Cast
Naomi Phoenix (as Jenny)
Naomi, a San Francisco native currently living in Sonoma County, started life in the footsteps of her parents, Henry and Jenny Sultan, as a prolific visual artist then switched to theater arts in her teens and 20s, attending Northwestern University and spending a number of years acting professionally. While through-hiking the Appalachian Trail she discovered her current vocation, being a connector and channel for money to flow to create positive change in the world. She’s since raised millions for the benefit of people and the planet, sung in a gospel choir, raised two fine boys, danced, and in the last few years returned to her roots as a visual artist. Naomi had a blast getting back to acting for this project, to honor the amazing artistic dream legacy of her mom, Jenny.
Naomi on LinkedIn
Crew
Hank Sultan (Producer)
Together for more than half a century, painters Hank and Jenny Sultan’s married life was filled with raising two children and supporting each other’s artistic journeys. In 2021, when Jenny was in hospice, Hank was overcome with a desire to make something of Jenny and his legacies. At 86 years old, Hank decided it was time to put The Sultan Family Trust to work to create a series of media properties. This includes the documentary short, Box of Dreams which chronicles a painting experiment Jenny created for her work at the Dream Institute in Berkeley. Hank’s first documentary short, I Never Was A Hippie, I Just Looked Like One, examines Hank’s self-portrait work throughout his life.
Hank is currently working with his son, Leon Sultan, and the designer HyunJu Chappell to create the book, Jenny Badger Sultan – Her Words and Her Images to be published in 2026 through Last Gasp Publishing. Hank’s first book, The Art of the Mandala, is also published through Last Gasp.
Kirk Goldberg (Producer/Writer/Director/Editor)
Kirk Goldberg has spent many years editing film and video while running his post-production business in San Francisco. These days, Kirk has also enjoyed getting back into producing and directing, often collaborating with Toshi Onuki on art direction and graphic design, Shingo Kohara on cinematography and Dave Nelson on sound and mixing.
Kirk met Hank Sultan while editing the feature-length award-winning documentary, The Creative High. Dianne Griffin, the film’s Producer, brought Kirk onto this project which led to working with the film’s Director, Adrianna Marchioni who was Hank’s close friend and neighbor. Adriana introduced Kirk to Hank and quickly led to Kirk's involvement in Hank’s self-portrait documentary short, Never Was A Hippie. After that, Hank convinced Kirk to start work on Jenny’s story, Box of Dreams. Kirk never had the chance to meet Jenny, but through her extensive journal entries, she made it possible for Kirk to tell her story and take his first major writing credit with Box of Dreams. 
Toshi Onuki (Art Director & Animator)
Toshi Onuki is a visual artist and art director based in Carmel Valley, California and Tokyo, Japan. He has worked on multiple Hollywood and music projects including names such as Disney and Neil Young. Toshi has extensive experience in video and film production as well as interactive media design experience on numerous platforms from small to large such as Web, Blu-ray, Mobile, Xbox, Android Wear, Apple Watch, and portable High-Resolution Music Players.
Shingo Kohara (Director of Photography)
Shingo Kohara is a San Francisco based cinematographer. Shingo was born in a rural part of Kumamoto, Japan and from a young age showed a passion for working with his hands and creating art which has inspired his career as a cinematographer. Shingo works with many local and international clients and is in high demand. His passion for creating continues in fabricating and modifying many of the tools he uses in cinematography.
Joan Jeanrenaud (Composer)
Joan is a cellist, composer, installation artist, and professor at Mills College in Oakland, California. The founding cellist of the Kronos Quartet, after two decades Joan left the group to pursue interests in improvisation, composition and installation art. Joan is President of Deconet Music and Deconet Records which manages publishing and distribution of her portfolio of music. She generously allowed us to use tracks from her Pop-Pop, Strange Toys and Visual Music albums to be used in this film.
Gary Barten (Composer)
Gary is a composer, musician, visual artist, college instructor, curator, and co-owner of Here Gallery in Santa Fe, New Mexico. His musical inspiration comes from the atmospheric landscapes of New Mexico. Gary has developed a technique in his music studio where he composes and performs on synthesizers, electronic percussion connected with MIDI, and adds melodic instruments such as electric mandolin, mandola, lap steel guitar, and hammered dulcimer. He calls the results of the special process he uses to compose music his Sound Paintings.
While colleagues at City College of San Francisco, Jenny and Gary worked together curating the college art gallery. He has always felt that Jenny and Hank’s friendship has been a gift and that their lifelong commitment to an art practice has truly been an exemplar.
Dave Nelson, MPSE (Sound Design and Re-Recording Mixer)
Dave Nelson is a pioneer of digital sound. In 1989, he began working with San Francisco software developers like Avid, Euphonix, and Dolby to integrate digital audio into film and music production. While he primarily works as a re-recording mixer, Dave has also mixed and produced several Grammy-nominated albums. His experience as a supervising sound editor and his creative thought process have made Dave a favorite among Bay Area filmmakers. You can find Dave most days at Outpost Studio SF and is the company he founded in 1996.
Advisors
Richard Russo MA(Advisor)
Richard Anthony Russo is an author, artist, and dream educator in Berkeley, California, and is currently Associate Director of the Dream Institute of Northern California and past president of the International Association for the Study of Dreams (IASD). His photographic work has been exhibited in galleries around the United States, including a piece in the 2022 show, Pictures of People, at the De Young Museum in San Francisco. Richard's publications include an anthology of dream articles and texts, Dreams Are Wiser Than Men, as well as numerous articles about dreaming. For more than a decade, he edited the journal DreamTime.
Richard met Jenny Sultan when she joined an ongoing dream group at the Dream Institute. They became colleagues and friends, and for two decades Jenny was a regular participant in a new approach to group dreamwork called Deep Dreaming, developed by Russo and Dream Institute founder Meredith Sabini. She was also an enthusiastic actor in a series of dream-inspired plays written and performed for the public at the Institute and other venues.
Delfina Piretti LMFT, REAT (Advisor)
Delfina has been wild about art and healing since forever. Walking a dual/non-dual path, she works as a licensed expressive-arts psychotherapist while maintaining a vibrant studio art practice at 1890 Bryant Street Studios in San Francisco. She holds a master’s degree in Transpersonal Clinical Psychology and has pursued extensive coursework in the visual arts.
As a visual artist, Delfina moves fluidly between painting, photography, and interactive installation. She taught expressive-arts therapy at the California Institute of Integral Studies for 10 years and co-created several prominent public art projects. Her work lives at the threshold of the poetic, the psychological, and the embodied spiritual.
Delfina had the privilege of meeting Jenny Sultan when Jenny participated in her Dream Repository art installation—an encounter that speaks to their shared language of images, intuition, and deep interior landscapes.
Chrystina Andrews LMFT (Advisor)
Chrystina is a Depth Psychologist and licensed Marriage and Family Therapist based in California, offering psychotherapy, clinical supervision, and professional consultation. She brings extensive experience supporting adults, children, and families as they navigate intense emotions and life-altering experiences.
Chrystina earned a Master’s degree in Depth Psychology at Pacifica Graduate Institute. Grounded in Analytic Psychology, Attachment Theory, Archetypal and Imaginal Studies, Somatic Inquiry, and Complexity Theory, she integrates practical tools for sustainable healing utilizing dreams, gestures, and active imagination as pathways to deeper understanding and transformation. She views imagination as a heart-centered faculty, an inner compass that expands awareness and nurtures compassion. Through this integrative lens, Chrystina supports clients in cultivating a life of meaning, connection, and joy.
Chrystina believes the Box of Dreams has the potential to be an educational tool for individuals and communities. It can foster dream tending and highlight the importance of imagination. By partnering with the film, she aims to showcase dream tending and living a life of purpose. This aligns with her desire to promote the use of imagination and meaning making on a larger scale through education and community workshops.