Filmmaker Payal Kapadia to Receive 2025 Coolidge Breakthrough Artist Award
On Thursday, January 9 at 7pm, Kapadia will introduce a special preview screening of All We Imagine as Light and participate in a post-screening Q&A.
The Coolidge Corner Theatre (‘the Coolidge’) has announced visionary writer-director Payal Kapadia (All We Imagine as Light) as the 2025 recipient of The Coolidge Breakthrough Artist Award. Kapadia’s stunning, lyrical portrait of the lives of three women in contemporary Mumbai won the Grand Prix at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival and was recently named the #1 film of the year by The New York Times, Associated Press, the prestigious Sight and Sound and Film Comment Year End Critics’ Polls.
On Thursday, January 9 at 7pm, Kapadia will introduce a special preview screening of All We Imagine as Light (which is being released by Sideshow/Janus Films and opens at the Coolidge on Friday, January 17) and participate in a post-screening Q&A. Following the Q&A, she will be presented with the 2025 Coolidge Breakthrough Artist Award. The film also won Best International Feature Film at the Gotham Awards, New York Film Critics Circle, Los Angeles Film Critics Association, and was named a top 5 Best International Film by the National Board of Review. Payal Kapadia is the first Indian woman nominated for Best Director at the Golden Globes (where All We Imagine as Light is also nominated for Best Film Non-English Language).
In All We Imagine as Light, the light, the lives, and the textures of contemporary, working-class Mumbai are explored and celebrated by Kapadia. Centering on two roommates who also work together in a city hospital—head nurse Prabha (Kani Kusruti) and recent hire Anu (Divya Prabha)—plus their coworker, cook Parvaty (Chhaya Kadam), Kapadia’s film alights on moments of connection and heartache, hope and disappointment to create a soulful study of the transformative power of friendship and sisterhood, in all its complexities and richness.
“Payal Kapadia’s remarkable and revelatory film All We Imagine as Light is at once a gorgeous city symphony and a poignant exploration of female friendship. She is one of the most exciting voices in contemporary cinema, and we are honored to celebrate her with the 2025 Coolidge Breakthrough Artist Award,” remarked Coolidge Corner Theatre Deputy Director Beth Gilligan.
Payal Kapadia is a Mumbai based filmmaker. She studied Film Direction at the Film & Television Institute of India. Her short films Afternoon Clouds and And What Is The Summer Saying premiered respectively at the Cinéfondation and the Berlinale. Her first feature film A Night of Knowing Nothing premiered at 2021 Director’s Fortnight, where it won the Golden Eye for best documentary. Her second feature All We Imagine as Light premiered in Cannes 2024 in Official Competition, where it won the Grand Prix.
The Coolidge Breakthrough Artist Award was established in 2023 to celebrate the bold and innovative film artists who represent the future of cinema. Past honorees are writer-directors Elegance Bratton (The Inspection) and Jane Schoenbrun (I Saw the TV Glow).
The Coolidge’s other signature award, The Coolidge Award (established in 2004) honors film artists with decades-long careers; previous honorees include Meryl Streep, Zhang Yimou, Jane Fonda, Werner Herzog, Michael Douglas, Thelma Schoonmaker, John Waters, Ruth E. Carter, and Julianne Moore. A 2025 Coolidge Award honoree will be announced next year.
The Coolidge’s screens are accessible by elevators. All are also equipped with a variety of options for patrons that are hard of hearing, deaf, blind, and/or visually impaired. For questions about accessibility or to request any special accommodations, please email info@coolidge.org.
Tickets for this event are $23 general and $20 for Coolidge members. The Coolidge Corner Theatre is located at 290 Harvard Street, Brookline, MA.
About the Coolidge Corner Theatre
The nonprofit Coolidge Corner Theatre is a New England landmark (established in 1933) with a national reputation for award-winning film programming, innovative educational programs, and community partnerships. A six-screen cinema, the Coolidge shows classic and contemporary films, hosts live performances and special guests, and produces innovative film series like Big Screen Classics, After Midnite, Science on Screen®, Cinema Jukebox, PANORAMA, Cinema in 70mm, The Sounds of Silents®, Kids’ Shows, and Rewind!, as well as film education classes and monthly repertory programs.
The Coolidge hosts several prominent film festivals and has recently welcomed film luminaries such as Werner Herzog, Julianne Moore, The Daniels, John Waters, Ruth E. Carter, Jane Fonda, Michael Douglas, Radha Blank, Frank Oz, Liv Ullmann, Ethan Hawke, and more. For more information, visit coolidge.org.
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