do in creative work. So yeah, I mean, picking the world of puppetry was a sort of vessel for that, but it really is just sort of his story too, in a way of just feeling the, yeah, the impossibility of just making something and not knowing if it's reaching anybody. For Always Azizam, Pouya Mohseni, who plays the lead Masa, she's trans and Iranian-American in real life. And so the story was based on her dating experience. And as you all might imagine, dating as a trans person can be tough. So I'm sure she had her journey through like rejection and acceptance, and she wanted to show moments of joy as well, trans joy and acceptance. So it was influenced by her real life dating journeys. So very personal films, all of these, at least all four that we're talking about here. Can you give me, give us a little idea of your background before you came to this project and expand upon that in terms of the filmmakers as well, if you may, if you can. Sure. Yeah. I'm a composer. Actually, I lived in this city, New York, for a while, studied at the New School of Manhattan School of Music, sort of also from a classical and jazz background, but really got the film scoring bug when I was living here. And then for the last eight years or so, was out in L.A., and that's where I met Jorge. And this is our third project together. I attended UCLA for a doctoral program in music, and it was just a great opportunity to work with lots of filmmakers scoring 50-something short films while I was there, a few of which were Jorge's. And I just love film. So that's why I'm here. And Jorge's a great collaborator. So there's that. Before coming on to the Hold On team and being able to help tell this story, I was just strictly an actor, but was ready to start exploring new facets, which I guess is probably relatable to other actors or whatnot. But yeah, I mean, I was or I have been a SAG member for 11 years now. I mean, a lot of people think I'm older, but I'm only 21. So that means I started when I was 10. So yeah, that's definitely a big accomplishment of mine that I'm very proud of and to be able to share and to say. But yeah, I guess that's kind of my background. And then I kind of met Marilyn through mutual friends and other people that I had done other projects with. And then she asked me to come be a part of this. Cool. So I'm a writer, actor, and producer, also a member of SAG for the last 13 years. And so many of us, I love this shit. It's all I want to do. It's all I've ever dreamt of. I'm also a musician as well. And yeah, I met Greg at Sundance this year, and I think that we kind of had a pretty instant connection as just people who just have a sort of real burning just desire to be doing this and to find a way to make it our living. And like a lot of you guys, I'm sure as well, I started my own production company recently to try to take a little bit more control over my own work and career. And after seeing Meeting Your Maker, me and my production company partner optioned Greg's, one of Greg's next scripts. So he and I are making a film, a movie together and are writing a second one together as writing partners after that. So that's why I'm here as his puppet. So I started out my film career mostly doing documentaries, directing, producing. But the past couple of years, I felt really drawn to narrative production. And so I executive produced Always Azizam. And it was great. They came to me, Pouya and her team came to me in post asking me to help them get into film festivals. I don't know why. I just really love film festivals and helping filmmakers get in. So I felt a personal connection as well to the film. I'm a trans man. I'm Iranian American. And Pouya and I have known each other on social media forever. So we finally got to collab on this film. Fantastic. So let's get into some nuts and bolts in terms of if any of you can help us understand the process of putting together a short film like this. They're all very different in many ways in terms of their production values, in terms of the number of sets, the number of actors. So I'm just curious if any of you don't have an insight, that's perfectly fine. But if you do have insights of how the filmmakers put together their crews, how the filmmakers put together their locations, and even financing. Anyone, feel free to grab that. Yeah. I guess I'll start with saying coming into this only being an actor or whatever it is that that means, I would not have been able to answer this question at all whatsoever. So I think now having this newfound experience of producing and hopefully going into other facets as well. Yeah. I think first and foremost, a lot of our crew was friends of friends and word of mouth or just like, oh, I'm working on this project. Would you like to come and help and things like that. And I think that really just kind of tells and helps express this message of community that's obviously very prevalent within the short itself or the idea of family. But that was also very prevalent behind the camera with our crew and how it is that everyone came together. I mean, even along the lines of funding, me and Marilyn were essentially on Instagram live every day, like just campaigning for the film and doing Kickstarters and things like that. And yeah, I mean, obviously to like our incredible families that help support, but even the strangers along the way or just the fans and whatnot that wanted to be able to help support the film and help get it made that are ultimately why we are here now. I could just jump in really quick. So I'm not Jorge. So I'm not going to speak to all the things that he would normally speak to. But what I would say is that what sort of set this project apart from many other projects was that there's lots of diegetic music or music that's seen or heard from something on screen. And we knew that early on. And having worked with Jorge in the past, he brought me in very early, sometimes earlier than most composers are brought into a project. Not always. But our job was to produce all the Banda recordings in advance so that when they go to shoot, they're already done or almost done. So we actually had to assemble a band in a recording studio, record all of that, and then prepare for their shooting days and try to just make everything sync up. So in terms of nuts and bolts there, the musicians at the party are the musicians that played in the studio, but you weren't hearing them play live at these parties. So we sort of piped all that in post-production. And we had a huge Bluetooth speaker and a metronome just clicking the beat for each one of these. So that's how we attempted to get things to align. And then our great sound mixer sort of did the rest with making it sound like it's coming from a car stereo or sound like we're outside and not in an isolated studio. So for Meeting Your Maker, I believe that the genesis of the project, I think it was sort of a lengthy development in a way, or that Greg had a fair amount of lead time because it began as a screenplay that went through, I think, some screenplay competitions and stuff like that. So I believe it won Best Screenplay at Holly's Shorts the year before, which I think may have contributed to, I don't know if there was direct funding, like any funding that came from winning that award. I think there may have been some, but I think it helped with raising the money that came for it. Though it was still an incredibly, like, I mean, as a fan first and now that we became really big, I mean, as a fan first and now that we became friends, I had the same questions that you did of, like, how did you do this? How did you do it so fast? You know, it was a three-day shoot. It was done on insanely little money. But just, yeah, he has, you know, 20 years of experience as a commercial filmmaker, music videos, tons of shorts, and a feature as well that he did in 2008 at the beginning of his career. But I think having, I think, a little bit of lead time as far as, like, to, you know, to really build out that world, he was able to just spend a lot of time prepping things in advance and I think made all that money kind of show up on screen. I know that he has said that he's gotten a lot of questions at festivals in the last couple months about the Yappy Hour world and that it was like, you know, I guess some people were confused as to whether or not that was a real public show. But, I mean, everything about the world of that was created for Meeting Your Maker. Original music was, you know, all of that was also done. And all of the little commercials, even if they're shown for just two or three seconds, were produced as full-length commercials with, you know, with SAG actors and, you know, everything was just, you know, it was all fully done. Yeah. Yeah, from what I know from the production side of Always Is, it was the SAG micro-budget agreement, which is, I'm working on another project that also has that agreement and it's been really like easy to work with SAG on that and get actors on board. And I believe for funding they relied a lot on like community support, crowdfunding, stuff like that, which a lot of indie films do that and it's usually just a great way to get to the green light as quick as possible and not rely on grants. Yeah, that's what I know from like the production funding side. Great. And since you brought it up, three days is insane on that film in particular. Agreed. I mean, honestly, there's a lot going on in that film. I don't understand. What about everybody else? What, do you know what the shoot dates on everybody else's films, just so we know? Ours was two, yeah. Two days? Yeah, we did a weekend shoot and then some of our footage was reshoots, but that was a like super-duper skeleton crew that came in, like our director, Aaron, who's here, Leilani, who plays my sister. Hi. What are you doing out there? You three stand up. Oh, well, and Fidel, the four of you stand up real quick. Fidel, who plays my dad, Leilani, who plays my sister. We have Brian, who plays Giovanni, and then our director, Aaron, there at the end. They just, they have me talking because they said I look the prettiest, but... No, I'm kidding. It's all in the eye of the beholder, I guess, but yes, go ahead. Yeah, but it was just a two-day shoot, weekend shoot, and then we came in, skeleton crew, and did like a couple of reshoots after that, but that was one day, so I guess three total. Well, that's three and three. Okay, so anyone else? I think we were maybe closer to five. I will say, this was my screen debut. They were looking for a UCLA music professor, and at the time, I was lecturing there, so it was sort of close enough, but happy to make the screen. All right, great. Very good. I think ours was three, but just no puppets. And so let's talk about how you guys found help with your filmmakers, all of you, producers, et cetera, found cast. What was the process like? Was there auditions? Were they just picking friends? How did it go down? I guess Marilyn, she already knew that she wanted to play her mother, so that was casted already, and then I want to say I was the second person, cast-wise, that came along, so then after that, it was really sitting down, the three of us, Aaron included, our director, and we had an audition process, which was funny. Leilani and I were just speaking about it before the screening started. Essentially, we got tapes, watched the tapes back, held callbacks, which was all a very surreal experience coming from an acting background to be on the other side of that now. Yeah, I mean, I literally was in a Starbucks watching these tapes on a Zoom with everybody else, and it was just like, oh, you know, this is what it's like. Yeah, it's such an interesting process when you move over to that side and you're just to see the other side of actor's access and to be watching other people's, it's wild. For Meteor Maker, I definitely don't know the entire story. I believe that Jonathan who plays Otis, and obviously Otis is a puppeteer, I believe that they started as friends. There was a casting process on the film, but I think a lot of it also came through a little bit organically through puppeteering community in LA where they filmed, and that I think for some of the celebrity casting like the Scarbrothers and Tom Lennon, I think we're friends that Gregory had made through the process and who kind of helped pull a great favor for the movie. Yeah, I think for Always a Z-Zone, Pouya, who's the lead and the writer, then she connected to the director, Cheyenne, and then Cheyenne, I think, had some people in mind, so they both collaborated on actors that would fit and then reached out to the actors either personally or through their agent. Yeah, that's how I think it worked. It was kind of like a who do you envision for this role and reach out to them. Great. No, sorry, were you going to say something? I was just going to add, I think that Casuenla Banda had auditions. I think I was hand-selected, but there were auditions. Jorge was especially excited when Anthony Gonzalez signed on. I don't know if you know who that is, but he's the voice of Miguel in Disney's Coco, so when he was a little kid, he did that, and now he's sort of trying to be more on-screen visually, so it was exciting for him, but there was an audition process as well. All right, so in terms of from script to production to post-production, did these stories change much throughout the process, the creative process? I don't believe that Meeting Your Maker changed that much in post-production. Obviously, I think, especially when you're working with the puppet and stuff like that, and so much of the, especially just the way this story was constructed with the almost sort of fight club, but emotionally resonant fight club thing of like, oh, he was there the whole time. I think it sort of controlled the edit in a certain way, so yeah, I don't think that it brought that many great new discoveries, besides just performance and all the little nuances. Yeah, I mean, going from pre-production to filming and post, I mean, there was different iterations of the script, but through it all, the story was very fundamentally the same. I think what Marilyn wrote down on the paper was essentially just ready to go, and that story that she's kind of been holding with her this, you know, these past 20 years, that she's expressed to me that she's just been ready to get out. So I think when it finally did come time, and also this project has been in development now, I guess, however early you want to consider that, probably like a good five or six years or so, but yeah, just what was already on the paper was like essentially ready to go. So really, I think I want to say really the only thing that was added was like those reshoots that we did, which was really just like a lot of that handheld footage that you were seeing at the beginning. We're sort of in the same boat where, you know, a lot was very carefully planned and not too much changed. I will say, you know, what became sort of clear to me was that the theme of our movie was learning to blend our roots with, you know, our own passions and interests as well. And so an idea that we hadn't thought of that came at the end was to sort of bring back the sort of Mexican Banda recordings and blend that with Javier on stage. You know, a little surreal, but to try to drive that point home. And that wasn't something that we had thought about prior. From what I heard, there was a lot of continuity between the script and like production. I think like maybe the ending shifted in ways and like that final quote that you see in Farsi probably was added in post and wasn't part of the script. And things did shift when I came on as executive producer because they didn't really know how to get this into film festivals and marketing. And that's a whole kind of, you know, other part of the process. So when I came on, I helped them kind of mold that as well. So I think, yeah, I think post was an ever-changing process. Great. Hold on. I was curious about the opening. I really thought it was such a cool way to introduce the characters and the kind of tone of the film. So you're saying that this was something you guys went back and did. Do you have any idea or anybody want to tell us what the decision making was about that, around that? Yeah. I mean, I can't take any credit for that. That was definitely Marilyn and our director, Aaron, who came up with that. Again, after the fact, like we had already did our weekend of filming, saw the footage that we had and kind of ultimately just felt like we didn't, I don't want to say that we didn't have enough because, you know, the story was there again and it was being told. But there was just like something missing to kind of help establish this bond between our two siblings. And just also to like help captivate the audience and pull them in like just right from the beginning. And yeah, I guess really the idea was just what better way to do that than showing the neighborhood and just showing, you know, first and foremost like handheld in your face what this relationship looks like between brother and sister. So then obviously when we make it to the end of the film, that's so much stronger. And for meeting your maker, the editing was really great. And I'm curious, do you have insights about the editor at all, who it was and what the relationship was? I know, yeah, I tried so hard to figure out, to study these like talking points and to kind of be able to, yeah. By the way, the reason Greg's not here is, I guess, because there's this, I guess it's a simul event, right? So he's doing what, yeah, he's in LA doing this at this exact moment, I believe with Jonathan, with Otis. So yeah, the editing process, I know that Greg is very involved and that it's very collaborative, the way he works, but beyond that, I'm not sure. Okay, that's cool. And for always Azazim, did you have any difficulty with casting or with getting people on board within the community at all because of the subject matter or was it just as easy as anything else? I think it was fairly smooth, luckily. I think like Pouya has been in the industry for a while, so probably knew who to work with. Interestingly enough, Shayan, who's the director, he's a cis guy, straight, so like not part of the community at all, but he did a great job. So it was interestingly like a very diverse casting crew, not just like trans or Iranian. So yeah, luckily all smooth, all good. Good to hear. And Labanda, so you already spoke about some of the composition in terms of the diegetic music. I'm curious how you work as a composer with the rest of the film. Like was that, I'm assuming it inspired it or like how did, was it, did you do a counterpoint? Like what was your process? Well, the score's purpose is really to tell the drama in this film. And we didn't try to use the brass or the percussion or similar instruments to be part of our score. So we wanted to have a distinction. And I felt there didn't need to be a ton of score, to be honest. So we sort of saved those moments, like it doesn't come in until the pan up from that party, the kissing scene. But we just wanted to keep it distinctive. And I think Jorge was drawn to the electric guitar and the cello and we worked those in and yeah. Cool. So what's next for this film, for these films? Is anybody making a feature out of them? Are they gonna live in the world as shorts? What's next? Yeah, I guess I'll go first. We're coming off of our initial premiere was last week at the New York Latino Film Festival, which was very exciting, just being a Latino team and our project itself. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. So we were very fortunate enough to walk away from that. We won an award like we won the honorable mention for this year's festival, which was very exciting. We have some interest from universities that are looking to put our film in their libraries, which is also very cool. But beyond that, the hope or the plan or the dream is to be able to to do more and I guess, you know, get bigger or we haven't really decided. I guess Marilyn and I had a drunken conversation after we won the award about what we wanted to do next. But yeah, I guess really the alleyways right now that we're trying to iron out is like if we want to do a feature route and obviously how we get to that point and how we get greenlit for that. Or if we would want to do something more like a limited series and just have like more space to be able to breathe and tell the story. But obviously, either of those points, it takes a lot of support and obviously money. So, yeah, just we've just been continuing to campaign publicly and whatnot. And I guess now that we have this and we have something to show for it now trying to go to those friends and the business and those connections and whatnot and see what we can do. Great. Anyone else? Yeah, I think there's a lot of interest that Pouya has in creating a feature film, something that's similar, maybe a rom-com with common themes, like similar themes to always Azizam. And in terms of like where we're at with film festivals, I think this is our like 11th or 12th film festival. So it's done it's done really well, especially with LGBTQ ones. So we're really happy because it started out with like zero and then they brought me on. So I'm glad I could help them out. And yeah, I think I just personally want to see like more films about trans joy, too, and not just a constant like anti-trans discrimination. I think the world needs more joy in general. So yeah. Yeah, for Meeting Your Maker, there is a feature being planned. I know that Greg's been approached by a couple of companies after it's had its premiere at the Dallas International Film Festival, where it won best short and which qualified it for the Academy Award. So they are now, yeah, it's I mean, it's amazing. Yeah. I don't know if he would be resume dropping the names right now, but I feel like since I'm just an advocate for the film, I can brag for him. But yeah, so there they are in the process of also gearing up for an Oscar campaign now for for the short, which is which is scary. And yeah, it's like it's like you said, it's expensive, too. So they're fundraising for both the the Oscar campaign and then also meeting people who are interested in wanting to make a puppet feature. So if any of you know anybody. Yeah. Yeah. So because when you're a band that sort of lives as a short film and it's going to live as a short film, we're too sort of we've been going for quite a bit. We like in terms of festivals and screenings and things almost a year, maybe we may. I'm not supposed to say certain things we may or may not have qualified for Academy like to be in the running for that. But but I'm not going to say one way or another. But I think the goal is better than me. Maybe I speak for everyone. I might speak for everyone, is that we just want to keep going, you know, keep making, keep making telling stories that matter and and sharing it with with a theater full of folks that appreciate it. So thank you for being here. All right. Good. That's all we have time for. And thanks for coming out, everyone. Thank you.