Board of Directors & Advisory

As the COO & Executive Producer at Serial Maven Studios, Julie is a driving force in content creation and production financing. With extensive experience in leadership roles across channels, production, and distribution, she brings invaluable expertise to her position. Julie’s skill in identifying, structuring, and closing financing opportunities is matched only by her ability to cultivate strong relationships with content creators and buyers worldwide. Her dedication to innovation and passion for storytelling shape the projects undertaken in the ever-evolving entertainment industry landscape.

Shaheen Ali is a Multiplatform Programmer at WildBrain, a global children’s content and brands company. She spearheads programming strategic content offerings and scheduling plans for global partner initiatives across SVOD, FAST and other non-linear platforms.

Previously, she worked as Channel Producer for specialty channels overlooking creative development and production. As a First-Generation Indo-Canadian, she champions broadening opportunities for diverse voices and independent thinkers in media arts by facilitating collaboration and partnerships.

Eric Ho is a Chartered Professional Accountant, Chartered Accountant and Chartered Investment Manager with a career in Financial Services. As a Director in Scotiabank’s Global Wealth Management Audit Department, he leads a team in assessing various risks and controls across the Wealth business units. Prior to Scotiabank, he worked at various financial institutions including Barclays Global Investors and Macquarie Private Wealth and achieved his CA designation at Ernst and Young.  In September 2020, Eric joined the Reel Asian board in the capacity of treasurer.

Sydney Wong is an Account Coordinator on the Data team at Pelmorex Corp, home to The Weather Network and recognized as the gold standard for consumer data privacy in Canada.

With a background in media and project management, Sydney has contributed to television programming, live-action and animated production, and short film distribution. She has also served on juries and panels for the Toronto Youth Shorts and Hamilton Film Festival. Sydney is passionate about sharing the Asian experience through diverse media forms to inspire meaningful change within the community.

Amanda de Souza is Canadian filmmaker, designer, and writer with over 15 years of experience working in the entertainment industry in Toronto, New York City and Los Angeles including public relations for Broadway productions with Boneau/Bryan-Brown and as Senior Designer at Condé Nast’s W Magazine. Amanda has worked in film for a decade in marketing, distribution, and in production on features and series with Netflix, Disney, Lionsgate and Universal Content Productions as an Assistant to Directors, Producers and Showrunners, including on Netflix’s Avatar the Last Airbender, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before and The Umbrella Academy. Amanda is currently a Producer for LA-based Apartment 3C Productions, founded by director, writer, and filmmaker, Jennifer Morrison.

Kristle Bautista is an award-winning author, course director at York University’s Faculty of Liberal Arts and Professional Studies, and HR advisory within the Canadian Aerospace industry. Kristle’s published book, The Pivotal Moment, was celebrated as a #1 new release and bestseller within weeks of release in both Canada and the US, and is in the process of becoming a feature film. Her global HR advisory, mentorship and training experience spans across the aerospace, business consulting, not-for-profit, and food and consumer packaged goods industries over nearly 20 years. She has successfully delved into different industries, fascinated with what makes employees tick, and the common thread between HR professionals — the thing that makes us all human.

In his 36-year career, Michael Fukushima has been an animator, a filmmaker, a producer, and more recently, executive producer of the NFB’s English Animation Studio. He’s a member of the AMPAS® Academy, with over 200 films (and some nice awards) under his belt. His last films, by Oscar®-winners Alison Snowden and David Fine, and Torill Kove, were each Academy Award® nominees. His final NFB film is Joanna Quinn’s AFFAIRS OF THE ART. Freshly retired from the NFB, Fukushima is enjoying the freedom to ski all winter and cycle the rest of the time, cherry-picking the film work that most interests him. As a longtime member of Reel Asian’s advisory committee, Michael has already contributed to the organization as a years-long jury member for our Pitch! competition, a contributor to our AnimAsian award, and general all-around supporter.

Victor Kim is a labour and employment lawyer at McMillan LLP. Acting for employers at the provincial and federal levels, Victor advances the interest of his clients in labour arbitrations, collective bargaining, labour board proceedings, wrongful dismissal and human rights litigation, and occupational health and safety proceedings. In his advisory practice, Victor coaches employers on workplace investigations and the development of workplace policies.

Aron Levitz is President of Wattpad WEBTOON Studios, where he leads a visionary team of global entertainment and publishing experts to create data-backed, fan-driven hit TV shows, films, and books from WEBTOON and Wattpad. Levitz pioneered Wattpad’s adaptation business, launching Wattpad Studios in 2016 and serving as the company’s global studio head until the creation of Wattpad WEBTOON Studios. In just a few short years, Levitz grew Wattpad Studios from a concept to global leader in creating can’t-miss entertainment.

Prior to his role as Head of Wattpad Studios, Levitz was Head of Business Development at Wattpad, building the company’s monetization strategy and native advertising solution. He was also instrumental in launching the Wattpad Stars program that gives top influencers access to a variety of opportunities.

Meelad Moaphi is a Toronto-based director and filmmaker. He most recently finalized his Telefilm-funded directorial feature debut entitled His Father’s Son, slated for release in 2024.

Meelad was Associate Producer on Antoine Bourges’ Telefilm-funded feature, Concrete Valley, which screened at the 2022 Toronto International Film Festival and the 2023 Berlinale. Born in Iran, Meelad spent most of his childhood in Japan and has also worked in Spain, enhancing his ability to direct across languages and a wide spectrum of culturally diverse content. His short credits include Arrhythmia (2009), Republic of God (2010), A Scene (2018), and Worth (2019), which have screened and collected awards at various festivals, including the International Film Festival Rotterdam, Filmets Badalona, Toronto Reel Asian International Film Festival, and EnRoute Air Canada.

Meelad is also a Permanent Professor at Humber College’s Bachelor of Film and Media Production department. He holds BFA and MFA degrees from York University’s Film Production program.

May Cheng is an internationally ranked lawyer and an LSO Certified Specialist in Intellectual Property law (trademark/copyright) practising at a Bay Street boutique firm in Toronto.  Prior to joining Dipchand LLP, Cheng spent 30 years in Big Law firms in Toronto, and continues to represent a variety of clients in the financial services, retail, travel and other industries, as well as luxury brands in anti-counterfeiting matters. The recent move to Dipchand LLP has allowed her to spend more time representing artists and filmmakers in protecting their creative works, as well as volunteering for causes near and dear to her values like Reel Asian.

Robin Soukvilay is a Senior Art Director currently at Leo Burnett Toronto. Working in the advertising industry for the last decade has given him incredible opportunities to speak on behalf of a collection of the world’s most known and unknown brands through his work. As a result of his insight-driven focus on creativity, not only has his work made positive impacts toward the client’s business, it’s also been recognized in news publications and awarded within the industry nationally and globally.

Being a proud Asian-Canadian of East (Taiwan) and South-East (Laos) descent, it didn’t take long for him to see the gaps in the industry when it came to BIPOC voices, so his passion for Asian representation in media has been an ongoing one. With Reel Asian, he finds himself with another way to put that passion to use and aims to transform his experiences in speaking on behalf of brands to help boost the voice of a community he is very much a part of.