FISHMONGER

Neil Ferron is a second year Directing Fellow at the AFI Conservatory. As a playwright, his work has received Critics’ Picks from The Seattle Times, Seattle Magazine, and The Seattle Weekly, as well as nominations for a Gregory Award (2011, Best Playwright) and a Stranger Genius Award (2014, The Satori Group). In 2014, he moved to filmmaking, starting with music videos. His music videos have been screened at national festivals and premiered by Rolling Stone, Pitchfork, and Stereogum. His work has been described as “wonderfully surreal” (Sub Pop Records), “shocking, horrific and just a little bit funny” (Rolling Stone), and a “Ph.D testing of a calculated hypothesis on what ‘works’ on the human consciousness” (Seattle Weekly).

Neil holds an Honors BA in Literature and Creative Writing from Santa Clara University, a creative writing certificate from Stanford University, and--thanks to a George J. Mitchell Scholarship--an MPhil in Theatre and Performance from Trinity College Dublin. He will be receiving his MFA in Film Directing from the AFI Conservatory in 2020.

Jack McDonald is a second-year Fellow at the AFI Conservatory, where he will earn his MFA in Cinematography in spring 2020. He previously earned his BFA in Film & TV from NYU Tisch School of the Arts. Before AFI, he worked in the grip and electric departments on dozens of feature films, including as gaffer on the award-winning THE RIDER (2018) and GOOD TIME (2017), both of which premiered at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival. He has gaffed numerous commercials including for Ford, Google, LG, and ESPN, and music videos such as for Pussy Riot and Pusha T. Outside of his work for AFI, his DP credits include the short films SKETCH (dir. Mariama Diallo), which premiered at Lincoln Center’s African Film Festival; BUG BITE (dir. Emily Ann Hoffman), which is currently playing festivals including the 2019 Palm Springs ShortFest, Maryland Film Festival, and the upcoming AFI FEST; and COFFEE SHOP NAMES (dir. Deepak Sethi), which won the 2019 Soho House ScriptHouse contest, and is currently submitting to festivals for 2020. He has also shot a variety of work on super8, 16mm, and 35mm, including a music video for a recent AFI graduate, a concert documentary, and an upcoming USC MFA thesis film.

Augustine So is a graduate of University of Hong Kong, with a Bachelor of Business Administration (Information Systems) and Master of Arts in Literary and Cultural Studies. His dissertation is titled "Auteur in 3 Minutes: Authorship in Music Video." He served as the editor and producer on Jason Joseph's short film, THE WINDSOR PARADOX. He also worked on Seamus Walsh's documentary WING CHUN as the Editor and Louis Papachristou's feature film WHEN THE SUN RISES as Assistant Editor.

Alexandra Dennis-Renner was born and raised just outside of Omaha, Nebraska before eventually relocating to New York City.

An alumna of Sarah Lawrence College and University College London, Alex majored in political science and creative writing, later joining the independent media streaming platform, SnagFilms, as a content acquisitions and development associate.

After years of making short films, sketches, and music videos “just for fun,” she found herself at the AFI Conservatory as a Fellow in the Screenwriting program, where she’s now in her second year with the hopes of continuing to write feature films, television episodics, and grow a body of work that her parents don’t totally understand but will tell their friends about regardless.