As a diplopic filmmaker, Erin Brown Thomas literally sees everything twice, shaping her slick, visually heightened approach to “traumedies”—dramas that masquerade as comedies until delivering an emotional gut punch. Her films explore the perils of unchecked ambition, satirize social imbalances, and earnestly critique industrialized Christianity, blending tones into genre cocktails.
Erin’s work has garnered widespread recognition, screening at 20 Academy Award Qualifiers. [subtext] won a handful of audience awards and was jury-nominated at Austin Film Fest, Rekindled screened competitively at Palm Springs International Shortfest, and her other projects have earned awards at Oscar Qualifiers Cinequest and HollyShorts.
Erin’s newest project, CHASERS—a 31-minute single-continuous-shot pilot—will premiere at Sundance Film Festival in 2025, and then premiere in Los Angeles at Slamdance. Her writing has also earned accolades as a Nicholl Semifinalist, with her dramedy The Body of Chris ranked 16th out of 24K comedies on Coverfly’s Redlist.
Throughout her mutli-hyphenate career, Erin has collaborated with heavyweight talent including Selena Gomez, Eminem, Tony Hale, Lena Dunham, Emmy Rossum, and Elisabeth Moss and companies such as HBO, Netflix, Refinery29, A Casual Romance, MTV, Snapchat Originals, and Makeready.
Erin is the Co-founder and Artistic Director of Salute Your Shorts Film Festival, where she champions other emerging filmmakers.