The Ballad of Luis Valdez

David Alvarado is an award-winning documentary filmmaker, focusing on biographies in science, health, and the arts. His past PBS work includes Bill Nye: Science Guy (POV), Matter of Mind (Independent Lens), Blood Sugar Rising (WGBH), and Secrets in your Data (NOVA). He lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Lauren DeFilippo’s acclaimed documentaries have premiered at TIFF, Sundance, and SXSW and are currently streaming on PBS, Hulu, and Netflix. Her work is driven by a deep commitment to storytelling with empathy, aiming to shape the collective future we’re building for ourselves, one film at a time.

Brenda Avila-Hanna is a Mexican filmmaker and educator whose work connects to the complexities within transnational identities. She is a Sundance Producers Lab Fellow, a recent Rockwood/Just Films Fellow and a DOC NYC Documentary New Leader. She is a board member of the Watsonville Film Fest and a professor at UCSC.