MCFC Selects Eliette Singleton as $2,000 Film Student Scholarship Winner

The Monterey County Film Commission announced that Eliette Singleton, a Cinematic Arts and Technology major at California State University, Monterey Bay (CSUMB), was named the 2021 winner of the $2,000 scholarship in the Monterey County Film Commission’s Director Emeritus Richard Tyler Film Student Scholarship Award Program. She is originally from Playa del Rey.

A $500 honorary award was presented to Jiya Day, also a CSUMB senior. She will use the prize money to help fund her success in her senior year, gaining experience on a set on her capstone film production. She comes from Hayward.

Singleton plans to use her prize money for cameras and underwater housings to capture surf footage for a project on the island of Santiago, Cape Verde, which she hopes will help propel surfboard skills and board shaping for long-term economic income for the Cape Verdean islands.

“I wish to create a film that highlights the beauty of African surf culture and follows the story of young men learning a beautiful craft—surfboard shaping,” Singleton said. “Cape Verde is home to a budding surf culture with world class waves shared by talented local surfers and children on planks of wood or even broken boards. Hopefully my work in Cape Verde results in an intersection of sustainable economic circumstance and art.”

“For creators who are able and passionate, I think it is utterly important to share the stories of people, places and creatures who do not have the same forms of opportunity and audience,” Singleton said.

The Monterey County Film Commission’s scholarship program was created in 2008 to provide financial aid and incentive to students of film as well as beginning filmmakers who reside in Monterey County, or those enrolled in a college or university here. The fund was established as a permanent endowment with the Community Foundation for Monterey County.

Contributions to the film commission’s Director Emeritus Richard Tyler Film Student Scholarship Award Program were made by the Craig and Paula Tigerman family, Dino Cocalis, Honest Engine Films, Lou Adler’s Monterey International Pop Festival Foundation, the Carmel Sunset Rotary Club, and numerous local businesses and individuals. Additional donations are welcomed.

“The Monterey County Film Commission is thrilled to help identify and promote the next generation of local young filmmakers,” said Garland Thompson, chairperson of the film commission’s scholarship committee. “These scholarships will assist these students as they take their next steps into a future career in the film industry.