Ramona Diaz

RAMONA S. DIAZ, DIRECTOR/WRITER/PRODUCER

Director-Producer-Writer Ramona Diaz is a filmmaker whose credits include Spirits Rising, an hour-long documentary about women’s role in the 1986 People Power revolution in the Philippines. Spirits Rising received a Student Academy Award, the Ida Lupino Director's Guild of America Award, a Golden Gate Award from the San Francisco International Film Festival, a Certificate of Merit from the International Documentary Association, and a Gold Apple from the National Educational Media Network. Spirits Rising has been screened internationally and it has been broadcast on public television stations in the United States and Australia.

Diaz’s first feature-length film, Imelda, about the former First Lady of the Philippines, garnered the Excellence in Cinematography Award for documentary at the 2004 Sundance Film Festival and the ABCNews Videosource Award from the IDA. The film was released theatrically in the United States and the Philippines, screened in over fifty film festivals around the world, and was broadcast on U.S. national public television in May 2005. The film was funded by ITVS, the Sundance Documentary Fund, and the National Asian American Telecommunications Association.

Diaz’s The Learning, a documentary film that follows several Filipino teachers in Baltimore City across two school years, chronicling the sacrifices they make as they try to maintain a long-distance relationship with their children and families, and begin a new one with the mostly African- American students whose schooling is now entrusted to them. The film was funded by ITVS, Sundance Documentary Fund and the Center for Asian American Media and was broadcast on POV in 2011.

Diaz is recently finished Don’t Stop Believin’: Everyman’s Journey, a feature length documentary film about the iconic 80s band, Journey, and their new lead singer, Arnel Pineda, whom they discovered through YouTube. It will have its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival.

Diaz is in development on Pacific Rims, based on the book by Rafe Bartholomew, which has received research and development funding from the Catapult Fund; and The Bill (working title), which recently received development funding from the Sundance Documentary Fund and the ITVS Diversity Fund.

Diaz, who was born and raised in the Philippines, lives with her husband, Rajiv Rimal, in Baltimore, where they are raising their American-born daughter, Sabina Diaz-Rimal, who is now a ninth grader. Diaz is a graduate of Emerson College, Boston and holds an MA in Communication from Stanford University.