Ari Gold

Ari Gold is a film director, poet, musician, & founder/president of Grack Films. His movies have screened at Sundance, Telluride, Karlovy-Vary, & hundreds of other festivals, & he has won over fifty prizes, including best film at SXSW (twice), the Student Oscar, and Best Director at the American Cinematheque / ARPA. Ari is currently in post-production on his third & fourth feature films. Helicopter expands on his student-Oscar-winning short film about his mother’s death, & features legendary director Alejandro Jodorowsky. Brother Verses Brother, a musical odyssey from the streets of San Francisco, is a companion to Ari’s first book of poetry (Father Verses Sons, Rare Bird Lit, 2024). Previously, he directed a romantic drama called The Song of Sway Lake which played 52 international film festivals, winning Best Feature at over a dozen of these. It features Rory Culkin, Robert Sheehan (Umbrella Academy), & Mary Beth Peil. His first feature film, air-drum cult comedy Adventures of Power, was called "One of the funniest films in recent years" by NY Magazine, and features Jane Lynch, Michael McKean, Nick Kroll, and Adrian Grenier. Ari has a dozen other film & TV projects in various stages of development, and also hosts a podcast about drumming called HotSticks, featuring some of the biggest rock stars on the planet. Ari’s most unusual distinctions include a High Times Magazine "Stoner of the Year" award (for his performance as a drug dealer in the rave film Groove), and a Guinness World Record for commanding the largest air-drum ensemble on earth.