Nick Fitzhugh began his career as a student at Brown University (BFA ‘02) by starting Glimpse (glimpse.org), a nonprofit multimedia platform for young people living and studying abroad to share stories about personal cultural experiences abroad. Seven years later the company was acquired by the National Geographic Society. He continued to run what became National Geographic Glimpse for three years.

In 2010, Nick started redfitz productions “human stories for a small world”, and turned his full-time attention to directing, producing, writing and shooting short films, music videos, series and features. His first film, the documentary series and featurette about life and soccer in the largest and most notorious township in South Africa during the first ever World Cup to be held in Africa, SOCCER CITY, was picked up by the National Geographic Channel International, ESPN Classic, and SnagFilms and is also available on iTunes, Amazon, XFinity and FiOS.

Current redfitz productions include the following:

STARBOARD LIGHT (thestarboardlight.com) is Nick’s first feature documentary and is currently in post-production in advance of the Sundance submission deadline in September. Revolving around a 160 year old house that was in Nick’s own family for a century and five generations until it was tragically sold in 2011, the film combines family footage shot in the 1930s-50s with footage shot by Nick during the family’s last summer with the house along with interviews, experiences, photos, audio recordings and archive material in order to explore the question: does a family make a house or does a house make a family?

LIFEBLOOD (facebook.com/LifebloodMovie) is a 25-minute short documentary, funded in part by the National Geographic All Roads Film Project, about the River Nile and its people through the eyes, the lives and the music of the best musicians that live along it. Currently in post-production, it is the first step towards a feature film currently in development that will follow the lives of the musicians being brought together from all 11 Nile Basin countries by The Nile Project (nileproject.org) as they create music together and tour the Nile, Europe and the U.S. over the next few years.

THE GARDEN OF STEVEN (facebook.com/TheGardenOfSteven) is a 25-minute dark comedy. Steven Crosby, a small town missionary in a strange land stumbles upon the lowest road to salvation with the help of a little Mayan girl, a black magic woman, and a saint with a cigar. Currently in post-production, it was shot in Antigua, Guatemala with a crew comprised primarily of DC residents. A Goldenbear (goldenbear.tv) production, Nick is one of its Executive Producers and one of its Producers. Development of the feature version of the film, REVERSE MISSIONARY (working title), has already begun and is expected to enter production in 2013.
30 is a documentary series currently in development. Pending a development deal, season one would be shot in DC.

SOCCER CITY / BRAZIL, currently in development, is a follow up to SOCCER CITY (soccer-city.tv) that will be shot in the lead up to and during the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.

In the summers, Nick also leads photography and filmmaking expeditions for National Geographic Student Expeditions allowing him to travel the world just that much more while teaching photography and filmmaking to high school students. You can follow Nick and his filmmaking at www.facebook.com/redfitz.

Visit our Filmmaker of the Month Section to see previous Filmmakers of the Month.