Filmmaker will be repped worldwide for commercials, branded content
Director Sterlin Harjo is joining the Hungry Man directing roster for worldwide representation spanning commercials and branded content.
A member of the Seminole Nation, Harjo has Muskogee heritage and is from Holdenville, Okla. Now based in Tulsa, Harjo is the co-creator and showrunner of Reservation Dogs (FX Productions), a comedy series following four Indigenous teenage friends living on a reservation in Oklahoma. After its first season, Reservation Dogs won a 2022 Peabody Award, 2022 Television Academy Honors Award, 2022 Independent Spirit Award for Best Comedy Series, was an American Film Institute Awards Honoree, and won Best Breakthrough Series under 40 minutes at the 2021 Gotham Awards. The series– co-created by Taika Waititi, who too is on the commercialmaking roster of Hungry Man–is now in its second season.
Currently, Harjo’s series Poster Girls, which he co-wrote with bestselling novelist Jonathan Lee, is in development with FX Productions. Paramount+ recently acquired Harjo's series Yellowbird, which he is co-creating with Erica Tremblay. The show is based on Sierra Crane Murdoch’s novel of the same name.
LeBron James’s company, SpringHill, is producing Rezball (Netflix), a series Harjo co-wrote with Sydney Freeland. Harjo has several other projects in development.
Over his career, Harjo has created and directed five feature films: three narrative dramas and two documentaries. His most recent feature, Love and Fury, is a documentary chronicling the work and intersection of over a dozen contemporary Native American artists. Love and Fury was acquired by Ava DuVernay’s ARRAY and released on Netflix in December 2021. The film premiered at the 2021 Hot Docs International Documentary Festival and was an official selection of the Seattle International Film Festival, Virginia Film Festival, and DeadCenter Film Festival.
Harjo’s first feature film, Four Sheets to the Wind, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2007 and was nominated for the Grand Jury Prize. His feature documentary, This May Be the Last Time, premiered at Sundance in 2014. His most recent narrative feature, Mekko, premiered at the 2015 Los Angeles Film Festival and had its international premiere at Toronto International Film Festival. Each of his films are set in Oklahoma and address contemporary Indigenous experiences.
A founding member of the Native sketch comedy troupe, the 1491s, Harjo co-wrote the group’s play, “Between Two Knees,” an intergenerational comedic love story/musical set against the backdrop of true events in Native American history. “Between Two Knees” was commissioned in 2018/2019 by the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and New Native Theater. In 2022, it completed a run at Yale Repertory Theater.
Hungry Man managing partner Mino Jarjoura said that the company is “honored to begin working with a filmmaker with as much raw talent and commitment to the craft as Sterlin has,”
Full Lineup Set For AFI Fest; Official Selections Span 44 Countries, Include 9 Best International Feature Oscar Submissions
The American Film Institute (AFI) has unveiled the full lineup for this year’s AFI Fest, taking place in Los Angeles from October 23-27. Rounding out the slate of already announced titles are such highlights as September 5 directed by Tim Fehlbaum, All We Imagine As Light directed by Payal Kapadia, The Luckiest Man in America directed by Samir Oliveros (AFI Class of 2019), Zurawski v. Texas from executive producers Hillary Clinton, Chelsea Clinton and Jennifer Lawrence and directors Maisie Crow and Abbie Perrault, and Oh, Canada directed by Paul Schrader (AFI Class of 1969). A total of 158 films are set to screen at the 38th edition of AFI Fest.
Of the official selections, 48% are directed by women and non-binary filmmakers and 26% are directed by BIPOC filmmakers.
Additional festival highlights include documentaries Architecton directed by Victor Kossakovsky; Cheech & Chong’s Last Movie directed by David Bushell; Devo directed by Chris Smith about the legendary new wave provocateurs; Gaucho Gaucho directed by Michael Dweck and Gregory Kershaw; Group Therapy directed by Neil Berkeley with Emmy® winner Neil Patrick Harris and Tig Notaro; No Other Land directed by a Palestinian-Israeli team comprised of Basel Adra, Yuval Abraham, Rachel Szor and Hamdan Ballal; Pavements directed by Alex Ross Perry; and Separated directed by Errol Morris. Notable narrative titles include Black Dog (Gou Zen) directed by Guan Hu; Bonjour Tristesse directed by Durga Chew-Bose with Academy Award® nominee Chloë Sevigny; Caught By The Tides directed by Jia Zhangke; Hard Truths directed by Mike Leigh with... Read More