Deadline: Producer's Notes

About the Filmmakers

Katy Chevigny [Co-Director/Producer] is the Founder and President of Big Mouth Productions and Arts Engine, Inc. in New York. She is also a co-founder of Mediarights.org. She produced the award-winning documentaries INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY, NUYORICAN DREAM, BROTHER BORN AGAIN, and OUTSIDE LOOKING IN: TRANSRACIAL ADOPTION IN AMERICA. Chevigny directed and produced JOURNEY TO THE WEST: CHINESE MEDICINE TODAY, a feature length documentary about traditional Chinese medicine in China and the United States. In addition, she has produced and directed over a dozen short-format documentary and advocacy videos (including projects for the American Bar Association, ACORN, the Fortune Society for Ex-Offenders, and the Vera Institute for Justice) on subjects ranging from public housing in Chicago to juvenile justice policies. In 1996, she directed a one-hour documentary, HOOPS ON FIRE, about an amateur basketball league, and in 1997 she wrote and directed two 16 mm fiction shorts, FLYING and THIRD WHEEL. Chevigny graduated from Yale University with a BA in Eastern Studies.

Kirsten Johnson [Co-Director/Cinematographer] has worked as both a director and cinematographer on numerous projects for television and theatrical release. She directed INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY, a feature-length documentary about the juvenile justice system in Washington D.C., which premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival in 1999 (broadcast on HBO). She has also directed three fiction shorts, including BINTOU IN PARIS, the story of a Malian immigrant family living in Paris that faces the question of female genital mutilation (broadcast throughout Africa on TV5 and SABC and winner of the French Human Rights Award in 1997). Johnson has filmed for Big Mouth Productions (BROTHER BORN AGAIN and JOURNEY TO THE WEST); Raoul Peck (WHOSE PROFIT?); and Barbara Kopple (AMERICAN STANDOFF and MY GENERATION), as well as for other the Sundance Film Festival selections ASYLUM, DERRIDA, and THE TWO TOWNS OF JASPER. She has filmed extensively for Steven Spielberg’s Survivors of the Shoah Visual History Foundation, shooting over 200 interviews in Paris and New York. Johnson shoots often for broadcast television, including ARTE, BBC, VH1, ABC, HBO, and PBS’ Frontline. Johnson is an honors graduate of Brown University and was the first American trained in cinematography at the French National Film School (FEMIS).

Dallas Brennan [Producer] is a Fulbright Scholar who conducted research on local television programming in Trinidad, West Indies. At Big Mouth Productions, she produced JOURNEY TO THE WEST: CHINESE MEDICINE TODAY (directed by Katy Chevigny) and Phil Bertelsen's OUTSIDE LOOKING IN: TRANSRACIAL ADOPTION IN AMERICA for public television (ITVS). Brennan worked in multiple capacities on the public television documentary OUR HOUSE (directed by Meema Spadola for ITVS) and the ten-hour series AN AMERICAN LOVE STORY (directed by Jennifer Fox for American Playhouse & ITVS). She has written reviews for American Anthropologist and has served as a judge for ABC television's Asian CineVision scholarship competition. She was a researcher and consultant with the Museum of American Folk Art, the Philadelphia Festival of the Arts and the Levy/Paley Galleries of Philadelphia. Brennan is a graduate of Swarthmore College’s Philosophy Department.

Angela Tucker [Associate Producer] also served as Field Producer and Sound Recordist for DEADLINE and will be the film’s Outreach Coordinator. She was also the Outreach Coordinator for Big Mouth’s film OUTSIDE LOOKING IN: TRANSRACIAL ADOPTION IN AMERICA. Her short film, CONVERSATIONS WITH ID, has screened at The Women of Color Film Festival in New York. With Bajan Brownstone Productions, she produced a pilot, INDIE GO! and a narrative Super 16mm short film, SHOOK (directed by Melanie Williams Oram). She has also worked in various capacities on the film HUGHES DREAM HARLEM (directed by Jamal Joseph), a documentary about Langston Hughes airing on Black Starz Network. Angela completed coursework for her MFA in Film from Columbia University where she was awarded a grant from The Academy of Arts and Sciences, a Dean's Fellowship and a Milos Forman Finishing Fund Award. Currently, she is developing LO, a documentary about African-American women with bipolar disorder that has received funding from The Paul Robeson Fund for Independent Media. Angela received her B.A. with Honors from Wesleyan University in Theater and African-American Studies.

Peter Gilbert [Executive Producer] is a director, producer, and cinematographer working out of Chicago with many credits to his name. He teamed with documentarians Steve James and Frederick Marx to shoot and produce HOOP DREAMS (1994), praised as one of the best films of the year. After the success of HOOP DREAMS, Gilbert re-teamed with Steve James to produce and film the biopics PREFONTAINE (1997) and STEVIE (2002). Gilbert has also worked as director of photography on other projects, including Michael Apted's THE LONG WAY HOME (1989) and the Oscar-winning AMERICAN DREAM (1990). He has shot videos for artists ranging from REM to Peter Gabriel and worked on such TV programs as American Masters, Nova and Phil Joanou's Age Seven in America (CBS, 1992). His other producing credits include MEN WITH GUNS (1997, associate producer), ALL THE RAGE (1999, producer), A TIME FOR DANCING (2000, producer), RISK/REWARD (2003, executive producer), and LOST BOYS OF SUDAN (2003, producer).

Kate Hirson [Editor] started editing films with David and Albert Maysles. For Maysles Films, she edited THE WORLD OF TOMORROW, which was released theatrically at the Film Forum (The New York Times reviewed it as “an exceptionally perceptive film essay.”) Hirson worked with Bill Moyers on COME CELEBRATE WITH ME and THE HEART OF THINGS, both of which aired on PBS. She recently edited and co-directed the award-winning documentary KEEPING TIME (Audience Award, 2003 Tribeca Film Festival). She has edited pieces for broadcast television, including The Discovery Channel, the Learning Channel, and PBS’ American Masters.

Carol Dysinger [Editor] has edited for such film luminaries as Martin Scorsese, who served as Executive Producer on Rain (Venice 2001; Sundance 2001) and John Sayles, Executive Producer of Santitos (Sundance 1999). She is known for bringing music to life on film: her editing credits include PUNK (1995-1996), part of a series on rock and roll; WOODIE GUTHRIE HARD TRAVELIN' (1984); and THE OTHER SIDE OF NASHVILLE, a feature-length music documentary. She has also directed feature music documentaries such as JOHN LENNON LIVE IN NEW YORK CITY (1985), and YOKO ONO BEHIND THE IRON CURTAIN (1986). Dysinger worked as a screenwriter for seven years and is a tenured professor at New York University 's Tisch School for the Arts.

Project Advisors

Anthony Amsterdam, Professor of Law, New York University Law School; Legal Defense Fund lawyer who successfully defended Furman in 1972
Steve Bright, Director, Southern Center for Human Rights; Professor of Law,Yale University; Lecturer, Harvard Law School
Bell Gale Chevigny, Professor Emerita of Literature, State University of New York, Purchase; Editor, Doing Time
David Cole, Professor of Law, Georgetown University Law Center; Author, No Equal Justice
David Elliot, Communications Director, National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty
George Kendall, Former Director, Criminal Justice Unit, NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund
Mark Mauer, Director, The Sentencing Project
Diann Rust-Tierney, Director, Capital Punishment Project, American Civil Liberties Union
Austin Sarat, Professor, Legal Studies Department, Amherst College
Russell Stetler, Director of Investigations, NY Capital Defender Office
Bud Welch, Representative, Families of Murder Victims Against the Death Penalty