About

Out of Nowhere is an independent film and media production company committed to telling unexpected, intimate, and provocative stories that stir audiences and ignite conversation about the ways we live.

Founded by filmmakers and journalists Maisie Crow and Abbie Perrault, the creatives behind the forthcoming documentary Zurawski v Texas, the duo has previously collaborated on the 2021 feature documentary At The Ready that premiered at Sundance, and the 2016 Best Social Issue Documentary Emmy Award-winner Jackson.

Meet the Team

Maisie Crow | Co-Founder & Partner

Maisie Crow is a documentary filmmaker and photojournalist based in Texas. Her films have aired on HBO and Showtime. She is a director and producer of Zurawski v Texas.

 Her 2021 documentary At the Ready premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and can now be seen on MAX. In 2018, her documentary, Jackson, received a News and Documentary Emmy award for Outstanding Social Issue Documentary. The film won 15 film festival awards for best documentary and audience favorite.

 In 2022, she was part of This American Life’s reporting team on the Peabody-winning episode The Pink House at the Center of the World. Her short films The Last Clinic and A Life Alone were both nominated for News and Documentary Emmy awards. Her work has also been recognized by the Overseas Press Club, American Society of Magazine Editors, Pictures of the Year International and World Press Photo.

Maisie has taught photojournalism and video storytelling as an adjunct professor at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, CUNY Graduate School of Journalism and the Salt Institute for Documentary Studies.

 In 2019, Maisie and her husband took the helm of The Big Bend Sentinel and Presidio International newspapers in Far West Texas, building a community gathering space around the publications to help bolster readership and revenue.

Abbie Perrault | Co-Founder & Partner

Abbie Perrault is a documentary filmmaker and journalist based in Chicago, Illinois. She is a director and producer of the feature documentary Zurawski v Texas. Previously she produced At The Ready, which premiered in the U.S. Documentary Competition at Sundance Film Festival in 2021 and streams on MAX. She has associate produced the documentary shorts An Abortion in Mississippi and Reproductive Rights Road Trip for The Intercept and was the impact producer on the Emmy-award winning documentary Jackson, which premiered on Showtime in 2016.

Her previous work as managing editor of The Big Bend Sentinel and Presidio International newspapers in Marfa, Texas has been recognized by the Texas Press Association for general excellence and her reporting received awards for outstanding feature writing and outstanding news writing. 

Her film work has been supported by the IDA Enterprise Documentary Fund, The Gotham, Catapult Film Fund, Ford Foundation, XTR, and the Austin Film Society, and she was a 2019 fellow in New Orleans Film Society's Southern Producers Lab.