Finding Your Pocket: Janicza Bravo Masterclass

Finding Your Pocket: Janicza Bravo Masterclass

By Andrea Nguyen

Fresh off of a spirited screening for her sophomore feature film, director Janicza Bravo took her seat at the front of a basement theater in Tisch, with guests lining the walls in anticipation of the afternoon’s Q+A segment. Before introductions were through, Fusion’s Woman of the Year had charmed the audience with her frank humor and steady irreverence for formal proceedings. Like Zola, a breathless ride through the social media-infused landscape of modern Florida, Bravo has an unrivaled ability to suspend her viewers in an unbroken state of rapt attention.

While Bravo’s charm certainly feels effortless, her filmic journey has been a function hard-earned expertise and a healthy dose of moxie. Originally intent on becoming an actor, Bravo studied her craft as a Theatre major at NYU and a member of Playwrights Horizons. To her surprise, Bravo found her initial reluctance to venture beyond acting erode as she discovered and subsequently embraced her identity as a director.

Post graduation, Bravo worked as a stylist for college friend Jon Watts, of MCU acclaim, and steadily branched out to collaborate with other film directors. Bravo understood that costume design could be a creative entry point, a way to soak up experience on set. Over the next few years, she transitioned to writing and directing several of her own short films, going on to helm her first feature, Lemon (2017), which screened at Sundance and opened the International Film Festival Rotterdam.
With reference to carving out your own lane as a filmmaker, Bravo offered the room the same advice a friend had given her: “if the door’s just a little bit ajar, you just kind of wedge your foot in and then you put your mattress down.” When Bravo caught wind of A’ziah “Zola” King’s viral Twitter thread, she knew she’d found her open door, the story that would become her second feature film. There was, however, one hitch: James Franco was slated to direct the adaptation. Ever-determined, Bravo wrote to Killer Films, one of two producing entities attached to the film, and threw her hat in the ring on the off chance that Franco left the project.

Fast forward two years. Bravo – in bed and fully ready to pass out – received a call from her friend, actor Jodie Turner-Smith. Adopting an English accent in her reenactment of the conversation, Bravo delivers Turner-Smith’s revelation over the phone that night: “I’m with James. He’s not doing Zola. It’s yours, babe.” Without hesitation, Bravo leapt at the opportunity, put herself back into the running, and emerged as Zola’s director, propelling us in