THE CREW
jesse
alton-milkman
PRODUCER
Jesse is a freelance director and producer living in Los Angeles. After graduating with an MFA from the USC School of Cinematic Arts, Jesse spent four years as New Media Coordinator for the television show How I Met Your Mother, supervising the show's web presence. He has produced and directed short films, commercials, short documentaries, and viral content that have reached over 500,000 views on YouTube and have been featured as part of the New Filmmakers New York series. He's currently producing the feature film Funeral Day which was recently selected as an Indiewire Project of the Day.
chris abernathy
PRODUCER
Chris is an LA-based filmmaker. Before his career in film production he worked as a news photojournalist in Seattle and Eugene, OR covering breaking news and sports. He received his MFA from the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts. He received his undergraduate degree in Journalism from the University of Oregon. Abernathy has produced films such as the James Franco’s adaptation of Actors Anonymous, staring Academy Award Nominated Actors Franco and Eric Roberts. Other films include The Outdoorsman, Sand and Snow, Deep Murder, Bullitt County, Monster Party, Papi Chulo, Phobias, The Odd Essay, Rise, No Running and most recently Offseason .Giovanni Spinelli.
matthew halla
DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY
I am from California. That’s important because growing up in the cultural crossroads of the San Francisco Bay Area created a hunger for knowledge and appreciation of diversity of perspective from the beginning. In a place like
California, you feel uncomfortable when you don’t have stimulation from multiple perspectives and opinions. I think that’s good because it fights apathy. My first home was a cabin in the mountains of Big Sur without electricity or running water. My parents were teachers in a one room schoolhouse. I got into cinematic storytelling through documentary first and then fiction filmmaking at USC’s School of Cinematic Arts Masters Program. I paid for grad school by doing camera work and asking questions for NBC4 in Los Angeles. I won three Emmy awards while doing it. I love watching film and making movies. To me, cinema is the most complex art form because it attempts to capture real emotion with the intention of connection. Camera and actors in the cinematic groove of real emotion happening is one of the most fulfilling and addicting occurrences I’ve felt in life. This is the reason I love cinematography.
jordan halpern schwartz
COMPOSER
Jordan Halpern Schwartz is a multi-instrumentalist and Los Angeles native. He has worked on multiple series for Netflix, HBO and Amazon Studios, as well as documentaries and feature films like Time To Choose and I Heard Sarah. In addition to scoring films, TV shows and video games, he also writes/produces songs and is the co-founder of Good Soup Music. He draws his inspiration from the natural world, his Great Grandfather, and composers like Brian Eno, Clint Mansell, Butch Vig, Jonny Greenwood and Lorne Balfe. All of who push Jordan to create unique music for each new project. If he isn’t recording, he’s probably meditating or coaching high school basketball.
sunghwan moon
EDITOR
Sunghwan works as an editor and assistant editor in LA. He worked on TV shows such as Jane The Virgin, The Originals, and The Bold Type. He edited Roswell, New Mexico for the CW most recently. Sunghwan's recent short film Scrap won Honorable Mention for Editing at Festigious Film Festival. While trying to be a good editor, he also dreams of having a room full of books and a long nice wooden desk.
walter moise
ADDITIONAL EDITING
Walter has edited numerous short and feature films. From the feature 'Coldwood' in 2012 to the short film 'The Door to Door Method' in 2013 which got official selection at the Los Angeles Fear and Fantasy Festival. Then he edited the feature film 'Counter Clockwise' in 2016 which won Best Picture at the Philip K. Dick Film Festival. In 2018 he worked with writer/director Kymberly Harris for the first time on the short film 'Faith' which won Best Short Film at the New York City International Film Festival. He continued on with the feature film 'Killing Joan' in 2018 and then in 2020 he worked with Kymberly Harris again on the feature film 'I Heard Sarah'.
kerry rock
CASTING DIRECTOR
Rock’s film career began while attending the prestigious New York University Film School. Following graduation, Rock moved to Los Angeles to work for Roger Corman’s New World Pictures, in distribution, acquisitions and foreign sales. Rock then joined Orion Pictures as Production and Acquisitions Executive where she supervised the development and production of feature films such as HOOSIERS and ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS. Rock was then asked to run the US operation of the British based Palace Productions in Los Angeles, as they went on to produce the critically acclaimed MONA LISA and THE CRYING GAME., which was released to record-breaking figures and went on to be nominated for multiple Oscars, winning for Best Screenplay.
Rock produced three films for Palace, SHAG, A RAGE IN HARLEM and HISTORY IS MADE AT NIGHT. One of the more fruitful acquisitions made by Rock, on behalf of Palace’s UK distribution arm, was RESERVOIR DOGS. She then served as Vice President of Acquisitions for Infinity Media Inc., and was in charge of finding feature films for the company to finance and produce. She brought both CAPOTE and SAVED! into the company and helped set up the financing for these films. Rock is credited as Co-Executive Producer of SAVED! (Jena Malone, Mandy Moore and Macaulay Culkin) distributed by United Artists and Executive Producer of CAPOTE (Philip Seymour Hoffman, Catherine Keener, Chris Cooper), distributed by Sony Classics. CAPOTE was nominated for five Academy Awards (2006) including Best Picture, and Hoffman won the Oscar for Best Actor. She was then a producer on PUSH (Chris Evans, Dakota Fanning, Djimon Hounsou), which was distributed by Summit Entertainment in 2009. Rock spent four years consulting for K5 International, handling acquisitions out of the United States for them. The company acquired THE VISITOR and GET LOW among others.
Her most current production as producer is GRAVY, directed by James Roday and starring Michael Weston, Jimmi Simpson, Sutton Foster, Gabourey Sidibe and Sarah Silverman. Rock serves as casting director on other producers’ films in her spare time, including THE NEW ROMANTIC –winner of Best First Feature at 2018 SXSW and THE MAGIC LANTERN- chosen to have its world premiere at the 2018 Venice International Film Festival.
THE CAST
dan adoniev
WRITER / LEAD / EXECUTIVE PRODUCER
Dan was born in Los Angeles where he lived until he was 10 years old before moving to Europe where he lived in Russia, Germany, Switzerland and finally the U.K where he went to an English boarding school, studying Theatre extensively. He then returned to LA to study English and Russian Literature at UCLA. He studied acting at the Lee Strasberg Film and Theatre Institute, and continues to study at the Ivana Chubbuck Studio He wrote and produced his first feature film, where he also appears as the lead, titled ‘I Heard Sarah’, which is currently being submitted to festivals across the U.S.
Daniel continues to produce, write and act in Los Angeles, with two feature films in pre-production.
cameron jones
Cameron is an actor from New Zealand. After completing training at the country's most prestigious drama school, Toi Whakaari, Cameron began to immediately book roles in local television and film including; Nancy Wake, the White Mouse, Passion in Paradise, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, and as a lead role on the hospital drama, Shortland Street.
In 2015 he moved to Los Angeles to further his career and was cast in Dolly Parton’s biopic Christmas Of Many Colors, as her Uncle Billy, which saw him attend the 69th Emmy Awards for Outstanding Television movie. Cameron also has an award winning one man show High Rise, which has won awards at the Hollywood Fringe Festival, and toured in his native country at arts festivals, with plans for a feature film adaption.
chloe hurst
Chloe Hurst is a British born, Australian actor. Upon completion of her schooling in Perth and graduate studies in Melbourne, Chloe was accepted into the prestigious Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute in New York City. Landing herself a role in Cole Porter’s Kiss Me, Kate in her first semester, Chloe was picked up by a US agent and submitted for subsequent roles in the New York theatre scene.
Some performance highlights include Guys and Dolls, Miracle on 34th Street, Can Can The Musical and A Chorus Line. In 2015, Chloe visited Los Angeles and an unexpected film and television career has kept her there ever since. Chloe can be seen in Shane Black’s, The Nice Guys opposite Ryan Gosling and Russell Crowe, and I Feel Pretty with Amy Schumer.
Appearing as the title lead role in Scarlett, Chloe has an extensive list of independent films under her belt including Welcome Home, A Few Less Men and We Are Boats. Chloe has recently completed two seasons of Disney’s Andi Mack and is represented by Active Artists Management in Australia, and Brianne Watson at Vanguard Management Group.
ethan harris riggs
Ethan is an actor and healer born in Brooklyn, raised in Illinois and based in Los Angeles. Since moving to the west coast ten years ago, Ethan has studied under the great Anna Strasberg, Daniel Passer, Robert Ackerman, Dharam Dev and Siri Marka Khalsa as well as dedicating years of study to his practice at California Institute of the Arts. There, he has integrated multimedia performance, virtual reality and performance art into his craft. He is actively engaged in the theatre scene as well as the film industry and is proud to debut his first feature film with such a supportive and committed team of artists.
angie kim
Angie received her paralegal certificate and was working in Law imagining she’d become a lawyer but eventually quit to pursue her love of acting. Soon thereafter Angie landed the female lead in KTOWN COWBOYS (SXSW, LAAPFF) alongside Ken Jeong, Daniel Dae Kim, and Eric Roberts followed by the lead in an HBO indie short called THE LAST SONG and THE L WORD.
Angie has also gone on to star in commercials for Samsung, Jeep, music videos, YouTube short films, and the list goes on.
diva zappa
Diva is an American artist, also known for several acting roles in film and television, as well as recording a one-off comedy single. She is the youngest child of Gail Zappa and musician Frank Zappa.