Data-Driven Narrative Strategist & Human Rights Advocate

Roya Rastegar is an acclaimed producer and writer with a background that spans finance, academia, and film. She began her career in investment banking at Merrill Lynch and UBS Warburg, working on complex media and telecommunications transactions, before leaving finance to pursue doctoral study. She holds a B.A. from Wellesley College and a Ph.D. in the History of Consciousness from the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Rastegar brings a rigorous analytical approach and a deep understanding of narrative and audience to her work across the film industry. She has held key roles at Sundance, Tribeca, the LA Film Festival, and Image Entertainment, where she developed a reputation for identifying emerging talent and shaping films that resonate at both critical and commercial levels. Based on original, interdisciplinary archival research, she is currently writing a book on the Sundance Film Festival that will be the first critical history of American film festivals.

Her producing and writing credits include Gaga: Five Foot Two; Cypher, winner of the Tribeca Film Festival Grand Jury Prize; Venus as a Boy, a Tribeca Audience Award winner; The Legacy of Black Wall Street; QueenMaker; and Wildness, which premiered at MoMA and was shortlisted for Cannes. She is the co-founder of the Iranian Diaspora Collective and is currently directing Exile of the Swans, a documentary about underground dancers in Iran.