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) and the Student Oscar.

As of late 2024, Ari is in post-production on his third & fourth feature films. 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). Helicopter expands on his student-Oscar-winning short film about his mother's death, & features legendary director Alejandro Jodorowsky.

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. And his first feature film, air-drum cult comedy Adventures of Power, was called "One of the funniest films in recent years" by NY Magazine, played Sundance and Karlovy-Vary, 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.