Shawna Baca

Director, Screenwriter and Producer

Los Angeles City Center, Los Angeles County, California

Member Since:
August 2013

Last online:
> 2 weeks ago

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About Shawna

Shawna Baca is an award-winning writer and director. Her first screenplay, Impersonal Impression, about a rape victim and her unusual hero, won the 2002 Slamdance Anarchy Competition. Shawna was selected by Steven Spielberg and Mark Burnett from more than 20,000 filmmakers to be part of his 2007 FOX reality show, ON THE LOT on the basis of her short film "Isabel."

She has participated in Film Independent’s: Project Involve: Director’s track, ABC/Disney IMPACT Workshop Director’s track, the Fox Diversity Writer’s Initiative, CBS Director’s Initiative, Producer’s Guild Diversity Workshop (Episodic Track), and has directed for the Writer’s Guild and NBC diversity showcases.

Shawna received a “Mujeres Destacadas” award by La Opinion newspaper and the City of Los Angeles. She was also honored at the Latina Symposium (Washington D.C.) with an award and recognition for being a “Latina Entrepreneur,” and given a scholarship to the prestigious Tuck School of Business Executive Education Program at Dartmouth University by Latina Style magazine. She has been creating New Media content for corporate clients since 2009.

She produced a feature documentary “Laserium: Gods of Light,” and is currently in development on an indie feature film, “Space for Raven.” The screenplay is a 2021 Stowe Story Labs - Finalist, 2021 BIPOC Writer's Fellowship: Book-to-Screen - Finalist, 2021 ScreenCraft Screenwriting Lab - Quarterfinalist, and has placed in the 2020 WeScreenplay Diverse Voices - Semi-Finalist, 2020 Script Pipeline Feature Screenwriting Contest - Quarterfinalist, and the 2020 Austin Film Festival - Second Rounder.

She is the author of the transformational memoir, “Fear Less: Conquering the Demons of Mental Purgatory," which documents her downward spiral into a panic disorder and agoraphobia at the age of 21 that left her sequestered in her home for over a year, before her Indigenous mother took her to see a Medicine Man on the Pala Indian reservation and cured her in a sweat lodge ceremony. This led her on a journey of exploration into Indigenous shamanism, spirituality and the unknown.

Her short screenplay, "What's Wrong With Me?," is an adaptation from her book Fear Less. The screenplay has won an Outstanding Achievement Award from the 2021 World Cinema Carnival in Singapore, a 2020 London Independent Story Prize Finalist, and the 2021 Phoenix Film Festival. The screenplay made the top 10 screenplays.

Shawna was born in east Los Angeles and is Apache, Yaqui, and Spanish.

Gender:
Female

Certifications

Photos

Loglines

SPACE FOR RAVEN Budget: $1M - $5M | Family ⋄ Drama A coming of age story about Raven Montoya, an East Los Angeles high school girl whose whole life has been determined by the creed of the Latino street gang that her family belongs to and her dream of wanting to become an astronaut.
CURANDERA Drama A promising intern at Yale Hospital, returns home to E.L.A. after her father's sudden death to care for her teenage siblings, and rediscovers the teachings of her Indigenous grandmother to become a Curandera, or healer, that she was meant to be.
WHAT'S WRONG WITH ME? Budget: $0 - $100K | Thriller ⋄ Drama Based on a true story, a young Indigenous woman must battle to escape the mental purgatory that she is trapped in before it consumes her.

Credits

Désirée (2012)
Film Producer
The Lesson (2011)
Film Producer
Encounters (2009)
TV Series Director
Situation Normal (2009)
Film Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Bearspring (2008)
Film Producer
Her Morbid Desires (2008)
Video Producer
We Are All Latino (2008)
Film Producer
The Boneyard Collection (2008)
Film Actress
Stebner Show (2008)
Film Actress
Isabel (2007)
Film Producer
On the Lot (2007)
TV Series Miscellaneous Crew
Tomoko's Kitchen (2006)
Film Producer
Girl Please! (2006)
TV Series Producer
3:52 (2005)
Film Producer
Dolorosas (2004)
Film Producer
Man, Where's My Shoe? (2004)
Film Producer
The Devil's Due at Midnight (2004)
Video Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Rose's Garden (2003)
Film Producer
Boogie with the Undead (2003)
Video Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
Impersonal Impression (2002)
Film Producer
The Vampire Hunters Club (2001)
Video Actress
Laserium
Producer