The Producers
Tracy Droz Tragos is an award-winning filmmaker who produced the Emmy Award winning documentary Be Good, Smile Pretty. Tragos started her career at DreamWorks, SKG, where she rose through the ranks from assistant to writer/producer.
Andrew Droz Palermo is one of filmmaker Magazines 25 New Faces of Independent Film of 2013. In 2011, he lensed his first feature. After growing up in Central Missouri, Andrew studied graphic design at Columbia College Chicago. He then progressed from photography to directing and shooting music videos for indie bands. Rich Hill is Andrews first documentary, a proud collaboration with his cousin, Tracy.
Making The Film
I made my first documentary after discovering a picture of my father the day he was killed in Vietnam. The film was well received and won the Emmy Award for Best Documentary in 2004. It was difficult to find another film project with such a deep connection - and then came motherhood. In 2011, with my daughters in school, I formed a partnership with my first cousin, Andrew Droz Palermo, and found that we shared an enduring relationship with our parents hometown of Rich Hill, Missouri.
The Sundance-winning story of three young boys living in desperate poverty in a forsaken Missouri town. Houses derelict, farms deserted, storefronts boarded-up. When the coal ran out at the end of World War Two, so did the people. It's a story that can be told all across rural America. Yet a few still live here and amid the squalor and shattered dreams, the camera achieves a relationship with the boys that is startling in its candour and compassion.
Winner - U.S. Grand Jury Prize: Documentary, Sundance 2014
