Faculty producing documentary on Rosen

University of North Georgia (UNG) faculty members are creating a documentary film and are bringing its subject to the Gainesville Campus to provide students with real-life experience.

Robyn Hicks, assistant professor of film and digital media will direct "Sybil," a documentary about award-winning author/actress/playwright Sybil Rosen. The film is co-directed by Natalie De Diego, and James Mackenzie, associate director of film and digital media in UNG's School of Communication, Film & Theatre, serves as producer.

"This is a personal passion project, and I am so grateful for the opportunity to integrate it into the work our film program is doing," Hicks said. "I am so inspired by her life and creativity, and feel I have so much to learn from her. I have a feeling others will feel the same."

Hicks received a Presidential Incentive Award for the documentary.

The film is an intimate documentary feature that interweaves the narrative of Rosen's past, as told by the 70-year-old writer herself as she contemplates her decades-long career and confronts an uncertain future.

Rosen will have a micro-residency that will include visiting classrooms and sharing her experience, knowledge and expertise with our students and faculty, Hicks said.

"This micro-residency with Sybil presents a unique and exciting opportunity to unite cross-departmental collaboration between film, theatre and English," she added. 

"After reading Sybil's memoir, and watching its film adaptation, I understood the appeal," Christine Perez, a student and unit production manager for the project, said. "Discovering and sharing extraordinary stories, like that of Sybil, is a major motivation for the types of projects I hope to develop. This experience directly enables me to put the extensive training I've received at UNG to practical use and, has confirmed I've chosen a fulfilling path."

Perez is a senior from Laurelton, New York, pursuing a degree in film and digital media with a production concentration.

Hicks said the experience of producing the documentary about Rosen is deeply personal.

"Although many years and life experiences set us apart, I am often left in awe at the parallels between Sybil's life and my own," Hicks said. "In 2017, I lost my husband and creative partner to cancer, rendering me uncertain of my own creative trajectory. Meeting Sybil sparked something within me — which I have not felt since his passing. I have an unyielding desire to tell Sybil's story of survival, her complete story, as raw and personal as it can be.”

Rosen will be performing the one-woman show "The Belle of Amherst" based on the life and poetry of Emily Dickinson at 2:30 p.m. Sept.18 in the Ed Cabell Theatre at the Gainesville Campus.