Meet the Team

  • Sam Osborn

    Co-Director • IMDb

  • Alejandra Vasquez

    Co-Director • IMDb

  • Luis A. Miranda, Jr.

    Producer • IMDb

  • James Lawler

    Producer • IMDb

  • Julia Pontecorvo

    Producer • IMDb

  • Daniela I. Quiroz

    Editor • IMDb

  • Michael Crommett

    Director of Photography • IMDb

  • Charlie Vela

    Sound Recordist • IMDb

  • Camilo Lara

    Composer • IMDb

  • Demián Gálvez

    Composer • IMDb

Directors Statement

Back in 2019, while filming a different project along the US-Mexico border in Texas, we stumbled upon one of the first fully-sanctioned UIL State Mariachi Festivals, where high school mariachi bands were performing at the same competitive level as cheer, football, and marching band. There was something striking about a publicly-funded arts program that celebrated traditional Mexican culture within a state so politically entrenched against immigration. We quickly started asking around and found our way to the students and administrators of Edinburg North High School’s Mariachi Oro, who were gracious enough to open their doors and allow us to begin the journey of capturing a year in the life of a varsity mariachi squad. 

Among the student musicians of Mariachi Oro we found a cultural dynamic that matched our own. All of the students were Mexican-American but their connection to the culture varied dramatically, much like our own connections to our heritage. We found ourselves drawn to the everyday dramas of these students; how mariachi music became an anchor and soundtrack to scholarship applications, falling in love, arguing with their parents, and the decision to leave home. Mariachi played the role that it has for many previous generations: to act as the accompanying music to life’s biggest moments. 

Along the way we came to understand that we wanted to make a film centered on an experience that millions of first, second, and third generation Mexican-Americans have, which is characterized best by the phrase “ni de aqui, ni de alla,” of being from neither here nor there. It’s a feeling that we have both felt growing up in families that pull from a hodge-podge of their Mexican and American roots. We wanted to show that the world of competitive high school mariachi represents a concerted effort by a borderlands Latine community to respond to this question of cultural identity and offer its young people some measure of solid footing–to show them the beauty, thrills, and joy of their heritage, and to assure them that they belong.

- Alejandra Vasquez & Sam Osborn

  • FIFTH SEASON (formerly Endeavor Content) is a global leader in the creation, production, and distribution of feature films and premium television series. Known for producing and distributing award-winning content that engages audiences and moves culture, the studio’s film titles include the multi-Oscar-nominated The Lost Daughter from Maggie Gyllenhaal, Michael Bay’s Ambulance, Destin Daniel Cretton’s Just Mercy, the Book Club franchise, and recent Sundance Film Festival Audience Award winner Cha Cha Real Smooth. Documentary feature 2nd Chance premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival and was acquired by Showtime. The studio produces premium TV series, including the 14 Emmy-nominated  Severance, See and Truth Be Told for Apple TV+, Wolf Like Me for Peacock, Life & Beth, Nine Perfect Strangers, and McCartney 3, 2, 1 for Hulu, Tokyo Vice for HBO Max, and Scenes From A Marriage for HBO. FIFTH SEASON also handles global distribution for dozens of hit series in addition to its own studio productions, including Killing Eve, The Morning Show, Normal People, and The Night Manager.

    Learn more at FIFTHSEASON.com, follow us @FIFTHSEASON.  

  • Impact Partners is dedicated to funding independent documentary storytelling that entertains audiences, engages with pressing social issues, and propels the art of cinema forward.

    Over the span of 15 years, Impact Partners has been involved in the financing of over 100 films, including: ICARUS, which won the 2018 Academy Award® for Best Documentary Feature; WON’T YOU BE MY NEIGHBOR?, which won the 2019 Independent Spirit Award for Best Documentary; DINA, which won the Grand Jury Prize at the 2017 Sundance Film Festival and was named Best Feature by the International Documentary Association; THE EAGLE HUNTRESS, which was nominated for the BAFTA Award for Best Documentary; HOW TO SURVIVE A PLAGUE, which was nominated for the Academy Award® for Best Documentary Feature; THE QUEEN OF VERSAILLES, which won the U.S. Directing Award at the 2012 Sundance Film Festival; and HELL AND BACK AGAIN, which won the Documentary Grand Jury Prize and Cinematography Award at the 2011 Sundance Film Festival and was nominated for the Academy Award® for Best Documentary Feature.

  • Embeleco Unlimited was founded by Luis A. Miranda, Jr. in the joyful spirit of a Puerto Rican colloquialism that describes ideas, endeavors or projects that erupt out of passion and good intentions from a group of innovative thinkers. Embeleco Unlimited is a multidisciplinary production house that strives to uplift underrepresented voices in front of and behind the camera.

  • Osmosis Films is a creative studio and production company working across all forms of visual media, from documentary films and series, to interactive media, to in-person experiences. Whether crafted for the big screen, a physical space or a virtual reality, Osmosis' team of story-makers delivers engaging narratives that inspire minds and move hearts. Osmosis was founded in 2011 by James Lawler and is based in New York City. 

  • The Ford Foundation seeks to reduce inequality in all of its forms, and artist-driven documentary and emerging media projects are crucial to this effort. As part of the Creativity and Free Expression program, JustFilms funds social justice storytelling and the 21st-century arts infrastructure that supports it. The projects and people we support inspire imaginations, disrupt stereotypes, and help transform the conditions that perpetuate injustice and inequality.

  • Masa Films is a production company founded by Alejandra Vasquez & Sam Osborn. Alejandra Vasquez and Sam Osborn are Mexican-American filmmakers based in Los Angeles. GOING VARSITY IN MARIACHI, their debut feature-length film as co-directors, was given the Jonathan Oppenheim Editing Award at the 2023 Sundance Film Festival in the U.S. Documentary Competition.

    Their 2022 short FOLK FRONTERA was awarded the Jury Prize for Best Texas Short at the 2022 SXSW Film Festival and was presented by Independent Lens and PBS. Other short works include VARSITY ORO for Pop-Up Magazine, NIGHT SHIFT, a four-part docuseries about those who work the graveyard shift, and EATING, a 10-episode docuseries for Topic.