The Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF) has announced the eight participants taking part in its 2025 Writers’ Studio, four of which are Canadian.

Founded in 2012, the four-day lab from April 14 to 17 at the TIFF Lightbox supports Canadian and international screenwriters and filmmakers developing feature film scripts. It includes workshops, mentorships and one-on-one project development consultations led by industry experts.

The cohort’s four Canadian participants, includes Cardston, Alta.-born Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers for her horror-satire Fire, about the violence of patriarchy and white supremacy in film culture. Toronto-based Joseph Amenta’s Sacred Bodies follows a self-destructive man in a cult over an indulgent weekend at a queer trailer park.

Montreal-based, Vietnamese-Canadian Carol Nguyen, and Thyrone Tommy from Toronto, round out the Canadian participants. Nguyen’s Love Club follows three family members in the aftermath of two relatives passing; and Tommy’s High Rider, an adaptation of John Gallaher’s novel of the same name, follows Bill Ware, a formerly enslaved soldier and cowboy turned Canadian rancher.

Tommy is the recipient of the Renee Perlmutter Memorial Fellowship for Literary Adaptation, and will receive $3,000 toward developing his project.

U.S.-based Ivan Rome is the recipient of the Sloan Science and Technology Fellowship, introduced last year, for his project Code Switch. Other participants are Brazil’s Nara Normande with Terra Nue (Naked Land); Kazakhstan’s Amir Amenov with Warm Night, Cold Beer; and L.A.-based Astor Kim-Stark with Mammoth.

Kim-Stark, Nguyen, Tailfeathers and Normande are part of the Chanel Women Creators’ Network, which supports a year-round program to advance the careers of women and nonbinary alumni of TIFF Writers’ Studio.

Industry participants for this year are filmmaker, novelist, playwright, essayist and professor Trey Ellis; screenwriter Christina Lazaridi; producer Simone R. Ling; and script consultant and story supervisor Vinca Wiedemann. Montreal-born writer, director and producer Kim Nguyen will also be giving a talk, a TIFF spokesperson told Playback Daily.

Images courtesy of the Toronto International Film Festival. Pictured (L-R): Thyrone Tommy, Nara Normande, Elle-Máijá Tailfeathers, Amir Amenov, Carol Nguyen, Astor Kim-Stark, Ivan Rome and Joseph Amenta.