Third Annual VSF Short Film Showcase Highlights Winners
Barry Hite’s SAINT LINDA swept the awards at the third annual VSF Short Film Showcase held at the Ashland Theatre. Hite’s comedic film won Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actress awards and tied for Best Screenplay with Adam Lapallo’s Ghost Light. Bob Eason’s DEAD won Best Actor. Eric Carlson’s MAGGIE CAMPBELL, co-directed by Adam Lapallo and Rachel Weatherly Grant, won Audience Choice. Maggie Campbell is VSF’s first funded production. At the showcase, Lapallo shared the film was recently selected as an Official Selection for the Magic of Horror Film Festival in October.
The 2024 filmmaker awards were judged by Richmond’s own Calvin “Jai” Jamison. A writer/Director, Jamison was most recently an executive story editor on the CW’s Superman & Lois, where he also directed an episode. He also worked on Steven Spielberg’s “Lincoln.”
Kathy Nguyen Li won $500 as the grand prize winner of the First Look, First Act (FAFL) Screenwriting Contest for NGUYEN OR LOSE. The D.C.-based writer’s feature screenplay, REFUGE, placed as a Semi-Finalist in the Academy Nicholl Fellowship, is Black List Recommended, and won her placement in the Women in Film and Video (WIFV)’s Narrative Script Development Fellowship in 2023.
Runner-up Vivian Owen, who co-wrote OCCULT DETECTIVE with Patrick Alexander, also attended the presentation. Owen wrote and script supervised the post-apocalyptic horror short, The Drove, which won Best Film in the Richmond 48 Hour Horror Film Project. Owen teaches in the Cinema department at VCU School of the Arts.
Patrick Alexander is a screenwriter, producer, and director based in Sarasota, FL, whose work has been showcased at film festivals around the world. He is the co-founder and co-director of The John Alexander Project, a 501c3 nonprofit that produces international stories for NPR's Morning Edition and All Things Considered.
Director, producer and writer Joy Kecken selected the 2024 FAFL awards, which included Honorable Mention for Debra M. Kamecke’s SUMMER OF GHOSTS. Kecken’s credits include Apple TV+’s “Swagger,” the critically acclaimed HBO series, “The Wire” and “Homicide: Life on the Street.”
The 2023 VSF Short Film Showcase was a night to remember. With more than 200 moviegoers in attendance and seven outstanding short films written and produced by members of the Forum this year, VSF’s second annual showcase nearly filled the historic Ashland Theatre for an afternoon of film screenings, Q&As, and award presentations. Legendary casting director Erica Arvold (Dopesick, House of Cards, Black Adam) came to announce the winner of this year’s First Act, First Look Screenwriting Contest, 36-time Emmy-winning director Jesse Vaughn (Juwanna Mann, Living in a Food Desert) announced the Audience Choice winner, and Swagger Executive Producer Joy Kecken recorded a special video appearance to announce her award selections for the films.
This year‘s guest judge is Erica Arvold, an Emmy nominated casting director, producer, writer/director, and educator. She has contributed to, participated in, or helmed the making of over 150 films, 90 television shows, and countless multimedia & commercial projects.