Fall 2023

Jacqueline Olive is an independent filmmaker with nearly twenty years of experience in journalism and film. Her award-winning debut documentary film, ALWAYS IN SEASON, has received numerous honors including winner of the 2019 Sundance Festival Special Jury Prize for Moral Urgency. The feature-length film received support from an array of funders including Independent Television Service, Black Public Media, Firelight Media, Sundance Institute, Tribeca Film Fund, Ford Foundation, Independent Documentary Association, Catapult Film Fund, Chicken & Egg Pictures, and more. ALWAYS IN SEASON broadcast on Independent Lens on PBS in 2020. 

In addition to creating the 2022 Peabody Award-winning VR project, Always in Season Island, Jackie directed, produced, and wrote the documentary film, DEATH IS OUR BUSINESS, which broadcast on FRONTLINE/PBS and the WORLD Channel in February 2021 and executive produced and directed the Emmy Award-nominated four-part unscripted series Lincoln’s Dilemma, in 2023 for Apple TV. 

Jackie is currently directing and writing the documentary feature film, THE COLOR OF COLA, with Academy Award-nominated director Stanley Nelson. The project is in collaboration with All Day Every Day, Los Angeles Media Fund, JuVee, and PepsiCo. In 2023, Jackie was awarded a Harvard University, Kennedy School Shorenstein Center Documentary Film Fellowship. She continues to dedicate her career to making films and immersive media projects full-time, while executive producing projects helmed by emerging filmmakers who are also dedicated to impactful storytelling. 

As a Shorenstein Documentary Film Fellow, Jackie examined the shifts in the current documentary distribution landscape by developing methods to analyze and map the complex interaction of power hierarchies that impact how independent BIPOC filmmakers’ work and reach the audiences they represent. Understanding and improving these power dynamics are crucial for BIPOC filmmakers to continue to tell underrepresented stories with the values they champion, while leveraging their relationships and influencing how their projects are shared out into the world.