Meet the Team
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Lauren Melinda is an award-winning filmmaker, artist, and founder of Simbelle Productions. Her work explores feminine identity and perception while interrogating the cultural forces that shape the roles assigned to women.
As a mixed-media artist, Lauren's video installations have been commissioned by galleries, museums, and private collectors in North America and the Middle East, and her photographs are held in major collections around the world.
Lauren has written and directed three short films that have screened at 52 festivals across nearly every continent, winning top prizes at six. Her most recent narrative short, Before You, became Oscar-qualified and is now the centerpiece of a campus screening tour in collaboration with Planned Parenthood Gen Action, launching at Vanderbilt University in April 2026.
She is currently developing her debut feature, Echoes — a psychological thriller in which an Iranian-American artist's identity is slowly consumed by the Berlin gallery that claims to champion her, exploring the seductive violence of self-erasure.
As founder and CEO of Simbelle Productions, a nonprofit production company she launched in 2024 and named after her two daughters, Lauren has executive produced six feature films with premieres at SXSW, the Venice Film Festival, the Locarno Film Festival, and the Toronto International Film Festival. Simbelle supports female-driven narrative films and the filmmakers behind them through equity investments, finishing funds, mentorship, and grant programs including the Career Advancement Program and Mothers in Focus.
Lauren holds dual bachelor's degrees in Fine Arts and Art History from UCLA and an MFA from UC Irvine. She is based in Los Angeles.
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From the South Coast of Brazil and currently based in Los Angeles, Helena Sardinha is a creative producer. Her work is recognized at prestigious festivals such as Sundance, Tribeca, DOC NYC, Aspen Shortfest, and Fantastic Fest. In 2018, she co-founded Driven Equation, a boutique production company bridging Los Angeles and São Paulo. Helena's work has garnered awards at the Humanitas Prize, Outfest, the Imagen Awards, and the UNESCO Award for Awareness and Sustainability.
A Sundance Producing Lab and Film Independent fellow, Helena continues to push boundaries with projects like Huella, with the support of the Sundance Institute; Piratas, supported by the SFFILM Rainin Grant, and Angel in Retrograde, a finalist in the AT&T Untold Stories at Tribeca. Her work spans both scripted and documentary filmmaking, with her first documentary feature, Barry and Joan, now streaming on Netflix, and first narrative film Beautiful, FL, currently available on Disney+. Her latest feature, Satisfaction, premiered at SXSW and showcases a stellar cast including Cannes winner Zar Amir (Holy Spider), BIFA nominee Fionn Whitehead (Dunkirk), British model Adwoa Aboah, and Scottish actress Emma Laird (The Brutalist). Helena leads the development arm of Simbelle Productions, a newly launched nonprofit dedicated to amplifying women's narratives.
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Janelle is a producer and writer from New York, now based in Los Angeles. She began her career working with acclaimed filmmaker Spike Lee, where she built her foundation in filmmaking.
After relocating to LA, Janelle continued her work in film before transitioning into unscripted television. She has worked on unscripted series for BET, Bravo, OWN, E!, and Peacock, including producing three seasons of the award-winning series Black Love. Her work centers on stories that explore connection, vulnerability, and the complexity of human relationships.
At Simbelle Productions, Janelle leads outreach, fostering relationships with individuals and organizations that share the company’s commitment to meaningful storytelling with social impact.
She attended Syracuse University, where she studied political philosophy as well as film theory and criticism. Janelle believes in the power of cinema to connect audiences and is committed to creating stories that heal and free Black women on screen.
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Rafael Thomaseto is a film producer and co-founder of Driven Equation, a boutique production company with bases in Los Angeles and São Paulo. He is also a founding member of the Brazilian Filmmakers Collective, a community-driven initiative supporting Brazilian voices in global cinema, and currently serves as Head of Production at the nonprofit production company Simbelle Productions.
Rafael has produced several award-winning short films, including The Ballad of Tita and the Machines, which premiered at the Tribeca Festival, and I Am the Nature, which debuted at DOC NYC and received the UNESCO Awareness and Sustainable Vision Award in Venice, Italy. His short film Huella premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and is currently being developed into a feature-length project with support from both the Producers and Screenwriting Tracks at the Sundance Institute.
He recently completed post-production on his first two feature films: Satisfaction, which had its world premiere at SXSW 2025, and The Eternity Man, an international co-production between Ukraine, Finland, and Canada.
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Alette Segerstrom is an actress and creative from Orange County, California, now based in Los Angeles. She earned her BFA in Theater and Performance with a minor in Marketing Communications from Emerson College, where she graduated Cum Laude.
Alette launched her career interning at Ramo Law PC, an entertainment firm based in Beverly Hills, following marketing internships at South Coast Plaza and the Boch Center. Since moving to Los Angeles, she has pursued acting professionally and taken classes at The Lee Strasberg Theatre & Film Institute. Alongside her work with Simbelle Productions, she sits on the board of directors for the Segerstrom Foundation, helping to facilitate support for various arts-related non-profits across Orange County.
Alette is immensely passionate about the film industry, and is deeply grateful for the opportunity to be a part of the Simbelle team.
Advisory Circle
Jennifer Loh
Eric Bromberg
Jean-Louis Rodrigue