Three questions is a new thing I decided to do because I like the people I work with and want to share more about them and what they do and what they care about. These brief interviews appear in my monthly newsletter (which you can subscribe to here) and I am republishing them to the blog. The following interview with filmmaker Nicole Witte Solomon was originally published in the December 2015 edition of the newsletter.
Nicole served as our Art Director for Meme, helped me produce Beneath the Black Moon, I frequently work with as an instructor at the I Was There Film Workshops, and we are now business partners in 4MileCircus offering Social Media Management and Consulting Services. Here’s what she has to say about herself.
What do you do?
I write things–screenplays, essays, short stories, reported articles, cook books, but mostly emails–as well as direct films and videos. I’m moving more into producing more as well.
I also freelance as an editor and consultant. My primary client right now is I WAS THERE Film Workshops, where I serve as the Communications Director. I Was There provides free, therapeutic filmmaking workshops to veterans, active duty service members and military families coping with Posttraumatic Stress. I also am also a film instructor at these workshops.
Why do you do it?
I work with I Was There because it’s rare to be able to get paid to do something you actually believe in. I have personally found filmmaking to be tremendously therapeutic, and I love sharing that with other people, and seeing the very real, dramatic shift that occurs within people who have been seriously wounded once they’ve been empowered with the tools to tell their own stories, on their own terms.
I write/direct/produce things that I would like to see that don’t yet exist. I’m generally interested in amplifying less-heard perspectives and narratives, whether my own or other people’s. Also I have always just have a compulsion to create and share stories.
What do you want to share?
You can learn more about I Was There at http://iwastherefilms.org. My short horror film, Small Talk, is currently in festivals and should be available for home viewing in 2016–we’re on facebook, twitter and tumblr as SmallTalkMovie, and the website is smalltalkmovie.com. The “Joan of Arc” segment I directed for the anthology Bring Us Your Women will be made publicly available in the latter half of the year. You can watch it and the rest of the film on demand now, though.
Also keep an eye out in 2016 new projects–a feature I wrote that will be produced/directed by Flavio Alves and is in preproduction, a short I co-wrote with Jeanette Sears called Happenstance that’s in post, a short I’m line producing for Christina Raia, a couple video projects for The Shondes that I’m directing, and several scripts I’m currently writing. Also a comic book that I’m writing with my friend Che Broadnax, about which I’m extremely excited but probably should bite my tongue for now. You can visit NicoleWitteSolomon.com for more.