Our Mission

137 Films is a non-profit, 501(c)(3) documentary production company based in Chicago that promotes science literacy through storytelling. We create films out of the stories found in the world of science and strive to entertain, educate, and inform by exploring how science's search for answers impacts our cultural, political, and personal lives.

Who we are

Monica Long Ross, Artistic Director

Monica is a filmmaker and playwright with a special interest in women living in and struggling with American culture.

A graduate of Northwestern's MFA film program, Monica's work has been screened at festivals around the world, including Dinner, a finalist at the Rose d'Or Montreux in Switzerland and the award-winning The Atom Smashers, broadcast on PBS's Independent Lens.  A published playwright, her plays have been produced nationally.

Monica's interest in women and technology led her to co-found 137 Films with the goal of exploring how science intersects with culture.  After many years of college teaching, Monica has retired from the classroom to concentrate on the job of Artistic Director of 137 Films where she is encouraged to engage in her favorite activity:  telling stories. 

Clayton Brown, Interim Executive Director

Clayton explores the hidden stories and compelling characters that emerge when people pursue their passions. After earning a MFA in film at Northwestern University, he received several awards and saw his films screened across the country. He has also created a showcase film for Microsoft featured at the IFP Market in New York.

His films tell the stories of musicians, artists, actors, and others caught in curious obsessions. His lifelong fascination with science led him to co-found 137 Films to tell the stories of scientists and their advances toward an understanding of the universe.

Clayton also teaches narrative and documentary film production at Northwestern University's Department of Radio/TV/Film.

Stefani B. Foster, Cinematographer

Stefani's passion for cinematography has been cultivated through film, video, and digital media production that has taken her all over the world. As director of photography for independent and commercial film and video projects (including experimental shorts, claymation, feature films, and documentary), Stefani has documented two thousand year-old Buddhist mural art in the deserts of western China and realized new methods of digital reproduction and presentation for the archives of the Chicago History Museum.

Most recently, Stefani's work was seen in the 2006 Idaho Panhandle International Film Festival (IPIFF) as the winner of the Soaring Eagle Award for Best Documentary for Art Seymour | Solo Performance, which follows the craft of chevron bead making over hundreds of years. The film also won the award for best cinematography, a rare feat in a category normally dominated by narrative films.

Peter Doetschman, Board Director

Peter Doetschman began working in The Rotary Foundation’s fund development department in 2005 and has held several positions. In his current role as Planned Giving Officer he is responsible for the cultivation and administration of life income and estate gifts to the Foundation.

Peter is passionate about anthropology, science and the nonprofit sector, and he currently serves on the Board of a nonprofit documentary film company called 137 Films. Prior to working at Rotary, he participated in the Japan Exchange and Teaching Program (JET Program) where he taught English in a fishing village on the west coast of Japan. He grew up on a farm in Illinois and loves to craft homemade beer.

Andy Swindler, Board Director

Andy brings expertise from building his own interactive marketing company, Astek Consulting, which helps clients reach audiences by designing and implementing web technology as unique and powerful as the messages it conveys. He is currently Vice President of the Promethean Theatre Ensemble board of directors.

Why 137 Films?

One hundred thirty-seven is a magical and bizarre number for physicists.  It is the value of a number called the fine-structure constant. This constant, 137, is the way physicists describe the probability that an electron will emit or absorb a photon: it's the square of the charge of the electron divided by the speed of light times Planck’s constant. It combines electromagnetism (the electron charge), relativity (the speed of light), and quantum mechanics (Planck’s constant), and, strangely enough, is a pure, dimensionless number.  It has fascinated physicists for decades.

Throughout the Thirties and Forties, the greatest scientists of the day tried and failed to figure out the magic number 137. The great Werner Heisenberg told his friends that the problems of quantum theory would disappear only when 137 was explained, and spent years trying to explain it; fortunately, the problems did go away despite his failure.

Richard Feynman, one of the greatest physicists of this century said that physicists ought to put a special sign in their offices to remind themselves of how much they don't know. The message on the sign would be very simple. It would consist entirely of one word, or, rather, number: 137.

Dr. Leon Lederman, Nobel Laureate, in his book The God Particle said "I tell my undergraduate students that if they are ever in trouble in a major city anywhere in the world they should write '137' on a sign and hold it up on a busy street corner.  Eventually a physicist will see that they're distressed and come to their assistance." 

During an interview for The Atom Smashers, John Marburger, President Bush's science adviser (himself a physicist), asked if we had ever stood on a street corner and tried it.  Monica said "we named our company after it, held it up, and physicists have been coming to our assistance ever since."

(thanks to Charles C. Mann for information about 137)

Michael Melander, Board Director

Mike is an attorney practicing with the law firm of Padgitt, Padgitt & Peppey, Ltd., in Winnetka, Illinois.  He concentrates his practice on small business advisement, estate planning and administration and litigation.  Mike is a member of the Chicago Council on Science & Technology, as well as a member of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs.   He is active in his local community in the 47th Ward of Chicago and is treasurer of his condo association board.  Mike uses his legal background and passion for science and science education issues to help 137 Films.

Amy Ellison, Development Director

Amy received her MFA in Filmmaking at Florida State University in 2000. Her thesis film Breaths screened in over 20 film festivals and received honors from The Florida Film Festival and The Producers Guild of America. She has taught screenwriting, documentary production and cloth diapering, but not all in the same places. When she is not writing grants for 137 Films, Amy sits on the board of directors for Chicago Fair Trade and shares parenting duties for two young sons with her husband, Brendan.

Stephen Poon, Assistant Editor

Stephen manages, directs, edits, and shoots for Northwestern's Academic & Research Technologies department, producing content for the Big Ten Network and documenting live events around the Evanston and Chicago area. He also does freelance videography for special events, dance, and corporate promotions.
When he doesn't have a camera in his hands, he likes to trade it for a guitar, microphone, or a stack of books.

Mia Capodilupo, Director of Operations

 Mia Capodilupo received a BA from the University of Chicago, an MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute and is currently working on a certificate in finance/accounting from Northwestern. She has worked as a director, manager and financial administrator for organizations including the San Francisco Art Institute, Lillstreet Art Center, Visual Aid and Kartemquin Films. She is also a sculptor and installation artist showing work nationally.
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