Doane Tulugaq Avery
Director of Information
Doane Tulugaq Avery is currently co-writing an unannounced queer western horror film for Blumhouse Productions and most recently co-wrote the forthcoming film MOTHERTRUCKER with Joey Soloway and Taylor Blackburn. Doane is one of three participants selected for the Native American Media Alliance’s 2021 Showrunner Program and one of four participants in the 2021 Sundance Native Lab. Originally from the Pacific Northwest, Doane is a filmmaker of Iñupiaq descent whose stories focus on feminine, queer, and Indigenous character-driven narratives. She was the recipient of the LA Skins Fest Emerging Filmmaker Award and the imagineNATIVE Jane Glassco Award for Emerging Talent. Her short films have screened at Outfest, Oaxaca Film Fest, Seattle Queer Film Festival, REDCAT, Māoriland, the Hamilton Workers Arts and Heritage Centre, and the Cinematheque in Winnipeg. She was selected as a fellow for the Sundance Institute + IAIA Native Writers Workshop, the Barcid Foundation’s Native American TV Writers Lab, and the 2nd Annual Native American Writers Room sponsored by the Pop Culture Collaborative. She received an MFA in Film Directing from the California Institute of the Arts.
William Jehu Garroutte
Director of Education
William Jehu Garroutte is an enrolled Citizen of the Cherokee Nation. He had an Army brat childhood, and a rural adolescence in a town famed for its cattle slaughterhouses. He didn’t go to college, and taught himself to write in the WGA library. He is an alumni of the Skins Fest Native American TV Writing Lab, NBC’s Writers on the Verge program, and the ABC/Disney TV Writing Program. He is currently staffed on a forthcoming Showtime show.
Carlee Malemute
Director of Government Affairs
Born and raised in an Alaskan village of 500, Carlee Malemute is a graduate from USC’s Screenwriting MFA Program and a participant in the 2016 Native American TV Writers Lab and the 2018 Native American Features Lab. She co-wrote three movies for Lifetime, was staffed on Hallmark’s Good Witch, and recently co-ran the writers’ room for a digital Native American series. She enjoys writing stories about complicated families.
Ian Skorodin
Director of Strategy
Ian Skorodin is an enrolled member of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma and has worked with numerous tribes to develop the Native American voice in media. Skorodin founded the Barcid Foundation to provide a collaborative partner for diversity and inclusion departments at several networks, studios, and unions. Skorodin has launched groundbreaking initiatives to provide training for Native American writers and filmmakers. He has also provided access for the entertainment industry by creating a conduit to talented Native Americans writers, directors and filmmakers. Skorodin currently oversees a streaming service of Native American content and a database of Native American writers.