Carmen Elly Wilkerson
- Director
- Writer
- Casting Department
Carmen Elly Wilkerson is an Award Winning Writer and Director born in Detroit, and raised in Downers Grove, Illinois. She's the niece of Ernest Elly, famed Jazz drummer for Ray Charles. Carmen, a former Epidemiologist, changed career paths when she felt the calling to use storytelling as a weapon for change.
Carmen attended The American Film Institute's Directing Program where she received her Master's in Fine Arts, and was awarded the Hollywood Foreign Press Award for Directing. Carmen directed Fred Savage and Robert Pine in A Guy Walks Into A Bar, that won her a Director's Guild Award, and a Cine Eagle Award. After 'A Guy's' television debut on Showtime, Variety called it a 'Mini Cult Classic'. That same year Kodak named Carmen One of 16 Film Makers to Watch. As a writer, Carmen trained in The Guy Hanks Marvin Miller Screenwriting Fellowship, and was twice a finalist in the Sundance Writing Lab. She spent a year in the CBS Director Training Program on NCIS and CSI-NY shadowing veteran TV directors, Dennis Smith and Oz Scott. Carmen's short, The Reunion (2016) starred Lex Scott Davis, and can be seen on AspireTV. Her short, The Peck Situation (2019), Produced by Films With a Purpose, won Best Short, Best Director, Best Actress and Best Ensemble at The Show Low Film Festival.
In 2022, Carmen's feature screenplay, The Gown Man, was a finalist in the Women in Film/ Black List Feature residency Program. In 2023, she has been chosen to helm, "A Christmas Call to Action' for Exodus Entertainment.
Carmen attended The American Film Institute's Directing Program where she received her Master's in Fine Arts, and was awarded the Hollywood Foreign Press Award for Directing. Carmen directed Fred Savage and Robert Pine in A Guy Walks Into A Bar, that won her a Director's Guild Award, and a Cine Eagle Award. After 'A Guy's' television debut on Showtime, Variety called it a 'Mini Cult Classic'. That same year Kodak named Carmen One of 16 Film Makers to Watch. As a writer, Carmen trained in The Guy Hanks Marvin Miller Screenwriting Fellowship, and was twice a finalist in the Sundance Writing Lab. She spent a year in the CBS Director Training Program on NCIS and CSI-NY shadowing veteran TV directors, Dennis Smith and Oz Scott. Carmen's short, The Reunion (2016) starred Lex Scott Davis, and can be seen on AspireTV. Her short, The Peck Situation (2019), Produced by Films With a Purpose, won Best Short, Best Director, Best Actress and Best Ensemble at The Show Low Film Festival.
In 2022, Carmen's feature screenplay, The Gown Man, was a finalist in the Women in Film/ Black List Feature residency Program. In 2023, she has been chosen to helm, "A Christmas Call to Action' for Exodus Entertainment.
