This fall, the PBS Fine Cut Film Festival celebrated its winners at an event co-hosted by Variety Television Executive Editor Michael Schneider and Senior Entertainment Writer Angelique Jackson. Taking home the night’s top honor was LMU School of Film and Television graduate students Sarah Frasco, M.F.A. ’24, and Marissa Chabria, whose collaboration on the short film “The Feast of Magical Small Things” earned them the prestigious Jack Larson Student Filmmaker Award.
The film was selected out of 33 finalists with the festival. Fine Cut awarded its four award winners prize packages valued at more than $45,000, including filmmaking essentials such as rental equipment, animation software, and design tools. Alumni of Fine Cut include two-time Academy Award-winning filmmaker Ben Proudfoot (“The Last Repair Shop,” “The Queen of Basketball,”) Student Academy Award winner Patricia Cardoso (“The Water Carrier of Cucunuba”), and two-time Oscar nominee Ryan Coogler (“Black Panther: Wakanda Forever” and “Judas and the Black Messiah.”
Despite their different backgrounds, Frasco and Chabria connected as LMU students over their love of character-driven films and shared comedic sensibilities. Frasco, a New Jersey native, studied comedy at Second City in Chicago before moving to L.A., while Chabria directed films in far-flung locations like Tanzania before relocating from Costa Rica to Southern California. Together they brought to life the poignant dramedy, “The Feast of Magical Small Things,” written by Frasco and starring her as a lonely young woman determined to host a dinner party despite her struggle to convince friends and acquaintances to attend.
We sat down with Frasco and Chabria to discuss what sparked the idea behind the film, how their collaboration evolved during production, and what it meant to have their work receive such a prestigious honor from PBS.
When penning her thesis script, Frasco shared that she was inspired by her theater days in Chicago and her desire to create something both funny and heartwarming, similar in tone to “Derry Girls” and “Fleabag.” She also wanted to capture the cultural zeitgeist of a society emerging from a pandemic and reckoning with the toll that isolation can take. “I was imagining what if there was a person who just, no matter what, kept reaching out, kept trying,” Frasco ruminated, “And I do think the only way to combat loneliness is to keep extending a hand no matter how many times it’s slapped or ignored.”
Introduced by Ali Blythe, M.F.A, ’24, a mutual friend at LMU, Frasco connected with Chabria who immediately embraced the idea of collaborating. “I definitely resonated with the script,” Chabria said, “L.A. is a very hard city, especially when you don’t know anybody and when you come from a completely different background and culture.” As they discussed the film’s overarching themes, Chabria remembers Frasco emphasizing a key takeaway that, “some people in your life won’t show up, but the people that do, there’s a lot of gratitude for them.”
Although it was her thesis film, Frasco wanted Chabria to feel empowered as a director when she invited her to join the project. “I want you to feel ownership,” she recalled telling her, “This is a collaboration, which definitely comes from my improv days because it’s all about the more minds there are on a project, the better it will be.”
Chabria, who had previously only directed her own scripts, understood that her role was to help bring Frasco’s creative vision to life. Midway through the process, recognizing how personal the story was, she suggested they share a directing credit. “I told Sarah, it feels like a co-direction because she was not only writing it but also producing and starring in it.” While Chabria focused on directing and left the acting and script refinements to Frasco, Frasco in turn leaned on Chabria and their cinematographer, Shady Malak, to navigate the technical aspects that were less familiar to her coming from a background in theater.
When the PBS Fine Cut Film Festival Showcase took place at the Eagle Theatre, Frasco was unable to attend due to illness. She awoke to texts from her former SFTV professor Weiko Lin that she and Chabria had won the night’s top prize. “Being a first-time filmmaker, you put so much time, effort, and money into a film like this,” Frasco confided, “To get into the PBS festival was such a moment of affirmation. And to receive the award is still an out-of-body experience, like I am still processing it, and it made me realize that I do want to keep making shorts. Here we go round two!”
Chabria echoed the sentiment, emphasizing the importance of enjoying the creative journey. “That’s actually one of the most important things – having fun,” she noted, “We learned so much from the process and each other. There were so many layers. When Sarah told me we got in, I was like, ‘Oh my God. This is amazing.’ Then finding out it would stream on PBS SoCal, and then winning the award, was like, ‘it doesn’t get any better than this.’”
Reflecting on the whirlwind journey of creating “The Feast of Magical Small Things,” Frasco shared her gratitude for the LMU community that made it all possible. She credited her SFTV professors for their invaluable guidance, her classmates for their thoughtful feedback, and Chabria for their close-knit directing partnership that helped bring their vision to life. “I’m so thankful for LMU, for the crew who gave their time and talents – anyone who had a fingerprint on this film,” she said, “Especially to Marissa, who undertook this year-long collaboration with me.”
