Indie Meme Industry Mixer

As IM grows, we want to expand beyond platforming to connecting South Asian creatives and film industry professionals. This is our first official attempt at that and we would LOVE for you to be a part of it.

The Industry Mixer will feature the following: 

• Keynote by Elizabeth Avellán

• A panel with visiting IMFF 2026 filmmakers

• Engaging conversations Texas Industry Professionals

• A lively, creative atmosphere

• Texas-style tacos!

• A tour of AUSTIN STUDIOS will be offered to attendees after the mixer at 12:45pm. Please read more about the tour and sign up for it here.

If you are a Director, Producer, Writer, Actor - you want to be a part of this event!

Keynote Speaker

Elizabeth Avellán

Co-Owner and Vice President of Troublemaker Studios and Owner/President at EYA Productions

Elizabeth Avellán is a Producer of bold narrative diversified content. She is Co-Owner and Vice President of Troublemaker Studios. In addition to producing family and genre films that have collectively grossed over a billion and a half dollars in box office, she has played a primary role in developing Austin, Texas as a thriving film community. Avellán began her producing career when she co-founded Los Hooligans Productions in 1991 with Robert Rodriguez as the two began their feature film project “El Mariachi.” Made for just $7,000, “El Mariachi,” was the winner of the 1993 Audience Awards at the Sundance and Deauville Film Festivals. Over the past twenty years, she has produced such films as the “Spy Kids” franchise, “Sin City,” “Predators,” “Machete,” “Desperado,” “From Dusk Till Dawn,” “Once Upon a Time in Mexico” among others. Also, Avellán proudly produced “Spy Kids Armageddon”, a film for families in which she worked with Rodriguez and their 5 children. The film was Netflix release in the Fall of 2023.

In conversation with:

Alka Bhanot

Co-Founder and Advisor of Indie Meme

Co-Founder of Indie Meme, Alka has extensive experience producing for Indian Television and was the Executive Producer for the first Late Night Show, ‘Movers & Shakers’ in India, which won numerous awards. In Austin, since 2003 her film credits include Bryan Poyser’s ‘Dear Pillow’ (2003) Winner, Best Narrative Feature, Atlanta Film Festival, Margaret Brown’s ‘Be Here To Love Me’ (2006) a film about the life and music of Townes Van Zandt and ‘Sunshine’(2009) a documentary about adoption and single parenthood by Karen Skloss which aired as part of the Independent Lens series on PBS. She also worked on the ‘Trevor Romain Video Series’ (2005) an animated kids show which aired on PBS.

Panelists

Panel 1: Jugaad Filmmaking!

Indie Filmmakers Superpower: Lessons learned from first productions and navigating challenges through indie filmmaking prowess.

Panel discussion with Indie Meme Film Festival 2026 talent

Kislay

Writer-editor of Shape of Momo

Kislay is a freelance filmmaker and alumnus of Film and Television Institute of India, Pune. He has made the feature Aise Hee (Just Like That) and three shorts and co-written the much acclaimed ‘Soni’ (directed by lvan Ayr).

Vaishali Sinha

Director-producer of Give it a Shot

Vaishali Sinha is an award-winning filmmaker, producer, and director of the feature documentaries Made in India (PBS) and Ask the Sexpert (PBS, Netflix). Her work has earned numerous honors, including the Critics Choice Award in India, a Grierson nomination for Best Entertaining Film, and a Ridenhour Peace Prize nomination for Excellence in Truth-Telling. Made in India became a case study at Harvard Business School in a course on ethics, while Ask the Sexpert achieved wide distribution across major platforms, including Netflix India. Vaishali was also a development consultant for the Academy Award–winning short documentary Period. End. Of. Sentence. and is currently on the producing team for multiple projects. She is a Fellow at the Rockefeller Foundation’s Bellagio Center and co-founder of Bitchitra Collective: Indian Women in Documentary, a peer-driven support network. She has mentored emerging filmmakers at Firelight Media Doc Lab, Kartemquin Film’s Diverse Voices in Docs, BAVC, and the Video Consortium. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Physics from St. Xavier’s College, Mumbai, and a diploma in 16mm film production from The New School, New York. Vaishali lives in Brooklyn with her husband and their child.

Amol Jadhav

Director of Deva Aaj Pan Vhay

Amol Jadhav is an award-winning advertising photographer and filmmaker based in Mumbai, India. He has created visual campaigns for brands including Tata Motors, Mahindra, Toyota, Volkswagen, Thums Up and Hindustan Unilever. With Deva Aaj Pan Vhay, he brings his visual storytelling experience into a heartfelt narrative about childhood, resilience and education.

Sangeeta Agrawal

Lead actor in Hills Don't Dance Alone

Sangeeta has been a stage actor for over 30 years and has acted in several short and feature films in lead roles. Her films have been screened at numerous festivals, both in the U.S. and abroad. Her film, A Good Match, was screened at the Delhi International Film Festival where she won the Best NRI Actress award. She made her writing and directing debut with a short film, Five O'Clock Shadow, which screened at more than fifty festivals and won numerous awards. Sangeeta's new screenplay, JUTTI KASURI - Shoes from Kasur, won Best Short Screenplay - Drama at The Northern Virginia International Film Festival - 2019

A Discussion Moderated by Uma Riddle

Uma Riddle

Indie Meme Festival Programming Team

A born and raised Austinite, Uma holds a bachelor's degree in Geography from UT Austin. She has worked with Indie Meme Film Festival for four years and has worn many hats, including as the former Program Manager for the Indie Meme Archival Project, and a current member of the Programming team. A member of the Austin film community, Uma has worked with Austin Film Society, Go-Valley Productions, and other local filmmakers. She specializes in documentary film production, storytelling, oral history, and decolonial film. 

Panel 2: Texas Filmmakers Code to crack the Maze!

The Unique Texas Film Landscape: what's super attractive about making movies in Texas, Incentives et all, Austin Film Society's Filmmaker Grants, and demystifying Producing for Austin PBS.

Panel Discussion with Kimberly LeBlanc (AFC), Bethiael Alemayoh (Austin PBS), and Holly Herrick (AFS).

Kim LeBlanc

Film Marketing Manager at Austin Film Commission

Kim LeBlanc is proud to serve as the Austin Film Commission’s Film Marketing Manager, where she works closely with creative industry professionals and community leaders to foster growth in Austin’s renowned media production industries. As a part of Visit Austin, the Austin Film Commission markets the Austin area as a leading destination for film, television, and commercial production and supports projects filming in Austin with services including permitting guidance, incentive-related guidance, referrals to local crew, cast, vendors and facilities, liaising with governing bodies and pushing for competitive production incentives.

Kim serves as Secretary of the Texas Association of Film Commissions (TXAFC) and is an Association of Film Commissioners International (AFCI) Certified Film Commissioner, as is Brian Gannon who serves as Director and makes up the other half of the Austin Film Commission’s team.

Bethiael Alemayoh

Director of Content & Distribution at Austin PBS

Bethiael Alemayoh is an independent filmmaker who guides independent filmmakers through the public media distribution pipeline. In her role as the Director of Content & Distribution at Austin PBS, she oversees the “Austin PBS Presents” slate, facilitating the national distribution of local films & television projects. 

Her mission is to demystify the distribution process for filmmakers by educating them on the public media model and empowering them to make the best choices for their projects, with strong consideration to career sustainability. Since joining Austin PBS, she's distributed over 30 projects including: City of Songs, How Are We Today, Price of Paradise, and more.

Holly Herrick

Head of Film and Creative Media at the Austin Film Society (AFS)

Holly Herrick is Head of Film and Creative Media at the Austin Film Society (AFS), where she has played a key leadership role in the expansion of AFS’s film exhibition and filmmaker support programs since 2012, including overseeing over $1M in grant funds for Texas-based independent filmmakers. In 2013, AFS began the Artist Intensive, a narrative feature development program for Texas-based artists that helped to launch the first feature films of Annie Silverstein (Bull, Cannes 2019), Channing Godfrey Peoples (Miss Juneteenth, Sundance 2020), and Augustine Frizzell (Never Goin’ Back, Sundance 2019), among others. In 2015, AFS opened Austin Public, a community media center where studios, filmmaking equipment and training classes are made accessible to the public. In 2017, AFS opened the AFS Cinema, Austin’s only non-profit repertory and first run art house cinema, now an essential destination for cinephiles in the region and often recognized as one of the country’s leading art houses.

A Discussion Moderated by Sachin Dheeraj

Sachin Dheeraj

Producers Guild of America fellow & Award-Winning Filmmaker

Sachin Dheeraj is a Producers Guild of America fellow and a Directors Guild of America Student Award-winning filmmaker whose work has been screened at prestigious film festivals such as Hot Docs, Raindance, EnergaCAMERIMAGE, and Kraków. His short documentary film, TESTIMONY OF ANA, won the National Film Award (Swarna Kamal/Golden Lotus) for the Best Non-Feature Film issued by the Government of India and was qualified for the 95th Academy Awards in the Best Documentary Short category. The film also secured distribution on reputable platforms, including Vimeo Staff Picks, MUBI, SIMA Academy, and Kinoscope. Dheeraj won the competitive Panavision New Filmmaker Program Equipment Grant and the UT Graduate Continuing Fellowship (an award given to support the final year of an outstanding graduate student) to implement his short narrative project, MEN IN BLUE, which was shortlisted for the 2023 Yugo BAFTA Student Awards.

Parking Information

Red boxes indicate available parking. There will be plenty of parking available for all attendees.