OUR
MENTORS
MENTORS 2025.
Jannat Gargi
Executive Producer
Jannat Gargi is an Emmy and Peabody-winning producer, known for her work on the Academy Award-winning documentary, Summer of Soul (...Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised). With over 25 years in the entertainment industry, Gargi has a proven track record for developing and producing a wide range of acclaimed, cause driven films and series.
As SVP of Documentaries for Westbrook Studios (founded by Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith), Gargi established the documentary division with a premium slate of films including Copa71, with executive producers Serena and Venus Williams which premiered at Toronto International Film Festival (2023), The Debutantes which premiered at Tribeca Film Festival in June 2024 and Full Circle: The First All Black Everest Ascent currently in post-production. Prior to joining Westbrook, Gargi served as VP of Documentaries for VICE Studios overseeing development and production for a slate of documentaries and series including three-time Academy Award nominated documentary FLEE (2022) and The American Gladiators for ESPN’s 30 For 30 series (2023).
Prior to VICE Studios, Gargi served as Head of Documentary Films for Paul G. Allen’s Vulcan Productions where she developed and produced a wide range of acclaimed, cause based documentary films including Academy Award Nominated short documentary, Lead Me Home (2022), News & Documentary Emmy nominated LIFT (2023) Master of Light, Best Documentary winner SXSW (2022), Academy Award nominated short documentary, Hunger Ward (2021), Sundance Audience Award winner The Reason I Jump (2019), and Academy Award nominated and Emmy Award-winning Body Team 12 (2016). In her work as an independent producer, Gargi served as showrunner and producer of the true crime limited series, Murder Among the Mormons with BBC Studios for Netflix (2021), co-executive produced the Academy Award nominated short documentary Knife Skills (2018) and produced the Emmy nominated documentary CIRCO (2010).
Gargi is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences (AMPAS), British Academy of Film and Television (BAFTA), Producers Guild of America (PGA), serves on the Board of Directors for Washington FilmWorks, Advisory Board of Tasveer International Film Festival and The Redford Center, a non-profit founded by Robert Redford and his late son James Redford that harnesses the power of media to engage people and galvanize environmental action.
Chris Annadorai
Director I Content Strategist
Chris Annadorai is an award-winning documentary director, wildlife filmmaker, impact storyteller and content strategist. Over a career spanning more than 20 years, he has crafted thought-provoking and emotionally resonant stories that celebrate our shared humanity and the wonder of the natural world.
From tracking the elusive, critically endangered Sumatran rhino through the ancient rainforests of Borneo, to capturing the cultural rhythms of life in remote Ugandan villages, Chris has directed and produced films for leading platforms including National Geographic, Discovery Channel, Al Jazeera, Channel NewsAsia and Our Better World.
As Head of Content at Our Better World, he orchestrated over 1,000 stories spotlighting environmental, wildlife conservation and social impact NGOs across Asia, catalysing millions of actions in volunteering, donations and advocacy to protect the region’s people, biodiversity and ecosystems.
Chris is driven by a conviction that stories can change hearts, hearts can change minds and together they can change the world.
Geoff Luck
Filmmaker I Educator
Geoff Luck is a multiple award-winning filmmaker and educator who’s been the showrunner for eleven television series and executive producer of more than a hundred and fifty programs in science and conservation. On staff at National Geographic, he oversaw global development and production of natural history programming—including the all-time #1 series on Nat Geo WILD—broadcast in 45 different languages across 180 countries, and reaching over 440 million homes worldwide.
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As a director, his work has been featured on Netflix, Disney+, PBS and many other leading outlets, awarded at numerous international film festivals, honored by the United Nations, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Museum of Modern Art, and nominated for an Emmy. For the past decade, his work has focused on storytelling for impact, and has driven multimedia campaigns in support of many of the world’s leading conservation causes, scientists, and NGOs.
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Geoff has also served as a panelist and speaker at TEDx, Jackson Wild, NEWF, SXSW and other international conferences, taught film history, theory and production at such leading institutions as Harvard, MIT and The Savannah College of Art & Design, led workshops for industry newcomers and veterans alike, and mentored filmmakers around the world.
Vicky Mathews
Showrunner I Producer I Director I Writer
Vicky Matthews is an Emmy nominated television producer with over twenty-five years in US and international long-form broadcast documentary. On staff at the National Geographic Society, she oversaw the development, production, and post-production of several key global series, broadcast in 25 different languages across 143 countries, reaching over 160 million homes. In the course of her career, she has produced programming in multiple genres including Natural History, Current Affairs & Investigation, Process & Engineering, Space Exploration and Archaeology, and has produced documentary films for PBS, Discovery, Animal Planet, History Channel, and ZDF.
Vicky is a strong and passionate storyteller, with a curiosity about people and places that has made her a powerhouse in the field in some of the most challenging places in the world. She has extensive interview experience with experts, scholars, scientists and advocates on a wide range of issues. As a director, she has the ability to turn the ordinary into engaging and interesting visuals, and prefers an active, ‘in-the-moment’ style that can make even the most camera-shy participant shine on television.
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Born in the United States, raised and educated in the UK, Vicky has work experience on six continents. She is driven and motivated by an innate cultural sensitivity born from working and living abroad.
Geeta Gandbhir
Director I Executive Producer I Editor
Director Geeta Gandbhir is an award winning filmmaker. She embarked on her career in narrative film under the guidance of Spike Lee and Sam Pollard. After working for eleven years in scripted film, collaborating with renowned figures such as the Coen Brothers, Robert Altman, and others, she transitioned into documentary filmmaking. She is currently directing a series for Netflix with Spike Lee and Samantha Knowles which is a retrospective on New Orleans post Katrina.
As a Director, recent credits include the series “Katrina: Come Hell and High Water” for Netflix, “The Perfect Neighbor” which premiered at Sundance in 2025, and won the Directing Award: U.S. Documentary, shorts "Reclaimed" for Sesame Workshop, "The Devil is Busy" for HBO, the Oscar Shortlisted film “How We Get Free” for HBO, the series "Born in Synanon" for Paramount, the series "Eyes on the Prize" for HBO, the feature doc "Lowndes County and the Road to Black Power," which was nominated for the 2022 Critics Choice Award, won a 2023 SIMA Award, and won a 2023 Emmy Award. She directed and show ran the series "Black and Missing" for HBO which won a 2022 NAACP Award for Best Directing, a 2022 Independent Spirit Award for Best Documentary Series, a 2022 ATAS Honors Award, and a Cinema Eye Honors for Best Series. She directed the film "Apart," with Rudy Valdez, for HBOMax, which was nominated for an NAACP Award and won a 2022 Emmy Award. Her short film from 2020, "Call Center Blues," with Topic Studios was shortlisted for the 2021 Academy Awards. She directed an episode "The Asian Americans" for PBS, which won the 2021 Peabody Award. Additional directing credits include the six-part series "Why We Hate" for Discovery, and "I Am Evidence" for HBO which won a 2019 Emmy, DuPont Award, and ATAS Award. Her film "Armed with Faith" for PBS also won a 2019 News and Documentary Emmy, an episode of the Netflix series "The Rapture," focusing on rap artist Rapsody, "Prison Dogs," which she co-directed with Perri Peltz, and "A Journey of a Thousand Miles: Peacekeepers," for PBS. She also played a co-director and co-producer role in the "A Conversation on Race" series in collaboration with The New York Times Op-Docs. This series earned recognition, including an Online Journalism Award for Online Commentary, an AFI Documentary Film Festival Audience Award for Best Short, and a MacArthur Grant. She also co-produced the HBO film "The Sentence," directed by Rudy Valdez, which received a 2019 Primetime Emmy. In her role as an Editor, her films have garnered two Emmy Awards, four Peabody Awards, and one Academy Award.
As Executive Producer, she just finished the series "Harlem Ice" for Disney Plus, and the feature films "Family Tree" "Black Table" and "New Wave" which are doing the festival circuit.
As Editor, her films have won 2 Emmys, 3 Peabodys and an Academy Award.
Brian Tilley
Director
Brian Tilley has directed a number of documentary series’ for Al Jazeera English including five seasons of the award-winning six part ‘MY’ series, shot in Nigeria, Cuba, Tunisia, Ethiopia and Zimbabwe.
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He was Series Producer of the Al Jazeera AFRICA DIRECT series of short African films – 72 films by 57 filmmakers from 28 African countries.
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Brian produced the short documentary films for the Steps’ WHY DEMOCRACY global documentary series and subsequently produced both the 8 long and 40 short films for the global WHY POVERTY series.
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His documentary on AIDS activist, Zackie Achmat, IT’S MY LIFE, was screened in competition at IDFA and on several international television channels including BBC, ARTE, YLE, CBC, YLE, SVT, DR and SUNDANCE CHANNEL.
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He wrote and directed the drama series THE LINE aka IN A TIME OF VIOLENCE co-produced with Channel Four, YLE and ARTE, which sold to 32 countries.
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He has been Story Consultant or Script Editor on acclaimed documentaries including Rehad Desai’s Emmy award-winning MINERS SHOT DOWN, Hajooj Kuka’s BEATS OF THE ANTONOV, which won the TIFF Audience Award and Anjali Nayar and Hawa Essuman’s SILAS, which premiered at TIFF and sold to Amazon.
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In addition he has script edited fiction films such as Oliver Schmitz’s HIJACK STORIES Wanuri Kahiu’s Kenyan Cannes hit, RAFIKI and Mickey Fonseca’s Mozambique feature film RESGATE. He co-wrote Akin Omotoso’s 2019 Nigerian feature film THE GHOST IN THE HOUSE OF TRUTH and was part of the writing team on the 2024 Kenyan Netflix series SPIN.
Ollie Huddleston
Documentary Film Editor
Ollie Huddleston is an award-winning film editor with over 30 years of experience working on cinema and television documentaries. He has worked with many of documentary's leading lights including Kim Longinotto, Adam Curtis, Molly Dineen, Sean McAllister, Marc Isaacs, Angus Macqueen and Aliona Van der Horst.
He has won two Royal Television Society editing awards and twice been nominated for a BAFTA. His f ilms have won BAFTA, BIFA and Grierson awards in the UK and many prizes at festivals all over the world including ‘’Hold me tight, Let me go’’ at IDFA , ‘’Rough Aunties‘’, ‘’Liberace of Baghdad’’ and ‘’Dreamcatcher’’at Sundance and ‘’Sisters in Law’’ at Cannes.
He has worked as edit consultant on many award-winning documentaries, sat on festival juries and taken part in edit workshops and masterclasses all around the world. He is a member of Rough Cut services, a select group of internationally acclaimed editors who consult on and support international documentaries.
His most recent feature documentaries include‘’Shooting the Mafia’’ which premiered at Sundance and ’’Dalton’s dream’’ both directed by Kim Longinotto and ’’In the Court of the Crimson King’’ directed by Toby Amies. He is currently working on a feature documentary directed Molly Dineen called ‘’Our Country’’.
Deepa Dhanraj
Writer I Filmmaker
Award-winning filmmaker and writer Deepa Dhanraj has been part of the women's movement in India since 1980. She was one of the founding members of Yugantar, a feminist film collective that made a series of films in the early 1980s documenting rural and urban women's movements for labor rights and autonomy. The Yugantar films were recently restored by the Arsenal Institute for Film and Video Art and screened at the Berlinale in 2019.
Focused on feminist politics, Deepa's extensive filmography spans three decades and subjects including population control programs in India, Muslim women's courts, community efforts to combat HIV/AIDS,and more. She has a special interest in education and has worked closely with government schools to create pedagogy suited for problems faced by first-generation learners who come from Dalit and Adivasi communities.