On Sunday, January 26, 2025, WIF, founded in Hollywood in 1973, the organization that advocates for and advances the careers of women working in the screen industries—in front of and behind the camera, at all levels of experience—to achieve parity and transform culture, for the third consecutive year, hosted women filmmakers and industry professionals in partnership with Acura at the Acura House of Energy at Park City, Utah, for a brunch and connection session, including robust panel programming in honor of Sundance. The brunch also shone a spotlight on the fellows of the ReFrame Rise program, a fellowship co-founded by WIF and Sundance Institute that supports 10 mid-career directors and cinematographers, all of whom were present at the event.
Programs included two dynamic panels: Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: Women Filmmakers Fighting for Change with Cathy Yan (The Gallerist), Maryam Ataei (The Friend’s House is Here), Alexandria Stapleton (The Brittney Griner Story), Sharon Liese (Seized), Olive Nwosu (Lady), and Amber Fares (2025’s Co-Existence, My Ass), moderated by WIF’s Director of International Programs Andria Wilson Mirza. The Emphasis on Empathy: The Power of Compassion, panel moderated by Tanya Selvaratnam and featuring Natalie Erika James (Saccharine), Nina Yang Bongiovi and Stephanie Ahn (Bedford Park), Liz Sargent (Take Me Home), and Julie Christeas (Run Amok, producer), followed.
The Can’t Stop, Won’t Stop: Women Filmmakers Fighting for Change panel featured a riveting discussion between independent filmmakers behind some of the year’s most talked-about documentary and fiction films, representing the broad diversity of perspectives and experiences that illuminate the state of independent storytelling around the globe.
Moderator Andria Wilson Mirza opened the conversation by delving into each director’s journey to the screen and exploring the challenges of curating films with unfolding narratives, like The Brittney Griner Story documentary, which is highly anticipated and debuting January 27, 2026, at Sundance. Stapleton, was also the director of the Netflix docuseries, Sean Combs: The Reckoning.
When asked about how she approaches creating, directing, and producing documentaries with unfolding narratives, she said the following. “I wish I had a good answer for that. The only way out is through. So we take everything, day by day, in Brittney’s story. I met her relatively soon after she got back from Russia, and I could feel her energy; she was still very much in a space and living with trauma.”
Stapleton continued, “We had this incredible conversation. ‘I said, why do you both want to tell this story?’ Because they had gone through so much trauma with her being detained, but they had also gone through so much trauma here in America with so much hate against them, and they were carrying a lot of heavy loads. And Cherelle Griner said, ‘I want people in the United States of America to understand how precious our legal system is, and how valuable our rights are.'”
Given the current state of the political climate, it was chilling for Stapleton to reflect on those earlier conversations. “I’m getting goosebumps even thinking about it, because the film is going to play on Tuesday, and there are things that Brittney is going to say in that film that we’re experiencing here in the United States of America. I’m so glad that the film is here now, and it creates another space where we can have these conversations together,” she said to the audience.
When it comes to the structure, process, and timing of the film, Stapleton believes it’s essential to know who your partners are when discussing distribution and release timing. “For every film that I do, I’m very conscious of who I am and who I’m partnering with. The Brittney Griner story is with ESPN, and it was theirs. I came into the family of that film, and it’s important to talk about the creative,” she said. “Still, it’s good to know the home it’s going to be in, that they are on the same page and wavelength with you about the timing of things, and that they understand I have no timetable. I take a really long time to make stuff.”
Additionally, Stapleton still believes in the power of hope for potential change in storytelling. “We have to believe in hope. They want us not believe in hope. And I learned so every film that I make, it comes to me in a place in my life where I need to hear the story,” she stated.