Directory Profile

Rommel Villa Barriga, MFA in Film and TV Production
Rommel Villa is an Emmy and Student-Academy-Award-winning filmmaker born and raised in Bolivia. He grew up writing and directing award-winning plays based on social issues within the Latinx and Queer communities. Rommel has a degree in Systems Engineering and an MFA in Film/TV Production. Winner of Directing stipends from Lionsgate-Televisa, USC School of Cinematic Arts, and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, Rommel's work ranges from magical-realistic LGBTQ+ stories like his film “Teddy Mate”, to movies based on real-life events like “Sweet Potatoes”, a historical film about the Mexican scientist who synthesized the birth control pill, which granted Rommel a Student Academy Award. That landed Rommel a job as an editing faculty at USC.
After film school, Rommel became a grantee at the 2021 Tomorrow Filmmaker’s Today program, where he made connections that allowed him to produce “Piedra Dura/Hard Stone”, which tackles the abuse of queer teenagers in small towns in Bolivia. Passionate about controversial, existential, and out-of-this-world topics that affect minorities, Rommel wrote "The Mechanical Box", a psychological thriller, and the TV Pilot “M is for Marta”, which tells the story of Colombian LGBTQ+ activist Marta Alvarez. Both scripts were finalists at the Sundance Development Labs, encouraging him to continue writing - and hopefully soon producing - more stories that combine drama, horror, dark humor, and complex emotions.
Rommel’s editorial projects include “Lives Not Grades”, a documentary by Daniel Druhora that won an Emmy in 2022. After that, Rommel edited a couple of feature films. The first one, “Phantom” was funded by USC in collaboration with 10 directors. Rommel’s second feature “Dark Obsession” directed by George Horton, was recently distributed by Alarm Pictures. Last year, Rommel was selected as a grantee at the ACE Diversity Program, where he hopes to learn more about the art of editing while connecting with filmmakers to build new relationships and collaborations. Recently, Rommel was hired by Grant Productions to direct and edit their independent proof-of-concept TV Pilot “Harold and Helen”.