What’s your background?

I was born in Rochester, New York, one of the snowiest regions of the United States, and from a young age was introduced to a variety of art forms: classical piano, ballet, modern dance, cartooning, ceramics, and more. I am an Xennial and have clear and vivid memories of life before the internet.

My family moved to New York City when I was 8, and I spent my formative years there visiting art museums and galleries, seeing concerts and plays, and generally running loose. 

I later worked at New York magazine and also wrote for their online culture blog Vulture, where I saw a ton of movies, interviewed artists I admired, and experienced the journalism side of the film industry.

I am the child of two language teachers, and worked for several years as a professional translator. I am a Hungarian citizen through ancestry and learned to speak the language in preparation for my citizenship exams. I also generally enjoy studying languages as a hobby.

I am bipolar and a significant portion of my daily life is devoted to managing this condition.

What influences you artistically?

I am equally influenced by low and high culture, from "Problem Child," "She-Devil," and "Wild Things" to "My Winnipeg," "The Holy Mountain," and Warhol's "Empire." I'm moved by dark comedy, light comedy, weepy melodrama, and straight-up bleak tragedy, too.

I love the earlier Todd Solondz films up through "Palindromes," the Japanese musical version of "Jack and the Beanstalk" (1974) and a lot of the grittier works of the New German Cinema. Also: Romanian New Wave and a range of gut-punch documentaries, including "Dear Zachary," "Crumb," and "Capturing the Friedmans." 

I am a big fan of contrapuntal music in film, the most influential example I can think of being Michael Moore's layering of the Beach Boys' "Wouldn't It Be Nice" over footage of the derelict houses in "Roger & Me."

Tony Tulathimutte's short story collection "Rejection" got under my skin last year, and I return to the story "Ahegao" every time I want to give myself a small electric shock.

My partner is a visual artist and we travel around Germany visiting every art museum we can. I feel at once stirred and at peace in these environments.

I've also spent a chunk of my life studying music, though I don't really consider myself a "musician" in any formal sense. I played piano for eons and then the tabla for three years. Music generally plays a prominent role in my film work.

How do you start a new work?

It could start with just one scene or one conversation, or even a dream that I've had, and then I gradually expand it. Or sometimes a script just bursts out of me. 

With "Ignore Your True Feelings at Your Own Peril," I started filming with my iPhone as soon as something interesting started happening to me, and then built a film around it.

What are you working on right now?

I am in post-production with two shorts: "Forgive Me, Natalija," a non-chronological bilingual thriller, and "Soap Angels," a Y2K-era dark comedy that I co-directed with Octavia Lily Windish. I am also in the very early planning stages for "Peggy Pulls Focus," about a beleaguered AC who, after weeks of abasement, takes revenge on the film crew by making all the footage soft.