Cultural Impact Through Storytelling: A Screening and Conversation with Michelle Satter and Director Glenn Kaino

Michelle Satter is the Founding Senior Director of Sundance Institute's Artist Programs. As a key executive of the Leadership Team, Satter has been one of the chief architects of the Institute's programs since 1981 and has created and leads all programs supporting scripted storytelling. Under Satter's tenure, the Feature Film Program has provided year-round and in-depth support to the ground-breaking and award-winning filmmakers Sean Wang (Dìdi (弟弟)), Daniel Kwan and Daniel Scheinert (Swiss Army Man) A.V. Rockwell (A Thousand and One), Roger Ross Williams (Cassandro), Charlotte Wells (Aftersun), Nikyatu Jusu (Nanny), Mounia Akl (Costa Brava, Lebanon), Radha Blank (The 40-Year-Old Version), Edson Oda (Nine Days), Lulu Wang (The Farewell), Boots Riley (Sorry to Bother You), Ryan Coogler (Fruitvale Station), Reinaldo Marcus Green (Monsters and Men), Dee Rees (Pariah), Marielle Heller (Diary of a Teenage Girl), Gina Prince Bythewood (Love and Basketball), James Mangold (Cop Land), Damien Chazelle (Whiplash), Chloe Zhao (Songs My Brother Taught Me), Benh Zeitlin and Lucy Alibar (Beasts of the Southern Wild), Ritesh Batra (The Lunchbox), Robert Eggers (The Witch), Taika Waititi (Boy), Rick Famuyiwa (The Wood), Cary Fukunaga (Sin Nombre), Paul Thomas Anderson (Hard Eight), Kimberly Peirce (Boys Don't Cry), John Cameron Mitchell (Hedwig and the Angry Inch), Quentin Tarantino (Reservoir Dogs), and Miranda July (Me and You and Everyone We Know), among many others. 

Satter also created and led the Institute's international initiatives in Latin America, Europe, Japan, the Middle East, and India, the Producing Program, and the Episodic Program. More recently, Satter founded and is charged with creative oversight and vision for Sundance Collab, a global digital storytelling and learning platform, and the Institute lead for the Sundance Artist Program Group, overseeing the Feature Film Program, Documentary Film Program, Producers Program, Episodic Program, Indigenous Program, Catalyst, and International Program. 

In recent years, Satter has been recognized with the Women in Film Business Leadership Award, the ACLU Bill of Rights Award, the Golden Eddie Award from ACE, the Horizon Award for her contribution to Female Filmmakers, the Indian Film Festival Los Angeles U.S.-based Industry Leadership Award, the MPAC Media Award, the Coral de Honneur at the Havana Film Festival, a tribute celebrating her 30 years leading the Feature Film Program at the Sundance Institute and the Giving Voice Award at the Sundance Festival Women's Leadership Luncheon. Prior to joining the Sundance Institute, Satter was a Co-Founding Partner and Program Director of ArtiCulture, Inc, responsible for producing hundreds of events in the Boston area and the Director of Public Relations for Boston's Institute of Contemporary Art. Additionally, Satter co-produced the Academy Award-nominated documentary Waldo Salt, A Screenwriter's Journey. 

In 2024, Satter received the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award, an Oscar celebrating her long-term work at the Sundance Institute supporting independent storytellers who have brought meaningful change and inspiration to world audiences. She was honored this year at the Sundance Festival Gala for her long standing commitment to nurturing artists and cultivating independent film through the Sundance Labs, where visionary artists convene to develop groundbreaking projects through an in-depth creative process, for the past four decades.

Glenn Kaino (Fox & Stork, 2022 Screenwriters Intensive) is a Los Angeles–based artist and filmmaker known internationally for his expansive vision and activist-minded practice. Kaino takes a multidisciplinary and collaborative approach to his work, uniting diverse systems of knowledge, methods of production, and individuals who might not typically intersect. His practice often includes long-term partnerships with a wide range of visionary collaborators.

Kaino has exhibited at museums and galleries around the world, including the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, the Japanese American National Museum, the High Museum of Art, the Andy Warhol Museum, and Pace Gallery amongst others. He was featured in the 2004 Whitney Biennial, New York; Prospect.3, New Orleans, in 2014; and the 12th Biennale de Lyon, France, in 2013. The artist represented the U.S. at the 13th Cairo Biennale in 2013.

Kaino recently co-directed With Drawn Arms, an Emmy-Nominated film about his collaboration with Olympian Tommie Smith, and co-produced the off broadway and film version of the Hulu special IN & OF ITSELF.

Erica Elson is a Producer, Writer and Educator based in the mountains outside Los Angeles. Her short film, WING NIGHT, premiered at Method Fest in Los Angeles. She is the co-author of the book THE AWKWARD HUMAN SURVIVAL GUIDE and co-hosted a podcast by the same name on the 5by5 network for five years. Elson's articles have been published by HuffPost, Lifehacker, and Reader's Digest. Prior to working in education, she worked in television development and writers’ rooms such as VH1’s HINDSIGHT, where she had the chance to write for the spinoff web series PLANET SEBASTIAN.

Elson joined the Sundance Collab team in October 2021 and produces courses, Master Classes, and events in the areas of screenwriting, television writing, directing, producing, and documentary filmmaking. She has moderated conversations with Sofia Coppola, Richard Linklater, Alexander Payne, and Susannah Grant, among others.

Prior to Sundance, Elson was the Thesis Production Supervisor at the American Film Institute for five years. She oversaw several award-winning graduate thesis films, notably the 2021 BAFTA student film winner APART, TOGETHER and the 2023 Sundance Film Festival short WE WERE MEANT TO. While at AFI, Elson developed a passion for sustainable production and created the Green Film School Alliance, which includes forty schools on four continents. She holds a BA in Communication and Film Studies from Concordia University and an MFA in Screenwriting from the American Film Institute.