Happy Wednesday, Creative Army!

As Deadline exclusively announced this weekend, we’ve officially selected the winner of our Empowering Women Script Competition in partnership with Catalyst Studios! Los Angeles filmmaker, Jacqueline Elyse Rosenthal has won for her fantastic feature film script, Backlog.

A first-of-its-kind screenwriting contest for feature films with a focus on social impact, the Empowering Women Script Competition brought forth some mind-blowing submissions from talented voices all over the world. It was a true honor to be a part of it!

An Excerpt From DEADLINE:

L.A. filmmaker Jacqueline Elyse Rosenthal has won the first edition of Stage 32 and Catalyst Studios’ Empowering Women Script Competition for her social impact film Backlog.

Rosenthal will receive a $5,000 option and be eligible for up to $3 Million in financing for the film from Catalyst Studios.

She will also be mentored by outgoing Berlinale Managing Director Mariette Rissenbeek, who will be taking on some development and production projects following her departure from the festival at the end of this year’s edition.

The winning feature project expands Rosenthal’s award-winning 2023 short film of the same name, which won the Oscar-qualifying Cleveland International Film Festival and was also in the selection of the Emerging Filmmakers Showcase at the American Pavilion in last year.

Rosenthal is a recent graduate of USC’s Masters in Fine Arts in Film and Television Production. She is repped by 3 Arts Entertainment.

She was among 11 finalists selected from more than 1,000 scripts submitted to industry training platform Stage 32 & Catalyst Studios’ Empowering Women and Non-Binary Script Development Program from 37 countries.

“We are blown away by the incredible talent that came in from around the world from the Stage 32 community,” said Stage 32 Managing Director Amanda Toney.

“It was clear that Backlog is a story that needs to be told, and Catalyst Studios and their commitment to inspiring change in storytelling is the perfect partner for this.”

The Catalyst team will collaborate with Rosenthal on development, while Stage 32 will provide educational support for script development.

You can see the full DEADLINE article HERE or by clicking on the photo below.

More About BACKLOG By Jacquelin Elyse Rosenthal

Logline: A young college sexual assault victim is silenced by her authorities, and after harrowing years spent reclaiming her life, she’s randomly chosen to be the key witness in the Senate Hearing to end the rape kit backlog. Can she find the strength to be the voice of hope for women globally? Inspired by a true story.

Jacqueline Elyse Rosenthal is a DGA Award-winning Director best known for her film BACKLOG (Winner, Cleveland International Film Festival - Oscar Qualifier, Cannes), a 2024 nominee for Best Drama Series by the Television Academy, and a writer whose Feature length script of the same name is in development as an official selection of Athena Film Festival's Writers Lab and a finalist for the Chinonye Chukwu Emerging Writer Award. Jacqueline, a recent Graduate of USC's Masters in Fine Arts in Film and Television Production (John Huston Scholar for Outstanding Directing), is gearing up for her next film, EUROPA, a sci-fi odyssey about humanity's relationship to the universe, that goes into production at Sony Studios this month. Repped by 3 Arts Entertainment.

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