Kirsten Tretbar

Short Biography

Kirsten Tretbar was born in Cleveland, Ohio, and spent her first two years of life living in Twickenham, England while her father studied medicine at the West Middlesex Hospital, and her mother studied English Literature. She grew up by a lake in Shawnee, Kansas, in suburban Kansas City. Her extended family are all wheat farmers and cattle ranchers in Stafford County, Kansas, where Kirsten went every summer to work wheat harvest with her brother Eric Tretbar - also a well-known indie filmmaker.Tretbar received a BA in Cultural Anthropology from Grinnell College, Iowa in '89, where she did her senior thesis/ Ethnography on a group of Women Quilters in the rural town of Grinnell. There she studied the importance of folk/amateur art in women's lives. In 1989, Kirsten moved to LA, where she got her Masters in Theater from USC in '91. At USC she focused on the Anthropology of Performance, and studied drama as ritual. There she also played several leading roles such as Lyubov in Chekov's, The Cherry Orchard. After drama school she became assistant to LA acting coach, Catlin Adams a famous Lee Strasberg "Method" teacher. During this time, she also acted in commercials and television.In '91, Tretbar met English filmmaker, Derek Goodall an "old school", well-known BBC documentary director. With Goodall, Kirsten learned the art of documentary filmmaking, and ran UK/LA based Goodwood Productions until 1997. She produced dozens of documentaries abroad - hiring crews, overseeing edits, and managing large production budgets for art and music programs for the BBC and ITV networks. In 1996, Goodwood became the private production company for the Sultan of Brunei. For 14 months, Kirsten worked exclusively in Southeast Asia, as an executive producer, filming royal Brunei events such as world-class polo matches, international soccer, and rock concerts. In 1998, Tretbar resigned from Goodwood, and moved back to Kansas City, where, during this time, she decided to direct her first documentary about her family's involvement, The Great Plains Passion Play. Since that time, she has finished her first feature documentary, Zenith (2001), which airs on NBC television, 2002.Filmmaking runs in the Tretbar family. Kirsten's brother, Eric Tretbar is a famous Indie Filmmaker, and is best known for his subtle black and white features, The Usual (1992), and _Snow(1996)_ both of which have won awards at The Berlin Film Festival (The Forum) and LAIFF. Snow (1998) gained Eric a nomination at The Independent Spirit Awards in 1999, for 'Someone To Watch, and aired on The Sundance Channel for the last two years.Kirsten continues to work with her brother, Eric, on several feature film projects. Zenith is her directorial and DP debut. Kirsten lives in Kansas City, Missouri, with her producer/graphic artist husband, Ozzy Ben.