Online job site Indeed partnered with Emmy Award-winning writer Lena Waithe and her Hillman Grad Productions company in February to provide opportunities for BIPOC filmmakers.
Their “Rising Voices” initiative, which distributed $1 million to 10 filmmakers to produce shorts for the Tribeca Festival showing how jobs can change the world, proved so successful that the partners are kicking off a second iteration of the program with a $3 million investment.
“The incredible work of the filmmakers in Season 1 of Rising Voices demonstrated our belief that talent is universal, but opportunity is not,” Indeed CEO Chris Hyams said in a press release. “The proof is in the amazing achievements of the filmmakers since their premiere at the Tribeca Festival.”
Beyond generous funding
Submissions for Season 2 of Rising Voices are open through Jan. 4, 2022. The 10 finalists will be chosen in early February and will receive $100,000 each to make a short for the 2022 Tribeca Festival. They will also receive mentoring from Waithe, be awarded a $10,000 writing fee and have access to a production line crew. More than 800 filmmakers applied for the initial program.
The other $2 million is being devoted to creating The Lab, a 12-month non-exclusive residency program modeled after Indeed’s internal incubator program. Three of the Season 1 Rising Voices filmmakers—Chinese-American filmmaker Johnson Cheng, Haitian filmmaker Stacy Pascal Gaspard and Dominican-born filmmaker Gabriela Ortega—will be paid $100,000 as filmmakers in residence as they develop ideas and create content for Indeed.
“I am ecstatic to expand our partnership with Lena Waithe and Hillman Grad Productions to our new production and development lab for three of the filmmakers we discovered last year, and to help another class of filmmakers be seen, heard and financed,” Hyams said in the release. “I am excited to see how the new voices and perspectives will showcase the meaning of work to the millions of people who rely on Indeed to find their next job.”
