NYWIFT at DOC NYC: In Conversation with Producer Cheryl Staurulakis
NYWIFT member Cheryl Staurulakis recognizes the power of documentary film to change hearts, minds, and even governmental policies – and it’s what drives her as a producer. Her latest film, Phyllis Ellis’s feature documentary Category: Woman, is a perfect example of Staurulakis’s commitment to social impact filmmaking. The film takes a hard look into the racist and sexist policies in global sports and the devastating personal consequences they have inflicted on women athletes around the world. Staurulakis spoke to us about her 2022 DOC NYC screening, racial and gender discrimination in sports, and how she hopes to save the world one documentary at a time.
READ MORENYWIFT at Sundance: Spotlight on Paula Eiselt
An alarmingly disproportionate number of Black women are failed every year by the U.S. maternal health system – and it is a crisis that has been largely ignored thus far. In the Sundance 2022 documentary Aftershock, Directors Paula Eiselt and Tonya Lewis Lee follow the bereaved partners of two of these women as they fight for justice and build communities of support, bonding especially with other surviving Black fathers. The story is presented within the historical context of racism throughout the U.S. healthcare system, and the deadly tendency to ignore or minimize Black women’s pain and concerns.
NYWIFT Member Paula Eiselt spoke to us about how she and Lewis Lee approached this harrowing topic, and why community activists are the natural heroes of her creative work.
Crystal R. Emery: Exposing Racism in Healthcare as America’s Most Lethal Pandemic
What makes COVID-19 even deadlier? Racism in medicine. NYWIFT member Crystal R. Emery’s documentary The Deadliest Disease in America traces the history of racism in American health care from the brutal medical experimentation forced upon enslaved peoples to the modern-day inequity in fatality rates and access to treatment experienced by people of color during the pandemic.
READ MOREOpinion: Hank Azaria apologized for playing Apu on ‘The Simpsons.’ I accept.
"As an Indian American actress, for me the shadow of Apu loomed larger in my life than I realized." NYWIFT Member Mellini Kantayya offers her take on the controversial "Simpsons" character - and subsequent fallout - in an insightful op-ed published in The Washington Post.
READ MORETweet of the Week
Disagree. Hiding the rare women of color who star in a film, even for neutral reasons, deserves specific criticism. http://t.co/0SviANHihU — Linda Holmes (@nprmonkeysee) August 6, 2013 – @annelabarba //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
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