Carmen Pelaez

An award winning Cuban American writer and filmmaker, Pelaez is also a Macdowell (2023) and Cintas (2026) Fellow. She has been commissioned by Miami New Drama, Oolite Cinematic Arts and The Huntington theater to create new work. Winner of the HBO NYLFF Short Film Competition (2012) with The Acting Lesson, she followed that up with her short, A Queen Without His Crown. Her short Mango Season received an honorable mention at the 2020 Miami International Film Festival. Pelaez was commissioned by Oolite to create the short doc Caridad y Gallo (2020).

In 2023, she was awarded an Ellie Award which she used to create her most recent short film, Colada, which received First Runner Up for Best Made in Miami Short at the Miami Film Festival. Currently she is working on the Colada feature as well as Radio Ventanita, a mixed media project.