HollyShorts Film Festival, the Oscar-qualifying celebration of short films, has announced the jury lineup for its 2023 edition.
The 18-person jury includes Chiwetel Ejiofor (“12 Years a Slave”), Sam Worthington (“Avatar”), Zoey Deutch (“Not Okay”), Alexandra Shipp (“Barbie”), Josh Whitehouse (“Daisy Jones & the Six”), Christina Chong (“Star Trek: Strange New Worlds”), Nelu Handa (“Run the Burbs” showrunner) and Jaime Ray Newman (“Skin”). PvNew international correspondent K.J. Yossman and Eric Kohn, executive editor and chief critic of IndieWire, will also serve on the jury.
Other industry professionals on the jury include Tom Berkeley and Ross White, whose film “An Irish Goodbye” won last year’s Oscar for best live-action short film; Aneil Kara, whose film “The Long Goodbye” won the Oscar in 2022; as well as short film Oscar nominees Pamela Ribon (“My Year of Dicks”) and Amanda Forbis and Wendy Tilby (“The Flying Sailor”). Two-time Oscar winner Joanna Quinn (“Affairs of the Art”), Oscar winner Alice Doyard (“Colette”) and Oscar nominee Joshua Seftel (“Stranger at the Gate”) will also be part of the jury.
Together, they will be responsible for determining the festival award winners, including the four short films that will qualify for the Oscars. Out of the 402 films that will screen at this year’s festival, 180 (43.3%) are from female filmmakers and 127 (30.5%) are from BIPOC filmmakers. This year’s hybrid event will take place both in-person at Hollywood’s TCL Chinese Theatres and virtually through festival streaming platform Bitpix.
HollyShorts Film Festival runs from Aug. 10 to 20, with its annual awards gala on Aug. 20.
