Amanda Upson: Last News

Nonprofit leader Cassidy Dimon, a film industry accessibility and inclusion veteran, has been named the inaugural executive director of FWD-Doc: Filmmakers with Disabilities.

Manori Ravindran International EditorA new “Accessibility Scorecard” launched this summer will aim to help U.S. and international film festivals assess and improve their accessibility measures, Variety can reveal.Developed by filmmaker and former International Documentary Association executive Cassidy Dimon in conjunction with the Film Festival Alliance and FWD-Doc, a collective of documentary filmmakers with disabilities, the Accessibility Scorecard will gather data from festival participants (such as speakers and filmmakers) and attendees that will be fed back to organizers in order to increase their awareness of how accessible their events are.“Right now, the burden is on the filmmaker or attendee to provide feedback and go to a festival and tell them what’s wrong or right — they can’t just [focus on] their job,” explains Dimon.