Inaugural Method M Film Fund grants go to 13 alumni of Murray Center for Documentary Journalism
Nearly $250,000 in grants supports film productions where alumni of the center serve in key roles
COLUMBIA, Mo. (March 16, 2026) — Thirteen alumni of the Missouri School of Journalism’s Murray Center for Documentary Journalism have received grants for their film productions from the center’s revolutionary new Method M Film Fund.
Powered by a multimillion-dollar gift in 2025 from the center’s founding donor and reality television pioneer, Jonathan Murray, the inaugural round of grants from the fund will support alums as they work on films at various stages of production. Totaling nearly $250,000, the individual grants range from $5,000 to $50,000 depending on the specific needs of each project.
“This fund is an extraordinary way for the School of Journalism to amplify its impact and support documentary filmmakers after they have graduated,” said David Kurpius, dean of the School. “Jon Murray’s generosity has given alums a new resource that is simply not available from other documentary programs and made the world-class Mizzou Mafia an even more robust, supportive network.”
The 13 grantees were chosen from 19 submissions representing more than 10% of the alumni body of the Murray Center, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, and several of the projects also feature multiple alums working together in key roles. Grants were given to films in preproduction, production and postproduction, and recipients have been encouraged to reapply for this annual grant in subsequent years as their films move through different stages in the production process.
The supported projects also range widely in scale.
“There is no program that has even attempted to do this kind of support. We’re supporting big projects, we’re supporting personal projects. We’re supporting long-term projects that alums have told us they were dreaming of making when they were students.”
Robert Greene, Filmmaker-in-Chief, Murray Center for Documentary Journalism
“There is no program that has even attempted to do this kind of support,” said Filmmaker-in-Chief Robert Greene, an acclaimed documentary filmmaker who selected the grantees alongside Supervising Producer Sebastián Martinez Valdivia and Tabitha Jackson, former director of the Sundance Film Festival and the new director of The Film Forum in New York. “We’re supporting big projects, we’re supporting personal projects. We’re supporting long-term projects that alums have told us they were dreaming of making when they were students.”
“What She Carries,” a feature-length documentary that explores a movement toward revitalizing traditional birthing practices in Indigenous communities, is one of the larger productions receiving a grant. The film’s lead producer, Taylor Hensel, MA ’19, is working alongside her sister, director Brit Hensel, to lead a crew of Native women documenting cultural knowledge and practices around birth in a variety of Indigenous communities.
The grant will go toward the film’s active production, with shooting currently expected to wrap in June this year. It will also support the film’s pluralistic approach to production, which includes a team of community producers who live and work in the communities visited by the film.
“This is my first feature, which is pivotal for my career,” Hensel said. “Having the Murray Center behind me is so meaningful.”
She said it felt fitting to return to the Murray Center for this grant support, given the center’s formative impact on her development as a filmmaker and producer. She had worked as a reporter before pursuing her master’s degree at the center, but filmmaking was a new frontier that she said the center made attainable through its hands-on curriculum and experienced faculty.
“I would not have a film career if not for the Murray Center, 100%,” Hensel added. “They gave me the tools I needed, the freedom, the inspiration, the connections. They just completely set me up, and I’ve worked as a filmmaker ever since.”
Martinez called the visual sample Hensel submitted “stunning” and noted the sisters’ teamwork dates back to Hensel’s student film, “Native and American,” which the sisters co-directed.
Another grantee is Michael Coleman, MA ’24, whose crew consists of two: himself and his cinematographer and co-producer, Samuel Ott (Ott earned a bachelor’s degree from Mizzou’s Trulaske College of Business in 2012).
“I would not have a film career if not for the Murray Center, 100%. They gave me the tools I needed, the freedom, the inspiration, the connections. They just completely set me up, and I’ve worked as a filmmaker ever since.”
Taylor Hensel, MA ’19
Coleman’s project expands his student film, “Satan’s Greatest Lies” — which won Best Director at the Murray Center’s 2024 Stronger than Fiction Film Festival — into a feature-length documentary about an eccentric environmental activist in East Texas struggling with the death of his youngest daughter. The grant will support the film’s post-production.
“It was always my intention from the beginning to make this a feature film,” Coleman said. “Without this grant, I don’t think I’d be able to get it across the finish line at the high quality that the story and the people involved deserve.”
Coleman was not a novice filmmaker before his time at the Murray Center. His short film, DV Footage Log 2014-2020,” premiered at the Film Diary NYC series; he produced another collaboration with Ott, the feature-length “To Love the Void,” which premiered at the Brooklyn International Film Festival in 2023; and he has taught classes on elements of filmmaking and digital media since 2016 in Mizzou’s College of Arts and Science.
Yet his time at the center was no less impactful for his prior experience.
“The guidance from Robert and Sebastián really instilled a newfound confidence in me as a filmmaker and storyteller that I had lost,” Coleman said. “I came into the program after spending a long time teaching at Mizzou, and this was the thing on campus that I needed to fulfill me both professionally and creatively.”
For Murray, who has gifted a total of $17 million since 2014 to build and expand the Murray Center, the fund is a way to make the competitive, connections-based world of film more accessible to alums, whose success is already raising the profile of an innovative documentary film program that has gained significant traction in the industry in its first decade.
“The hardest part of making a documentary is getting funding,” Murray said. “With the Method M Film Fund, Missouri graduates have a huge advantage over graduates of other film programs. And with the caliber of the first group of grantees, it’s clear the Method M Film Fund logo will become ubiquitous at film festivals around the world.”
The full list of grantees and their films is below.
Development
Beatričė Bankauskaitė, MA ’23, director
“The Place We Build”
Maya Bell, BJ ’23, director
“Before I Was”
Daniel Christian, BJ ’17, MA ’19, director
“Pigwood”
Sean Frost, MA ’22, director
“Aftermath”
Cam Medrano, BJ ’24, producer
“Dear Doris”
Sharon Quintana Ortiz, MA ’24, director
“El Último que Vio Vivo al Diablo Rojo”
Bradford Siwak, BJ ’23, MA ’25, director
“No New Normal”
Production
Steve Gieseke, BJ ’17, director
“Attack Area”
Taylor Hensel, MA ’19, producer
“What She Carries”
Meg Vatterott, BJ ’17, MA ’19, director
“Rabbit Hole”
Postproduction
Michael Coleman, MA ’24, director
“Satan’s Greatest Lies”
Kellan Embry, BJ ’17, editor
“A Texas Son”
Kyle Pyatt, BJ ’17, director
“Liberation Day”
Updated: March 16, 2026