CAST AND CREW

is a documentary film producer and director. In 2001, she founded Displaced Yankee Productions, an independent film company dedicated to using film as a platform for raising social awareness and activism through entertainment. She is a graduate of Salem University.

Heather is known for her award-winning documentaries. Small Voices: The Stories of Cambodia’s Children followed the struggles of the street and garbage dump children of Cambodia through the personal stories of five children and their journey toward education and Forget Us Not, which follows the stories of some of the five-million non-Jewish Holocaust survivors and is narrated by golden globe winning actor Ron Perlman.

Shortly after filming Small Voices: The Stories of Cambodia’s Children, Connell founded Safe Haven in 2010 in memory of her beloved Cambodian foster son Sumnang who passed away at age 5 from complications related to epilepsy and cerebral palsy. Safe Haven’s family centered, multi-disciplinary approach to providing therapeutic rehabilitation, facilitating access to medical services and providing training/education to parents/caregivers aims to provide children with disability the opportunity to reach their full potential and highest level of personal independence and health.

Heather is passionately dedicated to a life of philanthropy with the goals of building sustainable programs that not only serve children with disabilities and their families but aim to provide professional opportunities and education for local staff. She is a David Chow Foundation Humanitarian Award Recipient. The David Chow Humanitarian Foundation recognizes, and rewards dedicated and caring humanitarians found among charitable, religious, scientific, literary, and educational organizations worldwide that promote man’s humanity towards man whose service of unselfish giving might otherwise go unnoticed.  In 2013, she was one of GO Magazine‘s “100 Women We Love 

In 2019 she was honored to be asked to be a contributing writer for the book Art from Trauma: Genocide and Healing beyond Rwanda. This powerful collection of essays examines the role of aesthetic expression in responding to discrimination, tragedy and violence and questions how gender shape responses to both literal and structural violence, including implicit linguistic, familial, and cultural violence.

Golden Globe winner, Ron Perlman, a classically trained actor, has appeared in countless stage plays, feature films and television productions. He was born Ronald Francis Perlman on April 13, 1950 in Washington Heights, Manhattan, New York. His first real breakthrough came later, when he landed the role of Vincent, the lion-man, opposite Linda Hamilton in the cult-series Beauty and the Beast (1987). His work in this role earned him not only a Golden Globe Award, but a underground fan following.

After that, he spent time doing supporting work on television and independent films such as Guillermo del Toro’s debut Cronos (1993) (where a lifelong friendship and collaboration between the director and Perlman would blossom) as Angel and his first lead role as One in Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s surreal The City of Lost Children (1995). His first real big role in a mainstream film came when Jeunet wanted him for the brutish Johner in his first Hollywood outing Alien: Resurrection (1997). Perlman has also used his distinctive voice to his advantage, appearing in many animated films/series, commercials and he is a video game fan favorite because of his work on such games as the Fallout: A Post-Nuclear Role-Playing Game (1997) (VG) series.

It was not until much later, he got worldwide fame when his good friend Guillermo del Toro helped him land the title role in the big-budget comic book movie Hellboy (2004). del Toro fought the studio for 4 years, because they wanted a more secure name, but he stood his ground and in 2004, after almost 25 years in and out of obscurity, Perlman became and household name and a sought out actor. Perlman has had one of the most off-beat careers in film, playing everything from a prehistoric ape-man to an aging transsexual, and will always be a rarity in Hollywood.

Other notable roles include the cunning Norman Arbuthnot in The Last Supper (1995/I), sniper expert Koulikov in Enemy at the Gates (2001), vampire leader Reinhardt in Blade II (2002), his reprisal of Hellboy in Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008) and biker chief Clarence Morrow in the popular series Sons of Anarchy (2008).

Arthur Yee is a Director of Photography with a strong career emphasis in documentary production. In his eight years of experience, he has filmed worldwide, shooting in various geographical locations – from desert valleys to mountaintops. He brings a creative passion to every shoot, and uncompromising quality to every project. He has worked with such distinguished clients as: A&E, Discovery; MSNBC; National Geographic; NBC, and NASA.

Jason Rosenblatt is the editor at Displaced Yankee Productions after his film school documentary about a Chicago area rugby team impressed Heather E. Connell. Since 2008 he has kept busy as a screenwriter and director based out of Portland, Oregon. In 2016 his short film For Dad earned him Best Oregon Based Filmmaker at the McMinnville Short Film Festival. In 2017 his feature film Vicious earned him awards for Best Director at the Oregon Independent Film Festival and Indie Auteur of the Year at the Bare Bones International Film and Music Festival. He adapted the true crime novel The Last Rampage: The Escape of Gary Tison which starred Robert Patrick and Heather Graham. Following his divorce, he stayed active creating the YouTube web series Ted Tantrum: The Self Reliant Man (played by Alan Burrell) about a fictional divorced buffoon of a man trying to provide advice to divorced men about adapting to life after divorce. The pilot premiered as part of a collection of Jason’s worked titled Struggles to Connect that screened at the Northwest Film Center in 2018. He has continued to write and direct short films, many of which premiere at the McMinnville Short Film Festival where he has screened eleven films over seven years (and counting) including his own documentary short The Michelle Experience about violinist Michelle Alany. While being one of the most prolific micro-budget filmmakers of the Pacific Northwest, Jason is also a father of two, a part time dog caretaker and has worked the same full time day job for a dozen years (and counting). His short films can be found on Vimeo while Ted Tantrum (and sometimes the feature Vicious) can be found on YouTube.

Sherene Strausberg has been writing music for more than ten years. She has written music for film, television, and radio. Since moving to Los Angeles five years ago, Sherene has worked on several independent films. Many of the films have been screened in Los Angeles, the DGA Theater, the Egyptian Theater, Cinespace, as well as many fesivals including: The Tribeca Film Festival and the Cleveland International Film Festival. You Can see samples of her work at www.sweetnotes.com.

After graduating from the Music Synthesis program at Berklee College of Music, Rommel was awarded a scholarship to attend the Vancouver Film School. At VFS, he completed a one year program in Sound Design for Visual Media. Upon relocating to Los Angeles in 2009, Rommel continued to pursue his creative interests working as a sound designer and mixer at Danetracks and 740 Sound Design.

Jorge Costa is a Chilean music producer, mixer and engineer. He came to the U.S. to attend the prestigious Berklee College of Music in Boston where he graduated Summa Cum Laude. In 2006, he moved to Los Angeles where he has established himself in this highly competitive market working with a very diverse pool of high profile clients such as Korn, Melissa Etheridge, Jonathan Davis and Engelbert Humperdinck.

Understanding that the World keeps getting smaller Jorge has made a point to expand to foreign markets working with superstars Keti Topuria (Rusia), Agnes Monica (Indonesia) and Grammy winner Ines Gaviria (Colombia) among many others.

He is also a prolific score mixes for movies and television. His work in this area includes the movie “Cleaner” with Samuel L Jackson and Ed Harris and the TV series “Tracey Ullman: State of the Union” and “10 things I hate about you”. Most recently, Jorge had the great opportunity to worke in the upcoming documentary “Forget us Not” by award winning director Heather Connell.

In 2012 He produced the album “Train” for Grammy nominated blues artist Solomon King and is currently working on guitar legend Carl Verheyen’s new album to be released in 2013.

Theresa Kennedy has satisfied her craving to get behind the camera is a variety of locations, including: Cambodia, London, Paris, Vienna, Philadelphia, Big Sur, New York, Venice, Las Vegas, Santa Fe, and San Francisco. She works in both film and digital media, with a special enthusiasm for experimenting with night photography. For several years,has satisfied her craving to get behind the camera in a variety of locations, including: Cambodia, Viet Nam, Cuba, Paris, Vienna, London, Prague and New York. She works in both film and digital media, with a special enthusiasm for experimenting with night photography. She followed up a 10-year stint as Director of Print Production for the Fox Kids Network by building out and running a professional digital photography studio in Los Angeles for several years. Theresa also co-founded and produced (it) magazine, a site that spotlighted people and organizations making a difference, and more recently served as an Executive Director of Booxie, a photo sharing and book-making app. Theresa serves on the Board of Safe Haven Medical Outreach, has begun to learn to paint, and volunteers her time as a photographer for several non-profits in the LA area.