Nisha Balaram

Story Producer

Nisha Balaram is a documentary film director and producer based in the San Francisco Bay Area. 

She has worked on the producing teams of PBS VOCES: Latino Vote 2024 (2024), Voices Rising: The Music of Wakanda Forever (Disney+, 2023), Emmy-nominated El Equipo (PBS, 2023), and Stephen Curry: Underrated (Apple TV+, 2023). 

Balaram directs and develops content through her video production company, Mystery Squid Films. Recent clients include Google Arts & Culture, PBS, National Geographic Society, California Academy of the Sciences, Radio Free Asia, and the Center for Asian American Media.

She is deeply passionate about environmental justice and social equity and has reported on topics such as agroforestry in Panamá, zero waste cities in the Philippines, and the challenges of bioplastics. Her work in Panamá was featured on KALW’s One Planet episode and received the Alfred Hopkins Award for Reporting in Latin America.

Before her work in film, Balaram spent seven years in the racial justice and equity advocacy sector, contributing to legislative campaigns and key initiatives aimed at improving health equity and racial justice.