Jennifer Grausman recently completed the short documentary Investigator, which will screen at film festivals in 2026. She directed and produced the Emmy-nominated feature documentary Art and Craft (2014), which was shortlisted for the 2015 Academy Awards and was named one of the National Board of Review’s Top 5 Documentaries of 2014. Art and Craft opened theatrically across the country, as well as in France and Japan, before being broadcast on PBS via POV. Previously, she directed and produced the Emmy-nominated feature documentary Pressure Cooker (2008), which was executive produced by Participant Media.
She was a consulting producer on the A24 feature documentary Amazing Live Sea Monkeys, which premiered at SXSW, and also a consulting producer on Halston (2019). Grausman co-produced Eric Mendelsohn’s narrative feature film 3 Backyards (2009) and has produced several short films. She earned her MFA in film from Columbia University.
Please List the Title of Your Film at BIFF 2026
INVESTIGATOR
What was your first experience with film and how did it influence your first project?
My little sister was born when I was six years old. In an effort to get me out of the apartment to give my mother time with the new baby, my father took me to the Regency Theater—a revival movie theater on our corner. He took me to the movies he loved and wanted to see: Rear Window, North by Northwest, Vertigo, Sabrina, and Charade, among others. Maybe they were not totally appropriate for a six-year-old, but I loved them and the time I spent with my dad.
Those films did not directly influence my first project per se, but they led to my love of movies, both watching and making them.
Who is (are) your favorite filmmakers?
Alfred Hitchcock
Martin Scorsese
The Coen Brothers
Nora Ephron
Nicole Holofcener
Paul Thomas Anderson
Steven Soderbergh
Sofia Coppola
Some favorite movies not from these filmmakers: All the President’s Men, The Graduate, Charade, Sabrina, The Kids Are All Right, The Social Network.
What are you working on that no one knows about?
I’m adapting the non-fiction book How Not to Hate Your Husband After Kids into a romantic dramedy.
Who would play you in a movie? What’s your go to movie snack? What’s the film title that best describes your life?
According to ChatGPT, Jennifer Garner would play me in a movie.
My go-to movie snacks are Twizzlers, Junior Mints, and popcorn.
Walking and Talking
