Josephine Decker to Receive Indie Star Award at Tauron American Film Festival

Filmmaker Josephine Decker will receive the Indie Star Award at this year's Tauron American Film Festival, she told Variety in an interview published on 10 November 2026.

Past recipients of the award include Jesse Eisenberg, John Waters and Christine Vachon. Decker directed two films that many viewers will know, Madeline's Madeline and Shirley. She also made Chasing Summer, which stars Iliza Shlesinger.

In the same interview, Decker said she has a dream of setting up a residency for movies made without scripts. A residency is a set period in which artists work in one place, often with support. She described her own approach as collaborative. "I don't write alone," she said. "I either write with a community or build stuff with actors."

Her short film A Stable Marriage began with a single paragraph. The cast then spent a day improvising together, making up dialogue and action on the spot rather than working from a finished script. Decker said Madeline's Madeline is the project closest to her heart, because its idea grew out of many people and many minds, not just one.

She was also candid about the state of the business. Decker said filmmaking is harder than it has been in the 20 years she has worked in the industry. "Filmmaking is lonelier than ever, probably just because the world is lonelier than ever," she told Variety.

The award adds a public moment to a career built on working outside the traditional studio routine. Decker's comments suggest that the process behind her films matters as much to her as the finished pictures. The festival's full programme and presentation details were not part of the interview, so the ceremony itself will be the next thing to watch.