Emily Badescu

Fulbright-BAFTA Postgraduate Award - Duke University

Emily Badescu began storytelling through installations, video, and sound art while studying Fine Art at UAL. Upon graduating Emily moved to Brighton, where she discovered both documentary-filmmaking and skateboarding. Inspired by the skatepark’s intergenerational community, she started filming - and hasn’t stopped.

After a summer documenting skateparks in Texas, she trained with OTOXO Productions in Barcelona. Since then, she’s directed, produced, and edited award-winning documentaries and videos. Her credits include VICE, Netflix, BBC, AppleTV+, and The Guardian. A skilled editor, her work includes the SXSW-premiering Alien On Stage - described as “one of the funniest documentaries in years” (IndieWire) and “life-affirming” (Mark Kermode) - as well as edit consulting at Sheffield DocFest.

Supported by We Are Doc Women and ScreenSkills mentorships, she advocates for a more inclusive industry, using her skills to empower people to co-create films through workshops with Rites for Girls and Rambert. In her free time, Emily enjoys languages and the outdoors - interests she’s combined by working in educational community gardens across Spain.

Though her career has grown beyond the skatepark, Emily stays connected to the global skateboarding community, carving out time to make work that blends academia, art, and kinaesthetic intelligence. With the support of the Fulbright-BAFTA Award, Emily will pursue an MFA in Experimental Documentary Arts at Duke University - an ideal opportunity to further explore storytelling as a community-building tool.