The final Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah, is a little over a week away, and organizers are putting the finishing touches on what will be a historic event. This morning, the festival revealed the juries that cover competition slates such as U.S. Dramatic, U.S. Documentary, World Cinema, NEXT, and the Short Film competition. Notably, in a classy move, the festival has invited former Festival Director John Cooper, who ran Sundance from 2010 to 2020, and Trevor Goth, a beloved one-time Director of Programming, to serve on the NEXT jury.
READ MORE: Chloe Zhao, Nia DaCosta and Geeta Gandbhir To Be Honored At 2026 Sundance Film Festival
The U.S. Dramatic jury includes Janicza Bravo, whose film “Zola” debuted at Sundance in 2020, Nisha Ganatra, whose film “Late Night” premiered in Park City in 2019 (and just directed the global hit “Freakier Friday”), and Azazel Jacobs, whose film credits include “His Three Daughters,” “French Exit,” and “Momma’s Man” and “Terri,” both of which debuted at Sundance.
Other jury members include. Natalia Almada, Jennie Livingston, Ana Katz, So Yong Kim, Toni Kamau, Kirsten Schaffer, Martin Starr, A.V. Rockwell, and Nicole Perlman, among others.
In a statement, Eugene Hernandez, Director, Sundance Film Festival and Public Programming, noted, “This year’s jury represents a rare depth of creative conviction and exceptional range, made up of artists and thinkers who know what it means to take risks. They bring curiosity, rigor, and a deep respect for bold storytelling, qualities that are essential to discovering the films that will define the future of independent cinema.”
Kim Yutani, the Festival’s Director of Programming, added, “Planning this special year, it felt especially meaningful to invite a slate of jurors who have a rich history with the Festival, all deeply rooted in the creative community they will now help champion. It’s a full-circle way to honor many of the artists, partners, and industry members who have played such a pivotal role in shaping the Sundance Film Festival’s legacy for more than 40 years.”
In-person audiences will participate in selecting the 2026 Audience Awards, which features films in the U.S. Competition, World Competition, and NEXT slates. Moviegoers will also have the opportunity to vote for the Festival Favorite, chosen from all in-person eligible feature film screenings. The Audience Awards will be announced at the Awards Ceremony on Friday, January 30.
The 2026 Sundance Film Festival will be held in-person and online between Thursday, January 22, and Sunday, February 1.
A breakdown of this year’s jury members, featuring bios provided by the festival, is as follows:
U.S. DRAMATIC COMPETITION JURY
Janicza Bravo is a writer and director mostly but sometimes an actor. Her film Zola led the 2022 Film Independent Spirit Awards after premiering at the Sundance Film Festival. And her debut feature, Lemon, also premiered at the Festival in 2017. She has directed extensively in television, including a limited series, The Listeners, for BBC.
Nisha Ganatra was awarded the Cannes Lions Grand Prix for Film Craft: Direction for #wombstories. She directed Late Night, starring Emma Thompson and Mindy Kaling, which premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, and The High Note,starring Tracee Ellis Ross. She directed Freakier Friday, starring Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan, which broke box office records for a theatrical comedy release. Ganatra’s debut feature, Chutney Popcorn, won awards at the Berlin International Film Festival, Newport Beach Film Festival, Outfest, and more.
Azazel Jacobs wrote and directed His Three Daughters, one of 2024’s most acclaimed films, winning Gotham and Film Independent Spirit Awards. He previously directed French Exit, which earned Michelle Pfeiffer a Golden Globe nomination. His earlier work includes The Lovers as well as Momma’s Man and Terri, which both premiered at the Sundance Film Festival.
U.S. DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION JURY
Natalia Almada is a 2012 MacArthur “Genius” fellow and two-time recipient of the Sundance Film Festival Directing Award: U.S. Documentary for El General in 2009 and Users in 2021. Almada’s directing credits include Todo lo demás (2016 New York Film Festival), El Velador (2011 Cannes Film Festival), Al Otro Lado (2005 Tribeca Film Festival), and All Water Has a Perfect Memory (2002 Sundance Film Festival). She lives in Mexico City and San Francisco.
Justin Chang is a film critic for The New Yorker and NPR’s Fresh Air. He won the 2024 Pulitzer Prize for Criticism for his writing at the Los Angeles Times. He chairs the National Society of Film Critics and is a member of the New York Film Festival selection committee.
Jennie Livingston’s Paris Is Burning won the Grand Jury Prize: Documentary at the 1991 Sundance Film Festival. In 2022, The New York Times named it one of the 10 best films of all time. Livingston has made multiple short films, directs for live performance and television, and is creating Earth Camp One, a film about loss and queer identity.
WORLD CINEMA DRAMATIC COMPETITION JURY
Ana Katz is an actress, screenwriter, and director. She directed the feature films Los Marziano, Mi Amiga del Parque, and The Dog Who Wouldn’t Be Quiet. Her films have premiered at the Cannes Film Festival, the Sundance Film Festival, and the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival. She has written and directed theatrical works and has directed television series for Hulu, Netflix, and Amazon Prime Video. Katz is working on her next film, Águilas Plateadas.
So Yong Kim is an award-winning Korean American filmmaker. Kim received a Special Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival for her debut feature, In Between Days. Her acclaimed second feature, Treeless Mountain, filmed in Kim’s hometown in South Korea, garnered numerous awards. Kim’s subsequent features, For Ellen and Lovesong, also premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Kim directed episodes of TV shows like ABC’s American Crime, HBO’s Room 104 and Divorce, and Apple TV’s Roar.
Tatiana Maslany is an actor with over 30 years of credits, including her Emmy Award–winning performances in Orphan Black. Her most recent credits include Osgood Perkins’ Keeper, The Monkey, and Apple TV’s upcoming Maximum Pleasure Guaranteed. Her performance in Grown Up Movie Star won her a Special Jury Prize at the 2010 Sundance Film Festival.
WORLD CINEMA DOCUMENTARY COMPETITION JURY
Toni Kamau is a News and Documentary Emmy– and Peabody Award–nominated producer who grew up in Kenya watching rerun sitcoms and international news on the state broadcaster — her only window to the wider world. Traveling later deepened her fascination with how stories shape understanding. Her nonfiction credits include Softie (2020 Sundance Film Festival), I Am Samuel, and The Battle for Laikipia (2024 Sundance Film Festival). She is a member of the PGA and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Documentary Branch.
Bao Nguyen is a Vietnamese American filmmaker and a founding partner of EAST Films. He directed Be Water, The Greatest Night in Pop, and The Stringer, all of which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. The Greatest Night in Pop won a PGA Award and a Critics’ Choice Award and was nominated for a Primetime Emmy and a Grammy. His work has been recognized at major festivals worldwide, including Cannes, Berlinale, SXSW, and Telluride.
Kirsten Schaffer is the CEO of Women in Film (WIF) and a nationally recognized advocate for inclusive storytelling. With over 20 years of leadership in independent film at WIF and Outfest, she has built innovative artist programs and transformative global partnerships. She has advanced industrywide gender equity through strategic initiatives that expand opportunities for women and underrepresented filmmakers.
NEXT JURY
John Cooper is the artistic director of the newly opened True West Film Center in Healdsburg, California. For three decades, Cooper was a member of the Sundance Film Festival programming team and served as its director from 2010–2020, expanding ventures to bring the Festival to Brooklyn, London, and Hong Kong. He is co-host of the podcast The Film That Blew My Mind.
Trevor Groth, former Sundance Film Festival director of programming, helped launch many of today’s defining filmmakers and expanded the Festival’s global reach. Now at 30WEST, he applies decades of curatorial and industry expertise to source, finance, and champion bold film and television projects to elevate exceptional storytelling and ambitious new work.
SHORT FILM PROGRAM COMPETITION JURY
Liv Constable-Maxwell is publishing director at the London-based publisher MACK developing books on cinema and visual art. She has worked with notable filmmakers, including Sofia Coppola, Chloé Zhao, Jonathan Glazer, and RaMell Ross and collaborates with A24 on its book publishing.
A.V. Rockwell is a Queens-born filmmaker whose debut feature, A Thousand and One,earned the 2023 Sundance Film Festival U.S. Dramatic Grand Jury Prize. A Sundance Institute Directors and Screenwriters Lab alumna, she explores urban life and sociopolitical issues with a distinctive personal voice. Her short film Feathers screened at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival and was later acquired and distributed by Searchlight Pictures.
Martin Starr was plucked from obscurity by casting director Allison Jones for the acclaimed TV series Freaks and Geeks. He has gone on to star in Party Down, Silicon Valley, and the recent Spider-Man trilogy. He has appeared in numerous Sundance Film Festival projects over the years, including I’ll See You in My Dreams (2015 Sundance Film Festival) and Honey Boy (2019 Sundance Film Festival). He started a candy company called Sweet Stash, inspired by his love of well-made candy.
ALFRED P. SLOAN FEATURE FILM PRIZE JURY
Sophie Barthes is a Franco-American filmmaker. A Sundance Institute Directors and Screenwriters Lab alumna, her directorial feature debut, Cold Souls, starring Paul Giamatti and Emily Watson, played in competition at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival and more than 30 festivals around the world. Her second feature, Madame Bovary, was released in 2015 after premiering at Telluride and Toronto Film Festivals. Her film The Pod Generation with Emilia Clarke and Chiwetel Ejiofor premiered at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival.
Dr. Heather Berlin is a neuroscientist, clinical psychologist, and Associate Clinical Professor of
Psychiatry and Neuroscience at Mount Sinai. A leading voice on the brain, creativity, and
consciousness, she hosts PBS’s Your Brain and the Science of Perception Box podcast, blending
science and storytelling to explore what makes us human.
Dr. Andrea Ghez, Leichtman & Levine Professor at UCLA, is one of the world’s leading
experts in astronomy. In 2020, she became the fourth woman to be awarded the Nobel Prize in
Physics for her discovery of a massive black hole in the center of our galaxy. She appears in several documentaries on NOVA and PBS and an upcoming IMAX film.
Ari Handel joined Protozoa Pictures, where he is Darren Aronofsky’s producing and writing partner, after completing his doctorate in neuroscience in 2000. In addition to working on Protozoa’s features, Handel has been an executive producer on all of their science series, including National Geographic’s One Strange Rock, Limitless, and their sequels.
Nicole Perlman is known for co-writing Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain Marvel, and Detective Pikachu. She has won Tribeca’s Sloan Grant, the Hugo Award, and the Ray Bradbury Award. Perlman has been a creative advisor at Sundance Institute’s Screenwriters Lab; mentored for Global Media Makers, Women in Film, and the Black List; and served as Director of the Oxbelly Screenwriters Program. She is developing original series for FX and Netflix and executive-producing Dick Wolf’s procedural CIA, premiering 2026.
Follow Gregory Ellwood on Bluesky
Follow Gregory Ellwood on Threads
Follow Gregory Ellwood on Instagram
Sign Up For The Breakdown Newsletter
