The-Artery has brought directorial duo the Ray Sisters–Austin and Westin Ray–aboard its roster.
The siblings were introduced to The-Artery when their women’s equality spec PSA, “We Are The Daughters,” earned them inclusion in SHOOT’s 2019 New Directors Showcase. The-Artery was a sponsor of that year’s Showcase and the Ray Sisters were attracted to the creative company’s out-of-the-box thinking and approach.
Now that they are part of The-Artery family, the duo hopes to create content that explores roads less traveled. Austin Ray cited the producing prowess of The-Artery managing director/EP Deborah Sullivan, and the visionary VFX and aesthetic of company founder and executive creative director Vico Sharabani. “It’s inspiring for us to align with filmmakers who have been in this business for years, yet still retain an unbridled enthusiasm and spark for creative work–whatever the genre,” said Austin. “We’re extremely excited to join The-Artery as it blazes a new trail into narrative live-action.”
Sharabani said, “The-Artery was built around versatile talent and Ray Sisters fit these exact traces of personality, character, taste, and style. We’ve been in close contact with Austin and Westin for over a year and, as collaboration increased, we decided to bring them on board.”
Sullivan added, “I’m especially proud to add not one, but two talented female artists to our roster. During our early conversations with Ray Sisters, the most important consideration was how The-Artery can help them grow. Thankfully, our team has, over time, worked hard to develop the resources to offer that and more.”
The original idea for Ray Sisters came about as both siblings fine-tuned their separate talents in film school. After working various production roles, including producing shorts and music videos as well as composing, the sisters decided it was time to form a directing duo.
Decorated with awards since their school days, Westin emerged from film school with a DGA Student Film Award for directing while Austin’s music scores, which first premiered in a film at Telluride Film Festival, garnered the Student Academy Award as well as BAFTA Student Award. Later, their short film The Listening Box won the Audience Award at the Austin Film Festival as well as an HBO award from the SCAD Savannah Film Festival. Their film This One Step was also screened at the Sedona Film Festival, among others. A Not So Still Life, the duo’s branded content piece for Moët & Chandon, was one of the winners of the Moët Moment Film Festival. Recently, Austin was also named Best New Music Composer at the 2019 Kinsale Shark Awards.
Westin Ray noted that she and Austin “overlap quite a bit in skills, since we both direct, shoot, and edit. I am more language-oriented, whether screenwriting or discussing character arcs with actors. Austin is razor-sharp with visuals and typically the techie putting out equipment or software fires. We joke that separately we’re flawed, but together we make the perfect human being!”
Carrie Coon Relishes Being Part Of An Ensemble–From “The Gilded Age” To “His Three Daughters”
It can be hard to catch Carrie Coon on her own.
She is far more likely to be found in the thick of an ensemble. That could be on TV, in "The Gilded Age," for which she was just Emmy nominated, or in the upcoming season of "The White Lotus," which she recently shot in Thailand. Or it could be in films, most relevantly, Azazel Jacobs' new drama, "His Three Daughters," in which Coon stars alongside Natasha Lyonne and Elizabeth Olsen as sisters caring for their dying father.
But on a recent, bright late-summer morning, Coon is sitting on a bench in the bucolic northeast Westchester town of Pound Ridge. A few years back, she and her husband, the playwright Tracy Letts, moved near here with their two young children, drawn by the long rows of stone walls and a particularly good BLT from a nearby cafe that Letts, after biting into, declared must be within 15 miles of where they lived.
In a few days, they would both fly to Los Angeles for the Emmys (Letts was nominated for his performance in "Winning Time" ). But Coon, 43, was then largely enmeshed in the day-to-day life of raising a family, along with their nightly movie viewings, which Letts pulls from his extensive DVD collection. The previous night's choice: "Once Around," with Holly Hunter and Richard Dreyfus.
Coon met Letts during her breakthrough performance in "Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolfe?" on Broadway in 2012. She played the heavy-drinking housewife Honey. It was the first role that Coon read and knew, viscerally, she had to play. Immediately after saying this, Coon sighs.
"It sounds like something some diva would say in a movie from the '50s," Coon says. "I just walked around in my apartment in my slip and I had pearls and a little brandy. I made a grocery list and I just did... Read More