GUEST SPEAKER

  • New Orleans Film Society, South Summit, panel discussion on “The Shifting South” moderated by Noland Walker, VP at ITVS with filmmakers Naveen Chabul, Karla Murthy and Tim Tsai

  • Lit Fest Panel, YSU, “The Places That Make Us”, Moderator Rebecca Brown Asmo, Executive Director of Ohio Humanities, Sponsored by the Youngstown Foundation, with Laura Beadling, Candace Fleming, Kelly Fordon, Karla Murthy & Joy Priest in conversation about the element of place in the literary arts.

  • City College of New York, Journalism, “Covering Power” Class

  • New York University, Journalism Institute, “The Art of the Profile” Class

  • Rutgers University, Journalism and Media Studies Department, Video Storytelling Class

TALKS

  • Changing Narratives and Building Connection: the Power of Documentary Film to Redefine, Reimagine, and Break Stereotypes by Creating Empathy
    As society has become increasingly and dangerously divided, empathy through the arts is now more than ever a vital and powerful tool to bring people together.  In this talk, filmmaker and reporter Karla Murthy explores the subtle beauty of documentary as a vehicle to create an understanding of people's experiences unlike our own. Using clips from her award winning documentary film about Youngstown Ohio, Karla unpacks how her film sought to create new narratives, and in the process, made her confront her own stereotypes, while exploring the essential role of the artist today to help transform and reimagine the world around us.

  • From the Small Screen to the Big Screen:  Crafting Stories for News and Documentary Films
    In 2016, TV reporter Karla Murthy was sent to Youngstown, Ohio, to produce a news segment for PBS NewsHour, a fateful assignment that would begin her journey to make her first feature film, The Place That Makes Us.  Akin to writing a newspaper article and a narrative non-fiction book on the same subject, Karla explores the confines and freedoms of the newsmagazine format versus the documentary feature film. Comparing and contrasting similar thematic video clips from each, Karla pulls back the curtain to reveal not only the process, but how her journey from reporter to filmmaker led her to embrace the unexpected.