Today we’d like to introduce you to Katya Alexander.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Katya. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
Storytelling has always been the biggest part of my life. I’ve been writing short stories and plays since I was old enough to pick up a pencil. My parents bought me my first camera when I was seven. It was one of those cameras that recorded directly to the television. That’s when I knew that filmmaking was going to be my path. No matter what hobbies I ran into throughout life, I always came back to filmmaking and storytelling.
I got my first onset experience when I was sixteen years old as a director’s shadow. After being a production assistant on a couple of projects, I realized that I wouldn’t be happy if I didn’t go to film school for college. During my sophomore year at Emerson College, I started a production company with my three friends Victor Velle, Alex Monto, and Chance Molenda. Victor, Monto, and I started traveling the world making short documentaries and even won a few awards for them.
A couple of months later, Victor and I were asked to make a feature documentary, Eight Billion Angels, which was really our career-making experience. We brought on Jake Mitchell for cinematography, Douglas Emerson to help produce in pre-production, and Chris Marino to do our sound. We spent nine months in pre-production, filmed for four months in Japan, Maine, all throughout the midwest, and India, and then we spent a year and a half in post-production. Even Chris and Jake stayed on to help with post-production for sound design and some editing help, which made the process a dream. Right now, we are entering the sales process and getting ready to release the film.
I have been extremely blessed and extremely lucky. Sometimes, that’s what it takes to finally get that shot you need. What people don’t often see though is that I slept in the editing suits at my school from freshman through my junior year of college. I missed my high school prom for a set and I went to my first college party my junior year because I was always too busy. I’ve had way more failure than success, and I am proud of that because the failure never discouraged me or made me lose sight of what I was aiming for.
Has it been a smooth road?
My road has been far from smooth and has come with many sacrifices, all of which have been worth it. One of my earliest memories of my career is when I was a production assistant at 17 years old. The set was three hours away and I was too young to stay in the crew house close by. Instead, every morning I would wake up at 3 am to get to the set by 6:30 for a 7 am call time. We would often wrap late, so I would catch the 9:30 pm train home, and be home by 12:30 am to do it all again the next day. To keep up with school, I did all of my homeschooling on the train rides to and from the set. Although the experience was tiring, it was extremely rewarding and introduced me to a lot of people who’ve both helped me with my career and helped me grow as a person.
Later on, I started making movies of my own, and they were extremely bad and I loved every second of it. That’s the funny part about filmmaking: your first movies are going to be terrible. I wish more people talked about that and celebrated it. There’s no shame in that. You should be proud of your roots. My friends and I get together every once in a while to watch all of our worst movies together. It’s even better when it’s a movie that we made together.
When I reflect back, there are tons of moments that I wish I did something different. I either acted in a way that I’m not proud of or I wish I made different choices as a producer, but the term “everything happens for a reason” completely applies. I have grown a lot as a filmmaker and a person while being in this industry and I’m proud of the ways I’ve changed and developed.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the CQ Studios story. Tell us more about your work.
CQ Studios is a production company that makes a wide range of content. We started by making short documentaries, then added music videos to our list of content, started making short narrative films, and now we’re releasing our first feature documentary this year. The team that I work with has such a wide range of talent, and that makes what we do a lot of fun. All of us started in narrative film and only moved to documentaries because the opportunity presented itself.
Having a background in narrative film allowed our documentaries to be unique. The footage is always cinematic and we aim to tell our stories in a similar style as a narrative film. When we heard the term “cine-doc” (a documentary that values cinematography and sound design to the same level as a narrative film) the term just stuck. By the time we were making music videos and short films, we were actually returning to our roots and our original skills, but this time we were bringing an element of improv to it. Documentaries gave us the ability to work quickly and think on our feet. Bringing those skills back into the narrative world has been game-changing for us.
There are two things that set us apart. The first one is what I just mentioned: We are extremely versatile and bring skills from all areas of filmmaking into all of our projects. The second one is that we really truly care about what we are making. Every project we’ve taken on, we’ve been extremely passionate about. That’s something I’m really proud of.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
This industry is changing in a big way, and I love it. We’re starting to see more representation both on-screen and behind the scenes. We’re not just seeing that representation in the theaters, but for the first time, we are seeing it being recognized by our awards. Sandra Oh became the first Asian woman to ever be nominated for Best Actress at the Emmies in 2018. On one hand, it’s extremely exciting, but on the other, it’s a little sad that it’s taken this long. As of February 2019, there have only been five female directors ever nominated for an Oscar, and only one woman has even won, Kathryn Bigelow for The Hurt Locker.
We have a long way to go, but we are moving in the right direction. Now is the best time to be a female in this industry and that’s all because of the women and people of color that came before us. I am eternally grateful to all of them for paving the way.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.colorlessqueenstudios.com
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/katyakatt/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cqstudios/
Image Credit:
Asa Reed, Jake Mitchell, Henry Brower, Drake Baker, Victor Velle, Jessica DeNoia
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