SARAH POLLEY | FILMMAKER IN RESIDENCE

Sarah Polley has been writing and directing in Canada for the last six years. Her short films include Don't Think Twice, I Shout Love (which won the Genie Award for Best Live Action Short Film,) and The Harp.   Her feature debut, Away From Her, played to rave reviews at the Toronto Film Festival, Sundance, and the Berlin Film Festival. Following its world wide theatrical release, she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay and she won the Genie Award for Best Director.  Polley has also acted in over 40 feature films. Her extensive acting credits include The Sweet Hereafter, My Life Without Me, Don't Come Knocking, and The Secret Life Of Words. She is also a political activist, having worked with the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty, and fundraising with the Canadian Centre For Victims of Torture.

SUSAN COYNE | ACTOR IN RESIDENCE

Susan Coyne is a Canadian writer and actor. Susan was co-creator, co-writer and co-star of the award-winning Slings & Arrows (TMN/Movie Central). Susan has won three Gemini Awards for her work on the series, one for best performance in a supporting role and two for best writing for a dramatic series, in 2006 and 2007. Susan was also a recipient of the Writers Guild of Canada award for Slings & Arrows in 2006 and 2007.
A veteran of the Toronto theatre scene, she acted for several seasons at the Stratford Festival, was one of the founding members of the Soulpepper Theatre Company and is currently a playwright-in-residence at the Tarragon Theatre. As a playwright, Susan has written Kingfisher Days, an adaptation of her critically-acclaimed memoir of the same name, and Alice's Affair, amongst other works.

MARISSA RICHMOND | CASTING DIRECTOR IN RESIDENCE  

Marissa Richmond is currently the Casting Director on the CBS/CTV series Flashpoint. She is casting the third season of the highly acclaimed TMN/ION series Durham County. Durham County is the most recent Back Alley Films production Marissa has the pleasure of working on; having also cast their anthology series of female erotica Bliss, the hip hop dramatic series Drop the Beat as well as the critically acclaimed award winning series Straight Up.

She is looking forward to the launch of the new YTV series How To Be Indie which she cast for The Heroic Film Company. Other highlights include entering her ninth season as Casting Director-in Residence at The Canadian Film Centre as well as participating in the establishment of their new Acting Academy. Some of her acclaimed features and shorts include Love, Sex & Eating The Bones, directed by Sudz Sutherland, Only, directed by Ingrid Veninger, Cursing Hanley, directed by Kelly Harms, Big Girl, directed by Renuka Jeyapalan and 19 Months, directed by Randall Cole.

She was also the casting director on a number of movies for television including After The Harvest, directed by Jeremy Podeswa, and Lucky Girl, directed by John Fawcett, Scorn, directed by Sturla Gunnarsson and Murder Most Likely, directed by Alex Chapple. 

Marissa also cast the internationally acclaimed series Due South. The Gemini Awards have honoured her with nominations for Best Achievement in Casting for both Durham County and Flashpoint.

JASON KNIGHT | CASTING DIRECTOR IN RESIDENCE

Jason Knight is a Toronto based casting director. Some of his recent credits include Atom Egoyan’s Chloe, Sook-Yin Lee’s Year Of The Carnivore, Sarah Polley’s Away From Her, George A. Romero’s Survival Of The Dead and the award-winning Lifetime movie-of–the-week The Memory Keeper’s Daughter. He also currently serves as the casting consultant for CBC Television.

MAUREEN DOREY | STORY EDITOR IN RESIDENCE

Maureen Dorey is a free-lance analyst and story editor who helps writers renew their inspiration and find their voices.  Her production credits include: Amal written by Shaun and Richie Mehta (2007), A Stone's Throw written by Garfield Lindsay Miller and Camelia Frieberg (director) (2006), Moccasin Flats, Season II, Random Passage, an eight-hour mini-series directed by John N. Smith, produced by Passage Films and Cité-Amérique for broadcast on CBC and RTE (Eire), and Mile Zero, a feature film produced by Anagram Films. Other credits include Born Into This by writer-director Emmanuel Shirinian, Extraordinary Visitor, The War Between Us; Lyddie, Violet and On My Mind, 6 x 30 min. children’s dramas. 
 
She has acted as consultant to the National Screen Institute, Praxis Film Works, NIFCO and B.C. Film, and has been Story Editor in Residence to the Canadian Film Centre’s Writers Lab for the past seven years.  She has acted as story editor on several Canadian Film Centre Feature Film Projects, including: NURSE.FIGHTER.BOY (produced 2008), The Dark Hours, Siblings, Horsie's Retreat and Show Me.