Chase Joynt: Last News

NewFest, the New York film and media organizations has announced the full lineup for its second annual NewFest Pride event – a summer film series returning this year from June 2-6 in a hybrid format featuring a mix of exclusive in-person premieres/panels and virtual screenings. The announcement was made today by NewFest’s Executive Director David Hatkoff and Director of Programming Nick McCarthy.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor Hot Docs, North America’s leading documentary festival, will open with the world premiere of “Parade: Queer Acts of Love & Resistance,” directed by Canadian filmmaker Noam Gonick. The documentary explores the pivotal moments that sparked Canada’s 2SLGBTQ+ movement.

EXCLUSIVE: Production companies Level Ground and Visitor Media are underway on verité doc See You Tomorrow, about musician and octogenarian Beverly Glenn-Copeland, who last week announced his dementia diagnosis as he set off for his final, multi-show tour.

Charna Flam The Academy of Motion Picture Art and Sciences has launched an Academy Originals podcast, “The Art of the Documentary.” The new podcast is hosted by Oscar-nominee and “Crip Camp” documentarian Jim LeBrecht. The six-episode season will include LeBrecht sitting down with documentary filmmakers, as they reveal to the host and the audience their filmmaking processes. “The Art of the Documentary,” will chronicle “how a filmmaker approaches their subject and how they engage with it,” according to the press release. The podcast will highlight how the various documentarians work to find new filmmaking approaches, all in an effort to tell their stories in innovative ways. LeBrecht and guests will discuss how they achieve special access and how far they’ll go to get their story — even if that means taking dangerous risks.

Rebecca Rubin Film and Media Reporter Sundance Institute, which hosts the annual film festival in Park City, Utah, has announced the six people who were selected for its Trans Possibilities Intensive. The fellows for 2023 are Seyi Adebanjo, Rajvi Desai, Malik Ever, Nick Janaye, Jamie John and Tee Park Jaehyung. The second edition of the Trans Possibilities Intensive, which is a three-day event to aid project and professional development for transgender storytellers of color, is taking place from March 27-29. Moi Santos, who founded the program, is leading the initiative with guidance from creative advisers and Sundance Institute’s Equity, Impact and Belonging Program. This year’s creative advisers include Sydney Freeland (“Drunktown’s Finest”), Aitch Alberto (“Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe”), Félix Endara (“Unseen”) and Chase Joynt (“Framing Agnes”). 

The Sundance Institute has named the six transgender storytellers of color set for the second edition of their project and professional development program, the Trans Possibilities Intensive. 2023’s cohort will include Seyi Adebanjo (Afromystic), Rajvi Desai (Mother Wit), Malik Ever (GutBucket), Nick Janaye (Dead Ringer), Jamie John (2Spirit Water Carrier) and Tee Park Jaehyung (Destiny in Sedona).

Matt Donnelly Senior Film Writer“Framing Agnes,” a hybrid narrative and documentary feature film that explores trans lives and history, has sold North American distribution rights to Kino Lorber.Directed by Chase Joynt, the film closely and accurately depicts the journey of trans people past and present through reenactments of transcripts from a notable 1960s UCLA gender study. Based on a short by Joynt which premiered and nabbed awards at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival, the project features a cast of trans performers and academics that includes Jules Gill-Peterson, Angelica Ross, Jen Richards, Zackary Drucker, Max Wolf Valerio, Silas Howard and Stephen Ira.The film will make its New York premiere at NewFest on June 5, followed by a theatrical release from Kino Lorber in December. Joynt and Morgan M.

Caer, an innovative and illuminating semi-documentary about trans Latin women in present-day New York, particularly those willingly employed as sex workers.On the flipside of that is Framing Agnes, the latest from director Chase Joynt, which is just now starting to hit the festival circuit after its recent Sundance debut.The film features an all-star cast including Angelica Ross (Pose), Jen Richards (Disclosure), Zackary Drucker (Transparent), and Silas Howard (Tales of the City), helping to shed light on a little-known slice of real-life and scientific research, specifically the story of a pioneering transgender woman who participated in gender health research at UCLA in the 1960s.Also on tap is a special retrospective screening of By Hook or By Crook, the landmark trans buddy film from 2001 directed by Harry Dodge and Silas Howard. All screenings will be offered with subtitles or captions to maximize accessibility.Streaming starts on Thursday, May 5.

EXCLUSIVE: Framing Agnes filmmaker Chase Joynt, his producing partner Samantha Curley and their production company, Level Ground Productions, have signed with WME for representation, on the heels of the  documentary’s world premiere at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival.