Gabriel M. Paletz, Ph.D (Screenwriting, Documentary, Film Comedy and Learning from Bad Films), with a BA from Yale University, is the first PhD graduate from the University of Southern California in film history, theory and film production. Dr. Paletz has taught film at the College of William and Mary, Duke University and USC. He has published numerous scholarly essays and articles, as well as pieces in popular journals like Variety. He has served on several film festival juries and as both historical consultant on the film Serena starring Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence, and as visual storytelling consultant to the Ethiopian Aids Resource Center in Addis Ababa. He has just completed a book that reveals the connections between the multi-media innovations in the career of Orson Welles. As a film programmer, his recent series include "The Cinema of the Absurd," with new restorations from nine Eastern European national film archives, that has played in both Hong Kong and the U.S. National Gallery of Art, and "Creators of the Photoplay," a series dedicated to the great women screenwriters of Hollywood silent cinema. Diego Fandos (screenwriting) is a filmmaker from Spain. Originally a journalist (University of Navarra), he has written and directed TV commercials, documentaries and the feature Cosmos, presented in the San Sebastian Film Festival and released in 2008. His last two shorts - Under Pressure (2014) and Aurora (2017) - have been selected and awarded in more than 60 festivals around the world. Diego has published two collections of short stories -"Lemon Loves" (2015) and “Prague on February” (2020)- and the handbook "Writing for Short Film" (2019). Michael is an international director / cinematographer. Originally from South Africa he now lives in Prague where he primarily shoots and directs high-end TV commercials. He has served as a Director of Photography on 11 feature films, some episodic TV and he has directed and photographed hundreds of TV commercials. A feature film that he photographed, ‘Yesterday’ was nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Academy Awards in 2005. Kaveh Daneshmand is an Iranian filmmaker based in Prague, Czech Republic. A graduate of film directing, Kaveh co-founded ÍRÁN:CI Film Festival in Prague in 2010 and has been active as the artistic director of the festival as well as a director and a writer. His first short film, Occasional Showers premiered at Fajr International Film Festival and won the best short film of the year in 2016 Writers and Critics Awards in Iran. His second short film, Alula, premiered at the Oberhausen International Short Film Festival in 2019. Kaveh’s debut feature, Endless Summer Syndrome is at the stage of post-production and has won the KVIFF Works in Progress award at Karlovy Vary International Film Festival in 2022. Steen Agro is a director and writer known for Shut Up and Shoot Me (2005), Misguided (1999) and Mother’s Day (1999). He is a director of commercials, working with some of the largest brands on the globe. His specialty is comedy, which he excels at on screen and stage. Robert Gottman is a master Avid instructor with 10 years of experience teaching editing at the university level. He served as editor at NBC, KRON TV, KICU TV and KNTV. He has edited multiple award-winning news stories and specials. Masa Hilcisin is a visual artist, educator, and creative arts therapist. Her documentary films and experimental videos have been screened at many film festivals around the world. She teaches film production, creative video, and other forms of visual art at various schools and universities, and holds PhD In Film Studies and Audio-Visual Culture from the Masaryk University. Masa has been involved in many cultural and artistic projects, including film festival curating and various women artists’ support initiatives. For several years, she has been running visual personal storytelling workshops in Czech Republic, Georgia, Mexico, and India. Neal Dhand is a writer, director, and teacher who makes fiction films and music videos. Neal’s 2019 short film The Well premiered in-competition at the Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival, 2020, winning an Honorable Mention. He’s in development on the science-fiction feature Dark My Light, which was selected for the NAFF It Project Market and Blood Window at Ventana-Sur 2020, and was a Special Mention at Sitges Pitchbox, 2020. Neal’s screenplays have recently placed in a variety of prestigious competitions, including American Zoetrope, Austin, and BlueCat, and have been featured on The Black List. Neal has taught screenwriting, directing, producing, and film analysis at universities in Pennsylvania, New York, and the Czech Republic. Thomas Krivy, son of Czech parents and brought up and raised in Germany, gained experience as a camera assistant in Berlin and at the Babelsberg Studios before earning his MA in cinematography from the Czech national film academy. He regularly works on narrative feature films, commercials, documentaries and music videos. Josef Pecak (cinematography) is one of the Czech Republic’s leading authorities on the art and physics of cinema lighting. Josef was the former Dean of FAMU during the golden years of FAMU’s birth of new generation Czech filmmakers (1992 - 1994). Luka Knezevic is a PhD candidate in film studies at the University of Zagreb and manages the post production facilities at Prague Film School. He is a graduate of Prague Film School (2012) and is an active writer/director. His latest short, Pressure Point, was completed in 2018 and screened at several international festivals (Myrtle Beach, TIFF Oda) For over 20 years Adam has worked with a diverse array of clients; from Tarantino to LucasFilms to Fortune 500 companies like Google, HBO, Sun, Deloitte and AOL. As Media Director for Stillking Films, he worked on a myriad of films, commercials and music videos, and led Stillking Media to Partner with bEurope. From creative to strategy, his work has been featured in the Czech National Gallery, as well as film festivals, exhibitions, and a variety of publications. He recently completed a deep.art neural network AI Graphic Novel. Steve Reverand is a French-born and now Czech-based producer, graduate from Prague Film School. He co-founded in 2012 in Prague the production company "The LAB". Steve has been developing, producing and post-producing international fiction projects from short to feature films, with a focus on European-based hybrid genre narratives that can tap into a niche worldwide audience. Among the successful short film he produced are Kaveh Daneshmand's Occasional Showers (Best Short Film - Iranian Society of Film Critics’ Awards, 2016), Nicole Goode's Supine (Silver Méliès Winner 2019) and Rusty Lake: Paradox (6m views online). In 2020, he produced for The LAB his debut feature project as a film producer, the queer fantasy film Playdurizm (winner of the Jury Prize for Best Feature Film at LUFF 2020 and distributed internationally) Martin Raiman is an award-winning Czech/German film & advertisement producer and co-founder of the 2012-established, Prague-based production company "The LAB". As a producer, Martin likes to focus on one-stop solutions both for films and branded media concepts, that are not only economically effective but also help productions to have the least possible ecological impact on our planet. Notable examples are the critically acclaimed multimedia project Rusty Lake: Paradox and the in-house developed genre bending feature film Playdurizm, winner of Lausanne Underground Film & Music Festival in 2020. Saimir Bajo is a award-winning filmmaker, screenwriter, director, dramaturge, producer, lecturer and scholar. His screenplays have placed in a number of prestigious festivals and competitions including Berlinale Co-Production Market, CineLink, Co-Production Market at Sarajevo International Film Festival, ALBAScript and Cineuropa, TIFForm and Torino Film Lab, Meeting Poit Vilnius, Zagreb DOX Pro, Creative Europe. His films have been screened at the most prestigious film festivals around the world. Recently, he has directed the fiction film The Violinist (2020) and is finishing the feature documentary: Tomas Venclova - Forms of Hope (2021). Saimir is developing his new feature film, Journey to Awakening, a co-production of Czech Republic, Albania, Slovenia, Italy. 
Gabriel M. Paletz, Ph.D.
Screenwriting
Diego Fandos
Screenwriting
Michael Brierley
Cinematography
Kaveh Daneshmand
Directing
Steen Agro
Directing / Introduction to Comedy
Robert Gottman
Editing
Masa Hilcisin, Ph.D.
Directing, Documentary Film
Neal Dhand
Directing
Thomas Krivy
Cinematography
Josef Pecak
Cinematography
Luka Knezevic
Editing, Aspects of film language
Adam Trachtman
Animation
Steve Reverand
Production
Martin Raiman
Production
Saimir Bajo
Directing, Documentary Film
Nancy Bishop is the founder and former head of the Prague Film School Acting Program. She now participates in the program as distinguished guest lecturer. She is a C.S.A., Emmy-nominated casting director, author, and acting coach. The following are just a few of the many Hollywood and other productions Nancy has cast for: Borat 2, Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol, Snowpiercer, The Romanoffs, Euro Trip, Anne Frank, and many, many more. Nancy teaches a film acting technique, outlined in her book "Secrets from the Casting Couch.” Nancy and her coaching team are on demand internationally in Europe, North and South America and in countries as diverse as Turkey and Dubai. Amy Huck is a professional actress and director with numerous film and theater credits, as well as about 40 international commercials. Her film credits include Harrison's Flowers, From Hell, EuroTrip, The Omen 666, and Solomon Kane. She has also voiced numerous characters for a variety of projects, including video games, tv series, documentaries, and children's audio books. As well as working as an actress, she has been studying yoga for over 15 years, both in the US and Europe, and earned her teaching certificate in Thailand in 2007. Daniel Brown has worked as an actor and director with theatres in the U.S., Canada and Europe since 1982. His training includes commedia dell'arte, clown, improvisation, drama therapy as well as classical theatre. He has taught acting and lectured on theatre in places ranging from prisons in America to the Royal Shakespeare Company and Cambridge University in England. Arriving in Prague in 1998, Daniel has directed at various theatres in the Czech Republic (in Czech and English) and is the founder and Artistic Director of Divadlo Miloco. As an actor, Daniel has worked in films with such actors as Peter O’Toole, Bruce Willis, Ben Kingsley, Brenda Blethyn and Johnny Depp; he has filmed over 30 television commercials and currently is in his 9th season on the popular Czech television series Ulice. Daniel has worked as an acting coach for film and TV (including Anne Frank and Oliver Twist) and as a dialogue coach on many feature films. Daniel has a Masters degree from Cambridge University in the history and philosophy of science, specializing in the history of psychology and psychiatry. Brian Caspe is a professional actor who plays regularly in theater, TV, film and commercials. Motion pictures credits include Wanted, the Illusionist, Hellboy, Running Scared and Hannibal Rising. Brian also played a major supporting role in the NBC television series Revelations, opposite Bill Pullman. His most recent film is Solomon Kane with James Purefoy and Pete Postelwaite. In theater, Brian has gotten rave reviews playing in the lead in Oliver!, A Funny Thing Happened on The Way To The Forum, The Seagull, You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown among many others. Since moving to Prague in the spring of 2002, Brian has re-energized the Expat acting scene. In 2003, he founded the Prague Playhouse with the aim to give native English-speaking actors a company where they could perform and English-speaking audiences a venue to enjoy. Brian plans to tour in Ireland with The Sacred Sow a successful play he directed for the Prague Fringe. Brian also teaches Meisner technique which he studied in Los Angeles under Jeff Goldblum and Robert Carnegie (assistant to Mr. Meisner for 10 years). Over the past 4 years, many of his students have gone on to have successful acting careers and even more have learned to appreciate the power of living in the moment. Petra Johansson is an actress, director, theatrologist, pedagogue and even a screenwriter. She studied both in the Czech Republic and Sweden, which is her second home. Currently she is finishing her PhD at the Stockholm University. She has close to the physical theatre, especially the comedia dell’arte, which she studied in France. In Prague she appeared on the stage of the National theatre – Laterna Magika, she also worked for Městská divadla pražská and she plays and directs for the theatre Blama as well. 2018 she founded her own theatre group called Spolek Lek, where she stages her own plays and acts in them too. She also regularly appears in films and tv productions. Petra teaches physical acting as well as creative movement. Martin Kolda graduated from the Prague Dance Center conservatory and later from the Academy of Music Arts in Prague. He is the founder and director of the production company Art 4 People, which is involved in cultural events in the Czech Republic as well as TV shows. He is the manager of Prague Chamber Ballet. Howard Lotker is a founding member of HoME, an international theater company based in Prague, Czech Republic creating site-specific, participatory, public space, research, and other kinds of devised performances. Howard has directed and produced almost all of its productions within the past 6 years. He has a BFA in Acting (and Political Science) from the University of California at Santa Barbara, and his MFA in Authorial Acting and Pedagogy from KATAP, DAMU, Prague (CZ), where he also teaches Acting, Improvisation, Devising Theater, and Acting with the Inner Partner. Marc Cram is a founding member of Blood, Love & Rhetoric Improv (Prague, CZ), Dad’s Garage Theatre Co. (Atlanta, GA), and The Whammo Players (Tallahassee, FL). For over 30 years, he has taught and performed regularly in narrative-based group comedy improvisation. Marc has enjoyed developing new improv shows and formats, working with short and long-form improv. In film, television, commercials and theatre Marc has worked as an actor, improviser, puppeteer, musician, and as a commentator and emcee. As an improvisation instructor, Marc has taught from the Johnstonian school improv at dozens of theatres and universities across America, Europe and the Middle East including The Courtyard Playhouse (Dubai, UAE), English Lovers (Vienna), Improtresk and ZaPatra (CZ), and Georgia State University (Atlanta, GA). Marc is pleased to be returning to the dynamic Prague Film School for another exciting season of training. Jason Stone is a Speech and Dialect specialist trained in Knight-Thompson Speechwork. He holds an MFA in Directing from Long Island University and is an expert in the International Phonetic Alphabet. He has taught, acted, and directed in theatre and film all over the globe for two decades. Jason is dedicated to rigorous, positive, and inclusive training. History in action! Touch of sword! Steel in motion! The best fights for films, musicals and festival shows. Professional swordsmen, armourers and actors. Argo is a unique company which can create a flawless illusion of a real fight avoiding any slightest pain of the performers. The agency offers a full scope of services in preparation of film and theatre actors for demanding roles of fighters from different times including ancient, contemporary, far future and fantasy. The film armoury at 'Housuv Mlyn' has countless numbers of weapons, armours and props allowing to equip any film project. More info at agentura-argo.cz Luka Knezevic is a PhD candidate in film studies at the University of Zagreb and manages the post production facilities at Prague Film School. He is a graduate of Prague Film School (2012) and is an active writer/director. His latest short, Pressure Point, was completed in 2018 and screened at several international festivals (Myrtle Beach, TIFF Oda) Steen Agro is a director and writer known for Shut Up and Shoot Me (2005), Misguided (1999) and Mother’s Day (1999). He is a director of commercials, working with some of the largest brands on the globe. His specialty is comedy, which he excels at on screen and stage.
Nancy Bishop
Program Founder, Faculty Emeritus
Amy Huck
Acting for Film Department Head
Daniel Brown
Acting, Improvisation, Physical Theater
Brian Caspe
Acting, Meisner technique
Petra Johansson
Physical Acting, Creative Movement
Martin Kolda
Movement
Howard Lotker
Stanislavky
Marc Cram
Improv / Alternative Techniques
Jason Stone
Speech and Dialects
Agency A.R.G.O
Combat
Luka Knezevic
Editing, Aspects of film language
Steen Agro
Writing for Actors
Masa Hilcisin is a visual artist, educator, and creative arts therapist. Her documentary films and experimental videos have been screened at many film festivals around the world. She teaches film production, creative video, and other forms of visual art at various schools and universities, and holds PhD In Film Studies and Audio-Visual Culture from the Masaryk University. Masa has been involved in many cultural and artistic projects, including film festival curating and various women artists’ support initiatives. For several years, she has been running visual personal storytelling workshops in Czech Republic, Georgia, Mexico, and India. Gabriel M. Paletz, Ph.D (Screenwriting, Documentary, Film Comedy and Learning from Bad Films), with a BA from Yale University, is the first PhD graduate from the University of Southern California in film history, theory and film production. Dr. Paletz has taught film at the College of William and Mary, Duke University and USC. He has published numerous scholarly essays and articles, as well as pieces in popular journals like Variety. He has served on several film festival juries and as both historical consultant on the film Serena starring Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence, and as visual storytelling consultant to the Ethiopian Aids Resource Center in Addis Ababa. He has just completed a book that reveals the connections between the multi-media innovations in the career of Orson Welles. As a film programmer, his recent series include "The Cinema of the Absurd," with new restorations from nine Eastern European national film archives, that has played in both Hong Kong and the U.S. National Gallery of Art, and "Creators of the Photoplay," a series dedicated to the great women screenwriters of Hollywood silent cinema. Thomas Krivy, son of Czech parents and brought up and raised in Germany, gained experience as a camera assistant in Berlin and at the Babelsberg Studios before earning his MA in cinematography from the Czech national film academy. He regularly works on narrative feature films, commercials, documentaries and music videos. Robert Gottman is a master Avid instructor with 10 years of experience teaching editing at the university level. He served as editor at NBC, KRON TV, KICU TV and KNTV. He has edited multiple award-winning news stories and specials. Steve Reverand is a French-born and now Czech-based producer, graduate from Prague Film School. He co-founded in 2012 in Prague the production company "The LAB". Steve has been developing, producing and post-producing international fiction projects from short to feature films, with a focus on European-based hybrid genre narratives that can tap into a niche worldwide audience. Among the successful short film he produced are Kaveh Daneshmand's Occasional Showers (Best Short Film - Iranian Society of Film Critics’ Awards, 2016), Nicole Goode's Supine (Silver Méliès Winner 2019) and Rusty Lake: Paradox (6m views online). In 2020, he produced for The LAB his debut feature project as a film producer, the queer fantasy film Playdurizm (winner of the Jury Prize for Best Feature Film at LUFF 2020 and distributed internationally). Luka Knezevic is a PhD candidate in film studies at the University of Zagreb and manages the post production facilities at Prague Film School. He is a graduate of Prague Film School (2012) and is an active writer/director. His latest short, Pressure Point, was completed in 2018 and screened at several international festivals (Myrtle Beach, TIFF Oda)
Masa Hilcisin, Ph.D.
Directing, Documentary Film
Gabriel M. Paletz, Ph.D.
Screenwriting
Thomas Krivy
Cinematography
Robert Gottman
Editing
Steve Reverand
Production
Luka Knezevic
Editing, Aspects of film language
