Anjini Taneja Azhar is a director, screenwriter, and producer based in Los Angeles. She began her journey as an actor in 2011 in network TV & feature films such as JJ Abrams’ Star Trek Into Darkness, where she was permitted to shadow producer Jeffrey Chernov and observe Mr. Abrams’ direction. Surrounded by visionary directing and a labyrinth of light, Anjini immediately realized her childhood, filled with writing idle stories, had a greater purpose in the form of cinema. Since then she has written multiple award-winning shorts, associate-produced for companies such as the Bill & Melinda Gates foundation and artists like Olivia Rodrigo.

Anjini’s work has been featured in Forbes Entertainment, Women Cinemakers, and Ladygunn Magazine. Her 2023 narrative short, ‘EVERYWHERE YOU GO,’ screened at the Oscar-qualifying LA Short’s Int’l Film Festival and Newport Beach Film Festival. Anjini won the Grand Jury Prize from Shore Scripts Film Fund for her narrative short, ‘Who Are You, Nanu?’ which was filmed in May 2024 along the Ganges River in India on 35mm film, partnered with British Airways. She is a WritersxWriters Finalist, Golden Script Finalist, and PAGE Awards Semi Finalist. She has a deep reverence for cinema, for years beginning her mornings every day by watching a film.

The Scream of the Butterfly marks her and Ariya Akhavan’s first collaboration.

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Ariya Akhavan is an Iranian director, screenwriter, and photographer based in Los Angeles. Six months after he was born in America, he and his family moved back to Iran until he was five years old. When Iranian government officials threatened his family for their activism during Iran’s first revolution of 1979, Ariya and his family were forced to migrate back to the USA.

The Scream of the Butterfly is a film deeply personal to Ariya and serves as an ode to his family and the powerful women and men of Iran. His complex relationship with the home he left behind has largely shaped him as a filmmaker and made him the artist he is today. He received an MA in Dramatic Arts from the world-renowned Central Saint Martins.

Upon graduating, he was pulled into photography where he perfected art direction, storytelling within a frame, and painting with light. His work featuring actors such as Brenda Song, Oliver Jackson-Cohen, and Avan Jogia has made the covers of various magazines. Alongside his music video directorial work, his 2023 narrative short ‘Echoes of Silence’ received an honorable mention from AGBO’s ‘No Sleep ‘Til Film Fest’ Competition. He is a Filmmatic Script Awards Finalist and Screencraft semifinalist.

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