queer cinema: breaking biases
Mentor/screening/TABLE READS
Brianna Holt is an award-winning author, writer, journalist and current MFA Graduate Student at The American University of Paris studying Creative Writing. Her work explores culture, identity, and race, and has appeared in The New York Times, The Guardian, Rolling Stone, GQ, The Cut, The Atlantic, Vogue, and beyond.
Her debut book, In Our Shoes (Penguin Random House), was released in April 2023 and has been read in book clubs and included in college curricula. Her first screenplay, Blueprint, was listed at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival, and she co-wrote the scripted podcast Possession (Audible), which received a 2024 Ambie nomination. In 2024, she was named a Dazed100 honoree. You can read more about her seriously illustrious creative and academic achievements here: www.briannaholt.me/about
1:00 PM - 1:20 PM
Multi-hyphenate journalist, screenwriter, director, Brianna Holt (WGAE Women’s Salon), will discuss her contained short, HAPPY ENOUGH (A QUEER SHORT FILM) (14m), followed by a brief discussion of how her short led to optioning her feature, BLUEPRINT and a brief Q&A.
1:20 PM - 2:00 PM
Brianna will give notes on two table reads of our Cohort’s short scripts.
exercises & BEATS BREAKDOWN OF oscar winning short
2:00 PM - 2:50 PM
AC will SPRINT through:
-Beats Breakdown of 2026 Oscar winning short film, TWO PEOPLE EXCHANGING SALIVA
-AC’S editing cheat sheet, or 15 Ways to Shorten your script, with a few volunteers from the cohort to elevate/edit one page of their script!
break
2:50 PM - 3:00 PM
(10 min break)
ADAPTING A CONTAINED SHORT FROM A FEATURE
Mentor, Terence Taylor, lives and writes in Gowanus, Brooklyn. After years of writing award-winning children’s television for PBS, Nickelodeon, and Disney, Taylor turned to scaring their parents in print. His short story Plaything appeared in Brandon Massey’s Dark Dreams, the 1st ever horror-suspense anthology of African American authors (followed by inclusion in the next two volumes). His short stories and nonfiction essays have since appeared in Lightspeed, Fantastic Stories of the Imagination, Nightmare Magazine, What the #@&% Is That?: The Saga Anthology of the Monstrous and the Macabre, The Canterbury Nightmares, and Out There Screaming, edited by none other than Jordan Peele. His acclaimed bio goes on and on and can be read here: www.terencetaylor.com
3:00 PM - 3:15 PM
Conversation with Black, Queer horror writer, Terence Taylor who will talk BEATS, BEATS, BEATS with AC
3:15 PM - 3:45 PM
EXERCISE: Terence and AC will discuss how to REVERSE ENGINEER A FEATURE INTO A CONTAINED SHORT using the blockbuster, OBSESSION as an example.
Mentors John G. YOung & Billy narwocki
John G. Young is an award winning queer identified filmmaker and educator whose work explores the intersectionality of sexuality, class, and race. who teaches at the Purchase College Film Conservatory. His works, PARALLEL SONS, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival to critical acclaim, followed by THE RECEPTION (2005) and RIVERS WASH OVER ME (2009), earning several festival Jury Awards. In 2017, Young released his fourth feature, BWOY, starring Anthony Rapp. Recent work include the short, APRIL 14TH, 1982, which will premier at the 2026 Palm Springs LGBTQ Film Festival.
Billy Nawrocki is a director, senior editor, and founder of D.I.Y or DIE Productions, LLC, WITH a decade and a half of pro experience in film and media across commercials, branded content, feature films, shorts, and music videos. His work has been showcased at the Nashville Film Festival, Brooklyn Horror Film Festival, and Boston Underground Film Festival. Billy contributed to numerous award-winning feature films and shorts as an editor, with both emerging voices and established filmmakers, and served as a Senior Editor at Bleacher Report/Warner Bros Discovery producing high-impact branded content.
3:45 PM - 4:05 PM
Writer/Director/teacher, John G. Young and producer (and director in his own right), William Narwocki, will discuss John’s new short film, “APRIL 14, 1982,” a beautiful, risky biopic meditation at the intersection of a pop star’s life, right before they leave innocence and desire behind to meet punishing demands of fame.
4:05 PM - 4:45 PM
John and Billy will give notes on two table reads for two of our Cohort’s contained scripts.