About
THE HEARTBREAK OF ALZHEIMER’S, THE POWER OF ART, & THE MEANING OF FAMILY
The Genius of Marian is a visually rich, emotionally complex documentary about one family’s struggle to come to terms with the changes Alzheimer’s disease brings. After Pam White is diagnosed at age 61 with early onset Alzheimer’s, life begins to change, slowly but irrevocably, for Pam and everyone around her. Pam’s husband grapples with his changing role from primary partner to primary caregiver. Her adult children find ways to show their love and support while mourning the slow loss of their mother.
As she loses the ability to write, Pam’s eldest son, Banker, begins to record their conversations, allowing her to share memories of childhood and of her own mother, the renowned painter Marian Williams Steele who died of Alzheimer’s in 2001. The Genius of Marian paints a powerful contemporary portrait of the impact of Alzheimer’s disease, the power of art and the meaning of family.
The Genius of Marian premiered at the TribecaFilm Festival in 2013, was broadcast on PBS' award-winning series, POV, and then released internationally in more than 100 countries. For over a decade, we have worked diligently to establish partnerships and create educational resources to help maximize the firm’s impact. We have also organized more than 300 community screenings of The Genius of Marian, even sharing the film on Capitol Hill and we are so proud to now be able to offer the film a free public art work for the people who need it most.
“Over the past ten years since we started sharing the Genius of Marian, we’ve been truly humbled by the love and support from our audience. My mother was a gifted social worker who devoted her life to helping others. I can feel her pride in what we created together out of this this difficult time, , and I’m excited for this new chapter. That is what I am thinking about now, about continuing her legacy— a legacy of caring” Director, Banker White
The Genius of Marian was produced by Mirabel Pictures
The Team
The Genius of Marian team at Tribeca premiere
Shaleece Hass, Don Bernier, Luke White, Pam White, Ed White, Banker White, Anna Fitch & Dylan White
Banker White
Producer/Co-Director/Editor
Banker White, (Producer/Co-Director/Editor) is a multi-disciplinary artist and filmmaker. Banker co-founded Mirabel Pictures with his wife and producing partners, Anna Fitch in 2010, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that produces artistically bold, mission-driven art & media projects. His work has been celebrated for a uniquely intimate approach to telling large-scale social issues. From war and disease to the complex dimensions that surround aging and death, his work is unified by compassionate humanism. His projects have been supported by the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Sundance Documentary Fund, Creative Capital, MacArthur Foundation, the Tribeca Film Institute, Impact Partners, ITVS, DocSociety, the Catapult Film Fund, The Fledgling Fund, LEF, the California Council for the Humanities, Center for Cultural Innovation, the Creative Work Fund, the Pacific Pioneer Fund, and the Headlands Center for the Arts. Banker co-directed and produced SIERRA LEONE’S REFUGEE ALL STARS (POV 2006), THE GENIUS OF MARIAN (Tribeca 2013 / POV 2014); and, SURVIVORS (IDFA 2018 / POV 2018) which was co-produced with filmmakers at the WeOwnTV Freetown Media Center, a filmmaking collective Banker co-founded based in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
Anna Fitch
Producer/Co-Director/Editor
Anna Fitch (Producer/Co-Director) is a multidisciplinary artist and Emmy award-winning director based in San Francisco. She is known for her creative approach to elevating unlikely protagonists in both natural and human worlds. Anna’s films have aired on PBS, BBC, the National Geographic Channel, Al Jazeera, and Channel 4 UK, among others. Her work has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Sundance Documentary Fund, the Tribeca Film Institute, the MacArthur Foundation, SFFILM, the Center for Cultural Innovation, the Creative Work Fund, Pacific Pioneer Fund, Doc Society, the Catapult Film Fund, The Fledgling Fund, the Bertha Foundation, and the Headlands Center for the Arts.
Don Bernier
Editor
Don Bernier, ACE, is an award-winning and Emmy-nominated documentary film editor who has worked on experimental, historical and verité features, series, and shorts. Most recently, he edited In Waves and War (Participant | Actual Films), about retired U.S. Navy SEALs who use psychedelics to treat PTSD, which premiered at the 2024 Telluride Film Festival. Bernier’s editing credits also include Athlete A (Netflix), which won a 2021 Emmy award for Outstanding Investigative Documentary and earned Don a Critic’s Choice Documentary Award nomination for Best Editing; Always in Season, which won a Special Jury Award at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival; the Emmy-nominated Charm City (Independent Lens | PBS), which was shortlisted for a 2019 Academy Award. He is a two-time Sundance Institute Documentary Edit and Story Lab Fellow, and has served as a mentor for The Karen Schmeer Film Editing Fellowship, BAVC‘s MediaMaker program, Chicken & Egg, the Catapult | True False Rough Cut Retreat, and the SFFILM Makers Creative Advisory Board. In 2017, Don was invited to become a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences’ Documentary Branch. He is also an active member of American Cinema Editors (ACE) since 2022.
Bernier received a BFA at Kansas City Art Institute before going on to earn a graduate degree in media study at SUNY-Buffalo. He lives and works in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife, artist Tina Erickson… and world’s best cat, Arbus.
Shaleece Haas
Co-Producer
Shaleece Haas is an Emmy Award-winning documentary producer and director based in Los Angeles. Producing credits include the forthcoming film THE TALLEST DWARF, directed by Julie Wyman and executive produced by Multitude Films; DELIKADO (2022; Hot Docs, POV); ASIAN AMERICANS: BREAKING THROUGH (2020; PBS, Peabody Award); and TEXAS STRONG (2018; SXSW, Emmy Award). Directing credits include REAL BOY (2017; PBS/Independent Lens), and the animated short TO THE FUTURE, WITH LOVE (2021; POV Shorts). In addition to her work as a filmmaker, Shaleece is a certified somatic practitioner and a film supervisor at Film in Mind, which provides therapeutic support for the doc film industry.
Chris Riley
Impact Producer
Chris Riley is an Impact Producer and Community Organizer, has spent over two decades driving social change through strategic planning and grassroots activism, focusing on women’s rights, economic justice, and LGBTQ civil rights. Chris has collaborated with over a dozen filmmaking teams, expertly positioning films for distribution through film festivals, streaming platforms, and in-person screenings. As the Impact Producer for The Genius of Marian, the team achieved a groundbreaking milestone by accrediting the film as the first POV PBS film for medical professionals, facilitating its screening across the US and Europe. Chris also lends her expertise to various political campaigns and influential film projects.
Tyler Strickland
Original Music
Tyler Strickland is an Emmy Award Winning film composer and music producer based in Los Angeles, CA. From 2004-2011, he traveled the world with a variety of bands as a multi-instrumentalist; sharpening his skills in different genres. After deciding to leave behind the touring life, he quickly found his dream path of writing music for film and television.
In the past decade, Tyler has scored over 50 films that have collectively received a dozen Emmy nominations and have won numerous awards from the most prestigious film festivals around the world such as; Hot Girls Wanted (Netflix), Audrie & Daisy (Netflix), Jackson (Showtime), Ernie & Joe (HBO), The American Meme (Netflix) and Fresh Dressed (CNN) to name a few. Tyler is also no stranger to television, having composed for Netflix’s Chef’s Table universe as well as George Clooney-produced true crime series, Trial By Media, and Stephen King’s Castle Rock for Hulu.
