Emily Abt

Selected as one of Variety Magazine's 'Top 10 Directors to Watch', Emily Abt is an ambidextrous filmmaker who has directed five features. Abt's narrative feature "Toe to Toe" was nominated for the Grand Jury Award at the Sundance Film Festival and theatrically released nationwide by Strand. The film featured a critically acclaimed break-out performances by Sonequa Martin-Green and Louisa Krause. Abt's upcoming fiction feature project "Thirsty" won the Athena Award for scripts featuring outstanding female protagonists and is being produced by Jeff Allard, cast by Charlene Lee and Executive Produced by Sung Kang and Arin Hahn. Slated for production in late 2022, the film stars Jamie Neumann, Sung Kang, Mustafa Shakir and Kyra Sedgwick. Abt is also developing a Berkeley based episodic series entitled "Pureland". Abt's first feature documentary "Take It From Me" (PBS's POV series) was created when she was a 23 year-old caseworker in New York City. She then went on to receive her MFA in film directing from Columbia University and was awarded a Fulbright fellowship to make her thesis film. Abt's other feature documentaries include "All Of Us" (Showtime's 2008 World AIDs Day film) and "Daddy Don't Go" which was executive produced by the actors/activists Omar Epps and Malik Yoba. The film won eight "Best Documentary" awards and premiered on the Starz network in 2017. In 2018 Abt was tapped by Showtime to direct the feature documentary feature "Beyond the Opposite Sex" about two transgender people living in rural America. It premiered on the network in Spring 2018. Abt is also a seasoned documentary cinematographer and branded content director who has created films for clients such as Microsoft, Johnson & Johnson and Oracle. She shot and directed the short film "Born A Fighter" which was commissioned by 23andMe and premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival in 2019. In 2021 she was hired by producer George Rush ("Sorry to Bother You", "Burn Country", etc) to co-write the feature comedy "Unborn" and is also attached to direct. She is a Consulting Producer on three feature documentaries: "Raising Khan", "Suzy" and "Transcending". Abt was a Brooklyn based filmmaker for 20 years who moved to the Bay area in 2016 with her husband (UC Berkeley Professor Shamik Dasgupta) and their two daughters. She is a member of New Day Films, Free the Bid, Film Fatales and the Collective of Documentary Women Cinematographers.