Filmmakers
Tracy Frazier – Director/Producer
Tracy Frazier began her deep dive into filmmaking in the editing department on the feature documentary Slam Planet: War of the Words. She then transitioned into production as an assistant director on the feature film Jumping Off Bridges (d. Kat Candler). Tracy went on to produce two short films, Swerve and Backroads (d. Brian Scofield). She currently oversees production accounting on shows such as Houdini's Last Secrets, UFOs: The Lost Evidence (both for Discovery), My 600 Lb Life (TLC), and starting with work on Shipping Wars (A&E). She began filming Leslie alongside Ruby C. Martin in 2010 when she was initially drawn to learning more about Leslie’s unique world view and unwittingly stumbled into making a commentary on empathy, motivation and resilience of the human spirit. BECOMING "LESLIE" is her directorial debut.
Lauren Barker – Producer/Post-Supervisor
Lauren is an Emmy award-winning producer and post-supervisor who enjoys balancing her passion for organization and love of storytelling. She has worked on a number of documentaries, docu-series, pilots, and television series, which have aired on HBO, Showtime, CNN, and PBS among others, including Emmy winning Disgraced, Academy Award nominated Last Days of Vietnam, and Emmy nominated Ethel. She most recently worked as a co-executive producer and post producer for 6-part docu-series, The Radical Story of Patty Hearst, on CNN.
Michelle Randolph Faires – Producer
Besides a founding member of the Becoming Leslie crew, productions have included the feature documentary on the legendary Broken Spoke dancehall, Honky Tonk Heaven that premiered at SXSW 2016 and earned an Audience Award. She was part of the producing team for Stand Up Empire (PBS, KLRU) a series showcasing the expansive comedy scene in Austin, Texas. Michelle has managed and been a part of multiple crowdfunding and fundraising events. including Leslie, Honky Tonk Heaven, A Song For You: The Austin City Limits Story, and Curious George Documentary. She recently helped develop a nationwide film contest that incorporated multiple partnerships with the Corpus Christi Visitors Bureau, Corpus Christi Film Commission, Production For Use and the Texas Film Commission resulting in the short Goodbye Sirena screening at several festivals that included Austin Film Festival. She is currently in production on the feature Fugitive Dreams, as well as a feature documentary about criminal justice reform.
Michelle began her career in production with the Austin Film Festival as the Festival & Conference Hospitality Coordinator before being invited to join the staff full-time as the Outreach and Community Coordinator, producing various programs such as the Membership program and the Dell Childrens Hospital Summer Film Series. She worked for aGLIFF, as the Volunteer Coordinator and Festival Manager, later serving a full three year term on the Board of Directors. She loves building community through film and besides serving on multiple panels, has created the very successful San Antonio Filmmakers Happy Hour, a monthly networking event that encourages diversity and collaboration for all skill levels in the greater SA area.
Ruby C. Martin – Original Story/Producer/Camera
Ruby is an artist and filmmaker who grew up in rural West Virginia. She specializes in experimental filmmaking through layering images as moving collages. Her silent short film Love Heroines brings together her fine art background and film, and gives a different perspective on the filmmaking process. While working at Wet Salon in Austin, Texas, Ruby began filming Becoming Leslie in 2005.
As a writer and director, Jonny has a gift for crafting story. He directed America’s Parking Lot, a documentary about Dallas Cowboys season ticket holders that premiered in 2012 at the SXSW Film Festival. As an actor, he can be seen in over 34 films including Kat Candler’s short turned feature Hellion, David Gordon Green’s drama Joe with Nicolas Cage. In addition to Hellion and Joe, which both premiered in 2014 at the SXSW Film Festival, Mars has also appeared in Computer Chess, Fourplay, The Happy Poet, Pit Stop, Saturday Morning Mystery, Slacker 2011, Somebody Up There Likes Me, and A Teacher over the past four years. Mars also worked with his Hellion director Kat Candler on the short film Black Metal. He stars in the upcoming narrative film Rogers Park by Cannes award-winner Kyle Henry.
Lee got his start as a camera assistant on the thriller remake DOA (1988) and met up with Richard Linklater the following year. The two teamed up on Slacker (1991) and Dazed and Confused (1993), with Lee acting as cinematographer and director of photography, respectively. He subsequently worked again with Linklater on Before Sunrise (1995), SubUrbia (1996), Before Sunset (2004), and Fast Food Nation (2006), with the most recent work on the Oscar® winning feature Boyhood (2014). Highlighted documentaries include Be Here To Love Me: A Film About Townes Van Zandt (2004), The Unforeseen (2007), You’re Gonna Miss Me (2005). Currently Lee is in post-production on projects including two documentaries Are We Not Men? (2015) the official documentary of the band DEVO and The Seer (2016) about novelist and poet Wendell Berry.
Russell O. Bush – Cinematographer
Russell O. Bush is a rural Alaskan turned filmmaker based in Brooklyn, NY. As a director and cinematographer he works in narrative fiction, documentary, and wildlife filmmaking. Russell's recent film VULTURES OF TIBET was nominated for a International Documentary Association Award for Best Short and a Student Academy Award for Best Documentary. VULTURES OF TIBET was lauded by Hitfix.com as "Remarkable depth of interpretation, as anthropological observation gives way to sobering socio-political commentary." Russell recently launched From The Woods, a Brooklyn film production company that makes original content, with longtime creative partner, Annie Bush.
Sandra has worked as a documentary film editor and producer since 1995. She has worked on several PBS productions and has a critical eye for telling one-character stories. As coordinating producer for the American Experience documentary George Wallace: Setting’ the Woods on Fire, Sandra won an Emmy for research. With her main focus on editing, she edited and co-produced a POV documentary entitled Last Man Standing and was one of the editors for an Independent Lens documentary Writ Writer, on the prison civil rights movement in Texas. She has worked as editor on two acclaimed local public television series, State of Tomorrow and Downtown, both of which won Lone Star Emmys. She was editor on a Sundance Preserve-funded documentary entitled Fighting Goliath: The Texas Coal Wars (Sundance Channel, 2008). Sandra co-edited the documentary When I Rise (Independent Lens, 2011), screened at SXSW Film Festival and Hot Docs, and was nominated for an IDA Documentary Award. She has also delved into the world of reality TV, editing for shows such as Shipping Wars and Quints by Surprise. Most recently, Sandra was part of an editing team on the successful docu-series High Profits in 2015 as part of the CNN Original Series.
Austin Tighe - Executive Producer
Austin Tighe is an attorney and long-time supporter of the arts in Austin. He routinely provides no-cost legal assistance to local musicians in a wide range of non-musical areas of need. He is on the national board of directors of Justice For Children, a child advocacy group, and for years chaired the People's Law School, an annual event providing free legal education and guidance to the Austin community. His law practice focuses primarily on consumer and civil rights.
Louis Black – Executive Producer
Louis co-founded The Austin Chronicle, where he is editor, South by Southwest, where he is a director, and was a founding Board Member of the Austin Film Society. He has written extensively on film, music and politics. Executive producer of Be Here to Love Me, A Film About Townes Van Zandt, he was a producer on the Peabody Award Winning The Order of Myths. Having produced documentaries and reissues of classic Texas films (Eagle Pennell's The Whole Shootin' Match and Tobe Hooper's Eggshells), he is currently working on a number of documentary and narrative films as well as more reissues of classic Texas independent films. His most recent film, Richard Linklater - Dream is Destiny premiered at Sundance in 2016.
Christian Archer – Executive Producer
Nationally recognized democratic political strategist, Christian Archer, is the Founder of the San Antonio-based The Archer Group, a firm dedicated to winning at all things government, politics and commercial development. His impressive client base includes Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff, San Antonio Mayor Julián Castro, U.S. Congressman Joaquín Castro, Houston Mayor Bill White, and San Antonio Mayor Phil Hardberger, among others. Decades of serving in the worlds of politics and government function have created a perfect framework for yet another phase of his professional life, filmmaker and author. Christian simultaneously penned his first novel while in production on a feature length documentary about the need for criminal justice reform. The film is set to lock this fall, while the book is in the final stages of editing.
Why be an Executive Producer on BECOMING LESLIE? During the 2003 Austin mayoral campaign, a young strategist filled in last minute for his then-candidate Will Wynn who was trapped in traffic with a flat tire. Among the debaters? Jennifer Gale and Leslie Cochran.
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