Joana Vicente: Last News

The Sundance Institute announced on Friday that Joana Vicente will be stepping down as CEO, with Amanda Kelso to lead the organization as Acting CEO.

Film festivals in North America have launched some of the greatest movies ever – whether nonfiction or fiction. Telluride premiered Free Solo, Slumdog Millionaire, and Argo; Sundance debuted sex, lies and videotape, Napoleon Dynamite, An Inconvenient Truth, and this year’s Oscar winning documentary 20 Days in Mariupol; the Toronto International Film Festival premiered I Am Not Your Negro and Ray. 

Matt Donnelly Senior Film Writer Scandal at a film festival is usually generated by provocative auteurs or loose-lipped actors stirring up drama at press conferences. Last weekend’s laid-back Sonoma International Film Festival, held in the heart of California wine country, was a different story. Numerous indie film players spotted Sundance Film Festival director Eugene Hernandez at the event, alongside his two predecessors in the role: John Cooper, who left in 2020, and Tabitha Jackson, who stepped down in 2022.

Matt Donnelly Senior Film Writer Joana Vicente has stepped down as CEO of the Sundance Institute. The news will come as a shock to the global independent film community, as Vicente served under three years in a plum role she took after years in leadership at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Matt Donnelly Senior Film Writer Eugene Hernandez has reached the top of the mountain. The journalist turned nonprofit executive has spent decades rising through the ranks of the American independent film scene. This January he assumes his seat at its apex: as the director of the Sundance Film Festival.

Kristen Stewart will be lauded with the Visionary Award at the 2024 Sundance Film Festival’s opening-night gala January 18 at the DeJoria Center in Utah.

Pat Saperstein Deputy Editor The Sundance Institute has added four new additions to the Board of Trustees. Tessa Thompson, Pete Nicks, Nina Fialkow, and Kimberly Steward will help steer the organization and act in an advisory capacity. The new trustees will work closely with board chair Ebs Burnough and CEO Joana Vicente.

The nonprofit Sundance Institute today announced four newly appointed additions to the Institute’s Board of Trustees. Tessa Thompson, Pete Nicks, Nina Fialkow, and Kimberly Steward have joined the leaders who guide the entire organization and also act in an advisory capacity. They add to the Institute’s Board of values-based leaders, building an enduring, evolving community for storytellers. The distinguished new Trustees will work closely with Board Chair Ebs Burnough and CEO Joana Vicente and bring invaluable experience.

Marie Amachoukeli’s Ama Gloria has won the Best International Film Prize at the 40th edition of the Jerusalem Film Festival, running from July 13 to July 26.

Jerusalem Film Fest Unveils 2023 Industry ProgramNir Bergman (Broken Wings, Here We Are) and Yona Rozenkier (The Dive, 35 Downhill) will be among the Israeli filmmakers presenting new projects at the Jerusalem Film Fest’s Pitch Point event this year. The annual meeting connecting Israeli directors with international partners is one pole of the festival’s Jerusalem Industry Days, running July 13 to 15. Jurors will be Olivier Père (Arte Cinema France), Thorsten Ritter (Beta Cinema), Kevin Chan (MUBI) and Claudia Solano (The Match Factory), alongside Helge Albers (MOIN, Hamburg Film Fund) and producer Yael Fogiel (Les Films du Poisson). The Industry Days will also host the final pitching session for the Sam Spiegel International Film Lab. Other highlights include a focus on Austria, accompanied by Austrian Films’ Anne Laurent-Delage and Emilie Dauptain and producers  Antonin Svoboda (coop99), Oliver Neumann (FreibeuterFilm), Sabine Gruber (Golden Girls) and Barbara Pichler (KGP Filmproduktion). Filmmakers Sebastian Meise, Barbara Albert and Rainer Frimmel will also be in attendance. The program will also feature an industry talk with Joana Vicente, CEO of Sundance Institute, moderated by Israeli producer Osnat Handelsman-Keren (The Lost Daughter). The Jerusalem Film Festival runs from July 13 to 23.

Sophia Scorziello editor It’s official: Sundance Film Festival 2024 is set to take place in-person (and online) on Jan. 18-28, returning to Park City, Utah to commemorate its 40th anniversary of celebrating independent storytelling on the screen. Submissions are open as of May 11, with deadlines for consideration contingent upon project categories. This year, Sundance was held in-person for the first time since 2020, bringing along with it a wide array of programming. The Grand Jury awarded prizes to films “A Thousand and One” in the U.S. Dramatic category, “Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project” (U.S. Documentary), “The Eternal Memory” (World Cinema Documentary), and “Scrapper” (World Cinema Dramatic).

The Sundance Institute Science-in-Film initiative with the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation named Sophie Barthes’ The Pod Generation as this year’s Feature Film Prize winner.

Maryam Keshavarz, Noora Niasari and Sierra Urich have films at Sundance this year, two narrative features and a doc, wrenching and joyful family stories of the Iranian diaspora threaded with longing, regret and rebellion. None deal with ongoing civil unrest there, but it colors the filmmakers’ work and life.  

Sundance U.S. dramatic competition jury members — including Marlee Matlin– chose to leave after the festival fell short of providing proper captioning for deaf and hearing impaired audience members during the Eccles Theatre premiere of Magazine Dreams last night.

Sony Pictures Classics present Florian Zeller’s The Son on 554 screens, an emotional family drama that folllows the director’s 2020 Oscar-winning The Father. As with that film, The Son is adapted from Zeller’s own stage play along with Christopher Hampton. Hugh Jackman, Laura Dern, Vanessa Kirby, Zen McGrath and Anthony Hopkins star in the cautionary tale of a family struggling to reunite,

At today’s opening day Sundance press, Director of Programming, Kim Yutani announced the addition of Doug Liman’s first documentary, Justice, about Brett Kavanaugh.

The Grammy-winning folk rock duo Indigo Girls has been tapped to perform at Opening Night: A Taste of Sundance — the new fundraiser kicking off the Sundance Film Festival, which is being presented for the first time in Park City on January 19.

The Sundance Institute is bestowing its International Icon Award to Oscar nominated filmmaker Luca Guadagnino at their Opening Night: A Taste of Sundance presented by IMDbPro on Jan. 19 in Park City.

The Sundance Institute has announced the addition of Shripriya Mahesh, Lulu Wang and Patrick Gaspard to its Board of Trustees. The trio will now help steer and act in an advisory capacity for the organization, working closely with Board Chair Ebs Burnough and CEO Joana Vicente.

Eugene Hernandez has been set as the next Director of the Sundance Film Festival, as well as the Sundance Institute’s Head of Public Programming. The film and media industry veteran joins the Institute as its fourth official Festival Director after spending 12 years at Film at Lincoln Center, most recently as Senior Vice President of FLC, Executive Director of the New York Film Festival and publisher of Film Comment.

Tabitha Jackson, Director, Sundance Film Festival and Public Programming, will be leaving the Sundance Institute.