Daniel Dae Kim and 3AD Join Documentary 'School for Defectors' as Executive Producers
Actor Daniel Dae Kim and his production company, 3AD, have joined the documentary School for Defectors as executive producers, Variety reported on 11 November 2026. The film is directed by Jeremy Workman. An executive producer typically helps secure money and shape the project rather than running day-to-day filming.
The documentary follows the Jangdaehyun School in Busan, South Korea. All 20 students at the school are defectors who escaped from North Korea. Their stories sit at the centre of the film.
The producing team also includes Bearing North, WildBrush Media, SonaFilms and Hooligan Films, working alongside 3AD. Several companies sharing a credit is common on documentaries, where small teams often pool money and expertise from different partners.
The film premiered at the True/False Film Festival in March. Documentaries usually reach audiences through festivals first, and festival programmers, critics and buyers often watch them there. Since then, School for Defectors has screened at a dozen more festivals, including Florida, RiverRun, DC/DOX, Calgary, Hamptons, Woodstock, Heartland and Vancouver. It has also won six awards and is set to screen at Doc NYC, a documentary festival in New York.
Kim founded 3AD in 2014 to make work centred on people who have been historically underrepresented on screen. The company's credits include ABC's The Good Doctor, the Amazon Prime thriller Butterfly and the IFC documentary Bad Axe. Bad Axe made the Oscar shortlist in 2022.
For readers following the documentary world, the move adds a well-known name to a film that has already travelled widely on the festival circuit. The film's next public step is its Doc NYC screening. No release or distribution deal has been announced.
