Marcie Bloom Fellowship in Film, the New York-based mentorship program behind Hasan Hadi’s “The President’s Cake” and Antoneta Alamat Kusijanovic’s “Murina” announced the participating filmmakers for its Milestone 18th edition.
The 2025–2026 roster includes five new voices from global cinemas from a variety of backgrounds: Owain Astles, Sara Bouthorabi, Mariano Dongo, Roxy Moskowitz, and Leon Ristov.
Since its founding in 2009, The Thring Fellowship has trained more than 85 filmmakers from over 20 countries that have unveiled its first features at major international festivals such as Sundance, Berlin and Cannes. He worked on highly acclaimed television series and even tried Broadway.
Both Alamat Kusijanovic and Hadi won the Camera Doll Award for Best First Film in Cannes in 2021 and 2025, along with “Murina” and “The President’s Cake” respectively. Hadi also won the Director Director’s Audience Award for “The President’s Cake,” which was acquired by Sony Pictures Classics, recently announced as an Iraqi official submission to the 2026 Academy Awards.
Past Mercy Bloom Fellows also include Ellie Humbie from “Our Father, The Devil,” which premiered in Venice. Raven Jackson’s film “The Salt Taste of All Unpaved Roads” has opened at Sundance. Bernardo Britto with “Omni Loop” played on SXSW. Sarna Lapine directed Jake Gyllenhaal in the revival of Stephen Sondheim’s Sunday in the Park With George With George. Jason Kim performed the musical “KPOP” in a circle at Square Theater on Broadway. Silka Luisa is the creator of the Apple TV+ series “Shining Girls,” starring Elizabeth Moss, Wagner Moura and Jamie Bell.
“As we reach our 18th year, we look back with great pride in the fellowship and its extraordinary participant journey,” said Dylan Reiner and Alex Ullman, co-founders and co-directors of the program.
“These filmmakers are not only talented storytellers, but also deeply curious and culturally involved individuals. The fact that they represent over 20 countries and often tell stories that are rooted in their own community is truly remarkable.
Astles is a film director and producer based between New York, Bristol and London. He previously worked at Inside Job Productions, where he co-directed films with men in a London prison. He is currently studying in the graduation film program at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, developing his first feature film, “An Arrival of the Ensemble on Young People Experiencing Homelessness at Bristol.”
A graduate of Columbia University and an MFA, Boutorabi is based in New York City. Her 2024 short film, Vitajun, premiered at Palm Springs Short Fest about an Iranian woman with terminal cancer, and received a special mention of the best US student shorts. “Bitajun” also won the Great Jue Prize in Slam Dance for Best Narrative Short. She is post-production with her new short story, “Day of Fire,” and is currently developing her debut feature.
Dongo is a Peruvian writer, director and producer whose film has been screened at several festivals, including Palm Springs. His 2023 short “Mucho Mucho Amor” was recently commissioned by Mass Moca for a live score presentation. Selected as one of Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 Faces of Independent Film,” Dongo holds MFAs from NYU’s Graduate Film Program. He is now a producer partner and co-author Carrie Mason, whose Moment of Truth, develops in an urban horror film surrounded by Queens apartments following a clash between the building’s supermarket and a group of young residential activists.
Moskowitz is a writer-director from Brooklyn, who grew up in an ultra-orthodox Jewish family. The MFA candidate for NYU’s Graduate Film Programme announced her 2022 short film Sunday With Monica at Indie Memphis and the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival. She is currently developing the first feature on internet addicts who run away to Thailand to train Muay Thai. She is also involved in post-production of a new short film about a boy who believes she is the Messiah.
Listophe is a Macedonian filmmaker based in New York. He holds an MFA in script and director from Columbia University. His short film, “I’m Calling Your Fasers,” premiered at the Sarajevo Film Festival, screened at festivals around the world, and won two grand prizes. His upcoming projects are supported by the Sundance Ignite Fellowship and Clermont-Ferrand Euro Connection.
For nine months, these emerging filmmakers will be supported through intimate and monthly conversations with industry leaders and peers as part of their Mercy Bloom Fellowships.
