Our alumni are changemakers, innovators, activists, creators and leaders. They contribute to the life of the department in numerous ways, such as through mentorships, internships, class visits, special alumni events and financial contributions.
Meet some of our graduates who are making an impact in a wide variety of fields.
Film and entertainment
Patrice Vermette, BA 23
Patrice Vermette, Academy Award-winning and BAFTA-winning production designer for Dune, C.R.A.Z.Y., Young Victoria, Vice, Sicario,and Arrival. He returned to complete his degree in 2023 — the year his daughter Lili Bertrand-Vermette graduated from the same program.
Nastaran Dibai, BA 83
Nastaran Dibai is known for her work on shows such as Resident Alien, Dear White People, Flatbush Misdemeanors and Run the World, all of which she worked on as an executive producer. Over her long career she has also been a writer and producer on such classics as The Nanny, 3rd Rock from the Sun and Living Single and has worked at various studios and networks including Amazon, Warner Bros, Universal, Netflix and Disney.
Kieran Crilly, BA 03
Kieran Crilly is an Oscar-winning producer and cinematographer. He was the cinematographer and co-producer for The Lady in Number 6 which won the 2013 Academy Award for Best Documentary Short. He has also worked as the cinematographer for The Give and Take, Catching a Serial Killer: Bruce McArthur, Bad Ladies and Boost.
Frederic Bohbot, BA 01
Frederic Bohbot is an executive producer best known for the 2014 Academy-award winning documentary The Lady in Number 6. In 2002, he founded Montreal-based film production and distribution company Bunbury Films to “push the boundaries of social, environmental and popular culture for national and international markets.”
Barry Julien, BA 94
Barry Julien is a writer, stand-up comic and actor who has won 7 Primetime Emmy Awards (as of 2023) and has been nominated for many more. He currently works on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert and was previously a writer for Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report in New York.
Mary Stephen, BA 74
Mary Stephen studied filmmaking in Communication Studies and made her first feature film before she began a life-long collaboration with notable French filmmaker Eric Rohmer working as his principal editor and co-composer. She also continued to make her own narrative and documentary files. In 2023, she received the Fire Horse Award presented annually to an Asian Canadian individual who has made an extraordinary contribution to the film and media-arts community.
Paweł Pogorzelski, BA 04
Paweł Pogorzelski is a highly accomplished cinematographer and a graduate of Communication studies (2004). He has contributed his expertise to over 20 narrative films. Notably, his collaborations with filmmaker Ari Aster on Beau is Afraid, Midsummer and Hereditary have earned him acclaim for his outstanding cinematography, where his signature style shines through.
Alexandre Franchi, Dip 95
Alexandre Franchi is a screenwriter, film director, and producer with 20 years of practice. His films explore myth, fantasy, and humor as a means of coping with trauma. He is best known for his films The Wild Hunt (2009) that won the Best Canadian First Feature, Happy Face (2018), and Quest for Communitas (2023), that explores "playing" with one's own anxieties and oppressions to create transformative narratives.
Marketing
Livia Tortella, BA 91
Livia Tortella is the founder and CEO of Black Box, a music marketing juggernaut. Livia earned a reputation as a fearless entertainment executive, working with artists such as U2, Def Leppard, Dire Straits, Portishead, The Cult, Michael Bublé, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Josh Groban, Bruno Mars, Death Cab for Cutie, Halestorm, Gnarls Barkley and Janelle Monae, PJ Harvey, The Killers, Melissa Etheridge, Bon Jovi.
Jamie Lewis-Mella, BA 21
Jamie Lewis-Mella works in social media and digital marketing. As the creative marketing coordinator at Cozey, her job includes managing the production of content creation.
Journalism and writing
Andrew Carter, BA 84
Having earned his BA in 1984, Andrew Carter was among the first graduates of Concordia’s Joint Communication Studies and Journalism program. From beginnings in the Loyola radio station CIRL his career path took him to radio stations from Thunder Bay back to Montreal, where he has capped a 20-year career in broadcasting with the Morning Man position at CJAD 800 Montreal.
Hana Gartner, BA 70
Hana Gartner is one of Canada’s most recognized journalists, best known for her investigative reporting on The Fifth Estate. With a distinguished career of over 25 years in broadcasting for the CBC, Gartner has earned the respect of the journalistic community and numerous awards.
Photo: Michael James O'Brien
Adam Leith Gollner, BA 04
Adam Leith Gollner is a writer and musician based in Montreal. His first book, The Fruit Hunters: A Story of Nature, Obsession, Commerce and Adventure, was a national bestseller. He has written for The New York Times, Gourmet, the Globe and Mail, Maclean’s, Good Magazine and has been the editor of Vice Magazine and the associate editor of Maisonneuve Magazine.
Tessa Wegert, BA 98
Tessa Wegert is the author of the acclaimed Shana Merchant mystery series, which includes Death in the Family, The Dead Season, Dead Wind, The Kind to Kill, Devils at the Door, and The Coldest Case. Prior to writing fiction, Tessa developed content for brands like Audible, IBM, Spotify and Toshiba and worked in digital marketing as a media strategist.
Creative technologies
Steve Pariso, BA 04
Steve Pariso began programming (computers) at age 11. As a brand management technology consultant, Pariso has worked with Viacom (Nickelodeon, MTV), BellSouth and Time Warner. In addition, he developed over 40 software projects, systems and titles for various Fortune 500 companies.
Warren Wilansky, BA 96
Warren Wilansky has worked in web design and project management at HBE Software. Along with fellow Comm graduate Christiane Magee, he founded Plank, a web and multimedia design studio in Montreal. The company has an extensive client list from the National Film Board to the Fantasia Film Festival and more. The company does work for Old Brewery Mission, the Shriners’ Hospital, Gilda’s Club and the Highlands Hope Hospital Consortium.
Teaching and research
Sarah Ganzon, PhD 22
Sarah Christina Ganzon is an Assistant Professor of Communication Studies at Simon Fraser University. Her research revolves around game studies and digital fandom.
Trish Audette-Longo, PhD 18
Trish Audette-Longo is an assistant professor at Carleton University teaching digital journalism and reporting. Trish’s research interests include: digital, start-up and alternative journalism and media; journalism education; climate change and petroculture studies.
Mel Hogan, PhD 12
Dr. Mel Hogan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Film and Media at Queen's University with a research focus on data infrastructure, extractive AI and genomic media.
Social innovation, activism and non-profit sector
Camina Harrison Chéry, BA 23
Camina Harrison Chéry, BA 23, Valedictorian, is a passionate storyteller and social entrepreneur of Haitian descent. She is now a full-time multimedia producer at Concordia, where during her studies, she led the Black Perspectives Office's outreach, supported the launch and programming of the NouLa Black Student Centre and advanced diverse perspectives at the university on the President's Task Force on Anti-Black Racism.
She is the founder and owner of BUYPOC, supporting BIPOC entrepreneurs and Urban Wrapper, a headwrap brand. She is passionate about youth empowerment and improving youth livelihoods.
Donna Barker, BA 89
As a founding staff member of the Institute for Media, Policy and Civil Society (IMPACS) and faculty with the Hollyhock Leadership Institute, Donna has trained and supported over a thousand social and environmental activists across Canada, helping them to develop better media and public communications skills.
When she’s not helping activists tell their stories more effectively, Donna works as a documentary filmmaker. Broadcast credits include Sangoma: Traditional Healers in Modern Society and Side by Side: Women Against AIDS in Zimbabwe. Donna also sits on the Board of Directors of Moving Images Distribution and maintains several writing projects.
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