Correspondent Tom Wilmer visits with Guy Mossman, co-director and director of photography for the documentary SPEAK showcased at the 2025 SLO FILM Festival.
The documentary SPEAK follows five top-ranked high school oratory students as they spend a year crafting spellbinding spoken word performances with the dream of winning one of the world’s largest and most intense public speaking competitions.
The documentary deftly captures the euphoria of victory and the devastation of defeat as students craft and perform original oratories over the course of a 9-month season. Their dream is simple: To win the Super Bowl of public speaking, the National Speech and Debate Association (NSDA) Nationals.
Co-director, Guy Mossman says, “We witness them, their coaches and their parents as they fight to keep school speech programs alive amid budget cuts, book bans and censorship efforts that reach a fevered pitch during the 2024 election year.
The film begins at the 2023 National Speech and Debate Association (NSDA) Championships, introducing our eclectic orators: Noor, Noah, Sam, Mfaz and Esther, the two-time reigning national champion in Oratory. We follow them to the 2024 Nationals, where Esther hopes to beat the record set by SPEAK’s Executive Producer, Josh Gad, in 1999. SPEAK captures the passion, joy—and courage—of unforgettable teens using their voices to change hearts and minds. This film is the perfect antidote for these fraught times—intense, funny, and most of all, hopeful.”
A sampler of upcoming SPEAK Film Festival screenings include: Nantucket, June 29th; Washington D.C. June 13th; Sidney Film Festival June 9 & 14th.
Audio sound bites and music underbeds used in this show were provided courtesy of the SPEAK producers.
SPEAK Documentary:
Director Jennifer Tiexiera
Co-Director Guy Mossman
Producers Pamela Griner, Guy Mossman, Jennifer Tiexiera
Executive Producers Josh Gad, Simon Kilmurry, Lisa Hepner, Christoph Baaden, Abby Ellin, Joseph Wolfe, Polly Wolfe, Schultz Family Foundation, Hallee Adelman , Dawn Bonder , Daniel J. Chalfen, Marci Wiseman, Toby Nalbandian , Greg Schmidt, Sean Bradley, Lauren Lexton, Jenny Warburg, Jamie Wolf, Nathalie Seaver, J. Todd Harris, Melony and Adam Lewis, Andrea Van Beuren
Editors Delaney Lynch, Jennifer Tiexiera
Director of Photography Guy Mossman
Original Score Osei Essed
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