About
Cassie Jaye is an award-winning documentary director and producer known for character-driven filmmaking that explores human behavior, identity, transformation, and the forces that shape our lives.
Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, Cassie has worked in the film industry since 2003 and has been directing documentaries since 2008. As the founder of Jaye Bird Productions, her work has taken her around the world, from directing in the Kingdom of Eswatini in Southern Africa to deep in the Amazon rainforest of Ecuador, following real people into extraordinary circumstances and finding the human story at the center of complex subjects.
Interviewing is at the heart of Cassie’s filmmaking. She has a natural ability to build trust, move beyond rehearsed answers, and uncover the honest, unexpected moments that make nonfiction storytelling compelling. From identifying characters and themes to finding narrative structure within hundreds of hours of unscripted material, she thrives on shaping the story and creative vision of a project from concept through production, post-production, and final delivery.
Cassie has directed and produced three feature documentaries, two of which qualified for Academy Award consideration. Her films have screened at more than 40 festivals worldwide and received 15 awards. She has also served as a jury member for the International Documentary Association (IDA) Documentary Awards.
Her internationally recognized feature documentary The Red Pill reached #1 on multiple VOD charts, at times ranking ahead of the major studio new releases including Disney's Moana, Star Wars' Rogue One: A Star Wars Story, and Marvel's Logan. Her work has been featured by The New York Times, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, Los Angeles Times, BBC, The Guardian, VICE, and other media outlets around the world.
Cassie’s TEDx talk, “Meeting the Enemy,” has been viewed more than 13 million times and is one of the most-watched TED talks on gender.
Cassie is drawn to ambitious documentary films and series with extraordinary access to people, places, and experiences. She plans to continue to tell stories that surprise audiences, challenge perspectives, and stay with people long after they've experienced them.