appropriation

Paris Is Burning Screening Sparks Furor, Calls for Boycott

Rich Juzwiak · 05/14/15 12:51PM

Last week, arts organization BRIC announced a June 26 screening of the seminal 1990 documentary Paris Is Burning as part of its Celebrate Brooklyn! program. Invited to help present the screening was the movie’s director, Jennie Livingston, musician/artist JD Samson, who was to perform a DJ set, and exactly zero queer people of color or members of the ballroom community. That community of mostly black and Latin gay men and trans women who compete in pageant-like balls while voguing and wearing all kinds of drag provided the basis of Livingston’s doc and thrives today. It would have been extremely easy to reach out—I attended a PIB screening in November at a very tiny film festival (we watched it in a church!) and Milton Ninja (of the Legendary House of Ninja) spoke after the movie. These people are around and they’re still eager to share their experiences.