Virginia Film Festival

Marshall Persinger

Producer, Fresh Produce Pictures

Marshall Persinger, through her company, Fresh Produce Pictures, has gravitated toward creatively challenging and innovative projects. She has produced films, documentaries and television that are usually unique and/or edgy, utilizing both proven and/or newly discovered talent.

Persinger recently executive produced THE CONTINENTAL for Lionsgate and Peacock which will be released in September 2023, a prequel series to the John Wick movie franchise. Recent work also includes THE GOOD LORD BIRD, a limited series for Blumhouse Television and Showtime, starring Ethan Hawke as the extraordinary abolitionist John Brown. The series was nominated for multiple awards, including the Peabody for Limited Series. Other television credits include Hulu’s INTO THE DARK series, the TNT/PTV’s Emmy nominated series THE ALIENIST, AMC/SundanceTV’s Peabody Award winning RECTIFY created by Ray McKinnon (exec produced along with VAFF Advisory Board Chairman Mark Johnson) and the ABC Studios/Lifetime’s hit series ARMY WIVES.

Her documentary Z CHANNEL: A MAGNIFICENT OBSESSION directed by Xan Cassavetes for IFC, was an Official Selection at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival and subsequently screened at film festivals all over the world. Past projects also include: Showtime’s WILD IRIS, starring film legend Gena Rowlands and Oscar® nominee Laura Linney (both nominated for Best Actress Emmys® with Linney winning the award); CHERRY FALLS, starring Brittany Murphy and Jay Mohr (USA Films); the Polish brothers’ TWIN FALLS IDAHO (Sony Classics).

Persinger began her entertainment career in New York in 1986 under the mentorship of Academy Award®-winning producer/director Jonathan Demme. She worked with Errol Morris (on his groundbreaking documentary THE THIN BLUE LINE), George Armitage (MIAMI BLUES with Alec Baldwin and Jennifer Jason Leigh) and Demme (MARRIED TO THE MOB with Michelle Pfeiffer, Matthew Modine, Oliver Platt and the multiple Academy Award-winning feature film THE SILENCE OF THE LAMBS starring Jodie Foster and Anthony Hopkins). Persinger also produced E. Max Frye’s social satire AMOS & ANDREW, starring Nicolas Cage and Samuel L. Jackson.

Persinger is a native of Lookout Mountain, Tennessee and graduated from the University of Virginia with a B.A. in rhetoric and communications. She served for ten years as co-chair of the Independent Film Producers Committee for the Producers Guild of America.