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DONNA

By Jay BEDWANI

LGBT - Completed 2022

Ecstatic lip synching in downtown bars is a far cry from Donna’s Baptist upbringing; now in her seventies, she reconnects with the siblings who have never even seen her in a dress. DONNA is an intimate look at San Francisco iconoclast, Donna Personna.

- Year of production
- 2022
- Genres
- LGBT, Documentary, First film
- Countries
- UNITED KINGDOM, FRANCE, USA
- Languages
- ENGLISH
- Duration
- 75 mn
- Director(s)
- Jay BEDWANI
- Writer(s)
- Jay BEDWANI
- Cast
- Donna PERSONNA
- Producer(s)
- Dewi GREGORY (Truth Department)
- Synopsis
- DONNA is the first documentary feature by award-winning filmmaker, Jay Bedwani. With DONNA, Bedwani returns to the subject of his 2013 Iris Prize-winning short film MY MOTHER, the San Francisco iconoclast, Donna Personna. The result is an intimate and candid portrait of an inspiring trans woman learning to live authentically as herself. Bedwani’s trademark style of quiet observation yields powerful and mesmerizing moments. DONNA is a film that shows the strength that can be drawn from your community and proves: it’s never too late to find your voice and truly blossom
  
  Donna Personna first puts on a dress aged 59, lip-synching in downtown bars and drifting ever further from her estranged Baptist siblings. In her seventies, Donna is offered an opportunity to co-write a play about an overlooked episode in San Francisco’s transgender past, the Compton’s Cafeteria Riot, during which transgender women Donna knew stood up against police harassment. The project profoundly affects Donna, especially as the 50th anniversary of the riots approaches and the call for activism and visibility mount. Finding her voice fills Donna with a new sense of herself. She draws strength from her new actor friends and determines to reconnect with her family, come what may. The resulting visit with her sister Gloria is a personal triumph that is as important to Donna as it is timely as Gloria died shortly after the completion of the film. DONNA is the first documentary feature by award-winning filmmaker, Jay Bedwani. With DONNA, Bedwani returns to the subject of his 2013 Iris Prize-winning short film MY MOTHER, the San Francisco iconoclast, Donna Personna. The result is an intimate and candid portrait of an inspiring trans woman learning to live authentically as herself. Bedwani’s trademark style of quiet observation yields powerful and mesmerizing moments. DONNA is a film that shows the strength that can be drawn from your community and proves: it’s never too late to find your voice and truly blossom.