The third annual Athena Film Festival, co-founded by our own Melissa Silverstein, has announced the recipients for this year’s Athena Film Festival Awards, which honor actors, directors, producers and others involved in the film community for their contributions and leadership.
This year Gale Anne Hurd, producer of AMC’s The Walking Dead will receive The Laura Ziskin Lifetime Achievement Award. Other award recipients include Ava DuVernay, director of Middle of Nowhere and founder of the African American Film Festival Releasing Movement (AFFRM); Rose Kuo, Executive Director of the Film Society of Lincoln Center; Molly Haskell, film critic and author of From Reverence to Rape: The Treatment of Women in the Movies; and Pat Mitchell, president and CEO of The Paley Center for Media.
Hurd is thrilled to be receiving this award:
The Athena Film Festival does such an excellent job in highlighting THE MANY TALENTED WOMEN WORKING IN the film industry. To be selected as the recipient of this year’s Laura Ziskin Lifetime Achievement Award is TRULY an honor and I thank them for this recognition.
This year, the Artemis Rising Foundation will be a founding sponsor and The Ford Foundation’s JustFilms is a premiere sponsor. The festival co-chairs include Regina Kulik Scully, Debra Martin Chase, Diablo Cody, Greta Gerwig, Diane and Jon Levin and Mira Nair.
The Athena Film Festival will be held at Barnard College in New York from February 7-10, 2013. Check the Athena Film Festival site for pass and ticket information as well as an upcoming full schedule release. See full press release here.
