The Black Business Issue AUG 2025

A young woman’s mother shows up on her healing journey.

In my last email, I was raising funds to shoot For Peace of Mind. Today you are looking at stills from the actual production. This being my first narrative short makes every step of this process so sacred. It’s different than chasing a story for documentary or finding the authenticity for a commercial. This is a brain child. A dragon, I say. And we’re riding it’s back.

I want to express gratitude to my producing team, Mounir Soussan, Gia @ Discordia, and Carlos @ Future Self, my best friend Zoe, Philinese Kirkwood who got the ball rolling, and everyone else who supported, showed up, sent money, or well wishes. I feel supported, Masha’Aallah.

I photographed the star of my film for the press run of her new album - CUNTRY that just released. The images have been used for Stereogum, KCRW, United Masters, SoundFynd, and more.

We had 12 weeks to write a pilot. I spent 5 weeks overthinking, 1 week writing, and 4 weeks prepping to shoot For Peace of Mind. That means I had 2 weeks to complete a 45 page script. And voila! We finished the cohort with a RIVETING table read that brought the whole thing to life.

My father spent the first 6 months of this year running a grassroots campaign to be the next Governor of New Jersey. I worked with him to manage, cut, create, and commission content for his campaign. This was my way of… helping? We didn’t win, unfortunately (for NJ), but we did come in 2nd place to the establishment’s pick with a 6 person ballot and a quarter of their budget. The hustle was real. I spent many days and nights, through the wildfires, through the making of my short film, through the Writer’s Colony experience, working on this. What I learned is that it is more than possible to reach people without being the “party’s choice” - Rest in Peace to Kabir Moss, a key person that worked with me us in this process.

Below is a campaign film I directed in the process.

This one is tough. The central idea is around how women are treated in liberation movements. It is heavy work. I’m still finding a way into it. There was a time when I thought I was a comedy writer… turns out life just isn’t funny sometimes.

~

Thanks for getting this far! Feel free to respond with a hello.

All my best,

Amandla