HOMELAND - The Filmmakers

Broadcast Schedule

Jilann Spitzmiller (Codirector, Producer, Editor) and
Hank Rogerson (Codirector, Producer, Editor) of Philomath Films

An award-winning filmmaking team, Hank and Jilann have been creating films together since they attended Dartmouth College. HOMELAND, which they began in 1995, is one of their most memorable projects. They also recently completed Our Youth, Our Future, a profile on a drug and alcohol treatment center serving Native American youth in Shiprock, New Mexico. The video illustrates how Native ceremony and tradition is combined with western Alcoholics Anonymous models to heal at-risk youth. In 1994, the team completed Bless Me with a Good Life, a video about Native American elders. Hank and Jilann have also been working as episodic producers for a new Discovery Health Channel series called Medical Diary, which debuted in June 2000. The team is currently developing a television drama series, a feature film and several documentaries.

Jilann's past projects include Hecel Oyakapi: They Tell It This Way, produced for actor and activist James Cromwell; a music video for Indigo Girls, which is included in their biographical documentary Watershed; and Thoroughbred Pursuit, a documentary about her father Walt Spitzmiller, a world-renowned sports artist. Jilann is also a cinematographer, writer and painter.

Hank's past work includes cinematography on Rocks with Wings, a film about the Navajo Lady Chieftains basketball team and assistant camera work on several films including Surfer Girl, a documentary about the world's top five women surfers. Hank is also an accomplished actor whose work has appeared on television and in film. His favorite roles include Peter Jones in The Butter and Egg Man, and Pierrot in The Orange Orange.

Shana Hagan - Cinematographer
Shana Hagan has photographed over 30 films including Breathing Lessons, which won an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short, an International Documentary Association Award and an Emmy. Her recent works include Disney's Ub Iwerks: The Hand Behind The Mouse, and Disclosure: To Tell Or Not To Tell, a film profiling survivors of child sexual abuse. She recently completed the feature film Indemnity and shot the narrative short entitled Better Late, which premiered at the 1997 Sundance Film Festival. Shana's work has been featured on HBO, Cinemax, ABC, CBS, NBC, PBS, the Learning Channel and others. The Living Museum, an HBO feature documentary about an art space dedicated to the work of the mentally ill, premiered at the 1999 Sundance Film Festival.

Jacqueline Keeler - Associate Producer
After graduating from Dartmouth College in 1992, Jacqueline Keeler (Dineh/Nakota Indian) pursued a career in journalism and documentary filmmaking. She is currently an associate editor for the Pacific News Service, and freelances for a number of other publications, including Colorlines Magazine and Pacifica Radio. Jacqueline is also a filmmaker and is editing Anpetu Sa, her film about the Indigenous Rights Movement.

Keith Secola - Composer
Singer/songwriter Keith Secola (Anishinabe Indian) has a musical background "as varied as a geological cross section, with a bedrock of tribal dances, covered by successive layers of rock and pop." Keith and his band Wild Band of Indians have played with Neil Young, Indigo Girls, U2 and others. He was featured on NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross, talking about his CD Fingermonkey. Keith is releasing a HOMELAND soundtrack in conjunction with the program's PBS broadcast.

Lisa Leeman - Consulting Editor
A former president of the International Documentary Association, Lisa Leeman has over 15 years of experience working as a director and editor on documentaries. She worked as an editor on In Search of Our Fathers, and on Fear and Learning at Hoover Elementary. Lisa was the director on FENDER PHILOSOPHERS (ITVS coproduction) and Metamorphosis: Man Into Woman. She was also a consulting editor on Kevin McKiernan's Good Kurds, Bad Kurds.