Fiscal Agency

Selected Campaigns

Danielle Karagannis, an LA-based screenwriter and director, is an alum of several Stowe Story Labs programs, including the annual fall Narrative Lab, the EFM/Berlinale experience, and the ongoing mentorship program, where she worked with seasoned Creative Producer and Stowe Story Labs Mentor Paul Miller.

Her newest project is Ground Control, a live-action, psychological drama that's an interpretation of David Bowie's character Major Tom. Envision 2001: A Space Odyssey crashing into Requiem for a Dream. In a world where drugs are entirely shunned, an astronaut named Major Tom is assigned to export an exuberant number of drugs out of America and into space. Through Ground Control, we're taken on a visual and emotive, intense, poetic ride that's unapologetic to truth, reality, and possesses an external layer of satire. Stowe Story Labs was proud to support Danielle’s short/proof of concept project to help her prepare for the feature version of this story.

The devastating Tubbs wildfire in Santa Rosa changed Katharine Parsons’ work—and her life—forever. As an animal lover, she became riveted by the stories of the cats who beat impossible odds to survive—and by the stories of the rescuers who spent hundreds of hours in the field to find them. She put down her screenplays, drafted an idea for a short documentary, and The Fire Cats of Santa Rosa was born. With a small grant and blessing from Stowe Story Labs as her fiscal agency, she supplemented footage donated by the Sonoma County Sheriff’s office, firefighters, rescuers; and acclaimed National Geographic drone cinematographer Douglas Thron, with two field trips to Santa Rosa.

To create an immersive experience for the viewers to replicate the oral histories of the survivors, Katharine developed what she called painting-on-glass simulations. Part-animation and part-painting, the sequences combine rich colors and sometimes blurred motion. The trailer has some of the donated footage, as well as Katharine’s animation, and can be seen here.

A Seattle-based screenwriter, filmmaker, and video editor, Carrie Wachob is an alum of Stowe Story Labs. Her short film Crazy Cat Lady crowdfunded and wrapped post-production in the summer of 2018. The film won both the screenplay and filmmaking portions of the international Create50 competition, and will be included as a scene in the upcoming UK feature film The Impact, written by Joe Eszterhas and starring Olivia Williams. A dark comedy about the end of the world, Crazy Cat Lady is also beginning it's journey into the festival circuit as a stand-alone short film. Here is the logline: when Betty can't make it home to her darling Waffles, she must find another way to spread feline love.