Chelsea London Lloyd
Chelsea London Lloyd is an actor and comedian who appears as Emma Foster on Shifting Gears (ABC) as Tim Allen + Kat Denning’s grief counselor. TV credits include Ballard (MGM,) (HBO, Dir. Bill Hader) and Schooled (ABC) as well as national commercials with Mekanism, KC5, PrettyBird, etc., most notably in her 3-part Wayfair campaign with Kelly Clarkson. When she is not performing, you will find her volunteering as a grief counselor, DJ’ing Bat Mitzvahs and hosting her comedic grief podcast, Dying of Laughter. Because #YODO, you only die once. Lloyd holds a BA in Theatre from the University of Southern California.
Shmuel Hoffman
Born and raised in East Berlin, Shmuel began his career as a violist, performing with European orchestras and touring with Yo-Yo Ma after winning the Jeunesses Musicales International competition, before transitioning to film while exploring Jewish observance. He founded a production company and has created award-winning commercial and Oscar© qualifying documentary films for institutions such as the United States Holocaust Museum, Museum of Tolerance, Harvard University, Lexus, and MTV. A frequent speaker at the United Nations on Jewish identity and interfaith dialogue, he also serves on the Israeli President’s Voice of the People global council.
Janice (Jan) Fernheimer
Janice W. Fernheimer is a Professor of Writing, Rhetoric, and Digital Studies; Zantker Professor of Jewish Studies; and James B. Beam Institute for Kentucky Spirits Faculty Fellow at the University of Kentucky where she co-directs the University of Kentucky-Jewish Heritage Fund Kentucky Holocaust Education Initiative and teaches courses in “Bourbon Writing” and “Bourbon Oral History” in the Certificate for Distillation, Wine, and Brewing. She is also a Stave and Thief Certified Executive Bourbon Steward. In 2024 the Bourbon Women Foundation recognized her as a Woman of Whiskey with the Mike Keyes Ally of the Year Award honoring the trailblazing work of the Women in Bourbon Oral History Project, which she founded in 2021. She currently resides in Lexington, KY with her family and when she’s not writing or teaching, you can usually find her shimmying across the dance floor or cycling across the Bluegrass.
Rebecca Cunningham
Rebecca Cunningham is the Founder and CEO of Cordelia Studios, an award-winning kids’ podcast company. She started the kids’ podcast, Girl Tales in 2017 and has since helped build podcasts for Mattel, Realm, National Geographic, Spotify Kids & Family, Sony, America’s Test Kitchen, and tonies. She was honored with the Webby for Best Kids & Family Podcast Episode, a Signal Award, the Kennedy Center’s Next 50 Award, and The Gotham/Variety Audio Honors.
Marina Michelson
Marina Michelson is a writer, director, and actor originally from Tel Aviv, born to Soviet émigrés from the Republics of Georgia and Moldova. Her work explores identity and power through the everyday lives of women, as well as the rhythms of the contemporary immigrant experience. She holds a BFA in Theater from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and her short films have been recognized on the film festival circuit, including “Stagiaire,” which premiered at the 2021 Maryland Film Festival and “Biophilia,” which garnered the Outstanding Achievement Award for Best Screenplay at the 2018 Brooklyn Film Festival. She is currently in development on her first feature film, a coming-of-age refusenik story set in 1970s Soviet Union, with which she was a Top 50 Nicholl Fellowship semi-finalist, a Humanitas New Voices Fellowship semi-finalist, a 2024 fellow with NYU’s Production Lab Development Studio, and a 2025 recipient of NYU’s Production Lab Financing Slate.
Alex Mann
Alex Mann is a writer-director and the founder of Space Oddity, a next-gen content studio backed by Snap Inc. Mann has written feature films for several A-list production companies, including Platinum Dunes and Thunder Road Films. Mann’s short films have accumulated over a billion views and been featured by CNN, The Los Angeles Times and New York Magazine. He’s directed branded content for Netflix, TikTok, Amazon, Verizon and Honda. Outside of filmmaking, Mann is a contributing writer for VICE and The New Yorker. Mann is represented by Paradigm Talent Agency and The Gotham Group.
Robert Axelrod
Robert Axelrod is a gay Jewish writer based in Los Angeles, originally hailing from Michigan, whose work focuses on exploring the intersectionality of identity and culture. He is a past participant of the Warner Bros. Discovery Access Writers Program, Humanitas New Voices fellowship, CineStory TV fellowship, and is a previous winner of the ScreenCraft Stage Play Competition as well as The A-List, an annual competition honoring the best work by assistants in the entertainment industry.
Dan Goldman
Screenwriter, illustrator and narrative designer, Dan Goldman tells stories across comics, animation and video games. His graphic novel Chasing Echoes recounts a road trip of Holocaust survivors’ descendants across Poland to find their family’s land seized by Nazis during WWII. He is currently based in Brooklyn.
Josh Burstein
Josh Burstein is a standup comedian and journalist. A digital strategist who produced content for the Obama Administration and Biden campaigns, Josh works at the intersection of impact, education, and entertainment.
Alexandra Zahav
Alexandra Zahav is an actor, writer, director. She judges the top screenwriting competitions and coaches screenwriters, as well as facilitates Jewish spiritual dance workshops. She has spent over a decade focused on seeking knowledge and understanding of self, others, and God, and chasing ever-elusive wisdom.