About
About The Filmmaker
Pamela Tom is an Emmy award-winning documentary filmmaker, director, screenwriter and producer. Her work has explored subjects ranging from art and identity to foster youth, women’s rights, and the Asian American experience. She’s filmed on location in the US, Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean.
Speaking engagements
Pamela has spoken about documentary filmmaking, Asian American history, and diversity in the film industry at numerous cultural and educational institutions and companies including Yale University, Pixar, Disney, Dropbox, and Marriott International. She has taught directing and documentary filmmaking at the University of California at Santa Barbara, Loyola Marymount University, and UCLA Extension Education.
To book Pamela for a speaking engagement, please fill out this form.
Currently
Pamela is currently producing the feature documentary, A Better Way: Reverend James Lawson, Architect of Nonviolence. The film explores the life, spirituality, and activism of civil rights leader, Reverend James Lawson, who Martin Luther King called “the leading theorist and strategist of nonviolence in the world.”
She is also developing a feature script based on “The Celestial,” a short story by Edgar Award-winning mystery and noir author Naomi Hirahara. In 1880, a Japanese prostitute and Chinese miner are forced to flee a small Eastern Washington town after she commits a crime to save his life.
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Pamela Tom is an Emmy award-winning documentary filmmaker, director, screenwriter and producer. Her work has explored subjects ranging from art and identity to foster youth, women’s rights, and the Asian American experience. She’s filmed on location in the US, Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean.
Pam’s work includes the multi-award winning feature documentary TYRUS, about Chinese American artist and Disney Legend, Tyrus Wong, the Emmy-winning PBS documentary Finding Home: A Foster Youth Story, about four teens transitioning out of foster care, the critically acclaimed Sundance short narrative film, Two Lies, about a Chinese American woman who undergoes plastic surgery to make her eyes appear rounder, and A Tribute to Sir Sidney, a feature documentary about legendary actor Sidney Poitier that aired on Bahamian television. Pam directed Sidney Poitier in a promotional short for Showtime’s Mandela and deKlerk and actor Keith David for the voice-over narration on the BBC documentary series, WWII: Behind Closed Doors: Stalin, the Nazis and the West.
Pam is an outspoken advocate for diversity and inclusion in the film industry. She served as the Director of Diversity at Film Independent where she spearheaded Project:Involve, a pioneering mentoring program for emerging BIPOC and LGBTQ filmmakers. She’s a former Walt Disney Writing Fellow and winner of numerous directing awards. She is a frequent guest speaker who’s spoken at the Walt Disney Company, Pixar Animation, Marriott International, Dropbox, Berkeley Public Library, Yale, Tufts, and countless universities.
Pam is a member of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences, Film Fatales, a national organization of feature and television women directors, A-Doc, an Asian American documentary filmmaker group, and Brown Girls Doc Mafia. She’s passionate about Chinese American history and is a member of the City of Los Angeles’ 1871 Los Angeles Chinese Massacre Memorial Steering Committee. She received her BA from Brown University and MFA from UCLA's School of Theater, Film, and Television. She’s a 5 th -generation Chinese American Los Angeles native.
Pam and co-writer Pablo Miralles are currently adapting The Celestial into a feature script which she plans to direct. Based on the short story by Edgar Award-winning author Naomi Hirahara’s, The Celestial is an Asian American Western set in 1890 Idaho that involves a Japanese prostitute who commits a crime to save the life of a Chinese miner.
New Moon Pictures, LLC
Founded in 2015, New Moon Pictures is a Los Angeles-based production company that produces Emmy award-winning documentary and narrative films. Its films have screened at the Sundance Film Festival and Telluride Film Festival, and aired on the acclaimed PBS series, American Masters. Founded by Pamela Tom, New Moon Pictures creates compelling and thought-provoking stories that challenge stereotypes and promotes authentic portrayals of marginalized communities.
ACCOLADES
Los Angeles Emmy, Crime and Social Justice Category
Los Angeles Press Club Award
Hawaii International Film Festival, Audience Choice Award
Newport Beach Film Festival, Audience Choice Award
Disorient Film Festival, Best Documentary Feature
Cinetopia, Best Director, Feature Documentary
Los Angeles Asian Pacific Film Festival, Special Jury Award
San Diego Asian Film Festival, Audience Choice Award
Garden State Film Festival, Legendary Film Pioneer Award
Philadelphia Asian American Film Festival, Best Feature Documentary
Prescott Film Festival, Audience Choice Award for Best Documentary Feature
Boston Asian American Film Festival, Audience Award
Seattle Asian American Film Festival, Audience Choice Award
USA Film Festival, Finalist
Hometown USA Video Festival, 1st place
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Walt Disney Studio Writing Fellowship
Dorothy Arzner Award, Best Director
Asian American Pacific Women’s Network Award
Chinese Historical Society of Southern California, Golden Spike Award for Storytelling
Apparatus Film Grant
Center for Asian American Media Grant
Pacific Pioneer Fund Grant
Walt Disney Studios Foundation Grant
Western States Regional Media Arts Fellowship Grant
Women in Film Foundation Finishing Fund Grant
AARP Magazine, “Influential Asian American & Pacific Islander Movies”
Sightlines Magazine, “Seven Arts Documentaries to Watch”
Awards Daily, “Oscar Contenders Emerging out of Telluride”
COMMUNITIES
Academy of Television Arts and Sciences
Film Fatales
The ACTION Project
A-Doc
Brown Girls Doc Mafia
1871 Chinese Massacre Memorial Steering Committee, Los Angeles Mayor’s Office