Behind the Scenes with the Creative Team
Jenny Mackenzie
Director and Producer
Jenny is an award-winning documentary filmmaker who produces films that promote social change. Her films include Kick Like a Girl, Sugar Babies, Lead with Love, Dying in Vein, the 2018 Sundance and Emmy-award winning film Quiet Heroes, and the groundbreaking 2023 film The Right to Read. Jenny’s films have aired on top broadcast and video-on-demand channels such as HBO, HULU, PBS, and Amazon, and have received praise in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The Hollywood Reporter, and Variety.
Jenny has received grant support from Chicken & Egg Films, Artemis Rising Foundation, The Sorenson Legacy Foundation, The Fledgling Fund, The Larry H. Miller Foundation, and The Eccles Foundation. Jenny has a Bachelor's degree from Brown University, a Ph.D. from the University of Utah, and is an Assistant Professor in Film Production at Utah Valley University.
She is based in Salt Lake City.
Yennie Lee
Producer
Yennie brings over ten years of experience in philanthropy, design, social innovation, and storytelling for social change, having worked at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, IDEO, and Participant Media.
She has led award-winning social impact campaigns for both narrative and documentary films, including Dark Waters (Focus Features), American Utopia (HBO), Final Account (Focus Features), Found (Netflix), Last Flight Home (MTV Documentary Films), and The Right to Read (Tribeca Films).
She won a Shorty Impact Award for the Fight Forever Chemicals campaign in 2020 and the Literacy is Freedom campaign in 2024. In 2024, she also won an Anthem Award in the Awareness—Special Projects category for Literacy is Freedom. Additionally, she received a Bronze Cannes Lion in the Good Health and Wellbeing—Sustainable Development Goals category in 2021.
She is based in Los Angeles.
Carly Besser
Associate Producer and Assistant Editor
Carly is an Assistant Editor and Producer for documentary films. She studied film editing through the Manhattan Edit Workshop, and received a graduate degree in Narrative Medicine from Columbia University.
Prior to her work in post-production, she developed impact campaigns for both documentary and narrative films and series from Participant Media, including America to Me (Starz), American Factory (Netflix), Collective (Magnolia Pictures), and The First Wave (Hulu).
She is based in New York City.
Rose Bush
Director of Photography
Rose is the Director of Photography for the Oscar-winning film Colette. She holds an MFA in Film Production from the University of Texas at Austin, where her thesis film, Vultures of Tibet, was nominated for an International Documentary Association Award and a Student Academy Award.
She is the Director of Photography for Nicole Newnham's The Disappearance of Shere Hite, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2023. Rose was also a Director of Photography on Kathryn Bigelow’s limited series Year Zero, which had its world premiere at the Tribeca Festival in 2022.
Her films have premiered at SXSW, AFI Docs, and Mountainfilm and have been distributed by IFC Films, The Guardian, The New Yorker, National Geographic, Hulu, Dogwoof, Netflix, and more.
She is based in Los Angeles.
Franci Virgili
Design Director and Animator
Franci is a designer whose work spans visual storytelling, architecture, and the built environment. With a background in fine arts and an MFA from Yale School of Art, she has led projects in branding, environmental graphics, wayfinding, and motion design.
Her work has been recognized with awards including a Gensler Design Excellence Award, a D&AD Wood Pencil, and a Bronze Cannes Lion. She has collaborated with firms and institutions such as Brooklyn Museum, Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, OMA, 2x4, and büro uebele and has contributed to academia as a guest critic at Washington State University, Howard University, Tuskegee University, Florida A&M University, Pratt Institute, and Parsons School of Design.
She is based in Seattle.