Dara Kell - Co-Director
is a South African filmmaker and editor, and is the recipient of Participant Media’s ‘Outstanding Filmmaker’ award, representing Africa. Her editing credits include The Reckoning, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2009 and was broadcast on P.O.V., the Academy Award-nominated Jesus Camp,Courting Justice and Mercurial Son: The Blues of Lurrie Bell. She was a field producer in South Africa for Amnesty International’s Human Rights, Human Needs. The film tells the story of a doctor’s battle with the South African Department of Health to secure antiretroviral medication for child survivors of rape. She facilitates filmmaking workshops with grassroots organizations both in the US and South Africa to empower communities to tell their own stories. Dear Mandela is her first feature-length documentary.

Christopher Nizza - Co-Director/Editor
is a New York City born, bred and based filmmaker and editor. His Emmy Award-winning work includes documentaries and television shows (‘Hollywood DC’, ‘Ironman Triathlon’, ‘Dakar Rally’, ‘Iditarod’) as well as video game commercials and music videos. He will be editing Figure Skating at this year’s Winter Olympics in Vancouver, NBC’s highest-rated venue at the Games. A former high school basketball player-turned-journalist, he has edited programming for most of the major networks and cable channels. With co-director Dara Kell, he is a recipient of Participant Media's Outstanding Filmmaker Award, representing Africa. Nizza is a founding member of the University of the Poor, a project dedicated to using video and new technologies as part of a broad movement to end poverty. As part of this work he collaborated with other filmmakers and community groups to make ‘Crisis, U.S.A.’, ‘Copy This Tape’ and ‘Learning as we Lead’. These short documentaries have been used in educational programs at hundreds of grassroots meetings across the United States.

Tina Brown – Producer
is an Australian-born, New York-based producer who devised film marketing and PR campaigns for most of the major and independent studios – Paramount, Universal, MGM, DreamWorks and Miramax. She was Editor of an Australian magazine focused on positive media and promoting awareness of global issues, as well as working with the Starlight Foundation to raise funds to grant wishes for terminally ill children. She has interviewed dozens of world changers and artists, including Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai, Actor Don Cheadle and the late South African musician Miriam Makeba.

Matthew Peterson – Director of Photography
is an Emmy Award-winning cinematographer and winner of Australia's top cinematography award, the Golden Tripod. His most recent assignments include the Beijing Olympics, Tour de France and the Ironman World Championships filmed in Hawaii. He has worked in some of the most rugged conditions in the world – from Alaska's Yukon to the Sahara desert. Peterson specializes in high definition Panasonic VariCam and is at the cutting edge of high-end digital cinema. From the Red Camera to 16-mm film cameras, Peterson’s wealth of experience with creative rigging, car mounts and helicopter rigs make him one of the most sought-after cinematographers in the sports world. Peterson is also an accomplished still photographer. His solo photographic exhibitions snap [NYC] and snap [POSTCARDS] featured Matt’s exquisite photos of exotic locations and included stunning portraitures of Ringo Starr and Kelly Slater.

Shivaani Selvaraj – Education/Outreach Director
has designed media, organizing, and educational strategies, for over a decade, to strengthen grassroots economic human rights work in the US. She co-founded the Media Mobilizing Project in Philadelphia, ran a national program called the Media Empowerment Project, and is currently engaged in designing multimedia public health interventions to be delivered electronically. Working on a film in South Africa fulfills a long time dream to explore the social movements there and the complex and at times pivotal role that South Asians have played in the country’s past and present.

Aaron Plantenga – Web Developer
has been helping non-profits and small businesses develop and market their online presence since his formative years at the Community Media Center in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He has programmed the Dear Mandela web site in Drupal, a popular content management system.

Myah Williams - Intern
grew up in North Little Rock, AR and moved to New York City at the age of 18 to begin an undergraduate major in Cinema Studies and New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. Since living in New York, she has had the opportunity to intern in music publicity at Warner Bros. Records, entertainment marketing, film sales and distribution as well as with the East coast office of the Producer’s Guild of America. Her passion for compelling global issues, love for documentary, and interest in independent filmmaking guided her towards joining the Dear Mandela team as an intern this summer. Myah is excited to work with such an enthusiastic team and with a film with such an inspiring message!

BOARD OF ADVISORS

Ruth B. Cowan is a political scientist focusing on the rule of law in South Africa. Her articles about the transformation of the judiciary appear in law journals in South Africa and the U.S. She is the Founding President of Pro Mujer, a micro-finance organization that lends funds to poor women in five Latin American countries. She is a Senior Fellow at the Ralph Bunche Institute for International Studies and serves on the Board of Directors of Pro Mujer, The Global Partnership for Afghanistan and the Council of Women World Leaders. She is Former Scholar- in- Residence at the Women & Politics Institute at American University’s School of Public Affairs.

Richard Pithouse currently teaches Politics at Rhodes University in South Africa. Pithouse is a former research fellow at the Centre for Civil Society at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban, South Africa and works with a range of grassroots, civil society and church organizations dealing with urban issues including Abahlali baseMjondolo, the Church Land Program in South Africa and the Centre on Housing Rights & Evictions (COHRE) in Geneva. COHRE has special consultative status with the United Nations. Pithouse wrote the COHRE report into housing rights in Durban which was published in 2008 under the title "Business As Usual?: Housing Rights and 'Slum Eradication' in Durban, South Africa.”

Pamela Yates of Skylight Pictures is Director of 'The Reckoning', the Academy Award winning Executive Producer of ‘Witness to War’, the Sundance winning Director of ‘When the Mountains Tremble’ and the Emmy Award winning Producer of ‘Cause for Murder’. She is a 2008/9 Guggenheim Fellow.

Willie Baptist is currently the Poverty Initiative Scholar-in-Residence and is the Coordinator of the Poverty Scholars Program. He is the Recent recipient of the Educating for Justice Award from the Bread and Roses Community Fund.

SUPPORTERS

DEAR MANDELA is supported by:
The Sundance Documentary Film Program
New York State Council for the Arts
Chicken & Egg Pictures
Alter-Cine Foundation
Participant Media