Originally from the island of Antigua in the West Indies, Melissa’s perspective as a documentary filmmaker has been greatly shaped by her experience of being a hearing child of deaf parents. Her parents’ deafness meant that she grew up in a unique world, where visuals had much more value than words. It is no surprise then, that her first feature-length documentary is a portrait of her parents, entitled Silent Music – a film that has turned into a five-year long labour of love.

Melissa’s professional background includes working for three years as a Producer and Production Manager with Cinqué Productions, her own independent production company in Antigua. During this time, she wrote and produced two seasons of EcoZone - a twelve-episode, forty-five-minute reality television series aimed at educating the public about pertinent environmental issues affecting the Caribbean region. Both seasons were broadcast throughout the Caribbean in 2005 and 2007 respectively.

In 2009, Melissa was commissioned by Artscape (Canada) to produce and direct a short documentary entitled Changing Course for its "Creative Spaces and Places" Video Spotlight Series. More recently, Melissa has worked as a researcher with award-winning director Emily James at Dartmouth Films in London, England, and as an Archival Researcher at Jigsaw Productions in New York. Here, she worked with Oscar award-winning director Alex Gibney on his most recent documentary feature, Client 9: The Rise and Fall of Eliot Spitzer, which has been short listed for an Oscar.

Melissa’s first documentary short, Share and Share Alike, has been shown in film festivals across North America, the Caribbean and Europe. It recently won the award for Best Film / Video Documentary Production at the 2010 Berlin International Black Cinema Festival in Germany, and was also nominated for Best Short Documentary at the 2010 Pan African Film Festival in Culver City, California.