Best Kept Secret: Filmmaker Bio

Samantha Buck's (Director/Co-producer) directorial debut, the feature documentary 21 Below, aired on Channel 4 in the U.K. and YES in Israel, as well as at festivals worldwide, including Hot Docs, Sheffield Doc/Fest and AFI-Discovery Channel Silverdocs. As an actress, she was a regular on Law & Order: Criminal Intent, opposite Vincent D'Onofrio, and Stella, opposite David Wain. Her other acting credits include Third Watch, Big Apple, Golden Boy, Blue Bloods, Six Degrees, Z Rock and Sex and the City. Buck's film credits include Searching for Paradise, Wirey Spindell, The 24 Hour Woman and Woman in Burka (which won a Spirit of Slamdance Award in 2008). She can also be seen in the recent films Gayby, What Maisie Knew and Hellbenders.

Buck was born in Dallas, grew up in Washington, D.C. and now lives in Brooklyn. She is a graduate of New York University's Tisch School of the Arts and is currently a student at Columbia University School of the Arts' master of fine arts film program.

Danielle DiGiacomo (Producer) was born in Brooklyn, N.Y., and grew up in Cumberland, Md. and Princeton, N.J. She is the manager of video distribution at The Orchard, a 15-year-old independent music and video distribution company operating in more than 20 global markets. She is also an independent film producer and consultant. Previously, she worked as community manager at the Independent Filmmaker Project (IFP), the nation's oldest and largest membership organization for independent filmmakers, and as head of documentary acquisitions for IndiePix Films.

DiGiacomo developed and produced the first two annual Cinema Eye Honors for Nonfiction Films and associate produced two documentary features, Jennifer Venditti's Billy the Kid and Samantha Buck's 21 Below. In 2010, she produced three short films, two of which premiered at Cannes' Short Film Corner, and was associate producer for Andrew Semans' Nancy, Please, which premiered at the 2012 Tribeca Film Festival. DiGiacomo consults as a panel programmer for several international film festivals, and was one of six producers selected to attend the 2011 Sundance Institute's Creative Producing Lab, where she was the Mark Silverman honoree. She has a bachelor's degree in film studies from Wesleyan University and a master's degree in media studies from the New School.