Behind the Scenes
Melissa Bruning
Writer, Director, Producer
Inspired by reading a ghost story in the Washington Post, Melissa felt compelled to bring it to life. Veering away from costume design, she found her voice writing and directing A Ghost Story.
Her other short film, A Girl and A Gun, hit the festival circuit in 2009 and was seen at the San Diego Women Film Festival, Omaha Film Festival, Baltimore Women’s Film Festival, Little Rock Film Festival, New York United Film Festival, Los Angeles United Film Festival and Portland Women Film Festival where she won the Most Original Short Film Award. She also won the Best Thriller Screenplay Award for American Gothic at the Gotham Screen Film Festival 2008.
Spending most of her career working as a costume designer, Melissa has had a front row seat watching many talented directors, the best training ground. Her films includes; Space Jam: A New Legacy, War and Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, Wild, Rampage, Love Ranch, Showtime’s Black Monday (Seasons 1-3) and many others.
She is excited to be doing this project with her talented other half, Derek Cecil.
Elias B Goldstein
Director of Photography
Eli is a Los Angeles based DP, born and raised in upstate NY. After attending Ithaca College’s Park School, with a focus on cinematography, he began his career shooting short documentary projects. His early years were spent loading film and pulling focus on a variety of commercial, music video, and narrative films where he gained a strong technical background and built a visual style that is both naturalistic and graphic.
His recent documentary credits include a feature with Jennifer Lopez, profiles on incarcerated and formerly incarcerated individuals for John Legend’s Free America, and work on the film Timekeepers, directed by Liz Unna.
His collaboration with director Georgia Tribuiani on her short film At Work, has been exhibited at the Berlin Fashion Film Festival and Fashion Film Festival Milano. Her more recent experimental short, Things Must Separate, garnered a Vimeo Staff Pick and screenings at the Hammer Museum and Nowness.
In 2018 Eli joined the International Cinematographers Guild and continues to lens a variety of narrative, commercial and independent projects. In his spare time he enjoys making coffee, campfires, and a cat calendar.
Sarah Demeestere
Producer
Sarah Demeestere is an award-winning producer from Paris and now based in Los Angeles. She began her career working in commercials and voice over, representing brands such as Kodak, Seiko, and Gaylord Hauser. After many years as a model, she pursued acting and began studying at the prestigious Cours Florent in Paris and then with Howard Fine in Los Angeles where she remained for several years. She lived between LA and Paris obtaining a Masters Degree in Film from the Sorbonne University and continued studying acting with Helene Zidi and Jordan Beswick.
Within time on film sets (Terry Gilliam’s Brothers Grimm, Roman Polanski’s Oliver Twist) and television sets as an actor (Without A Trace, The Unit, Star Trek: Picard), she naturally gravitated towards the producing side of the film industry working in production and development. Since she started in Hollywood with directorial success producing and directing short French films Sarah was already being sought-after to develop and produce feature films. Since 2014 Sarah has been developing and adapting the works of writers Jerome-Anaud Wagner, Elizabeth Hunter and Inelia Benz.
Sarah’s producing credits include dramedy DuElle, co-produced with Oscar-winner Alain Sarde (Mulholland Drive, The Pianist); comedy film Show All, which screened in Cannes then picked up immediate distribution; and Osmosis. Highlights from her career as a producer-director-actor include festival awards (SFSFF, NYLA Int’l Film Festival), and screenings at the Cannes Film Festival and the Clarity Theater in Beverly Hills, CA.
Sarah is also engaged in empowering youth to master the skill of filmmaking and is currently producing and directing 5 short films with young students from French immersion school LILA.
Sarah K Larsen
Production Designer
Originally from Salt Lake City, Sarah studied Art and Anthropology at the University of Utah before traveling the world for five years, painting murals and creating art along the way. After having traveled to over 50 countries, Sarah settled down in Los Angeles to pursue her career in the film industry.
With a background in painting and immersive art, she has been designing and creating sets for festivals, businesses and events for over 10 years now. An emerging production designer, Sarah has worked as an art director and has filled many roles throughout the art department since the start of her career.
Scott Janssen
Author, Hospice Social Worker
It was Scott’s article in the Washington Post, Near the end of life, my hospice patient had a ghostly visitor who altered his view of the world, that inspired Melissa to turn his experience into a short film.
Scott is a hospice social worker and writer. He is member of the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization's Trauma Informed Work Group and has written extensively about providing trauma-informed care for patients who are terminally ill. His work has appeared in dozens of publications including Social Work Today, Psychotherapy Networker, American Journal of Nursing, HuffPost, Reader's Digest and Washington Post. His novel Light Keepers is a visionary adventure about the transformational power of kindness and love when the world appears lost in anger, conflict and fear.
www.jscottjanssen.com
