Six women fight to prove they have what it takes to be among the first female military pilots in WWII, while, unbeknownst to them, political forces in Congress try to destroy their efforts and erase them from history. Framed by the diaries and letters written during our heroes’ time in the service, the first-ever feature-length film about the WASP also celebrates early female pilots of all races and their contributions to aviation from the 1920s to today. 

Coming Home: Fight for a Legacy also highlights:

• 16 Interviews with surviving WASP

• Never-before-seen personal archival footage

• 2016 WASP victory for their inurnment rights at Arlington Cemetery 

• 25,000 women pilots who applied for the service and the 1,074 who made it through

• 38 women who died in the line of duty, with no Gold Star or military benefits

MATIA KARRELL (DIRECTOR/PRODUCER), a Fulbright scholar, has an extensive career in film and television and was nominated for an Academy Award for her short film, Cadillac Dreams.  She is known for the film, Behind the Red Door, starring Kiefer Sutherland, as well as The West Wing and Army Wives. The recipient of the Fulbright and other prestigious fellowships, Karrell is also a Graduate Film Instructor at ArtCenter College of Design, Pasadena.

HILARY PRENTICE (PRODUCER) is also producing Karrell’s dramatic television series about the WASP, FlyGirls. Prentice worked on Emmy-nominated HBO film, The Tale, and award-winning animation director Fabrice Joubert's film, Safety. Prentice produced writer/director Jim MacDonald’s award-winning first film, Heavy Lifting. Prentice has also written, directed, and produced educational shorts for nonprofits including the award-winning start-up Magic Links. An Academic All-American graduating with honors from Dartmouth College, Prentice was also the recipient of Dartmouth’s prestigious Louis Morton History prize and a Sloane-Dicky fellow.

TARA CRAIG (PRODUCER) is the founder and president of The Squid Farm, which launched in 2017. Under the Squid Farm banner, Craig recently produced the feature comedy Guest House and the sci-fi thriller 3022. In 2018, Craig also served as Executive Producer on the comedy feature Friendsgiving, produced by Ben Stiller’s Red Hour Productions. She also recently produced commercials for the National Basketball Association and Goodyear. Craig produced the 2013 Tribeca film Trust Me, Balls to the Wall and April Fool’s Day. 

SHARON WOOD (WRITER), a longtime documentary filmmaker, has served as writer on OSCAR® nominees Tell the Truth and Run: George Seldes and the American Press, and Super Chief: The Life and Legacy of Earl Warren, along with the Peabody and Columbia-Dupont award-winning The Celluloid Closet and Paragraph 175.  Between 2003-11, she was producer/writer for Lucasfilm’s documentary department and co-authored The Art of Nonfiction Movie Making along with OSCAR® winners Jeffrey Friedman and Rob Epstein, published by Praeger-ABC Clio in 2012. 

MOLLY MERRYMAN, Ph.D. (HISTORIC RESEARCH PRODUCER) is the founding director of the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality and Associate Professor, School of Peace and Conflict Studies at Kent State University. She is the author of Clipped Wings: The Rise and Fall of the WASP of World War II, first published in 1997 and recently selected for a 2020 re-release in the New York University Press “Classics” collection. She has directed and produced nine documentaries that have been broadcast in the United States and the United Kingdom and have screened at academic meetings, museums, and universities around the world.          

CHARISSA THREAT, Ph.D. (CONSULTING PRODUCER) is the author of Nursing Civil Rights: Gender and Race in the Army Nurse Corps (University of Illinois Press, 2015), won the 2017 Lavinia L. Dock Book Award from the American Association for the History of Nursing for outstanding research and writing on the history of nursing. Charissa Threat is an Associate Professor of History at Chapman University where she teaches courses in United States and African American history.  She is also the author of several book chapters, most recently, “Patriotism is Neither Masculine or Feminine”: Gender and the Work of War” in the Routledge History of Gender, War and the US Military, Kara D. Vuic, ed. (Routledge Press, 2017).  She is currently at work on her second book, "Sweethearts and Pin-Ups". It is a history that examines home-front activities, wartime participation, and investigates intimate relations among African American women and men in the context of the Second World War.