Ondi Timoner

Ondi Timoner is known to be one of the greatest talents in non-fiction filmmaking. She often takes on the stories of visionaries fighting against all odds with a gripping and unique mixed-media, narrative style. Ondi has the rare distinction of winning the Grand Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival twice - for her documentaries DIG! (2004) and We Live In Public (2009). Both films were acquired by MoMA, NY for its permanent collection. Other award-winning features include: The Nature of the Beast (1994), Join Us (2007), Cool It (2010), Brand: A Second Coming (2015) & Coming Clean (2020). Timoner has also directed countless award-winning shorts, among them "Library of Dust" in 2011, "Amanda Palmer on the Rocks" in 2014 and "The Last Mile" in 2015. Ondi wrote, directed, produced and edited the scripted film, Mapplethorpe, starring Matt Smith. After premiering at Tribeca FF where it won an Audience Award, it continued a strong festival run, garnering eight more audience awards and three awards for best narrative feature. It was released theatrically by Samuel Goldwyn in 2019. The more complete, original Mapplethorpe Director's Cut will be released in April of 2021. For television, Timoner created, executive-produced and directed the critically-acclaimed 10-hour nonfiction series Jungletown for Viceland about a group of young adults in the Panamanian jungle determined to build "the world's most sustainable town," and Sound Affects, the series about music's affect on people's lives for VH1. Ondi was nominated for a Grammy for Best Long Form Music Video for an EPK she directed about the band Fastball in 1999. She has also produced and directed music videos for The Dandy Warhols, The Vines, Paul Westerberg, Lucinda Williams, Vanessa Carlton, The Jonas Brothers, and Run DMC, among others. Timoner has also enjoyed a career in front of the camera, interviewing filmmakers and innovators across tech and government as well for a number of shows. From 2011-2016, she created and hosted BYOD (Bring Your Own Doc) for thelip.tv producing over 300 episodes of unique interviews she performed with top documentary filmmakers around the world. From 2012-2017, she founded and produced A Total Disruption, an online network dedicated to telling the stories of entrepreneurs & artists who are using technology to innovate new ways to live. Subjects included musician Amanda Palmer, graphic artist Shepard Fairey, comedian Russell Brand, musician Moby, Twitter-founder Jack Dorsey, Instagram-founder Kevin Systrom, and the late founder of Zappos, Tony Hsieh. Ondi has released two masterclasses for filmmakers, "Lean Content" with Eric Ries & "How to Make a Great Documentary (In My Opinion)." From 2018-2020, Ondi produced & hosted WeTalk, a traveling talk show about the women shaping our culture with the mission of taking #MeToo to #WeDo. Timoner gave a popular TEDxKC talk entitled "When Genius and Insanity Hold Hands" in 2014, explaining why she tells the stories of what she calls "impossible visionaries." In 2020, she premiered her newest feature documentary, Coming Clean, which uncovers the genesis and potential solutions to the opioid epidemic through the eyes of political leaders and recovering addicts working together on the front lines. The film has picked up the Best Feature Film at Dallas Docufest, the Impact Award at the Naples International, Best Life & Liberty Film and the Special Jury for Editing award at the Sidewalk Film Festival on a robust festival tour and opened theatrically in early 2021. Ondi is currently helming a new feature documentary Between Us, which looks through the eyes of scientists and artists at how technology is transforming our ways of connecting and loving, given the societal trend towards increasing physical isolation, accelerated by the onset of the COVID-19 global pandemic. She is also directing REPLIKA, which follows ordinary people - from the founder of the company to its ballooning numbers of users - who are seeking solace in friendships and romantic relationships with AI-driven bots. Meanwhile, she is putting the finishing touches on a new screenplay, A Stroke of Genius, about the remarkable life and career of her father Eli Timoner, who founded the fastest growing airline in the history of the world before suffering an accidental stroke and living the next forty years as a hemiplegic. Ondi Timoner is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, the DGA, the PGA, the International Documentary Association, Film Fatales and Women in Film.