The Filmmaker
A Jewish filmmaker born in New York, Marty has called Berkeley home for over forty years, bringing more than three decades of Bay Area commercial, corporate, and food video production to the project. He began documenting Emily Winston's journey when Boichik Bagels was but a gleam in her eye.
It began in 2018 at a Peet’s Coffee shop in Berkeley. Marty had just returned from New York with a suitcase full of bagels when he overheard Emily Winston interviewing an employee for her fledgling bagel shop. That chance encounter planted a seed.
What started as a local story became a detective story spanning continents, from Instagram discoveries of artisans in Shenzhen and Lima to BagelFest connections in Dallas and Mexico City.
What began as curiosity about a baker became something personal: a story about his own heritage, and about the resilience of a culture told through the food it carried across the world.
Creative Team
Director / Producer
Marty Jackson is the founder of Indigo Video Productions, a Bay Area production company with over three decades of commercial, corporate, and food video experience. A Jewish filmmaker with deep expertise in cinematography, editing, and post-production, his 2018 encounter with Emily Winston sparked the journey that became this film.
Executive Producer
Janis Plotkin is an award-winning documentary producer and pioneering figure in independent cinema. Janis joined Deborah Kaufman, founding Director of the groundbreaking San Francisco Jewish Film Festival, in 1982 and eventually served as the Festival's Director from 1994 until 2003. She later spent 14 years as Senior Film Programmer at the Mill Valley Film Festival and currently teaches film at Stanford, SF State, and UC Davis.
Consulting Producer
Heidi Reinberg is an award-winning documentary producer with over two decades of experience in nonfiction programming. Operating through her banner Necessary Pictures, she has collaborated with Oscar winners Ross Kauffman and Cynthia Wade on content for HBO, PBS, LOGO, Cinemax, and HGTV.
Director of Photography
Ashley James is an award-winning cinematographer and co-founder of Searchlight Films, specializing in documentary television. He has shot for PBS, BBC, and CBC, with credits including Terry Zwigoff’s acclaimed Crumb. His honors include five CINE Golden Eagles, the Prix Bartok Award, and an AFI Independent Filmmaker Award.
Editor
Ken Schneider, ACE is a Peabody Award-winning editor of 45 feature documentaries on subjects ranging from human rights to untold American histories. He co-edited the Oscar-nominated Regret to Inform, and his work has appeared on PBS, HBO, and Frontline, earning Peabodys, Emmys, and an Oscar nomination.
Advisor
Noah Alper founded Noah’s Bagels in Berkeley in 1989, building it into a beloved Bay Area institution before selling the chain in 1996. Author of Business Mensch, he mentored Emily Winston of Boichik Bagels and brings irreplaceable insight into bagel culture’s evolution from traditional roots to contemporary renaissance.