Heather Lyn MacDonald is the director of Toots Crackin Productions, a video production company based in New York City. 

Heather produced and directed the feature documentary Been Rich All My Life, as well as the Sundance Award-winning Ballot Measure 9.  Both documentaries are featured in detail on this website, and are available to stream or on DVD with bonus features.

Been Rich All My Life tells the story of a remarkable group of dancers earning standing ovations and "busting a move" 70 years after their chorus girl days at the Apollo Theater and the Cotton Club in Harlem.  Ballot Measure 9, a chilling portrait of the politics of intolerance, received jury and audience awards internationally — from the Sundance Film Festival to the Berlin International Film Festival. Often named as one of the best films of the year, it continues to be distributed in the educational and home video markets.

Other award-winning documentaries that Heather produced and directed include Kiev Blue and Kitchen Talk USSR, both intimate glimpses into the lives of Soviet citizens just prior to the collapse of the USSR. Each was broadcast nationally by PBS and distributed by Filmakers Library.  Kiev Blue, a portrait of gay life in Ukraine, was also used to aid those in that LGBTQ+ community seeking asylum in the USA.  I Am, a short film about personal values was used extensively by educators.  I Am had the honor of being chosen to tour the Soviet Union with the “Showcase of American Documentary in the USSR” (which planted the seeds for Heather's two USSR documentaries).  Gibbs Garden, about an artist battling AIDS at his easel, was distributed by AIDS groups and featured as part of art exhibitions.  Nuclear Navyport, New York City, MacDonald's fledgling work, was aired on PBS in New York and used as a tool for environmental advocacy groups.

Heather’s black & white photographic portraits been have exhibited in galleries in New York City. She has been a screenwriter, and was for many years an actor. She is a long-standing member of Actor’s Equity and SAG-AFTRA. 

Heather has received grants and awards from The New York State Council on the Arts, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rockefeller Foundation, Peter Jay Sharp Foundation, Ford Foundation, Harburg Foundation, JP Morgan Chase Foundation and Mary Duke Biddle Foundation. She was twice the recipient of a fellowship from the New York Foundation for the Arts.

Please visit Heather's photo portfolio pages herein, 
and also find information for our photo restoration services.