Award-winning documentary team Fisher Stevens and Mark Monroe, in partnership with East Pleasant Pictures, have selected The Lake Tanganyika Floating Health Clinic as the subject of its next feature-length documentary film.
LTFHC Creates Short Film in Collaboration with Sundance Institute and the Gates Foundation
In the fall of 2010, Sundance Institute partnered with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation on a special collaborative project, designed to harness the power of film to create communities and inspire action on issues related to global health, poverty and education. Six short documentary films commissioned by the Institute’s Documentary Film Program, including the LTFHC’s Dear Mothers, are part of a multi-platform communications initiative of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which plans to share the films online and at speeches and public events around the world.
Mark Monroe, Director; Lisa Cole, Producer; Fisher Stevens, Producer;
Dr. Amy Lehman, Executive Producer
Dear Mothers highlights the extraordinary challenges and hard-won successes around maternal and newborn healthcare in Moba, DRC, a region along the shore of Lake Tanganyika, in southern Africa.
Fisher Stevens (Director/Producer)
Fisher Stevens is an actor, director and a producer. He has appeared in over 40 stage productions including the Tony award winning Torch Song Trilogy, Brighton Beach Memoirs and Carousel. He also co-founded Naked Angels Theater in New York City, where he acted, produced and starred in over 30 productions. The company is still producing plays after 20 years. He has appeared in over 50 Motion Pictures and Television programs. Films include: The Flamingo Kid, Short Circuit, The Marrying Man, Hackers, Reversal of Fortune, Awake, and the upcoming Gringos in Rio. On television he was a regular on CBS’s Early Edition and Key West, and also appeared on Friends, Frasier, Law and Order and Lost; he recently produced and starred in the upcoming pilot for NBC’s The Grean Teem. In 1996, along with John Penotti, Fisher founded GreeneStreet Films where he directed Just a Kiss with Marisa Tomei, Kyra Sedgwick and Taye Diggs. He produced or executive-produced over 15 films including 5-time Academy Award nominated In The Bedroom, Swimfan, Uptown Girls, A Prairie Home Companion, the upcoming Tenderness with Russell Crowe and the critically acclaimed documentary Once in a Lifetime. Last year he produced and co-directed along with Dan Klores the Independent Spirit Award winner for best documentary Crazy Love. He has just completed the documentary The Cove, which won the audience award at last year’s Sundance Film Festival and was released by Lionsgate/Roadside Attractions July 2009. The Cove has won numerous awards in film festivals around the world, and has been an effective tool for policy change and awareness.
Mark Monroe (Writer/Director)
An award-winning documentary filmmaker and freelance producer/writer, Mark has over fifteen years of experience in all facets of production – writing, producing, directing and editing. After more than a decade in television, Mark began writing for the big screen. His on-screen credits include: writer, Once in a Lifetime: The Extraordinary Story of the New York Cosmos, the critically-acclaimed Miramax/ESPN documentary released worldwide July 2006 (W.G.A. nomination “Best Documentary Script”, January 2007); writer, Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who, produced by Spitfire Pictures and VH1 Films – released in 2007 by Universal Pictures, nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award; writer/director, Morning Light, produced by Roy Disney and released theatrically by Disney Pictures October 2008; and most recently – writer The Cove, AUDIENCE AWARD WINNER Sundance Film Festival January 2009.
Television credits include: Supervising Producer, Fearless first two seasons (Outdoor Life Network/Asylum Entertainment); Producer/Development Executive (20 episodes), Beyond the Glory (Fox Sports Net/Asylum Entertainment); Producer, Behind the Music (Vh1); Intimate Portrait: Oksana Baiul (Lifetime); Story Producer, Project Greenlight (HBO/Miramax); Writer, Titanic: Secrets Revealed; Producer, LA Medical; The Greatest: Muhammad Ali (nominated for NAACP Award); Commander in Chief: Richard Nixon, George Bush & Bill Clinton (Discovery/TLC); Producer, Extra (Warner Brothers TV); Feed Your Mind (TBS); Writer/Associate Producer, Headline News (CNNHN) & Newsnight (CNN).
East Pleasant is an award-winning production company specializing in TV commercials, film and documentaries. With over 20 years combined experience, their directors and DPs have traversed the world shooting beautiful imagery and capturing pertinent stories that reflect the most pressing global issues of our times. The team includes Xander Strohm/director, Damien Drake/Director-DP, Stash Slionski/Director-DP, David Weinstein/director and Sarah Roebuck/executive producer.
In addition to producing Lake Tanganyika/Floating Health Clinic, East Pleasant’s most recent work includes the six-time Emmy nominated TV program “Knick’s Poetry Slam” for MSG (including a nod for Best Documentary), theatrical film “Regina Spektor: Live in London”, “Stiller & Meara” webisodes, and two Nissan car commercials, amongst other projects. In the summer of 2010 East Pleasant began a strategic partnership with Spanish-based Garage Films to represent their directors in the US general and Hispanic market. They share offices in New York, Los Angeles, Barcelona and Madrid.
eastpleasant.com