Political Animals

Political Animals presents an exciting portrait of two stories — the history of the legislation that paved the way for marriage equality, and the first four openly gay female legislators who championed the movement. Confronted with fear, indifference and homophobia, these four women stared hate in the face and emerged triumphant.

Date: Friday, February 10, 6PM
Location: Held Auditorium, 304 Barnard Hall
Q&A session to following screening with filmmakers Jonah Markowitz, Tracy Wares and  former Sentator Carole Migden

Filmmaker Bio:

Jonah Markowitz recently finished post-production on the forthcoming documentary film Political Animals. Previously, he was an artist in resident at the San Francisco Film Society, where he completed the screenplay for his next feature film Start At The End. Markowitz wrote and directed the critically acclaimed narrative feature film Shelter which was released theatrically by Regent Entertainment and was named “The Number 1 Gay Film of All Time” by AfterElton.com on their bi- annual poll. Shelter won the HBO Award for Outstanding First Feature, The Scion Director’s Award, as well as audience awards in New York, Vancouver, Sao Paulo, Melbourne and more. Previously, Markowitz wrote and directed two short films, I Left Me and Hung Up, which screened at over 40 festivals worldwide and were both programmed at The American Cinematheque in Los Angeles.

Markowitz also has a background in production design. His most recent film, The Diary of a Teenage Girl, premiered at Sundance 2015 and won the Grand Prix at Berlin. His credits also include the Sundance Jury and Audience Award winning Quinceañera, as well as Studio films such as We Are Marshall, The Help, and The House of Sand and Fog and the upcoming A Futile and Stupid Gesture.

Jonah graduated from the Film department at Emerson College and also studied art history in the Netherlands, as well as film theory and production at FAMU in The Czech Republic.

Tracy Wares has made documentaries on six continents including; Bomb It, about graffiti around the globe, which she shot and produced (Tribeca Film Festival 2007), was cinematographer for Gay Republicans (AFI’s Audience Award 2004), and co-produced Smokin’ Fish (PBS and IDFA 2011). Most recently, she’s directed and produced documentaries for VICE Media, including Politics of Food (2015) and Ovary Action (2016). Wares’ work has aired on ABC, PBS, Sundance, Nat Geo, Discovery, A&E Bio, CW, TNT, WeTv, Trio, TLC, and VICE online.