Introducing FUSION VOICES: Conversation with Eliza Hittman, Fusion's 2020 Woman of the Year

Welcome to FUSION VOICES: the brand new official podcast by FUSION FILM FESTIVAL, New York University Tisch School of the Arts' premiere student-run festival that celebrates women and non-binary creators in film, TV, and new media.

Our first season premieres MARCH 8, 2021, international women's day! We have some exciting episodes coming up featuring conversations with documentary filmmakers, podcasters, student comedians, and more.

Until then, please enjoy the full audio from Fusion Film Festival's conversation with our 2020 Woman of the Year, ELIZA HITTMAN. This Zoom webinar took place on January 22, 2021, where Eliza was presented with the 2020 Woman of the Year Award by Tisch Dean Allyson Green. She then took questions from Time Magazine film critic Stephanie Zacharek and from the live webinar audience.

Eliza Hittman is an award-winning filmmaker, born and based in Brooklyn, NY. Her latest film, the critically acclaimed Never Rarely Sometimes Always,  was released by Focus Features this spring following its international  premiere in competition in the Berlin Film Festival where it won the  Silver Bear Grand Jury Award. The film had its US premiere in  competition at Sundance where it won a special jury prize. Hittman  recently won Best Screenplay from both the New York Film Critics Circle  and the National Society of Film Critics, among the many end-of-year  accolades the film has received. Beach Rats, her previous film,  premiered in the US Dramatic Competition at the 2017 Sundance Film  Festival, where she won the Directing Award. It premiered  internationally at Locarno in the Golden Leopard Competition and was the  Centerpiece Film at New Directors / New Films. Beach Rats was  released domestically by NEON Rated, and was a New York Times Critics'  Pick. It was the winner of the Artios Award for Outstanding Achievement  in Casting, Outstanding Screenwriting in a U.S. Feature at Outfest, and  the London Critics’ Circle Film Award for Young British/Irish Performer  of the Year. In 2018, it was nominated for Best Cinematography and Best  Male Lead at the Independent Spirit awards and a Breakthrough Actor  Award for the Gothams Awards. Her micro-budget feature film It Felt Like Love premiered at Sundance in 2013 in NEXT and was a New York Times Critic's  Pick. She earned an MFA from California Institute of the Arts and is  currently an Assistant Professor of Film/Video at Pratt Institute. She  is the recipient of the Emerging Artist Award from Lincoln Center, and a  2018 Guggenheim Fellow.

NEVER RARELY SOMETIMES ALWAYS SYNOPSIS:

Written and directed by Eliza Hittman, Never Rarely Sometimes Always is an intimate portrayal of two teenage girls in rural Pennsylvania.  Faced with an unintended pregnancy and a lack of local support, Autumn  (Sidney Flanigan) and her cousin Skylar (Talia Ryder) embark across  state lines to New York City on a fraught journey of friendship, bravery  and compassion.

NYU community can stream Never Rarely Sometimes Always at no charge here: https://stream.nyu.edu/media/1_un1c7jb0

Also available on HBO Max, Hulu, Amazon Prime.

Event produced with the support of the NYU Production Lab.

Thank you to Fusion Film Festival's faculty advisor, Susan Sandler, and the Fusion Voices team: Schuyler Barefoot, Maya Gavant, Carly Kline, Nina Leitenberg, Aspen Nelson, Roni Polsgrove, and Sam Whitley.