Christine Vachon to Receive Polly Platt Award for Producing at 2025 Austin Film Festival
Iconic indie producer Christine Vachon is getting her due from the 2025 Austin Film Festival. IndieWire can exclusively announce that Vachon will be feted with the acclaimed Polly Platt Award for Producing at this year’s AFF Writers Conference, which will take place from October 23 to 26. “Dear White People” showrunner Yvette Lee Bowser will also be honored with the Outstanding Television Writer Award during the annual conference.
Vachon is an Independent Spirit Award and Gotham Award winner who co-founded powerhouse Killer Films with partner Pamela Koffler in 1995. Across 30 years, the duo’s banner has produced more than 100 acclaimed films, including “Boys Don’t Cry,” “Hedwig and the Angry Inch,” “Far from Heaven,” “Still Alice,” “Past Lives” (which landed Vachon her first Oscar nomination in the Best Picture category), and “Carol.”
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Vachon launched her career at Sundance in 1991 with her first feature film, which was “Carol” auteur Todd Haynes’ Grand Jury Prize-winning “Poison.” Vachon notably has collaborated with Haynes on multiple films, including “May December,” plus his TV series “Mildred Pierce.” Killer Films was also set to produce Haynes’ now-shelved queer romance that was going to star Joaquin Phoenix before the actor parted ways with the project.
In addition to the Emmy and Golden Globe-awarded miniseries “Mildred Pierce,” Vachon has also executive-produced the Emmy Award-winning limited series “Halston” for Netflix. Read IndieWire’s interview with Vachon here.
Austin Film Festival’s Polly Platt Award for Producing was established in 2019, and is annually given to a producer with a “keen sense of story and a history of fostering new talent,” according to its official description. Perhaps soon-to-be former Lucasfilm executive Kathleen Kennedy, Plan B’s Dede Gardner, Lauren Shuler Donner, Stephanie Allain, and Sarah Green are all producers who have been honored with the award since its inception.
The Outstanding Television Writer Award, which Bowser will be honored with this year, was introduced in 2000. The award highlights the “artistic achievements and contributions of television creators and their importance in shaping the landscape of serialized storytelling,” as the description states. Past award recipients include Damon Lindelof, Vince Gilligan, Ronald D. Moore, Larry Wilmore, and Marta Kauffman.
Writer/producer Bowser is the first and youngest Black woman to create and run her own television series. Bowser began her career in television as an apprentice writer on “A Different World,” where she penned 25 episodes and became a producer during her five-year tenure. Bowser then went on to produce “Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper” before creating “Living Single” for FOX when she was 27 years old. Bowser also helped launch “black-ish” on ABC and executive produced Netflix series “Dear White People,” for which she was also the showrunner for.
Bowser most recently was the showrunner and executive producer of “UnPrisoned.” She has an overall deal with 20th Century Studios, and was the recipient of the Writers Guild of America’s 2023 Paddy Chayefsky Laurel Award. Bowser previously helped launch the WGA Showrunner Training Program.
“I am humbled and honored to receive this distinguished award from the Austin Film Festival,” Bowser said in an official statement. “Throughout my career, I’ve been blessed to showcase humanity through storytelling. I am grateful for this recognition of my very intentional work.”
Both Vachon and Bowser will speak at AFF’s 2025 Writers Conference and later be recognized at the Awards Luncheon on October 25. The luncheon will honor the awardees, Script and Film competition winners, and the recipients of industry-sponsored fellowships such as the AMC One Hour Pilot Award, Big Indie Pictures Screenplay Fellowship, Big Indie Pictures Film Fellowship, Nickelodeon Writing Program Comedy Teleplay Fellowship, YMH Studios Comedy Fellowship, Enderby Entertainment Filmmaking Fellowship, and Enderby Entertainment Screenwriting Award.
The Austin Film Festival’s Writers Conference in total will present more than 150 panels on the art, craft, and business of storytelling, featuring a slate of prominent industry professionals working in film, television, and new media.
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