First Match
TFI Suppport
Tribeca All Access® 2016
Logline
Hardened by years in foster care, a teenage girl from Brooklyn’s Brownsville neighborhood, decides that wrestling boys is the only way back to her estranged father.
Olivia Newman
SCREENWRITER, DIRECTOR
Olivia Newman is an award-winning writer/director whose films have screened at festivals internationally, including the New York Film Festival, Aspen Shortsfest, and the Vancouver International Film Festival, among others. A 2015 participant in the Sundance Directors Lab and the Sundance Screenwriters Lab, she is currently in development on her first narrative feature, First Match. The script for First Match was a quarter finalist for the Academy Nicholl Fellowship and one of seven winning scripts for the 2015 Columbia University Blue List competition. Olivia is also the recipient of the 2015 Durga Entertainment Filmmaker Grant and the Maryland Filmmakers Fellowship, and is an alum of IFP’s No Borders International Co-Production Forum, IFP/Film Society of Lincoln Center’s Emerging Visions program, Film Independent's Fast Track market, and the Cine Qua Non Screenwriters Lab. Her films have received support from the Sundance Institute, HBO and The Caucus Foundation, and have been broadcast on PBS. Olivia received her MFA in Film from Columbia University.
Bryan Unkeless
PRODUCER
Bryan Unkeless is the principal at Clubhouse Pictures. He is best known for co-producing the Hunger Games franchise. He’s an alum of Duke University.
Chanelle Elaine
PRODUCER
Chanelle Elaine is a creative and social impact producer in New York City. She field produced MTV’s premiere episode “Native America” from the docu-series Rebel Music. With over 4 million hits, it was one of the most successful episodes MTV has premiered on Facebook. As a result, Chanelle was invited by the White House to produce videos for President Obama’s Tribal Nations Conference in December of 2014, and for the Generation Indigenous Youth conference in July of 2015. Currently, she is the project manager for a special project with the New York Civil Liberties Union, and the producer for NoVo’s Women’s Building Project. As a commercial producer Chanelle has created branded content for companies such as Univision, Ubisoft, and L’Oreal, and a host of fashion designers for NY’s Fashion Week over six seasons. Ms. Elaine was selected for the 2015 Sundance Creative Producing Summit and was a Dean’s Fellow at Columbia University School of the Arts, where she received her MFA.
Veronica Nickel
PRODUCER
Veronica Nickel is an independent producer based in New York. In 2015 she wrapped production on her fourth feature film, a prison drama entitled Heartlock. Her third feature film, Stand Clear of the Closing Doors, won the Special Jury Prize at Tribeca in 2013 and went on to play at acclaimed international festivals like Karlovy Vary, Deauville, BFI London, and Busan. Nickel’s traditional western, Dead Man’s Burden, had its theatrical release in May 2013. She produced the thriller Nor’easter that premiered in July 2013. In 2010, Nickel was chosen to take part in the prestigious Sundance Institute Creative Producing Summit. In 2009, while earning her M.F.A. at Columbia University, she was awarded the Arthur Krim Endowment Award for excellence in producing. She continues her relationship with Columbia University as a staff advisor. Nickel currently runs her own production company, llluminaria Productions.