Jameel Khaja is an American filmmaker and photographer. His debut feature film as writer and producer, A PASSAGE TO OTTAWA, won the best film prize at the Austin Film Festival, and a Special Jury Prize at the Berlin Film Festival. It was released theatrically in Canada and played in rotation on broadcast television. Other screenwriting includes BOOM BABY BUTTERFLIES, selected for the Tribeca All Access program and the American Zoetrope Screenwriting Workshop, and STEPPING UP, a feature project developed for the director/choreographer Twyla Tharp.
Jameel’s commercial directing and photography projects include all corporate branding imagery for Balzac Coffee Gmbh during its growth from a single store to the second largest coffee shop chain in Germany. He also directed music videos for Warner Bros. Records, a live jazz TV series for Star TV Asia, and public service videos for the City of New York. His editorial photography has been featured by Self magazine, the Wella Corporation, Grow NYC Greenmarkets, the Queens Times/Ledger, the Bay Area Reporter, Hamburger Klonschak, Upstart Business Journal, Wholesome Wave, and the CMJ music marathon.
Previous to his own film projects, Jameel worked as a story analyst for feature film development at New Line Cinema, Fine Line Features, Polygram Filmed Entertainment, and Propaganda Films. Simultaneously he worked for Broadway and off-Broadway theaters as an assistant to the writers Terrence McNally, Richard Nelson, and the directors John Tillinger and Jack O’Brien.
Jameel has an MFA in film from Columbia University in New York, and a BA in theatre from the University of Michigan. His teachers have included James Schamus, Richard Peña, Annette Insdorf, Jean-Claude Carrière, and Paul Schrader. Jameel has also taught as an adjunct professor of film at Columbia University, Cornell University, and in the Barnard Pre-College Program. He works and resides with his wife and two children in New York City and maintains a production office in Austin, Texas.
Jameel’s commercial directing and photography projects include all corporate branding imagery for Balzac Coffee Gmbh during its growth from a single store to the second largest coffee shop chain in Germany. He also directed music videos for Warner Bros. Records, a live jazz TV series for Star TV Asia, and public service videos for the City of New York. His editorial photography has been featured by Self magazine, the Wella Corporation, Grow NYC Greenmarkets, the Queens Times/Ledger, the Bay Area Reporter, Hamburger Klonschak, Upstart Business Journal, Wholesome Wave, and the CMJ music marathon.
Previous to his own film projects, Jameel worked as a story analyst for feature film development at New Line Cinema, Fine Line Features, Polygram Filmed Entertainment, and Propaganda Films. Simultaneously he worked for Broadway and off-Broadway theaters as an assistant to the writers Terrence McNally, Richard Nelson, and the directors John Tillinger and Jack O’Brien.
Jameel has an MFA in film from Columbia University in New York, and a BA in theatre from the University of Michigan. His teachers have included James Schamus, Richard Peña, Annette Insdorf, Jean-Claude Carrière, and Paul Schrader. Jameel has also taught as an adjunct professor of film at Columbia University, Cornell University, and in the Barnard Pre-College Program. He works and resides with his wife and two children in New York City and maintains a production office in Austin, Texas.