Alumni Spotlight: Neha Shastry '09

Neha Shastry ’09 was destined to be a journalist. It’s literally in her DNA. Her mother, Ferzine Esmail, spent her life working in the media, and her father, Vasuki Shastry, is an author, journalist, and worked at the International Monetary Fund. 

“I have to say that even before my experiences in school or at college - my parents have always been a big influence when it came to my choice of originally pursuing journalism,” Shastry said. “My experience growing up, from moving multiple times because of my parents’ jobs to dinners they would have at our home with their journalist friends, were really what shaped my ambition. It’s also not the most stable industry to work in, so you need a lot of emotional support from family and friends to get through it, and I’m lucky that my family just implicitly understood why I would want to do this from the beginning.”

What she does is produce and direct documentaries, including the Peabody Award-winning “All In: The Fight for Democracy” which was shortlisted for the Academy Award in 2021. More recently, she was a producer on “The Murdochs: Empire of Influence” which aired on CNN and “Harry & Meghan” which premiered on Netflix in late 2022.

“It was my first project as a director and I learned a lot making it and worked with the most incredible co-directors and producers,” Shastry said. “It also doesn’t hurt that The New Yorker called it one of the best documentary series of 2022.”

The Class of 2023 will hear more about Shastry and her experiences when she speaks in June at St. Andrew’s graduation where she will give the commencement address.

“It’s surreal,” Shastry said. “My 17-year-old self would probably have had something wildly sarcastic to say about it, but I’m genuinely grateful that anyone thinks I have any valuable insight or advice to give.”

Shastry explored storytelling as a high school student, through words (The Mane News), pictures (photography class) and performing (in Upper School productions). “Looking back, I had a lot of time to explore my creativity in high school and find different ways to express myself. I recognize now that having all of those opportunities at my fingertips as a teenager was rare, and no doubt had an impact in shaping what I eventually chose to do for a living.”

Film wasn’t on Shastry’s radar when she went off to college at St Andrews in Scotland. That wasn’t a problem as film found her.

“It’s funny to look back because I think that film chose me,” Shastry said. “I graduated college thinking I would work in TV news and was perfectly happy with that. I didn’t even know it was possible to work in film without going to film school or having no connections in the industry. Once I moved to New York, my first job ended up being at a media company that was exploding at the moment and was specializing in making short documentaries. That first job felt like film school for me, and an unintended consequence was that I eventually fell out of love with what I consider ‘traditional journalism’ and just wanted to make movies.”

What Shastry enjoyed most about film as opposed to other mediums was the time it allowed her to spend with subjects. “ I loved being able to spend more time with people whose stories I was telling, and be able to craft something that was visually appealing as well as a strong story. I think narrative films have always brought people together, and documentaries have the power to do that as well. There’s never been a better time to be a documentarian and I couldn’t imagine doing anything else. I’m glad it found me because I did not know this was a job a person could have when I graduated college.”

Shastry has spent more than a decade of her career building to this point, along the way earning a year-long nonfiction and directing fellowship from Netflix and Ghetto Film School. 

“Someone recently said that in order to work in film, especially as a female director, you have to have a sort of pathological optimism and persistence to get anything done,” Shastry said. “Even though it’s 2023, there are very few women, not to mention women of color, working as directors today. So needless to say it’s been a solid decade of hard work so far to get to a place where I can comfortably even call myself a working director.

“In 2019 I was hired to work with Liz Garbus, who is one of the best documentarians working today, and together we made “All In: about Stacey Abrams. That project was a real turning point for my career because I also gained an incredible mentor and found a community of filmmakers who are invested in my growth and in my projects. So it’s definitely a mix of persistence, hard work, and finding your people.”

Shastry has a number of high profile documentaries on her recent resume with a number of projects on the horizon.

“I have a lot in the pipeline for the next couple of years so I’m excited for all of it and just grateful that I get to keep doing what I love,” Shastry said. “It took a long time to get to the stage where I can really choose my projects and who I work with, and there’s so much more I want to do. I’m in the process of slowly building my own production company, and I eventually want to work in between documentary and scripted as well.”

Commencement will not be the first time Shastry has spoken to Upper School students. In September of 2021, she spoke at an assembly about her career and how St. Andrew’s helped her develop her point of view as a filmmaker. As far as what advice she will give to the Class of 2023, Shastry pointed to putting your faith in yourself.

“I think the biggest lesson I’ve learned since graduating high school is the value in trusting my own gut and getting to a place where I believe in myself,” Shastry said. “There’s a lot of pressure when you get to college to ‘figure it out’ in those four years and the truth is, no one figures it out until a lot later. So hopefully I can put together something coherent about trusting the process of learning about yourself and then trusting yourself. It’s the most invaluable thing you can do.”