Director Adraint Bereal has signed with bicoastal production company Epoch Films for first-time commercial representation in the U.S.
Bereal is a multi-disciplinary creative who focuses on film, photography, bookmaking, and graphic design. He is a BFA Design graduate from the University of Texas Austin.
His work is culturally relevant, and he has an authentic, original voice. In 2018, he had his first solo show at the George Washington Carver Museum in Austin, TX. The work was titled “1.7,” the percentage of Black men on the UT Austin campus out of 52,000 students. The show included images of physical expression and interviews from 25 Black men.
Bereal’s next project, “The Black Yearbook,” showcased the stories of Black students on campus, and was featured in The New York Times, The Atlantic and Vice. Recently he has worked with several high-profile clients, including AT&T, Calvin Klein, The New York Times and Airbnb.
“Joining the Epoch family is a new step in my career, and from the jump they listened before anything else,” said Bereal. “It’s often difficult to find those partners that will hear you and understand you. The people at Epoch each took their time to get to know me, and invested in my craft without any doubt that I’d make something awesome.”
“Adraint is bursting with talent and new stories to tell,” assessed Mindy Goldberg, founding partner of Epoch Films. “His passion is contagious. We are proud to be formally introducing him to the marketplace and are looking forward to great collaborations.”
Bereal and Epoch are represented in the West by Dexter Randazzo and Jonathan Logan at The Department of Sales; in the East by Tara Averill and John Robertson at RepresentationCo; and in the Midwest by Chris Brown and Nicole Feddock at Baer Brown Reps.
First-Time Feature Directors Make Major Splash At AFI Fest, Generate Oscar Buzz
Two first-time feature directors who are generating Oscar buzz this awards season were front and center this past weekend at AFI Fest in Hollywood. Rachel Morrison, who made history as the first woman nominated for a Best Cinematography Oscar---on the strength of Mudbound in 2018--brought her feature directorial debut, The Fire Inside (Amazon MGM Studios), to the festival on Sunday (10/27), and shared insights into the film during a conversation session immediately following the screening. This came a day after William Goldenberg, an Oscar-winning editor for Argo in 2013, had his initial foray into feature directing, Unstoppable (Amazon MGM Studios), showcased at the AFI proceedings. He too spoke after the screening during a panel discussion. The Fire Inside--which made its world premiere at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival--tells the story of Claressa “T-Rex” Shields (portrayed by Ryan Destiny), a Black boxer from Flint, Mich., who trained to become the first woman in U.S. history to win an Olympic Gold Medal in the sport. She achieved this feat--with the help of coach Jason Crutchfield (Brian Tyree Henry)--only to find that her victory at the Summer Games came with relatively little fanfare and no endorsement deals. So much for the hope that the historic accomplishment would be a ticket out of socioeconomic purgatory for Shields and her family. It seemed like yet another setback in a cycle of adversity throughout Shields’ life but she persevered, going on to win her second Gold Medal at the next Olympics and becoming a champion for gender equality and equitable pay for women in sports. Shields has served as a source of inspiration for woman athletes worldwide--as well as to the community of... Read More